Joe Lansdale - Waltz of Shadows

The stock fit my shoulder comfortably. My view through the scope was good. I scanned a little from left to right. I leaned the rifle against the tree and pulled the. 38 out and opened it and saw that it was loaded with full metal jacket wadcutters. I put the. 38 back, and looked up and through a clutch of branches just as Virgil tooled his car up the horseshoe drive and stopped.

“Ball game’s started,” I told Arnold.

“Yeah,” Arnold said.

Virgil, Doc, and Poot got out of the car. Virgil went around front of the car and leaned against the hood. Poot sat at his feet. Doc kept looking around, as if trying to locate us.

“Doc’s gonna fuck it up, he don’t loosen up some,” Arnold said.

About that time I looked toward the mill, and Fat Boy was already walking toward them. He was wearing a bright lemon yellow leisure suit with a parrot green shirt. His hair shone in the sun like a metal cap. He was walking as if nails were in his shoes.

I lifted the Marlin to my shoulder and looked down the scope. I found Fat Boy’s head in the scope and put the crosshairs on him. One shot, and his brains would be all over the marshlands. God, Jesus. I thought about what he had done to Bill and me and Arnold, and finally Beverly. I flexed my fingers and put my forefinger on the trigger. I wondered about the gun’s pull. I wondered if I could still shoot. I wanted to shoot right then. I wanted never to shoot.

Where was Snakey Poo? Where were the two cops?

I moved my finger off the trigger, floated the scope over to take in Virgil. He looked friendly. His smile was as bright as Fat Boy’s jacket. He leaned against the hood of the car.

I moved the scope to Doc. He was running a hand through his sweaty hair. He kept looking in our direction, then toward the trunk of the car. His feet kept shifting.

“Easy, Doc, easy,” I said to myself.

“I think Doc’s gonna fuck it,” Arnold said. “I’m?aid. “ going ahead, fading left and around.” I took my eye from the scope and Arnold was already moving, at a stoop, swift and sure, heel toe, heel toe.

I heard Fat Boy’s voice over Poot’s wiring. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Virgil said.

“I understand Doc thinks you’ll like what we got,” Fat Boy said.

“Yeah,” Virgil said. “He showed me some. It’s good quality. You take the pictures?”

Pause.

“Sometimes… What the fuck you so shaky for?” Fat Boy said.

“Me?” Doc’s voice. “Nothing. I’m not shaky.”

“You act like you got a fuck’n ’lectric dildo up your ass,” Fat Boy said.

“I told him not to get out with the cold he’s got,” Virgil said. “Might even be the flu. But hey, he knew how bad I wanted this stuff. He gets sick, I’m gonna owe him.”

“Yeah,” Fat Boy said. “No offense, fella, but I gotta look you over, know what I mean?”

Virgil raised his arms and Fat Boy patted him down. He called the Doc over and did the same. Fat Boy said to Virgil, “Yeah, okay… You got money?”

“Money?” Virgil said, taking on the demeanor of a hick in checked pants, “I fucking wanted to, I got money enough to feed every starving nigger in Africa. But I don’t want to.”

Good move, I thought. Virgil was putting himself on Fat Boy’s level. Good thinking on your feet, Virg.

“Yeah, well, they can starve them shifters in India too, for all I care,” Fat Boy said.

“You won’t hear me play taps,” Virgil said. “Hey, these pictures, they ain’t a bunch of ’em of niggers are they?”

“We do a little nigger trade,” Fat Boy said, “but not because I like it. A nigger’s money, or money made on niggers, spends just like anyone else’s.”

“That’s okay,” Virgil said, “but I damn sure don’t want to see a naked nigger. I mean, you got something with a nigger girl that’s young enough and kinda white looking, I might take a peek at that, but I can’t see me puttin’ money out for it, taking it home. It’s all pink on the inside, but it’s the outside I got to look at.”

“I hear you,” Fat Boy said.

That’s the way, Virgil, you got him eating out of your hand. But where are the others?

As if to answer, Virgil said, “Those the two guys? The cops?”

I took my eye off the scope and looked toward the mill. Two big guys who looked as if they ate too much barbecue and white bread came out of the mill and started moving toward Fay Boy. That would be the cops. One of them yawned big and kept lumbering.

Fat Boy looked over his shoulder and waved at the cops. They waved back and kept?back and coming. Fat Boy returned his attention to Virgil, said, “Yeah, they were gonna be out here anyway, or I wouldn’t have bothered. Why a guy buying kiddie fuck would want cops around makes me wonder some. That’s funny.”

“Wasn’t a necessity,” Virgil said. “But you can understand how I might be a bit worried, doing something like this. Got some cops around here think it’s okay, gives me some security.”

“I’ll introduce you,” Fat Boy said. “You deal with me, you got nothing to fear from anybody. There ain’t a man-jack in this county whose dick ain’t hanging limp in my grinder. You about ready to take a little peek at the goods?”

“Sure,” Virgil said.

The wire’s sound went funny. I touched the headset and tried to adjust it, but it still crackled. I put my eye back to the scope and moved it around until I found Poot. Christ, the little bastard was scratching. Virgil’s voice came to me through a load of static. “Hey, boy, take it easy.”

“Stop it,” Doc yelled at the dog. “Stop it, goddamn it!”

The scratching stopped.

Fat Boy said, “Your dog?”

“Yeah,” Virgil said.

“You ought to have him dipped.”

“I’ll do that.”

A long pause.

“You are nervous, Doc,” Fat Boy said. “You boys wouldn’t be fucking me, would you? You don’t fuck Fat Boy, fellas. I’ll do the fucking, but I won’t take any I don’t want.”

“No. No.” Doc said. “I wouldn’t fuck you.”

“What’re you talking about?” Virgil said.

Doc had been standing at the front of the car, beside Virgil, but now he walked in front of him, trying to show Fat Boy how friendly he was by using exaggerated arm gestures and repeating over and over that he wouldn’t fuck him. The dumb bastard was panicking, and now he was between me and Fat Boy.

“What the fuck’s that?” Fat Boy asked.

“What’s what?” Virgil said.

“That,” Fat Boy said. “The mutt… That’s a wire… You fucks!”

I realized what had happened. Poot’s scratching had revealed his wire and Fat Boy had put it together. I could see Fat Boy’s shoulder, I could see him move, but Doc was backpedaling directly into my view, continuing to block my shot. I could tell Fat Boy was drawing his gun from under his coat. There was a pop and I saw Virgil go halfway up on the hood of the car and roll off and hit the ground on his side and not move. Poot darted across the pasture, running low, making for the woods.

The trunk popped up, and Price came out on my side, hitting the ground with one foot and throwing himself out of the trunk. He rolled across the ground and swung his. 45 up with both hands and fired from a prone position. The shot hit Fat Boy and spun him around like a b?ound likallet movement, spun him away from Doc, spun him so that he was facing me. The. 45 slug had punched Fat Boy on the high right side of his yellow jacket. The jacket bloomed a stain; it looked as if someone had hit him with a rotten tomato. Fat Boy stagger-stepped in my direction. I cross-haired him and put one in his face. Part of his jaw leaped away on a red wet wave. He spun again and hit the ground face first.

I lowered the rifle to take in a quick overview. I saw Arnold on the left, coming wide of the cops, almost directly behind them. The cops weren’t looking in his direction. They had their handguns drawn and were blazing at Price, who was barely visible. He had practically melted into the earth. Turf exploded all around him. I saw his leg jerk once as a slug skidded across the ground and burned into him. He lifted up the. 45 and snapped off a round, not hitting anything, then got tight with the dirt again.