Matt Lennox - The Carpenter

The bearded man nodded.

— For the most part we’re a family business. And to be honest with you, we’re a little slow-going right now. But I’d be happy to put your information into our files.

With some reluctance Lee withdrew his hand from the table.

— You got the time by any chance?

The bearded man had a silver timepiece on his belt. He brought it out. With his timepiece and his beard he was like something out of the olden days: It’s two o’clock, said the man.

— Two o’clock. Well, I’ve got some things to do.

What he had to do was meet Wade Larkin at three o’clock. After the barge accident and the Ministry of Labour inquest, Larkin said he wanted to meet with Lee more frequently, once every three weeks or so, especially since Lee was out of work. They were set to meet, today, in the same spare municipal office where they’d always met, and this appointment would be the last Larkin would see him before Christmas. Not that the meetings ever amounted to much. Larkin couldn’t do anything to get Lee a job, or get Irene into her own room at the hospital. He would just ask his questions and nod and make notes in his notebook, and confirm, as always, that Lee had Larkin’s business card in case of any trouble. At least today Lee would be able to tell him that he’d tried to get a job.

Lee went to the front door of the furniture store. He paused, looked back over his shoulder at the table: I do think that piece is a beauty.

— Thank you, said the grey-bearded man. Happy holidays.

Lee went back onto the street. He bought a pack of cigarettes and some lottery tickets from the pharmacy. He wanted to buy some booze, as well, before the liquor store closed. He had just enough time, perhaps, to pick up a bottle of rye, walk home and stash it, and arrive at the meeting with his parole officer empty-handed.

That night Speedy was on the drums at the North Star. The band he was playing with was driving through Rolling Stones covers. People whirled. Garish coloured lights beamed through the smoke.

Lee and Helen had had a few drinks, and he was feeling good. Helen said she’d had no idea he could be so goddamn fun. Lee had seen Maurice over near the bar, eyeing the dance floor. Maurice nodded to him. In a booth, Helen sat across from him with her chin propped on her hand, smiling. She’d worn a chambray shirt unbuttoned low enough to show the deep crease between her breasts. She had her foot up between Lee’s thighs.

In the adjacent booth sat Gilmore and Arlene. Gilmore leaned over the plywood divider and clapped Lee on the shoulder and asked if they were enjoying themselves. Lee said they were. It was Speedy who’d gotten them out here. Lee had had some drinks with Speedy a few nights earlier and he’d told Lee a band he jammed with was going to be at the roadhouse-would Lee and his lady friend come for some rock ‘n’ roll? Lee was feeling now like a big man.

Gilmore dropped back into his own booth.

— I didn’t know you had friends out here, called Helen.

— I’ve got a few.

She gave his thigh a friendly dig. He looked into the crowd and saw strangers moving to the music.

The band took a break and Lee got up to go to the men’s room. He studied the graffiti over the urinal. Someone had written Sally D Is A Cocksucker. There were black hairs on the drainplate.

He came out. Gilmore was waiting in the passageway, leaning on the brickwork with one hand in his pocket.

— Looks like you’re having a good time, said Gilmore.

— We’re having a good time, yeah.

— What would you say to going for a ride?

— You want to go for a ride someplace?

— Have a smoke.

Gilmore took out his Camel cigarettes and offered one to Lee.

— I told you before, said Lee.

— I know you did. It’s just a ride is all it is.

— Where is it you want to go?

— I have a business associate I’d like to visit. All you’re along for is just another pair of eyes and ears, that’s all. Lee took a long drag: Eyes and ears, said Lee.

— In business there’s a matter of appearances.

— You keep using that word, business. Gilmore laughed: Yes, I do.

He had a fifty-dollar bill folded between two fingers. He tucked it into Lee’s breast pocket. He said: On good faith, Lee. It was a hell of a bad accident you were in a few weeks ago. A raw deal for a dependable guy. I want to see better things come your way.

— What about my lady friend?

— Come.

Gilmore showed Lee to the booth where he’d been sitting. Helen was in the booth with Arlene. They were laughing. Arlene looked up when she saw Gilmore.

— You keep Lee’s lady friend company, said Gilmore. You hear me?

— Yes, daddy.

— You’re going somewheres? said Helen.

Lee looked at the tabletop. Helen reached her arm behind him and patted his butt.

— Well, go on, Brown Eyes. Just give me a bit of money, will you?

He gave her a few dollars. He and Gilmore walked out shoulder to shoulder like old comrades. Out in the parking lot, Maurice was waiting at his Caballero.

— You were pretty sure, said Lee, quietly.

— Pretty sure about what, pal?

— That I’d come with you.

Gilmore just smiled.

They drove all the way back to town, to a row of frame houses along the rail line. The house they parked in front of had paint peeling from its siding. No sooner had the car come to a stop than two barking Rottweilers materialized behind a chain-link fence penning in the backyard.

A door opened on the crooked porch and the shape of a man shouted at the dogs. He came out and stood on the porch and looked at the car.

— Come on, Lee, said Gilmore.

Maurice did not get out of the car. Lee felt uneasy. During the drive into town it had occurred to him that maybe this was some affair of old blood, though he couldn’t think of who or what, but maybe this was a house he would go into and not depart from.

The man on the porch was wearing unfastened work boots and a T-shirt, despite the cold. He was short but he looked like he pumped a lot of iron. He merely nodded when they came up. The dogs behind the fence seemed half berserk. Gilmore and Lee were led into a kitchen. The room was crammed with junk on the counters, engine parts, a twelve-ton jack. Through an opening, they could see into a living room where coloured Christmas lights were strung around a shuttered window. A young child was parked on the living room floor, watching a movie on a black-and-white cabinet TV.

The man closed the door to the porch. Turned the deadbolt.

Gilmore sat down at the kitchen table. He pushed aside a telephone from which a snarl of wires had been partially eviscerated.

A woman in a wheelchair rolled through the opening into the kitchen. She was thick-bodied, with grey hair in braids. Her legs were gone below the knees. She pulled up to the table. The man in the T-shirt leaned against the wall behind her. He glanced back into the living room, perhaps to check on the child.

— Gilmore, said the woman.

— Happy holidays, Jean.

— You got a new friend.

Gilmore looked back over his shoulder at Lee, smiling: Where are my manners? This is a good friend of mine. Say hello, Lee.

Lee nodded to the woman. She looked him up and down. There was something shrewd about her, calculating.

— You might think we came because of the Christmas season, said Gilmore. Friends calling on each other to spread cheer and all that.

The woman chuckled: The way you talk, Colin, I almost got the idea you think I’m just some young hussy.

— Jean, I wouldn’t think that of you for one second. Not one second.

Gilmore brought out a thick sheaf of money held together with a wire clasp. Lee saw twenties. There might be a thousand dollars in there. Gilmore held the money out to Jean and she took it and counted it.