Elmore Leonard - Tishomingo Blues

He wasn't trying to be. Robert looked at situations straight on, didn't color them in his mind or change his personality to meet the occasion. He liked to look around, believed he could get something going with Carla, but would have to meet her in New York. Carla, without you realizing it, would run you like a company and you wouldn't own yourself no more. He liked to grade women, see how they'd measure up as wives, but without seeing any need to ever marry. He didn't need kids. He was still a Young Boy.

Robert punched his way through channels with the remote and came to a movie he liked and could see anytime, All That jazz , a behind-the-scenes movie, Robert's favorite kind, this one taking you backstage to show what putting on a musical was like, Roy Scheider playing the choreographer based on Bob Fosse, Roy smoking all the way through the picture, smoking while a doctor examines him, has a heart attack and the cute nurse is in bed with him in the hospital, the man living every minute of his life till the way he's living kills him. Beautiful.

Watching the movie Robert twisted one to smoke along with Roy, and somewhere before it ended he fell asleep.

When he opened his eyes he clicked the set off, he sat low in the chair staring at the dark screen, staring for maybe a minute before he reached for the phone and called the hotel operator.

" Helene, how you doing? You know the number for Junebug's? I don't have a phone book, somebody stole it." He said, "I'd appreciate it, dear, thank you." He waited ten rings before a voice came on. " Wesley, how you doing? Listen, this is Robert. Is Walter Kirkbride there?… Well, can you take a peek, see if his car's in back?"

"He don't use his car," Wesley said, "he uses one of Arlen's."

"I forgot. Wesley, is it Traci he sees or the other one?"

"I think Traci. Yeah, the little bitty one."

"You see Walter, tell him I called, okay?"

Wesley said, "Who's this again?"

At nine, Robert got dressed and stepped two doors down the hall to Jerry's suite. Anne let him in and went in the bedroom. Jerry was standing in front of the TV watching a baseball game. He turned the set off saying, "Braves and the Cards-who gives a shit."

Robert said, "I talked to Kirkbride. Told him we know what he's doing."

"You're sure about this?"

"Five to one I'm right."

"You told him-what'd he say?"

"Nothing. But he listened. You know what I'm saying? The man listened to every word. Took it in. Almost seemed to nod his head like he was saying yeah, that's how it works."

Jerry had his hand on the doorknob.

"Can we use him?"

"Have to wait and see."

"For what?"

"My man Dennis."

Jerry shook his head as he opened the door.

Robert said, "Walter wants to stage a fight in the woods, dying to."

It caught Jerry before he could walk out.

"But we won't be able to do it and still have the spectators watching us. See, they did fight in the woods at Brice's Cross Roads and Walter likes to do it right, make it look authentic."

Jerry waited, holding the door open.

"Or he wants to get me and you and Dennis in the woods and take us out with nobody seeing it. I don't mean make it look like an accident. I told you, they inspect the weapons before you take the field. It can still happen-there was a man shot during a reenactment one time, but it was a strange situation, not one you can pull any time you want. So they'd have to set it up some other way, get us out of sight of the crowd, the people watching."

Jerry looked like he was thinking again, concentrating this time. He said, "You tell this guy what we know, him and the redneck, Arlen, and give 'em a reason to want to take us out."

Robert nodded, the man catching on.

"So instead of us thinking of a way to get them in the woods," Jerry said, "you have them thinking of how to get us in the fuckin woods."

"And chase us," Robert said, "all the way to a levee road back there-I checked it out-where we put the truck."

"I forgot about that part, the truck."

"Doesn't work without it, Jerry."

He looked like he was thinking again, but about what? It was hard to tell. All he did then was shrug. He said, "Okay," and raised his voice toward the bedroom. "Annabanana, I'm going now."

Robert wondered was she gonna come out to kiss him goodbye. Uh-unh. Her voice came back, "See you later."

"One other thing," Robert said. "The CIB man, John Rau? He lives for this reenacting. He's gonna be on your side, with you the whole time, and he won't leave till it's over. You hear what I'm saying? We don't want him anywhere near when we start shooting people. And we sure don't want to shoot him ."

Jerry said, "Whack a cop-only if your life depends on it."

"We want him far away when it goes down."

Jerry said, "How do we work that?"

"I'll have to think about it."

Jerry said, "I'll leave it up to you," the way he left everything, and was gone to roll dice.

Robert glanced toward the bedroom as he walked to the balcony. He opened the doors and heard a woman's voice coming over the speakers, the TV woman, Diane-what was her name?calling the dives again, Diane telling the crowd they'd have to clap real loud if they wanted world champion Dennis Lenahan to hear them way up on that eighty-foot perch.

There he was in the spotlight climbing to the top.

Robert moved to the railing to watch him: Dennis looking down at the crowd looking up at him, mostly white people from around here, small groups of teenagers, the older crowd in their lawn chairs. How many, a hundred? Close to it. Dennis deciding what to show them. Or thinking about his crossroads, way up there alone in the night. Thinking about money. Thinking about years to come and where he'd be. No, right now he was cool, he was haughty seeing himself in the air. Come on, flying reverse pike.

Anne's voice came from the bedroom. "What're you doing?"

"Watching my man."

"Are you coming?"

"In a minute. He's about to go off."

Every day honest people got into dealing drugs, it wasn't so unusual. Dennis wouldn't even be dealing, strictly speaking.

He had his arms raised, ready to go. Then lowered his arms and held on to the ladder with one hand as he leaned out and yelled down something and now Charlie was looking up at him. Now Charlie picked up a pole, the skimmer they took bugs out of the tank with, and mounted the ladder to the narrow walk that went around the tank and now Charlie was waving the skimmer over the surface of the water to make waves. Robert decided it was so Dennis could judge where he would enter the water, the man not taking any more risk than he had to. Good.

Anne's voice said, "Are you coming or not?" sounding closer.

He stepped toward the doorway, quick, to see her coming out of the bedroom in her kimono, open, nothing on under it. He thought, The Open Kimono by Seymour Hare, and said, "Wait. Don't move." And turned back in time to see Dennis go off twisting and somersaulting to slice the water and come up with his hair slicked back in the spotlight. Hey, shit. How'd he know to make all those moves in two seconds? Maybe even less.

He felt Anne's hand slip under his shirt and move up his spine. He said, "I love to watch people who make what they do look easy. No flaws, nothing sticking out."

"God, I hope you're not queer for him. Are you?"

"No, I never tried that. Like I never tried the opera. Or never roller-skated. I've ice-skated and I've skied. Steve Allen says to Jose Jimenez standing there with a pair of skis, `So, you're a skier. Is that right?' And Jose Jimenez says, `Yes,' with his accent, `I'm a skeer to go down the hill.' "

He felt her hand slide down his back and out from under his shirt. Her voice, off in the room now, said, "You want a glass of wine?"