Joe Lansdale - Waltz of Shadows

We went down and got in my truck and Bill gave me directions to Dave’s apartment.

· · ·

Dave’s apartment was in an expensive complex›

“There’s a watchman here,” Bill said. “He comes around now and then. We got to watch for him.”

“Now you tell us,” I said.

“Would it matter?” Arnold said.

“Well, it might,” I said. “Which room is it, Bill?”

Bill leaned forward. “You know, we didn’t come over here that much. Mostly we went to someone else’s place. I just sort of followed the others in when we did.”

“You saying you don’t know which room it is?” I said.

“No,” Bill said. “I’m saying I got to think a minute. We usually came up on the other side and walked around. It throws me a little from here, but…” He pointed. “See the lighted room? It’s the room to the left of it.”

“Great,” I said. “It has to be upstairs. We get caught up there, we haven’t got anywhere to go.”

“Don’t think so goddamn negative,” Arnold said.

“Here’s some gloves I brought for us.” I said. “Burglars need gloves.”

“I got my own,” Arnold said, and produced a pair from his coat pocket.

I gave Bill a pair and slipped my pair on.

“Hey,” Bill said, “these are Mickey Mouse gloves. These are kid’s gloves. They got the mouse right here on them.”

“Actually, they’re a pair Bev had,” I said. “So what?”

“How come you gave me the kid gloves, man? That tells me something, is what it does.”

“Beverly wears them,” I said. “She likes them.”

“You wear ’em,” Bill said.

“They don’t fit me. You got little hands.”

“Gimme that pair you had for Arnold.”

“They’re too big.”

“Give ’em here.”

I gave them to him and he slipped them on. The fingers flapped loosely on his hands, “Shit,” Bill said. “I can’t do nothing in these. Give me back the goddamn mouse gloves.”

He put them on. Perfect fit.

“This is good,” Bill said. “I get caught, I got on a pair of mouse gloves. Maybe you shoulda brought me one of the hats with the ears on it.”

“You’re up for multiple murder, and you’re worried about Mickey Mouse gloves?” Arnold said.

I pulledlef“You’ out and went around the block. I cruised into a church parking lot over by where it connected with a fenced yard. There was a huge oak in the yard and its limbs stuck out over the fence. I parked under the limbs and they draped shadows like black confetti over the truck. It was kind of pleasant. Maybe I was sleeping. I hoped so. I wanted to wake up in my own bed and see if Bev wanted to play poke the pumpkin again.

When I got out of the truck and the cold hit me, I knew I wasn’t dreaming.

We walked over to the sidewalk and turned right.

“Shouldn’t we be sneaking around or something?” Bill asked.

“That’s just what we don’t want to do,” Arnold said. “Someone comes along now, we’re just out walking and talking. We creep around through someone’s yard and get caught, you got to have a lot better lie handy.”

Dogs barked at us as we went by the front yard of the house with the fence, but the barks weren’t serious, just professional.

We turned right and went up to the edge of the apartment complex and stood behind a row of shrubs and looked around and tried to spot the night watchman. We didn’t see him.

“What we do,” Arnold said, “is we go up quick and get it over with.”

“Okay, Houdini,” I said. “How we getting in?”

“Don’t worry,” Arnold said, unbuttoning his coat and reaching inside and pulling out a small crowbar. “I got a key.”

We darted up the stairs and eased along the landing till we came to the apartment. Arnold brought the crowbar out, jammed it quickly and almost silently into a spot above the lock. He tensed his broad back and jerked. There was sharp, but not too loud crack of wood and a spring of lock, then the door was open and we were inside.

Arnold pushed the door gently into place, so that unless someone was really looking, the break wouldn’t be noticed.

“Flashlight,” Arnold said softly.

“Who you talking to?” Bill asked.

“Whichever of you dumb assholes has the light,” Arnold said.

“No one told me to bring a light,” Billy said.

“Shit,” Arnold said, then whispered to me. “You haven’t got a light neither?”

“I thought you had the light,” I said.

“It’s all right,” Bill said. “I got a lighter and some matches.”

“I don’t want a smoke,” Arnold said. “I want a flashlight.”

“Couldn’t we just turn on the light?” I asked.

“Not in this room,” Arnold said. “Not near the front windows. We don’t want to draw any attention to this apartment. Christ, some fucking burglars you are.”

“Actually, I only do this part time,” pa1em" I said.

Bill popped his lighter. The orange flame danced over the furniture and brushed up and down the walls. Bill said: “Place looks different in this kind of light. I don’t remember it so good. The video stuff’s in the bedroom… over there.”

We followed Bill and the light. Bill opened the bedroom door and stuck the lighter inside. He stopped and pulled the light out and closed the door carefully. “Oh fuck,” he said.

“What’s ‘oh fuck?’ ” I said. “Don’t give me ‘oh fuck’ and quit.”

Arnold took the lighter away from Bill and popped up the flame and pushed the bedroom door open silently and held the light in there. I looked past his shoulder. I could see a man lying in bed with his arm over a woman’s naked belly. Her breasts were bare and they rose above his arm like mountains beyond a plateau. The covers were draped loosely over their legs. The man stirred slightly.

Arnold lightly closed the door.

We tiptoed to the center of the living room. Arnold held the lighter toward Bill, reached out with his free hand, grabbed him by the coat and pulled him close. In the glow of the lighter Arnold’s teeth were the color of carrots. He said, “This ain’t it? This ain’t the apartment, is it?”

“I thought this was it,” Bill said. “I’d have sworn it was.”

“I knew this would happen,” I said. “I knew it.”

“It has to be the door on the other side of the lighted room,” Bill said. “We always came the other way. I got turned around.”

“I’ll turn you around,” Arnold said.

“Forget it,” I said. “Let’s go.”

We moved toward the door. Arnold started to open it, but we heard steps coming along the walk. Arnold killed the lighter. I went to the window, eased back the curtain for a peek.

It was the night watchman, an in-uniform off-duty cop. He stretched and leaned a hip into the railing just outside of the apartment and got a pack of cigarettes. He shook one loose and studied the moon while he put it in his mouth, routed it from one side to the other with his tongue. He positioned his gun holster where it was more comfortable without looking away from the sky. He patted his coat pockets and found a lighter and popped it and lit his coffin nail and puffed.

I dropped the curtain and eased back to Bill and Arnold.

“It’s the night watchman,” I whispered. “An off-duty cop picking up some bucks.”

“Oh hell,” Arnold said. “He sees that door’s been jimmied, we’re fucked.”

“Let’s just be quiet and let him finish his cigarette,” I said. “Maybe he won’t notice the door.”

I went back to the curtain, lifted a corner and looked out. The cop had changed positions slightly and wasn’t studying the sky anymore. He was smoking and looking in the direction of our door. He had a blank look on his face, a man with his thoughts turned oug. The coinwards. For all I knew, he might have been on the verge of redefining relativity, but if he focused just right, he was going to see where the wood had been splintered in the door jamb.