Fifty Grand (29 page)

“I ain’t gonna do it. You’re going to kill me,” he says.

“No one is going to die. Soon I’ll be leaving and you’ll go back to your TV show. I promise if you do what I say you will not be hurt.”

“Hmm, I don’t know,” he says.

“Do I sound like a killer?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Just do it!”

He slides his wrists into the cuffs. “Never had a pair of these on before,” he mutters.

When his hands are fully clipped I step out from behind the chair. The ski mask startles him and I take that stunned second to check the cuffs. Tight. Good.

He’s not what I’m expecting. About sixty-five, maybe seventy, wearing a plaid shirt and dark blue jeans. His face says that he’s lived a lot of life. Blue-collar outdoor stuff. His eyes are green and sharp and kindly. It would be very hard to have to kill this man.

“Why don’t you sit down?” he says.

“I will.”

I turn off the TV and sit in the rocking chair opposite him. Rocking chair. A heartbeat ago I was in Santiago de Cuba watching little Ricky sitting down triumphantly in Uncle Arturo’s rocking chair, winning the game, Mom laughing, Dad winking, Lizzy bursting into floods of tears. A blink and the years are gone like playing cards. And Cuba’s gone and I’m in the dream
world, America, opposite an elderly man in an unnamed hamlet outside a mountain town in Colorado and Dad’s dead and Ricky’s gay and Mom’s got pre-Alzheimer’s and I haven’t spoken to Lizzy or Esme or Uncle Arturo for a decade.

“Well,” the man says. “What can I do ye for?”

“Pardon?”

“What can I do ye for?”

“I have come about your advertisement in the newspaper.”

“What ad?”

“For the guns.”

“I can detect by your accent that you ain’t from around these parts.”

“No.”

His eyes twinkle. “Well, I have to tell you, ma’am, that in general this here thing with the knife and the handcuffs is not how you’re supposed to respond to a small ad in the newspaper.”

“I need the handgun,” I tell him.

He nods, scratches his nose. “Why is that? If you don’t mind me asking,” he says.

“I need it for protection and I don’t have enough money to buy one downtown.”

He clears his throat. “Ok. Just let me get this straight. You think someone’s trying to harm you and you want to get a gun to protect yourself, but you don’t have much money, so you thought you’d break into my house and steal one of my weapons?”

“Yes.”

He thinks for a second and nods. “Well, ma’am, if you’re willing to take a risk like that then I reckon you’re in a heap of trouble, all right.”

I nod in agreement.

“I got two daughters myself. Both in California.”

“Hmmm.”

“Two daughters, four grandchildren. All girls. Not a boy among them. Don’t get me wrong. I ain’t complaining. Thank the Lord they is all healthy.”

“Mister, uh . . .”

“Oh, you can call me Jonesy, everyone pretty much calls me Jonesy. And I won’t take it as a sign of disrespect if you don’t want to tell me your name considering the circumstances.”

“Thank you, sir,” I say.

A pause and then a look of cunning. “Well now, missy, how much money you got?” he asks.

“About ninety dollars.”

“Ninety bucks? My oh my. You’re right about that. That ain’t a whole lot of nothing these days. Well, I know you’ve kind of got me over a barrel here, but I’d be very reluctant to part with that brand-new Smith & Wesson nine-millimeter for less than a hundred dollars, no matter how I come to it, but I’ve got some older models you might wanna use for personal protection. Good guns. Stop any ex-boyfriend, ex-husband, that kind of thing. Stop a bull elephant if you was close enough. Lessen you is set on the M and P.”

“I don’t care what the gun is as long as it works.”

He smiles. “Yup, that’s what I reckoned. Well, if you’ll open that red cupboard over there. The key is on top of the TV.”

I find the key and open the cupboard. Half a dozen hunting rifles and a drawer full of revolvers and semiautomatic pistols. Many more guns than he needs for personal protection. Obviously a dealer or a collector of some kind.

I look back to check that he’s still sitting. He hasn’t stirred.

“Ok. You want an M and P? Good choice, by the way. The new one is over on the left-hand side but I got one with a little bit of scoring on the handle, very similar gun, 1997, shoots real good, just under the—”

“I see it,” I say, pulling it out. Looks perfect, not heavy. The grip a little big for me, but not too unwieldy.

“You like it?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Excellent, ninety bucks even for her and no questions asked. She’s a beaut, shot her myself behind the old homestead here. Fires pretty steady up to fifty feet.”

“I’ll take it.” To prove my honesty I remove four twenties and other bills from my pocket and hand them to him. He grins, showing a couple of missing teeth, the first American I’ve seen with that very Cuban look.

“Tell you what, let’s call it seventy. Can’t say fairer than that. That’s a good gun. Serial number filed—not by me, I don’t do that kind of thing. Not my line. Serial number’s gone but it wouldn’t be fair dealing if I didn’t tell you that in the Salt Lake City police department there’s a ballistics report saying
that there handgun was used in an armed robbery. Smart cop might be able to trace it back. You shoot that ex-boyfriend of your’n and they’ll have you for armed robbery too. And of course, if you ever brought up my name I’d deny everything.”

“I understand.”

“Good, good. Well, we’re almost done here, I reckon.”

“We are done, thank you.”

“Don’t go running off now just yet. You and me got off to a rocky start, but ain’t that the way sometimes? We’re fast friends now.”

“I’ve got what I came for.”

“Wait a minute, you’re going to need something from me and I’m gonna need something from you.”

Suspicion makes me frown under the ski mask.

“What do I need from you?”

“Don’t you want some shells?”

For a second I don’t understand what he’s talking about. Why would I want shells?

“Ammo,” he clarifies.

