Lawrence Block - Hit Man

“Goodbye, Tex,” the blonde would call out. “I hope you enjoyed your stay with us.”

The lounge downstairs turned out to be the hot spot in Martingale. Restless, Keller had gone downstairs to have a quiet drink. He walked into a thickly carpeted room with soft lighting and a good sound system. There were fifteen or twenty people in the place, all of them either having a good time or looking for one.

Keller ordered a Coors at the bar. On the jukebox, Barbara Mandrell sang a song about cheating. When she was done, a duo he didn’t recognize sang a song about cheating. Then came Hank Williams’s oldie, “Your Cheatin’ Heart.”

A subtle pattern was beginning to emerge.

“I love this song,” the blonde said.

A different blonde, not the perky young thing from the front desk. This woman was taller, older, and fuller-figured. She wore a skirt and a sort of cowgirl blouse with piping and embroidery on it.

“Old Hank,” Keller said, to say something.

“I’m June.”

“Call me Tex. ”

“ Tex!” Her laughter came in a sort of yelp. “When did anybody ever call you Tex, tell me that?”

“Well, nobody has,” he admitted, “but that’s not to say they never will.”

“Where are you from, Tex? No, I’m sorry, I can’t call you that, it sticks in my throat. If you want me to call you Tex you’re going to have to start wearing boots.”

“You see by my outfit that I’m not a cowboy.”

“Your outfit, your accent, your haircut. If you’re not an easterner, then I’m a virgin.”

“I’m from Connecticut.”

“I knew it.”

“My name’s Dale.”

“Well, you could keep that. If you were fixing to be a cowboy, I mean. You’d have to change the way you dress and talk and comb your hair, but you could hang on to Dale. There another name that goes with it?”

In for a penny, in for a pound. “Whitlock,” he said.

“Dale Whitlock. Shoot, that’s pretty close to perfect. You tell ’em a name like that, you got credit down at the Agway in a New York minute. Wouldn’t even have to fill out a form. You married, Dale?”

What was the right answer? She was wearing a ring herself, and the jukebox was now playing yet another cheating song.

“Not in Martingale,” he said.

“Oh, I like that,” she said, eyes sparkling. “I like the whole idea of regional marriage. I am married in Martingale, but we’re not in Martingale. The town line’s Front Street.”

“In that case,” he said, “maybe I could buy you a drink.”

“You easterners,” she said. “You’re just so damn fast.”

There had to be a catch.

Keller didn’t do too badly with women. He got lucky once in a while. But he didn’t have the sort of looks that made heads turn, nor had he made seduction his life’s work. Some years ago he’d read a book called How to Pick Up Girls, filled with opening lines that were guaranteed to work. Keller thought they were silly. He was willing to believe they would work, but he was not able to believe they would work for him.

This woman, though, had hit on him before he’d had time to become aware of her presence. This sort of thing happened, especially when you were dealing with a married woman in a bar where all they played were cheating songs. Everybody knew what everybody else was there for, and nobody had time to dawdle. So this sort of thing happened, but it never seemed to happen to him, and he didn’t trust it.

Something would go wrong. She’d call home and find out her kid was running a fever. Her husband would walk in the door just as the jukebox gave out with “You Picked a Fine Time to Leave Me, Lucille.” She’d be overcome by conscience, or rendered unconscious by the drink Keller had just bought her.

“I’d say my place or yours,” she said, “but we both know the answer to that one. What’s your room number?” Keller told her. “You go on up,” she said. “I won’t be a minute. Don’t start without me.”

He brushed his teeth, splashed on a little aftershave. She wouldn’t show, he told himself. Or she’d expect to be paid, which would take a little of the frost off the pumpkin. Or her husband would turn up and they’d try to work some variation of the badger game.

Or she’d be sloppy drunk, or he’d be impotent. Or something.

“Whew,” she said. “I don’t guess you need boots after all. I’ll call you Tex or Slim or any damn thing you want me to, just so you come when you’re called. How long are you in town for, Dale?”

“I’m not sure. A few days.”

“Business, I suppose. What sort of business are you in?”

“I work for a big corporation,” he said. “They fly me over to look into situations.”

“Sounds like you can’t talk about it.”

“Well, we do a lot of government work,” he said. “So I’m really not supposed to.”

“Say no more,” she said. “Oh, Lord, look at the time!”

While she showered, he picked up the paperback and rewrote the blurb. He killed a thousand miles, he thought, to ride a woman he never met. Well, sometimes you got lucky. The stars were in the right place, the forces that ruled the universe decided you deserved a present. There didn’t always have to be a catch to it, did there?

She turned off the shower, and he heard the last line of the song she’d been singing. “ ‘And Celia’s at the Jackson Park Inn,’ ” she sang, and moments later she emerged from the bathroom and began dressing.

“What’s this?” she said. “ ‘He rode a thousand miles to kill a man he never met.’ You know, that’s funny, because I just had the darnedest thought while I was running the soap over my pink and tender flesh.”

“Oh?”

“I just said that last to remind you what’s under this here skirt and blouse. Oh, the thought I had? Well, something you said, government work. I thought maybe this man’s CIA, maybe he’s some old soldier of fortune, maybe he’s the answer to this maiden’s prayers.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just that it was already a real fine evening, Dale, but it would be heaven on earth if what you came to Martingale for was to kill my damn husband.”

Christ. Was she the client? Was the pickup downstairs a cute way for them to meet? Could she actually be that stupid, coming on in a public place to a man she was hiring to kill her husband?

For that matter, how had she recognized him? Only Dot and the man in White Plains had known the name he was using. They’d have kept it to themselves. And she’d made her move before she knew his name. Had she been able to recognize him? I see by your outfit that you are a hit man? Something along those lines?

“Yarnell,” she was saying. “Hobart Lee Yarnell, and what he’d like is for people to call him Bart, and what everybody calls him is Hobie. Now what does that tell you about the man?”

That he’s not the man I came here to kill, Keller thought. This was comforting to realize, but left her waiting for an answer to her question. “That’s he’s not used to getting his own way,” Keller said.

She laughed. “He’s not,” she said, “but it’s not for lack of trying. You know, I like you, Dale. You’re a nice fellow. But if it wasn’t you tonight it would have been somebody else.”

“And here I thought it was my aftershave.”

“I’ll just bet you did. No, the kind of marriage I got, I come around here a lot. I’ve put a lot of quarters in that jukebox the last year or so.”

“And played a lot of cheating songs?”

“And done a fair amount of cheating. But it doesn’t really work. I still wake up the next day married to that bastard.”

“Why don’t you divorce him?”

“I’ve thought about it.”