James Sallis: Driven

Some bird had built its now abandoned nest on the outside ledge of the bedroom window, the nest spilling through a missing chunk of screen into the space between. A tiny fragment of freckled eggshell remained.

He’d been living on coffee, air, and nerves since yesterday morning, and he’d seen a diner two streets up, Billy’s or Bully’s, hard to tell from the sign, where the last time he’d been through, there’d been a Mexican restaurant.

Its historic smells had come forward with it to the new ownership. As though chile and cilantro and cumin were additional pigments in the wall’s blue paint. Judging by the row of counter seats, booths and gunnery windows to the kitchen, the place had in some earlier incarnation been a Big Boy’s or Denny’s. An old man with a fringe of dandelion white hair sat at the counter, looking as though he grew there. A waiter stood off at a safe distance, talking through the half-door into the kitchen. Young couple in the back corner booth by the emergency exit, both busily engaged with hand-held devices, iPods, cells, whatever.

Driver sat down-counter from the dandelion, who kept glancing his direction. The eggs were surprisingly good, the bacon thick-cut and rimed with the perfect amount of fat. Coffee fresh, though watery. When the cook peered through the window, Driver gave him a nod and held up his fork.

Someone had scratched the name Gabriel into the counter Formica, with the blade of a pocket knife held sideways from the look of it. Driver found himself wondering during what incarnation of the diner that had happened, about the person who had done the carving, and the story behind it-his name? A friend’s or loved one’s? Thinking, too, about how we all struggle to leave markers behind, signs that we were here, that we passed through. How imprints like this, and like the fanciful tags on walls and buildings and overpasses, were urban equivalents of cave paintings.

He paid up at the register, $7.28, and cut through the parking lot on the way back. Just past, he came across a block of homes, five in a row, that didn’t seem to belong here, so perfectly in order-windows clear, roofs free of debris, lawns freshly barbered, a quarter-inch gap at the edge of foundations, drives and walkways-that he wondered if the same compulsive person owned them or saw to their upkeep. Then, crossing the street, he was back in the real world, back among shambles and make-dos.

And taking note of the car parked across from his house, a sleek Buick sedan in a neighborhood of pickups and make-do’s, single occupant.

The other one would be out back, he figured.

Driver cut around to the wall bordering the alley. Enough stuff back here, piled up along the wall, to furnish five or six homes, parts of all of it gone missing: legs on the furniture, glass in the mirrors, cords and elements on appliances. The gate, he knew from his initial reconnaissance, was held by a chain, one he’d be able to reach through the gap but not without making noise. No problem, though, since the wall was just over six feet and through the gap he could see the other guy leaning against the side of the old garage, looking toward the house.

Driver was up, over and on him as a car passed slowly out front, momentarily taking the man’s attention. Manicured fingernails raked Driver’s arm, ruby or bloodstone ring like a fat jelly bean on one finger. A good choke hold doesn’t leave much wiggle room. It’s not just the breathing, you’re clamping the carotids too, shutting down blood flow to the brain. Work on kung fu movies, you spend hours hanging out with stars and stunt men while waiting to saddle up and drive. You learn things.

Without thinking-he was on some level now where thought and action were a single seamless thing-he slammed the man’s body against the side of the garage, got a drumlike thud, louder than he’d anticipated, then a series of reverberations. He slipped around behind, into the narrow channel between garage and wall.

It took all of three minutes for the other one to show. Came in carrying something in his left hand, gun, slapjack, taser. Spotted his partner and moved slowly toward him. Crouched low, Driver watched through the cracks between boards.

Left-handed then. And carrying about forty extra pounds.

Driver waited.

The man drew up close, looked around one last time. Struggled some on the squat, then dropped that left hand to the ground as he eased down.

The moment the man’s eyes shifted, Driver was there, stomping hard on his hand. Still wrapped around the gun handle, fingers cracked. But the man didn’t make a sound. He looked up with blank eyes, waiting to see how this was going to go.

Driver kicked him in the head.

Sirens sounded in the distance, over on McDowell or thereabouts, maybe coming this way, maybe not. Driver looked around. There hadn’t been enough noise to alert neighbors, but three or four two-storeys were within view, someone could have seen and called it in. He listened again for the sirens. Closer? Much as he wanted to talk to these two, to have a conversation as Felix would put it, he couldn’t take the chance.

He was up the alley and around the corner when two police cars swung onto San Jacinto.

“That’s your idea of laying low?”

“So I’m out of practice.”

Driver was on a throwaway. Felix was calling back from the message he’d left at the tattoo parlor on Camelback.

“One might surmise that hanging out by dumpsters isn’t going to make it.”

“Right. Somehow they got on to me again, and fast.”

“I don’t like it much, either. They found you, chances are good they know more about me than anyone should.”

“Just what I’m thinking, why I’m checking in.”

“You put four of their people down and they’re still on empty. Whatever jones they had for you at first, it’s got way stiffer now. What can I do?”

“I’ll need another place to stay.”

“Money?”

“That’s taken care of.” Old habits hadn’t completely passed with the old life. He had stashes of money, ID, bank cards.

“Might want to give Maurice a call.”

“Your guy who does false documents?”

“Not just documents. He does whole identities-birth certificate, military, degrees. But he’s just as good at erasing them. This juncture, more invisible would be wise.”

“You’re right.”

“Swing by The Ink Spot in an hour or two. Justin’ll have everything you need. Keys, clothes. Anything else you’re wanting, call me direct.” Felix gave him the number. “That one’s with me and always on.”

“Many thanks, my friend.”

“Nothing. Be cool-”

“-and care. Will do.” Driver hung up.

The second call was the one he dreaded, but he knew he had to make it. Mr. Jorgenson picked up on the seventh ring. Once hello was done, he said nothing further, not when Driver told him who was calling, not when he told him how sorry he was, not when he told him they wouldn’t be hearing from him again.

He and Elsa had always joked about how purely middle-America her parents were. “Toasted cheese!” one of them would say, then the other: “Sectional couch!” “Jello salad!” “Mashed potatoes!” “Lawrence Welk!”

When Driver stopped talking, there was silence on the line for a time.

“Mrs. Jorgenson and I knew from the first that we didn’t have the whole story, Paul. We knew that. But our girl loved you, and you loved her, and whatever we felt, about the strangeness that stood behind you where it couldn’t be seen, about all those things that didn’t quite add up-none of that came to matter much.”

Silence again before he said, “How terribly we will miss her, I can’t begin to tell you.”

Most anyone else, Driver thought, would be dispensing homilies now: she’s in a better place, she’s gone to her reward, her journey’s over. He could see where so much of Elsa had come from. Her spirit, the quiet at her center, her generosity.