Paul Theroux - The Stranger at the Palazzo D'Oro

We were not boys anymore but men with a purpose as we made our way by a zigzag route to the crest of the hill above Doleful Pond, approaching from behind, flattening ourselves on the ground, sliding forward in the leaves until we could see the far shore, then dropping into the foxhole.

“What did you bring?”

Walter had taken off his knapsack. “Couple of bricks.”

“I’ve got the rope,” I said. ‘About fifty feet. Chicky?”

Chicky kept his eyes on the pond. He said, ‘A potato. A bag of sugar. A couple of tonic bottles. Pair of pliers. Usual stuff.”

He had always been talkative before, but now that he was in charge he liked to be mysterious. He wasn’t good at schoolwork, but he knew how to fix things, and was even better at breaking them.

“Someone’s coming,” Walter said.

But it was the Chevy, the lovers. We watched closely.

“They’re making out — he’s feeling her up. Hey, this guy I know told me the best way to get laid,” Chicky said. “You get a girl in a car, huh. ‘Cheryl, hey, let’s go for a ride.’ Then you drive into the middle of the boondocks, like where they are now, and when it gets dark you park the car and shut off the engine and you say, ‘Okay, fuck or walk.”’

“What’s supposed to happen?” Walter said.

“Listen, banana man. The guy leans over. 'Fuck or walk.' It’s dark, it’s cold, it’s wicked far. So the girl has to take her clothes off and let him bang her, or else she’ll have to walk home.”

“I’d go with them,” Walter said. “I’d get sloppy seconds.”

“You’d just jerk off. You’d leave pecker tracks.”

I said, “When I was young and in my prime, I used to jerk off all the time. But now that I am old and gray, I only jerk off twice a day.”

“Andy plays with the one-eyed worm.”

“And you get hind tit.”

“You can kiss the snotty end of my fuck stick,” Chicky said.

The next time we looked up, the Chevy was reversing down the road.

“She came across,” Chicky said. “Didn’t have to walk.”

By now the sun was low enough to cast long-legged shadows across the pond and the road. The place where the Chevy had been parked lay in darkness.

None of us saw the blue Studebaker appear. All we saw was its rear lights winking as it braked, sliding into the shadows at the end of the road, where we had removed the No Parking sign and the iron pipe barrier. Its rumplike trunk was blue, though just a few minutes after it parked, even while we were staring at it, we could not make out the color.

Each of us had one job to do. Walter’s was first — to get Father Staley out of the car and up the road, chasing him, long enough for Chicky and me to do our jobs.

“There’s someone with him.”

“Probably some kid.”

“Maybe someone we know.”

“Like they say in Russia, tough shitsky,” Chicky said.

“What are you going to do?” Walter said.

Slow-witted and sly, liking the mystery, Chicky said, “I got my ways. Just make sure that bastard is out of the car and up the road for a few minutes to give me time.”

“If he sees us, we’re screwed,” I said.

“He’s only going to see Herkis,” Chicky said. “Herkis is Protestant!”

“Let’s put on bandannas,” I said. The word was from the cowboy movies. I took out my handkerchief.

“You mean a snot rag,” Chicky said, and shook out his own and tied it around the lower half of his face, as I was doing.

We crouched in the foxhole on the bluff, watching the car. The sun sank some more, the temperature changed, the woods grew cooler, damper, darker, while the pond held the last light of the day.

“What’s the bastard doing?” Chicky said.

The end of the road where the car was parked was so shadowy, a person passing by would not have noticed the car. After it had parked, it had seemed to darken and shrink and disappear.

“I can’t see him,” Walter said.

Chicky said in his conspirator’s whisper, “If we wait any longer, he might take off. So let’s go. You’re dumping the bricks, Herkis. Andy, you’re doing the bumper.”

“What about you?”

“You’ll see. Meet back here, after.” Chicky then put his finger to his lips: no more talking.

Keeping low, we descended through the bushes single file to the edge of the pond. We used the thick brush at the shore to hide ourselves. Approaching the car from the rear, we could not see anything of the people inside. We were sure it was Father Staley’s car, but where was his head? Now we were kneeling.

Chicky turned and poked Walter’s arm, and as he did, Walter snorted air and looked alert. With a brick in each hand, Walter rocked back to a squatting position, sort of sighing as he did so. I could see how angry he was from the way his head was jammed between his shoulders and the sounds of his shoes when he crossed from the dirt path to the cinders.

We heard nothing but his shoes for a moment and then two loud sounds, one of a brick hitting the metal body of the car, the other the crunch of a brick against the windshield. Just after that, a complaining two-part shout that was so long the first part was muffled inside the car, and the second part a very loud protest as it was released by the car door swinging open.

Father Staley stumbled out, pulling at his clothes, and Walter screamed “Homo!” as he ran into the woods, and he was gone, hidden by darkness, before Father Staley had stumbled twenty feet. But Father Staley was still going after him.

My hands trembled as I tied the bowline knot on the front bumper. The other end of the rope, another bowline, I tied to the nearest tree. While I was tying the knots, Chicky rushed from the rear of the car, where he had been doing something, to the side, where he was pulling the flap that covered the gas cap. The last sound I heard was the smash of glass, the tonic bottles under the tires.

Passing the car door, which was still gaping open, I saw someone inside, a boy, huddled in the seat, his head down, his knees up. I was glad I could not see his face. Then I was off.

Chicky kicked the car repeatedly, making it shake, and ran, flinging his feet forward, and crashed into the bushes by the pond. He was right behind me, running hard, feeling the same panic that frightened me, the going-nowhere running of a bad dream, skidding on the soil that was cool and moist from the end of day, like running on fudge. We were racing in darkness, but after all the stakeout time we knew where we were going, and when we got to the lookout boulder on the bluff I knew we were safe, because I saw the car's headlights switch on, blazing against the green leaves.

“He’s taking off.”

Chicky said, “Did you see me kick the freakin’ car? I didn’t even give a shit!”

The blue Studebaker was still stationary, its lights dimming each time the engine turned over.

A noise behind us startled us, but before we could react, Walter flopped down and said, “I wrecked his window!”

“Lookit,” Chicky said.

The car grunted and roared, the gearshift grinding, the engine strained against the rope I had tied — strained hard, making no progress, trying to reverse. When the rope snapped with a loud twang I expected to see the car shoot backward, but it had not gone ten feet before the engine coughed and died. Chicky was laughing. The engine groaned to life again — Chicky said, “Hubba-hubba, ding-ding”—and then gasped and died again. But seconds later it was stammering, the intervals shorter and shorter, the engine noise briefer, until at last there was only silence.

“Car’s freakin’ totaled,” Chicky said.

And gloating, combing his hair, Chicky explained: my rope had made the engine rev, but he had jammed a potato into the tailpipe, to delay Father Staley in case the rope broke. He had put a pound of sugar into the gas tank, and that was now in the fuel line, gumming up the pistons. The engine was destroyed, the car was a wreck. Father Staley was stranded in the woods with whomever he had brought there.