Elmore Leonard: The Big Bounce

“Like he know what we found,” Billy Ruiz said.

“Sure,” Pizarro said. “He got a nose for it.”

Ryan spread open his canvas suit-pack on his cot. He put on a clean shirt and stuffed everything else he owned into the bag.

“He think he’s leaving,” Pizarro said. “We better tell him what we found.”

“THERE IT IS,” Billy Ruiz said. “It’s brown, you can’t see it much in the trees.”

“I see it,” Ryan said.

“The people with the sailboat? They’re from the house. And the ones making the fire, I think.”

“How many would you say?”

“I don’t know. Twenty cars. Frank say they must have start coming before noon.”

“I like it so far,” Ryan said. He was smoking a cigar, a thin one that was now half smoked. He looked all right with it because he was at ease; his jaw clamped it lightly and he didn’t fool with it or keep blowing out smoke.

They were walking along the shoreline where the water would wash in and leave a strip of sand wet and smooth. They walked barefoot with their pants rolled to their knees and sneakers in their back pockets; they wore sunglasses and peaked fishing caps and walked along taking their time, taking it easy, two guys from one of the cottages or the public beach out getting a little exercise, looking around at the boats and the people on the beach, looking at the cottages that were up on the slope, back a good two hundred feet from the water. By now most of the swimmers and sunbathers had gone in, though there were children still playing and digging in the sand and a few people walking along the shore.

“How would you like some of that?” Billy Ruiz said. “The red two-piece.”

“Maybe in a couple of years,” Ryan said.

“Man, young and tender.”

“There’s one.”

The girl was coming down from a beach-front store. She wore sunglasses and a white sweatshirt that reached to her tan thighs and covered her bathing suit.

“You can’t see what she’s got,” Billy Ruiz said.

“She moves nice.”

“Now you can see the house good,” Billy Ruiz said.

The house was a brown-shingled, two-story house that seemed as old and permanent as the pines closing in on it. A square of white interrupted the dim look of the house, a sign, a canvas banner strung between two of the porch posts. It became a sign as they drew nearer the house.

ANNUAL ALPHA CHI ALUMNI OUTING-red letters on the white field. There were a few people on the porch, but most of the alumni and their wives seemed to be on the beach; in a gypsy camp of lounge chairs and beach towels or in small groups standing by the beached sailboat and around the cookfire they were building, each one holding, elbow at his side, a paper cup or a bottle of beer.

“I like it,” Ryan said. He squinted toward the house, chewing a little on the end of the cigar.

“We better cut up, uh, before we get there?”

“No, we’ll walk past. Then up through the trees.”

“I wouldn’t mind another beer.”

“Just take it easy.”

They approached the group by the sailboat. Billy Ruiz started to walk out into the water to go around them, but Ryan touched his arm and he followed Ryan past them on the beach side, Ryan pausing to look at the fiberglass catamaran hulls of the boat and Billy Ruiz thinking, God, he’s going to talk to them. When they were beyond the people, Ruiz said, “You want them to see you?”

“I never saw a boat like that,” Ryan said. “You see it? Like two hulls.”

“Man, why don’t you ask them for a ride?”

Ryan grinned with the cigar in his mouth, glancing back at the house. “Come on, this is far enough.” And now they crossed the beach, climbing the rise to a deserted stretch of frontage that was overgrown with brush and young pines. They stopped to put on their shoes, then made their way through the trees to the private drive behind the cottages. They could hear cars passing on the highway, the Shore Road off beyond a stand of trees, but they couldn’t see the cars from here. The private drive was good and private: no cars except for the ones parked near the brown house, parked in the yard and on both sides of the road and in front of the sign nailed to a tree. YOU’RE HERE! the sign said, and something smaller beneath the two words.

“A nice turnout,” Ryan said. “A nice active group.”

Billy Ruiz was looking up the drive toward the cars. “That goddamn Pizarro,” he said.

Ryan felt a little tight feeling in his stomach, but it was natural and there wasn’t anything you could do about it; he stood at ease with his hands in his pockets and watched Billy Ruiz: Ruiz squinting and frowning, his bony shoulders hunched, walking a few steps and turning, kicking a stone, pulling a cigarette out of his shirt pocket now, and taking three matches to light it.

It was about a quarter after four. If he had left the camp by one, he would be in Detroit now. But Pizarro and Billy Ruiz had talked him out of it. They had stopped in a place about noon for cigarettes and all these guys were in the store buying cases of beer and ice and all kinds of mixes. Pizarro and Billy Ruiz had followed them to the house on the beach and there it was, man, waiting for them, just like they had talked about it over the wine and tequila all those Saturday nights. Man, he couldn’t go home now. Later, maybe. Now he had to at least look at it. So they had picked up a case of cold beer and had driven past the place, out to the state park, where they drank three beers each and talked about it, Ryan wanting Pizarro to go in the house with him but Pizarro insisting that he drive the truck because it was his truck. (“You can drive after,” Ryan had said. But Pizarro had said no, “I drive it all the time. Nobody else.” “Frank,” Ryan had said, “if Billy dents the son of a bitch, we’ll pay you for it.” No, Pizarro wasn’t having any of that. “I drive,” he had said, “nobody else.”) All right, Ryan had thought. No arguing. It would have been good to let him have one in the mouth and wake him up, but the better thing was to get it over with and get out. So he and Billy Ruiz had taken off down the beach.

“He’ll be here,” Ryan said now.

“He don’t know we’re going to take so long.”

“Then, what’re you blaming him for?” As he said it they heard a car door slam and saw the car backing out of the yard behind the brown house. It moved off in the other direction.

Billy Ruiz stood rigid. “Where is he going?”

“He’s going to get some mustard,” Ryan said. “They brought the charcoal and the hamburger and the paper plates, but his wife forgot the mustard.”

He was watching the car and saw it edge close to the side of the road as Pizarro’s panel truck, coming this way, squeezed past. “Here comes a friend of ours,” Ryan said. He heard Billy Ruiz let his breath out in a sigh of cigarette smoke and both of them stood waiting for the truck.

“You were supposed to be here,” Pizarro said. “I come by before, you’re not here.”

“It took longer than we thought,” Ryan said. “All right?” The first and last time, he was thinking, and said to Pizarro, “You wait here. If somebody comes, you still wait here.”

“What if it’s cops?”

“What if we forget the whole thing?”

“Listen, I want to be sure. That’s all.”

“Who’s sure?” Ryan said. He went to the back of the truck and brought out the beer case. The full bottles and empties had been taken out. He glanced at Billy Ruiz and the two of them walked away from the truck toward the brown house, Ryan still with the little stub of cigar in his mouth.

“What if somebody’s watching?” Billy Ruiz asked.

Never again, Ryan thought. He said, “Billy, what are we doing? We’re delivering beer.”