Joe Lansdale - Cold in July

Ann looked down at the man she hit with the car. “Did you see him fly through the air?”

“With the greatest of ease,” Russel said.

Jim Bob took the keys from Ann and went around and opened the trunk and put the shovels and the tools in it. He slid back a part of the trunk bottom, reached inside and took out a double-barreled, sawed-off shotgun.

“You’re not gonna finish them, are you?” I asked.

He laughed at me, walked over to one of the pickups and shot the front tires out. He broke open the stock of the shotgun, rolled out two more shells, reloaded, went over to the other truck and did the same.

Turning toward the graveyard, he yelled out to the guys, “They were damn near bald anyway.”

He put the shotgun back in the trunk and we got in the Red Bitch and Jim Bob put the pedal to the metal and we were gone.

· · ·

When we got back to the Holiday Inn we went up to Jim Bob’s room. He took off his shirt, which had been torn somehow in the fight, and started to put on another. Ann said, “Is that a chicken tattooed on your chest?”

“Chicken?” Jim Bob said. “It’s an eagle.”

“It looks like a chicken,” Ann said.

We all leaned forward. It did look like a chicken.

Russel said, “I’ve always thought it looked like a chicken.”

“I was drunk when it was done, but I didn’t ask for no chicken. It’s just faded some is all.”

“It wasn’t faded when I first saw it,” Russel said, “and I thought it looked like a chicken then.”

“To hell with the chicken,” I said. “Price set us up tonight. The description that guy gave was Price. He went in and hired those men to beat us. I just don’t know how he knew we were at the cemetery.”

“He didn’t,” Jim Bob said, snapping the snaps on his shirt. “But he thought it was a good possibility. He’s trying to discourage us. It’s just.

“And how are we going to do that?” I asked.

“For the time being, leave that up to me.”

“So what do we do?” Ann asked.

“You and Dane go home and do what you always do. Normal business. Go to work. Go home. Go to work. Regular shit. And Dane, I’d like you to hire Russel to work at your place. Ben said you owned a, what is it?”

“Frame shop,” I said.

“Yeah, you put him to work so he isn’t a vagrant, and I’ll put him up here at the Inn. Just pay him a token salary and count it out of what you owe me. Keep it cheap, though.”

“I’m not sure I like this,” I said.

“I’m not wild for it either,” Russel said.

“We gonna get this done,” Jim Bob said, “we’re gonna do it my way, or you two can do it yourselves or just forget it. I’m curious and I want to do this for Ben, but I’m gonna call the shots or it ain’t gonna happen. It’s not like I’m making ally big fortune off this.”

“I’m paying you,” I said.

“It ain’t my regular fee. Lot of this is coming out of my pocket, and I can tell you now, if you want to stay in business, you don’t work that way. You don’t buy the frames for your clients, do you, Dane?”

“I'm not asking you to work cheap,” I said. “You settled on a fee-”

“I’m not complaining. I’m just saying money isn’t what’s keeping me in this. But I’m not going to stay at it unless I’m calling the shots. That’s how it is.”

“All right,” I said, “I’ll take him on, but let’s don’t drag this out.”

“It takes as long as it takes,” Jim Bob said. “Ben can start working for you in the morning. In the meantime, I’ll get on the next step here. You want to check in and see how things are going, great, give me a call. But this is gonna take some time and I want to be left alone as much as possible.”

“That’s it then?” Ann said.

“For now, Lady,” Jim Bob said. “So let’s say good night, or damn near good day, and go home and sleep. You skipping work today, Dane?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. You look like hell. Tomorrow Ben starts working for you.”

“Nine o’clock,” I said.

Ann and I stood up.

Jim Bob shook our hands. “Just go on about things regular like.”

Russel offered his hand to me, and after a moment, I shook it. Then he offered it to Ann.

She looked at it for a long, hard moment.

“I don’t think so,” she said.

He nodded and put his hand by his side. “I don’t blame you,” he said.

“It wouldn’t matter if you did,” Ann said.

We went out. On the way home it started to rain again. This time very hard. It continued that way throughout the day and most of the night and the morning after.

A day’s rest hadn’t helped me much. I was still tired on the morning I started back to work. Depressed too. The idea of having Russel around me all day was not appealing.

To make the situation even more confusing, he reminded me more and more of my father. It wasn’t just the massive hands. He moved like my father and I fancied their voices were much the same.

And perhaps there weren’t that many similarities, and I was merely trying to raise the ghost of my dad and give him substance.

But if that was the case, why couldn’t I have chosen a more suitable host than a goddamn ex-con who threatened my child and nearly beat my brains out?

The morning was already hot, as usual. The rain had quit only a few hours before and the sun was out now and boiling the wetness off the brick streets like the damp off a beached fish’s scales.

I had to pass in front of the shop before I could make the turn that led to the lot in the rear where I parked and as I passed, I saw Russel standing out front, leaning on the glass door. I had hoped to at least have a little time to get unlocked and get the coffee brewing before I had to deal with him.

I went on around back and parked and opened the shop and went through to the front door and tapped on it. Russel jumped a little, and I unlocked the door and let him in.

“Snuck up on me,” he said.

“I drove by out front and saw you. I thought maybe you saw my car.”

“No, I was woolgathering. Nice place. It looks like you get some business.”

“Yeah. We do all right.”

I led him to the back and told him to take a chair and I put on coffee. When I was finished with that, I turned the thermostat to a cooler level and went over to the cash register and unlocked it. I had the bag of money I’d brought from home, just enough small change and dollars to get us rolling for the day, and I put all that in the register.

“What is it you want me to do?” Russel said.

He had left his chair and was standing at the counter.

“I don’t really know,” I said. “I haven’t thought about it. I guess you can clean up.”

“All right. With what, and how do you want things done?”

I took him to the back and showed him the closet with the broom, mop and dustpan. I showed him the bathroom. “You can get water from here for mopping,” I said. “Somewhere in that closet is a bucket and there’s some soap and all manner of stuff. I’m not even sure what’s in there. We’re not too good at cleaning up, actually.”

“I noticed,” Russel said. “There’s glass and wood and sawdust all over the floor under the work tables.”

“Yeah, well, we’re busy. You just do what you like, but look busy. I don’t want to make James and Valerie feel like I’m playing favorites.”

James and Valerie came in then, and they looked at Russel, then looked at me.

“New employee,” I said. “I’ve hired him for a little while to kind of straighten the place up, since we don’t seem to get around to it.” I hesitated, wondering if I should say Russel’s name. It didn’t seem likely they would remember who it was I was supposed to have shot, and even if they did, it was even more unlikely that they would associate the last names as kin. “This is Ben Russel.”