“Yes, of course.”

“Fair trade, I’ll give you enough for a clip. Gratis. But you gotta remove these here handcuffs. There’s no way I can tell any of the neighbors around here to cut ’em off. Laugh themselves silly. And as for calling Sheriff Briggs, forget it.”

“What are you saying?” I ask him.

“Bottom drawer of the cupboard. Standard nine-millimeter rounds. I want you to load your clip and when you’re done, throw me that handcuff key. I’ll uncuff myself, you’ll take your gun. You go out the way you came in and we’ll say no more about it.”

“Sounds reasonable, as long as the ammo isn’t dud.”

“It’s good stuff. A-grade. Dry as a hornet’s nest.”

I find the ammo box and load eight rounds into the clip. The spring has a little more give than I would like but it’s not bad for an older weapon.

I throw him the handcuff key. He fumbles with it but eventually uncuffs himself. I take the cuffs and key and put them in my pocket.

“What now?” I wonder.

“There is no
what now,
” he says. “What now is you going and me staying and us never meeting again.”

He sits in his chair and picks up the beer can. He hits the remote and the TV comes to life.

I walk into the kitchen and slip out the back door and down the yard.

I’m half expecting a shotgun blast tearing up the air around me, but nothing happens.

I dart into the woods and take off the ski mask.

No one follows me on the road back to town and everything’s real smooth until Sheriff Briggs in his black Escalade pulls in beside me.

Bad judge of character—I didn’t figure the old man for someone who would call the cops.

Briggs leans out the window. “Aren’t you one of Esteban’s . . . Wait a minute, I know you. I got you myself, day before yesterday. What the hell are you doing down here?”

No, Mr. Jones isn’t a
chivato,
this is just the Mercado luck.

Briggs handbrakes the car and takes off his aviator sunglasses.

Looks at me. I look at him.

A spark.

That man and I know each other. In other lives or other universes our paths have crossed. We’re right to be wary.

Let me see you, Sheriff. Let me really see you.

Skin the tone of a throat-cut murder victim. Eyes the blue ice of an alien moon.

“Asked you a question.”

No muscle in his face moves when he speaks, his voice slipping between his thin lips like one of Mother’s voodoo spirits.

“I must have gotten lost, sir,” I say in Spanish.

“Lost? Christ on a bike, your people managed to fucking walk here from Siberia and you can’t find your way around a town with half a dozen streets?”

“I took a wrong turn,” I suggest.

After this remark, which seems to highlight a prima facie case of falsehood, he hesitates for a moment and then pulls out a packet of cigarettes.

Something’s up, something’s not quite right.

“Lost, eh?” he repeats.

“
Sí, señor.
”

“Gonna tell you one more time, cut out the Mex.”

“Yes, sir.”

He opens the car door and gets out. “Gonna search you, sister. If you got any large sums of money on you, you and Esteban are in for the fucking high jump. I don’t care if the INS is fucking with the program, I’m not that desperate. I run this town, not him, get me?”

“Yes, sir, but I have no money, sir.”

Just a ski mask, a gun, a fucking sledgehammer.

“I’ll be the judge of that. Take off the pack.”

I let it drop. Gently.

Towering over me, he pats me down, his big horrendous paws touching my sides and ass. He looks inside my shoes and pulls my sweater forward to look down my bra.

“What’s in the backpack?”

Lies. Lies that won’t get believed.

Here it comes—

The big paws pummeling me. Smashing down and down. Blood pouring from my nose and mouth. From my eyes. Drowning in blood. Screaming nerve endings. Pain. Mercy shot to the head. Shallow grave in the woods. A missing Mex. The world doesn’t hesitate on its ellipse.

“Fucking deaf? What’s in the backpack?”

“Cleaning supplies.”

“Open it up.”

The radio crackles inside the SUV.

“Sheriff?”

Briggs reaches through the window and grabs the mike. “This is Briggs.”

“Sheriff, we got a twenty-two on the Interstate. Messy one.”

“Shit. Deaths?”

“I don’t know, Sheriff, at least three vehicles. One of them’s on fire, so I reckon Channel Nine will send up the chopper.”

“I’ll be right over,” Briggs says and gets back in the Escalade.

“Mex town is at the top of the hill and turn left,” he says.

“Thank you,
señor
.”

“And don’t let me catch you in this neighborhood again. Decent folks along here.”

“No, sir.”

He starts the engine, drives off.

When the SUV disappears over the brow of the next hill my body wilts.

Relief. Exhaustion.

I sit down on the grass verge. December in Colorado, but the sun is shining and it’s warm—not Havana warm, not hot enough to melt that lake in Wyoming; but a dry, wearisome mountain heat.

Get up. Hoof it.

After a klick I find a sign on a forest trail that says
ROAD CLOSED—SUBSIDENCE DANGER
. That might come in handy. I roll up the sign, put it in my backpack. As I’m zipping another car slows and a voice says, “Me to the rescue. Need a ride?”

T
he white Bentley, Jack leaning his head out the passenger’s-side window.

“Yes, please,” I replied, and once again I was annoyed that I wasn’t wearing lipstick or looking my best.

“Get in. Ever been in a Bentley before?”

“No.”

“Get in, get in. I’ll put the top down. You can’t put the top down without a beautiful girl next to you, it’s obligatory, says it right there in the owner’s manual.”

I sat in the passenger’s seat. He pressed a button and the roof slid back. The Bentley accelerated away from the curb with a feline roar.

“I’m probably the oldest ‘girl’ you’ve had in this car.”

“How old are you?”

I gave him what I hoped was an ironic look.

“Yeah, I know, not the sort of question you’re supposed to ask. Tip—don’t ask actors, either.”