Christopher Sorrentino - The Fugitives

Apology accepted. The adults who hadn’t already bailed on the chaos withdrew with their kids. I heard the librarian mutter, “They think every place is a darn Chuck E. Cheese, now.” She began gathering up the scattered books, straightening and pushing in chairs.

“Damn,” Kat said. “I think you scared him off.”

“Scared? How?”

“I’ll explain later on.”

“Why not now?”

“Just, no. Let me call my friend Becky and see if she can meet us today.” She got up abruptly and headed toward the exit.

I sat for a minute pondering Kat’s evident annoyance with me, then went to the men’s room and took a long look in the mirror. I’d thought I was content, but I considered changing my mind when I saw myself: I looked dissolute and angry, like a prairie spree killer after his apprehension; hair askew, gray stubble glinting like metal filings, eyes dull but glaring. I washed my face to see if I could wash the impression away, and then attempted a smile, which only accentuated the look of derangement. When I returned to the lobby, Kat was entering the building, tucking her phone into her purse.

“Well?”

“She asked if she could call me back.” She frowned. “This is turning out to be the weirdest morning. She says that someone called and told her that she’d won a plasma-screen HDTV. Some radio station promotion. She’s got to stay home and wait for it to be delivered.”

We were conversing in a normal tone of voice, and the librarian who’d confiscated my coffee was glaring at us. Kat took me by the elbow and led me out of the building.

“What did you mean about me scaring him off?”

“Not everybody wants to talk to reporters. As you yourself pointed out at great length.”

“But he told me he wanted to. He said that he had a lot to tell you. Here.” I dug in the pocket of my parka. “He gave me his address.”

“Now he tells me.” She took it from me and looked at it. “No phone, though.”

We returned to the front desk. Kat made a point of whispering. “I’m a reporter for the Chicago Mirror .” She dug in her wallet for her press card, which I was gratified to see looked substantially like what I might have conjured in my most hopeful imaginings, PRESSprinted vertically and in enormous letters down its left-hand margin, suitable for inserting in the hatband of a snap-brim fedora. “I had an appointment to interview Mr. Salteau today. I was wondering if you could give me his contact information.”

The librarian looked at us skeptically.

“I have his address,” Kat said, showing her the slip of paper. “But I don’t seem to have his phone number. I guess I didn’t think I’d need it, seeing as I was supposed to meet him here.”

The librarian sighed. She leaned to one side and heaved open a drawer, studied something.

“And can you confirm the address?” asked Kat.

“That’s what we have,” said the librarian. She wrote a number on a Post-it.

“Here,” she said, “we tried him already.” She looked at me. “And who’s this?”

“My photographer,” said Kat.

“I’ve seen him here before,” said the librarian. Clearly I was not going to be included in the exchange.

“He’s local. Not from Chicago.” She added, “He’s the best. Give her your card, Alexander.”

“I forgot to bring any,” I said. “You can look me up, though.”

“What’s your name?”

“Eigengrau.”

“Where’s your equipment?”

“It’s one hundred percent digital,” said Kat.

“OK,” said the librarian. It was a dismissal, but she remembered to add: “Have a nice day.”

WE TRIED THEnumber, but it rang and rang. We got into my truck and checked a map. Abbottsville was twenty-five miles away.

Wendell Banjo had packed the living room of his mobile home with things he’d had removed from the old house, which sat derelict about twenty yards away. Some of these things, like the enormous desk he sat behind, were in use, others were packed away in neatly stacked boxes, and still others were piled and clustered and leaning against the walls, jamming the dusty space. There were wall clocks and old radios, a console television set, dusty bouquets of artificial flowers, folding chairs, a folded ping-pong table, a box spring, lampshades nested inside each other, a portrait of Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. A passage had been cleared to the front door. There was a whiteboard hanging from one wall, neatly divided with colored tape into rectangular segments, to keep track of various games, scores, and spreads, its surface wiped clean. Next to it a large flat-screen television was connected to the old satellite dish that perched on the roof. Wendell Banjo was a local bookmaker.

Hanshaw, a giant former tribal cop who took the occasional job, mostly collections, from Wendell Banjo, sat opposite in a bentwood rocking chair that had been pulled up before the desk. He sat gingerly because there was a tear in the caning and he was worried that his ass would fall through the seat.

“When you going to burn that dump down?” asked Hanshaw.

“It has its uses,” said Wendell Banjo. “So, what? Are you game?”

“Sure,” said Hanshaw.

“Sure, he says. Cool as a cucumber, ennit? You need anything from me?”

“You know it’s Argenziano for sure,” said Hanshaw.

“They know it’s him. And that’s good enough. Like I said,” said Wendell Banjo, “I am always interested in not stirring up trouble. These are serious people and they’re talking about a lot of money.”

“Some of which you ended up with.”

“Which the thing of it is I get to keep it. If I do this.”

“Me. If I do this.”

“OK, you.”

“Why not one of your boys?”

“These pussycats? Be serious. Reminds me. How’s your nephew, what, Jeramy?” Wendell Banjo lit a Pall Mall.

“He’s good,” said Hanshaw.

“Sharp kid,” said Wendell Banjo, generously. “My son’s a senior at Kalamazoo now. Wants to go to graduate school and get something called a MFA.” He pronounced each of the letters distinctly, as if speaking the name of a genus of insect. “You know what that is? You pay to go to school to learn to do something no one’s ever going to pay you to do.”

“And so you told him?”

“ ‘Good luck.’ ”

Wendell Banjo laughed. Hanshaw shook his head sympathetically. “So,” Hanshaw said. “When?”

“No rush,” said Wendell Banjo. “I mean, be on it. You need anything else?”

“Money.”

“Out back.” He gestured with his thumb in the direction of the derelict house.

“For Christ’s sake,” said Hanshaw. “I have mold allergies.”

“How long can you hold your breath?” asked Wendell Banjo.

TODAY

They drove to Abbottsville under a flat white sky, seemingly always on the outskirts of tiny settlements, a flip-book view through the windshield of manufactured homes clustering and then thinning out again, service stations and tractor supply stores, open country where a collapsing barn or a stone farmhouse persisted amid the snow-covered fields. The highway eventually fed them directly onto Abbottsville’s main street, a thoroughfare that was simultaneously shabby, utilitarian, and quaintly old-fashioned. Mulligan thought idly that the place was prime for what he thought of, with irony, as a revival ; that when hopes ran high and credit came easy (and once a certain kind of person had been priced out of other towns), cafés, boutiques, galleries, and wine shops would virally multiply on these razor-angled plats.