Christopher Moore - Coyote Blue

"The Master will now fix the car," the younger monk said. Sam looked to the tatami mat; the old monk was gone. The young monk turned and went out into the sun.

Outside, the Z's hood was open and the old monk was bent over the engine, running his hands over the hoses and wires, but staring off into the distance. Sam realized that he was blind, and noticed that there were fingers missing from each of his hands.

"What's he doing?" Coyote asked.

"Quiet," the young monk said. "He is finding the problem."

"We really have to get going," Sam said. "Can we leave the car here and pick it up later?"

The monk said, "Does a dog have a Buddha nature?"

"Does a fish have a watertight asshole?" said Coyote.

The young monk turned to the trickster and bowed. "You are wise," he said.

"This is nuts," Sam said. "We've got another car. Let's go."

"We've lost them," Calliope said.

"No, we haven't. We know where they're going, Cal."

"How do you know?"

"It's a long story. Coyote helped."

"Not enough," Coyote said. He pointed to the police cruiser that was bouncing across the desert toward them. Sam looked to the limo and realized that they had run out of time, and, more important, places to run. The cruiser slid to a stop by the limo and they were all engulfed by a cloud of dust. When it cleared, a seven-foot black man stood beside the limo. A bald man in a sport coat was leveling a riot shotgun over the hood at them.

"I'd like the keys to the limousine, please," Minty said.

Calliope looked at Sam. "Are we in trouble?"

"This is not good," Sam said.

The monk said, "Life is suffering."

"You need to get laid," Coyote said.

Sam dug into his pocket for the keys. "Careful," said the man with the gun.

Minty Fresh approached Sam. "Relax, Jake," he said. Then to Sam, "Mr. Hunter, the police are not really involved in this. I just want two things. I want the keys to the car, and I want to know what the hell is going on here."

"Quiet!" the monk said. "The Master is finished." They looked to the Z, where the old monk was staring blankly in their direction.

"Disharmony in the cam chakra," he announced. The young monk bowed. Sam wondered about the Master's missing fingers.

"Well?" Minty said.

Sam said, "Do you have a little time?"

Minty Fresh sat on the tatami mat with Sam while the young monk, who they had found out was named Steve, served them tea. He'd sent Jake back to town and the others were outside fiddling with the broken sports car. Minty wanted some answers.

"Mr. Hunter," he began. "There is something very strange about your friend."

"Really? He seems fine to me. Tell me, though. Do you think I have shifty eyes?" Sam affected his best innocent look.

Oh, no, two of them , Minty thought. "They look normal to me." They didn't look normal at all — they were golden. Minty hadn't noticed before.

Sam said, "I mean, do I look untrustworthy to you?"

"Mr. Hunter, you stole my employer's car."

"I'm really sorry about that. Besides that, though. Do I look shifty?"

Minty sighed. "No, not particularly."

"How about if you were shorter, say, eight inches tall."

"Mr. Hunter, what is this all about?"

"We really needed the car. It doesn't justify taking it, but we would have brought it back."

"Look, I'm not going to involve the police in this. Just tell me."

Sam took Minty through the story of Lonnie taking Grubb and the chase, leaving out as many details about Coyote as he could, making their destination in South Dakota seem close, easy. The story was slanted, however; Sam told it with a purpose in mind, thinking as he spoke, You can't sell if you don't pitch.

Sam closed, "If we don't have the limo we won't be able to find Lonnie and get Calliope's baby back. You have a mother, don't you?" Sam waited.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Hunter, I can't let you have it. It's not mine. I'd lose my job."

"We'll bring it back after we get Grubb."

"I'm sorry," Minty said. He climbed to his feet and walked to the door, then turned. "I'm really sorry." He pushed his sunglasses up on his face and ducked through the hole in the steel. Sam followed him out.

"Mr. F.," Sam called.

Minty looked up as he reached the car. "Yes?"

"Thanks for not going to the cops. I understand your position."

Minty nodded and got in the Lincoln.

Calliope came up beside Sam and stood with him watching Minty drive away. She said, "Grubb is all I have."

Sam reached out and took her hand, not knowing what to say, having failed at the only thing he was really good at, talking people into doing things they didn't want to do.

The young monk came out of the door behind them. "The Master is fixing your car," he said. He was stirring some green tea into an earthenware bowl with a bamboo whisk. "More tea?"

They stood together in the sun, watching the old man work. He fingered each bolt carefully before fitting a wrench to it, then removed the bolt so quickly that his hands blurred with the movement.

Sam said, "How long…"

"Don't talk to him when he works," Steve cautioned. "He will finish when he finishes. But don't talk to him. When you work, work. When you talk, talk."

"Do you get many customers? I mean, you are pretty far out here."

"Three," Steve said. He was wearing a straw hat to protect his shaved head.

"Three today?"

"No, just three."

"Then what do you do in the meantime?"

"We wait."

"That's all?"

Steve said, "Is that all the patriarch Daruma did at the wall for nine years?" There was no anger in his voice. "We wait."

"But how do you pay your rent, buy food?"

"There is no rent. The owner of King's Lake, Augustus Brine, brings us food. He is a fisherman."

"King's Lake is up the road, right? What is it, a resort?"

"A house of pleasure."

"A whorehouse that supports Buddhist monks?"

"How sweet," Calliope said.

"He's got it," Coyote said, pointing to the Master, who was holding up a rod of polished metal.

"A bent push rod," Steve said. The master carried the push rod into the shop. They all followed and watched as the old man tightened the rod into a vise. He picked up a hammer and stood over the vise, his free hand feeling the rod. Without warning the old man screamed and delivered a clanging blow to the push rod, then bowed and set the hammer on the bench.

"Fixed," Steve said, bowing.

"Is that how he lost his fingers?"

"To achieve enlightenment, one must give up the things of this world."

"Like piano lessons," Coyote said.

As Minty Fresh drove back to Las Vegas he thought about what Sam had said: "You have a mother, don't you?" And the question set Minty Fresh to thinking about a phone call from his mother that had changed his life.

"You're the only one left can do something, baby. The others are too far or too far gone. Please come home, baby, I need you." (Even when he had to duck to pass through her front door she still called him "baby.") That tone: he'd heard it in her voice before, when she was tugging at her husband to get him to stop strapping her youngest. But he hadn't gone back for her, had he? It was a call deep with duty and silent pride that brought him home. He went back for Nathan.

Nathan Fresh had never been home when any of his nine children were born. He was a sailor, and as far as he knew, when you came home from sea a new child would be waiting for you. The others grew an inch or two at a time, and the shoes that one was wearing when you left would be on the next one down when you got home. He loved his children, foreign creatures that they were, and trusted his wife to raise them — as long as they could line up, snap to, and pass inspection when he came home. And although he was gone most of the time, making the high seas safe for democracy, he was a presence in the house: photographs in crisp dress whites and blues stared down from the walls; commendations and medals; a letter once a week, read out loud at the supper table; and a thousand warnings of what Papa would do to a doomed misbehaver when he got home. To the Fresh children, Papa was only a little bit more real than Santa Claus, and only a bit more conspicuous.