David Wiltse - Prayer for the Dead

Christ, he felt mean. At least the old life had offered some compensations; he’d been able to let off some steam now and then. Profit wasn’t the only motive for burglarizing the bastards. It did the rich fucks good to have someone trash their houses. Let them know how the other half lives in shit most of the time. It taught the men humility to feel their teeth crack. All those perfect teeth, ah those smiles they bought from the braces man. Let them go out and buy some more. They could afford it, and it did Eric a world of good to paste one of them now and then. Sometimes he would wrap his hands before going out on a job, just like a boxer. A good stiff wrapping with elastic, a pair of work gloves to protect the skin, a roll of nickels clenched in the fist-oh, it did their humility a lot of good. Plus it made Eric feel terrific. He was doing a service for them and himself Now that was his definition of a good deed.

Landscaping, on the other hand, not only didn’t offer any compensations but it didn’t pay worth a damn, either. Here it was Wednesday and he was out of money again. He would have to go to the bank again if he wanted to eat or drink tonight. And he sure as hell wanted to drink. The only good thing to be said about landscaping was that it kept him out of jail. At least he no longer had the cops rousting him out of bed every time somebody lost a VCR. In Shereford there just weren’t any junkies to blame, so all the thefts got pinned on him. And Eric hadn’t stuck a needle in his vein in his whole life. He hated needles. Stick one in himself? He’d have to be crazy. He’d smoked some, popped a pill or two, but nothing serious. Nothing to put him in the same league with the hard-core addicts you had to live with in jail. He didn’t belong there. He might not belong in landscaping, either, but he belonged in jail even less. Which was the only good reason he could think of not to grab the first son of a bitch who looked at him cross-eyed and do a number on his head.

On a whim, Eric decided not to go to his regular bank but to drive to Guileford instead. It would be dark when he got there and there was an automatic teller machine at the train station where the light didn’t work. Or could be made not to work. He wasn’t promising himself anything, but if everything worked out just right, if some wimp decided to get some money and it was between trains and no one was around and Eric felt froggish, well, he just might jump. He didn’t have to, that was the beauty of it. He would just see how things worked out and how he felt. And if nobody showed, he could always just draw twenty-five out of his own account and go back to Shereford and hassle the waitress at the Peacock Lounge. “Lounge,” he liked that, the place was a saloon-hassle the middle-aged bitch until the bartender was forced to try to make him stop. Now that he wanted to see. That might be even better than whipping ass at the Guileford station. He didn’t see how he could lose.

Not once in the thirty-five-minute drive to Guileford did Eric look in his rearview mirror. He hadn’t done anything yet; there was no reason to worry about cops who, as far as he knew, hadn’t gotten around to reading minds yet, and so there was no reason to notice the gray Toyota that followed him all the way to the train station.

Eric drove past the automatic teller machine and turned the corner, parking in front of the office supplies company so that his car was not visible from the machine. That way all he had to do was saunter around the corner, get in the wagon and drive off without worrying whether the victim-if there was a victim, he still had not decided-could identify his car.

A woman was walking away from the teller machine as Eric rounded the corner, putting money in her purse. Let her go, too far away. Eric was not about to chase anybody down the street. What he wanted was a nice, plump businessman, somebody with enough meat that he wouldn’t fall at the first blow. Eric liked it when they stood there, not quite believing him, not even having enough sense to cover up so that he could get in three or four good licks before they really understood what was happening. And men would not scream right away, the way women did. Most of them had just enough ego to convince themselves it was some sort of contest-see how many punches you can take before you fall. None of them took very many.

The street was empty when the woman left. A car drove slowly by and Eric waited until it turned the corner before crossing to the machine. He decided to give it a few minutes. It was a whim, after all, not a job. He could take it or leave it.

The machine was mounted on a concrete wall that had been installed just to house it. On the other side of the wall, between the concrete and the depot, was a small recess, out of sight and in the dark. Stepping into the recess, Eric glanced at his watch before pulling his work gloves up snugly on either hand. Ten minutes, that’s all he would wait, ten minutes, fifteen tops. He was already getting thirsty.

The situation was ideal. Dyce pulled his car into the spot just to the left of the station wagon. He leaned across the seat and opened the passenger door to check. It opened and came to a rest against the driver’s door on the wagon. Dyce had removed the fuses for the overhead light and the door buzzer so he could work in silence and darkness. Perfect.

Removing the plastic cap from the syringe needle, Dyce pressed the plunger until a drop of liquid oozed from the tip. Perfect. He kept the syringe in his right hand, resting out of sight on the seat.

The station was empty. There were no trains due for another forty-five minutes. There was a light on in the office supply shop, but not enough to illuminate Dyce clearly to any passerby. Anyone passing in a car would see only the back of his head, if they even bothered to look. Perfect.

Dyce put Schubert’s Trout Quintet on the tape machine and turned the volume down low. He turned slightly to one side so he could see Eric coming around the corner and have at least thirty seconds to go into action. Perfect.

He settled in to wait. Schubert was beautiful. Dyce felt certain he and the composer would have understood one another.

Fifteen minutes stretched to twenty, and Eric finally said fuck it. The place was a goddamned morgue. Two cars had passed and that was it. He didn’t need this shit, and he was thirsty and hungry and had to piss. He started to pee in the recess, then decided to do it on the teller machine, just to let them all know what he thought of them. He peed a long time and actually managed to hit the face of the machine. Then, walking back to his car, he remembered that he had forgotten to withdraw some money for himself. He had to stand in his own puddle, cursing, to get the twenty-five dollars.

When he reached his wagon he was madder than when he cut his knee with the sickle, and now here was some dumb son of a bitch with his car door open so Eric couldn’t get into his truck. The whole street to park on and he had to squeeze next to his wagon.

“I’m sorry,” Dyce said, leaning across the seat to the passenger door. “Sir? Sir? I’m sorry, but I can’t get my car started. Could you help me, please?”

Eric leaned down and looked at the man stretched across the seat and decided against ripping the jerk’s door off and handing it to him. Heaven works in marvelous ways its wonders to perform, he thought.

“Happy to help,” said Eric. He smiled broadly.

“Oh, thank you, that’s most kind. If you could just hold this flap up so I could get to the wire.”

“What flap is that?” Eric tugged his work gloves on tightly. He hadn’t had time to wrap his knuckles, but this would do very nicely.

“Under the dashboard here. You can reach it if you get in the car. It won’t take a minute.”