Clancy Martin - How to Sell

“I can’t believe Cindy would walk away from her desk with that cash on it. What was that woman thinking?” This was Mr. Popper. I glanced up and saw the way he glared at his wife. Cindy the bookkeeper was Sheila’s responsibility. She reported directly to Sheila.

I never had the courage to look at my own wife that way, later. That was a look men used to have with their wives that we men today have forsaken, relinquished, or lost.

“There are no cameras in the bathroom.”

“Not in the bathroom. To see who went in back. They have timers on them. We can check them against the time.”

“I know it wasn’t Lisa,” Jim said.

“The cameras are on the showcases. There are no cameras in back. The cameras are all on the floor.”

“It could have been Cindy. Why not Cindy? I would be tempted if I were her,” Dennis said. What an innocent thing to say, I thought. You can learn from that, Bobby, I told myself. Dennis was that smart. That street-smart, I mean.

“It wasn’t Cindy, you moron. For chrissake.”

That was Sheila again. She always frightened me. She was not the sort of person who thought children — children like I am only a child, really, I wanted to remind them all — were naïve. Plus she did not even like her own children. She would have fired me over that first Rolex deal if I hadn’t been Jim’s little brother.

“Cindy was in the bathroom. That’s why the money was on her desk.”

“These fucking salespeople. No fucking gratitude.” Sheila swore frequently. In Texas they call it cursing. “Why do you curse so much, Sheila?” Roger or Paul would ask her, and she would say, “Fuck you,” to be funny. But to a Canadian it was unnerving.

“Ten grand. It takes some balls to stick ten grand in your purse.”

“Or your pocket. Why does it have to be a purse?” Jim said. He was a defender of women. Or maybe he was still thinking of Lisa.

“A lousy ten grand,” Popper said. “Why take the risk for that? Frustrating. I don’t care about the damn money.”

“Well I sure as fuck care about the money, Ronnie. And you should damn well care yourself.”

“You’re missing the point, Sheila. The point is there is a criminal among us.”

He was Ali Baba in the house of a thousand thieves and he trusted these people. I have since noticed that both trusting and trustworthy people often have this problem of insufficient skepticism and investigation of the truth. It may be a laziness they share.

“Not even into that hallway? There must be a camera that can check that.”

“They had to put the money somewhere. That’s a good point. That much money wouldn’t fit in your pants pockets.”

“You wouldn’t walk back into the phone room. Too many people.”

“You would be too nervous.”

“We might see if someone let a customer through the gate.”

“Why take the cash off Cindy’s desk when you knew it would be noticed? Why not just hit the cash box? You could hit the cash box every day and no one would ever notice.” I glanced up because of a familiar sound in the way he said it and there was Jim giving me a close look. I arranged the cans of soda. Dr Peppers on the left, Tabs on the right. In the door were Sheila’s Frescas and Perriers.

“I mean, if you are a thief,” Jim said.

“You can’t take money from the cash box like that. We reconcile it every night before we leave.”

“Well, technically, I think you could. Come to think of it. That’s something we better change. Shit, this is depressing.”

“How many times do I have to tell you, Ronnie? You can’t believe a word they say. Little pieces of shit.”

“Plus the temptation. She should never have left it sitting there.”

“It could have been anyone. We could polygraph them. The suspects. The ones who probably might have done it.”

“What about the Polack? There’s something sinister about that girl.”

“She’s not a thief,” Popper said quickly. “No, it’s not her.”

I saw Sheila Popper give her husband a quick, sour glance. Jim and Dennis wiped their faces blank. But I saw them trying not to look at each other.

“Why this now?” Popper said. “Why did she just leave it on her desk? This is all we need.” Mr. Popper hammered his desk with his brass Rolex paperweight. It was the signature Rolex crown but the size of a soup bowl. He was not angry. He was sad.

“We could call the cops. That might put a scare into someone.”

“We are not calling the fucking cops, you fuckhead.”

“Sheila! Control yourself!”

“If we polygraph anyone we have to polygraph everyone. Everyone who was here today, anyhow. That’s the new law.”

“I bet it was Roger.” Roger was the Watchman. “I don’t trust that guy. Plus he’s getting divorced.”

“How did they get the money out of the store?”

“It’s only a few steps from the bathroom.”

“Cindy couldn’t have been in the bathroom.”

“That’s another reason why it couldn’t be the Polack,” Jim said. He looked at Popper as he said it. “The Polack was in the bathroom. That’s what we said. We already established that.”

“I thought it was Cindy in the bathroom.”

“Do we know that?” Dennis said. “All we know is that somebody was in the front bathroom.”

“I still think it could be Roger. Rita says it’s a very messy divorce. Those are expensive. He isn’t making any real sales lately, either.”

Rita was an idea, I thought. The way she watched Lisa and me.

“Suppose for the sake of argument it was Cindy,” Mr. Popper said. “She would have stolen something else. Why take just ten K? She could have hit us for tens of thousands. Maybe hundreds of thousands.”

“Only a real dummy would take ten thousand dollars off the bookkeeper’s desk like that.” This was Jim. His tone was unpleasant for me to hear.

“We’re not all thieves, Sheila,” Dennis said.

“Dennis, just shut the fuck up,” Sheila said.

There was a quiet moment.

“I bet it was Rita,” I said. I said it very quietly, like I was speaking to the carpet and not the grown-ups in the room. I supposed nobody might even hear me.

Sheila said, “From the mouths of babes.”

“I wouldn’t want to think that. Golly, I hate to think that,” Ronnie said.

“She’s been disgruntled,” Jim said.

“Hell, disgruntled! That’s one word for it. Pissed off is another. Pissed off is what I’d call it,” Mr. Popper said. “Ever since last Christmas. Or maybe it was the Christmas before that.”

“She’s been demanding a raise for three years,” Sheila said. “I wouldn’t put it past her.”

“I bet you’re right, Bobby,” Dennis said. He looked back at me with the cold face of a lizard. You know something, you bastard, I thought. You know it was me. “I bet it was Rita.”

“It’s always the one you don’t suspect, isn’t it?”

“Rita. Huh. Who would have guessed?” Jim said. He was always the store’s best closer.

I t was late, the highway was black, and his cheeks and nose were green in the light from the speedometer and the other gauges. Jim and I were driving home.

“I am worn out,” he said. “I hope all this is worth it.”

The windshield wipers squeaked. I opened the window a crack. Outside, more sleet was falling. I thought about how our little black car must look on the black highway in the icy rain, from high above us, with the yellow beams of the headlights stretching out in front. The highway was already freezing over. Tomorrow the roads would be closed. But tonight, after Jim and Lily were asleep, I would drive to Lisa’s.

I found the money, Bobby. I can’t take this money.”