Ross Thomas - The Fourth Durango

“If you got a glass, there’s a faucet.”

“I was thinking of whiskey.”

“You want me to go bring you a whiskey?”

“I have my own,” Adair said, picked up the black cane and shook it so Contraire could hear it gurgle.

“Yeah, Dixie was telling me about that thing.”

“Any objections?”

Contraire shrugged.

Adair twisted off the cane’s handle, removed the cork, then the glass tube and drank. He offered the tube to Contraire, who shook his head and said, “Maybe you put some kind of poison in there.”

“Then I’ll soon be dead,” Adair said, replacing the tube, the cork and the handle.

“But maybe you’ve got an antidote hidden somewhere.” The implausibility of his last statement made Contraire hasten to add, “Anyway, I hardly ever drink on the job.”

“Would that there were more like you.”

Contraire leaned against the wall, the M-16 cradled in his arms, and studied Adair. “You know who I really am?”

Adair nodded. “You’re the guy Sid Fork ran out of town back in ’sixty-eight after he caught you, gin bottle in hand, with twelve-year-old Dixie tied to a bed.”

“That was all her idea, not mine. Dixie’s kind of kinky. Always was. Always will be.”

“You’re also the brother of Marie Contraire who died after her car ran into a cottonwood tree when its steering failed-rather mysteriously, I’m told.”

“Got any idea of how much I’d’ve inherited from Marie if the state’d overdosed those two Jimson brats like it was supposed to?”

“Millions.”

“Millions and millions and millions.”

“I’m curious,” Adair said. “When you were putting together this-well, this scheme to turn Dixie into a rich widow-did she get in touch with you or did you get in touch with her?”

Contraire formed a thin-lipped smile that quickly turned into a smirk. “Since ’sixty-eight, me and Dixie were never out of touch. At least, not for long. You gotta understand-and I’m not bragging now either-but I’m the only one that can keep up with her in the sex department. We both go for the same kind of stuff.”

“And poor Parvis, I assume, is now dead?”

Contraire again looked at his watch. “Has been for prid near an hour. After I shot him I locked him in the safe, so it wouldn’t have been more’n five minutes, ten tops, before he ran out of air or bled to death.”

“How much will Dixie inherit?”

“Ballpark figure?”

Adair nodded.

“Maybe thirty million. That’s not near as much as I’d’ve got from Marie if all that’d worked out. But thirty’s not peanuts either.”

“So what happens next?”

“Well, Dixie comes home from her visit and is all shocked and shook up and sad when she finds her husband’s dead because he let himself get mixed up in some screwy deal the mayor and the chief cooked up. The sheriff’s gonna be all over them two-Sid and B. D.-so they’re gonna stonewall. And you sure won’t say anything, being dead, and neither will Vines when I find him. So that doesn’t leave hardly anybody who really knows what the fuck’s been going on.”

“What makes you so sure about the mayor and the chief?”

“Dixie figures she can buy ’em both for maybe a million or two.” Contraire frowned. “How’d you find out about Dixie anyway?”

“It was Vines who first suspected her-thanks to Soldier Sloan.”

“I kept telling her if she didn’t quit messing around with that old fart, I’d have to do something about him and I did.”

“Did you also have to do something about my son?”

“Now there was one smart cookie. You know he almost had the whole thing figured by the time he got down to Tijuana there. I sometimes think fags are smarter’n people.”

After looking at his watch again, Contraire said, “Doesn’t look like Vines is coming back after all.” He flicked the M-16 to full automatic and aimed it at Adair’s chest.

“One last drink?” Adair asked with an obviously forced smile.

Contraire smiled back, apparently enjoying himself. “Make it a quick one.”

Adair twisted the handle of the cane again. But this time he twisted it to the left rather than the right. He also coughed just loudly enough to prevent Contraire from hearing the cane’s faint click. After the click, Adair shook his head sadly, looked up and said, “I guess I don’t want that last drink after all.”

“Tummy a little upset?” Contraire said, chuckled, but suddenly stopped chuckling when another thought occurred to him.

“That was just bullshit, wasn’t it-about you knowing something that was worth a million dollars? You just cooked that up and fed it to B. D. and Sid after Dixie got Soldier to steer you up here.”

“But who was the steersman and who the steered?” Adair said.

“Maybe it was about fifty-fifty. But you didn’t know squat. Nothing worth a million anyhow. So what was really in it for you and Vines-me? Getting even?”

“You killed my son. Helped destroy my daughter’s mind. Managed to land me in a Federal penitentiary for fifteen months. So, yes, I must’ve had revenge in mind. As for Kelly, well, he’ll have to speak for himself.”

It was Vines’s cue. He shoved the rubberized green shower curtain all the way to the left. Its plastic rings created a racket that made Contraire start and spin toward the stall. As Contraire turned, Adair jerked the handle from the cane and with it came a seven-inch-long stiletto that resembled an ice pick. Now on his feet, but in a crouch, his pants and shorts still down around his ankles, Adair plunged the thin blade into Contraire’s right buttock.

Contraire yelled, shifted the M-16 to his left hand and used his right one to grasp his wounded buttock. Vines burst out of the shower stall and grabbed the M-16, shoving its barrel toward the ceiling. Contraire-or his reflexes-fired a burst into the air. Vines kicked at Contraire, aiming for the short man’s kneecap and hitting his crotch instead. Contraire snorted and Vines, using both hands, tore the M-16 from his grasp.

The short heavy man with the remarkably ugly face sucked in as much air as his lungs would hold and doubled over. He stayed that way for at least twenty seconds, his left hand cradling his balls, his right hand still pressed against the wound in his right buttock. Vines thought it was an extremely awkward posture, which, for some reason, reminded him of a pretzel.

When Contraire finally straightened, all evidence of pain was gone, concealed by a mask of indifference. He looked down at the bloody stiletto in Adair’s right hand.

“How’s that fucker work?” he asked with what seemed to be professional curiosity.

“You turn the handle to the left instead of the right until you hear a click,” Adair said. “The click means a tongue-in-groove catch has fastened on the blade.”

Contraire nodded, as if in appreciation, and looked at the M-16 Vines was aiming at him, much as he might aim at a not-quite-dead snake.

“You gotta pull the trigger to make it work, dickhead,” Contraire said.

Vines nodded, as if in thanks for the reminder, wrapped a forefinger around the trigger, aimed the M-16 more carefully at Contraire, glanced briefly at Jack Adair and said, “Well?”

There was a long pause before Adair said, “No.”

“Why not?” Vines said, his eyes on Contraire.

Adair sighed. “Because, Kelly, it’s against the law.”

Contraire, his hands now locked behind his neck, came out of the bathroom first,followed by Vines with the M-16 and Adair with the black cane, its curved handle back in place, its stiletto sheathed.

They were moving silently toward the poker room’s steel door when the telephone chirped. Adair answered it with a hello. Contraire, hands still locked behind his neck, turned to look at Adair, who was again massaging closed eyes with thumb and middle finger as he listened, the corners of his mouth curved down into twin hooks. Kelly Vines kept his eyes and the M-16 on Contraire.