Joe Lansdale - Waltz of Shadows

Price nodded at the plyboard, said, “Redecorating?”

“Golf ball.” Doc said. “I was putting a few along the room here, and one got out of hand. Bounced and went through.”

“Big golf ball,” Virgil said.

“Are you officers, too?” Doc asked me and Virgil.

“They’re not,” Price said. “They don’t have to be. They’re with me. Sit down over there and shut up, would you, Doc?”

“I don’t have to do any of this,” Doc said. “I got a lawyer.”

“Who doesn’t,” Virgil said.

“Just sit down before I rough you up,” Price said.

“I could have your job for that,” Dor that, oc said. “I got connections all over.”

Price slid across the room as if he were on a camera dolly. His fist shot into Doc’s stomach and Doc went to his knees. Price reached down and slapped Doc on the ear.

“Take a seat,” Price said. “We’ll discuss your connections later.”

Doc got up and sat on the couch, held a hand to his injured ear. Price said, “Little thing like your wife getting murdered hasn’t stopped your sex life, has it?”

“I haven’t made any secret of the fact I was cheating on my wife,” Doc said. “She wasn’t true to me either. We had a strained relationship.”

“Strain is off now, though, isn’t it?” Price said.

Doc’s answer arrived by banana boat. “I suppose you could look at it that way.”

“Can we look at it another way?” Price said. He pulled a chair from beneath the table and sat on it backwards, his arms resting on the backrest. “Can we look at the part about you having her killed? And please, don’t say, ‘what are you talking about?’ ”

“I have to say that,” Doc said. “I don’t know anything else to say.”

Price slipped out of the chair and took two fast steps to the couch, grabbed Doc by the front of the robe and jerked him up and kneed him in the nuts and sat him down on the couch. He slapped the Doc on the other ear. Doc grabbed his head with one hand and stuck the other between his legs. He fell sideways on the couch and made a noise.

“Don’t do that,” I said to Price, but I’m afraid I didn’t sound as if I really meant it. Price ignored me. This was his play: a deep well thought out plan. Beat the shit out of Doc.

Price got hold of Doc and pulled him to a sitting position on the couch. “Want to go for a broken nose?” Price said. “And don’t say ‘you can’t get away with this.’ I can get away with it. Want to test me?”

“No,” Doc said.

“Good,” Price said. “Here’s the exclusive. I got a guy working for me you probably know as Fat Boy. Aha, saw your eyes light up on that one. Fat Boy he’s got a guy working for him he calls Snake. They worked for you one night. Night this man’s nephew showed up with some other fools to put a scare in you. You weren’t here. Fat Boy was.

“You hired him to kill your wife, and he did, and he pinned the murder on the nephew. I don’t know your wife. Just her picture in the paper. Maybe you had a good reason to get rid of her. Maybe she had pussy stank like a dead fish. Maybe she was a dyke or had a dick on her. I don’t know. I don’t care. It’s not her murder I’m worried about. It’s Fat Boy’s dealings concerns me. Him working for me, and him doing what he did for you. This comes out, it makes me look bad. See how frank I am, Doc? I want you to be frank with me, now. I want you to admit you hired Fat Boy to do your wife in. I want some particulars.”

“I haven’t got a clue,” Doc started, and Price slapped him again, this time on the jaw.

“Talk to me,” Price said. height="0em"›

I went out into the hallway and closed the door.

The girl came out of the bedroom again. “Is everything okay?” she said.

“It’ll be all right,” I said. “They just argue like this sometimes. Go back to bed.”

She swallowed. “All right,” she said, and went back into the bedroom and closed the door. A moment later I heard the door lock.

The hall door behind me opened and Virgil came out. He said, “Come in here. Doc wants to chat.”

I went back inside. Price had helped himself to some brandy from the Doc’s liquor cabinet. He stood by the cabinet sipping the drink. He didn’t look as if he had exerted himself at all. His shirt wasn’t even wrinkled. Doc was on the couch. Blood was running out of his nose and the corners of his mouth and it had dripped onto his beautiful robe. No wearing it to church now. There was a lump above his right eye. He reached up with his right sleeve and wiped the blood away.

I felt very small and very ill.

Price held up the glass of brandy and said, “Anyone else want some? Doc? I bet you could use something.”

Neither Virgil nor I said anything. Doc said, “Yeah.”

“Brandy?” Price said, as if he were accustomed to bartending.

Doc nodded. Price set his glass aside and lightly poured Doc a brandy from a large decanter and brought it to him. Doc took the glass carefully, as if expecting Price to hit him with it.

Price smiled at him. Doc sucked the brandy down and gave the glass back to Price. “More,” Doc said.

Price said, “That’ll do you.” He went back to the liquor cabinet and set the glass next to the brandy decanter. He picked up his own glass and sipped. He said, “Now where were we?”

“I admit to what you say I did,” Doc said, “what’ll happen to me?”

“They’ll strap you to a gurney and stick a needle full of poison in your arm,” Price said. “Unless I set things different. I can do that. I would do that, provided I get the stuff to see Fat Boy and Snake go down.”

“You can do that?” Doc asked.

“I can do any goddamn thing except lick my own balls,” Price said.

“I’m going to talk,” Doc said. “I’ll need another drink. Something stronger. Switch me to Scotch.”

“All right,” Price said. He poured Doc two fingers of Scotch and gave it to him. Doc drank half of it and melted into the couch. “Our marriage was a sham,” Doc said. “Tara had a kind of mental cruelty you can’t dream of. She…”

“Hey,” Price said, “you’re breaking my heart here, but what I want’s the skinny on Fat Boy and Snake. Give me that and save the harp music.”

Doc sucked in a slug of Scotch and moved it around in his mouth. He swallowed. When he spoke, his words were as dry as an emery board, “All right. I hired Fat Boy and Snake to kill her.”

“How’d you set it up?” Price asked.

“An accident really,” Doc said. “You see I have a special interest in certain things. Things that bother some people.”

“We playing charades here?” Price said. “I’m tired of prodding. Talk like you know some English, or you and me, we’re gonna dance again.”

“I like them young,” Doc said.

“Like the big tittied heifer,” Price said, nodding toward the hallway.

“I like that,” Doc said. “But I like them even younger. I haven’t acted on that, mind you. I just like to think about it now and then. Thinking isn’t doing any harm, is it? Just thinking?”

Suddenly the child pornography angle Fat Boy had brought into all this clicked. “You like children,” I said.

“I like to look at them,” Doc said. “You know, naked. Well, a little more than naked, you know?”

“Yeah, I know,” I said.

“I just look at the pictures,” Doc said. “I mean, I haven’t touched any children. It’s just the fantasy, you see. Looking at the pictures and thinking about it. Where’s the harm in that?”

“Just connect the dots,” Price said. “It’s past my bedtime.”

“Guy I knew out of Houston who came to me now and then for a little work was my connection to Fat Boy,” Doc said. “His name was Jake. Into oil or something. He came to get some tightening around the eyes, mouth, that sort of thing. He used to do a little fishing around here now and then, and he got to thinking all the money he was spending on me made us buddies. I went fishing with him a few times, because he was talking about a breast implant job for his wife. I figured the money was good enough, and he could pay a little more than was needed, so I went along with him. Kind of a business investment.