Spree (5 page)

“I don’t see your daddy,” the fat man said. Lyle felt the fat man hadn’t yet figured out what was going on; but of course he had, miles and miles ago.

“He’s waiting over there,” Lyle said, and pointed to the wooded area across from them; the bluff had given way to an area that seemed almost scooped out of the ground, thick with brush and trees.

“That’s a funny place to wait,” the fat man said, and something in his pocket exploded.

The bullet whizzed past Lyle but didn’t touch either him or his cherry-red Camaro. Lyle’s reflexes were the fastest thing about him, and he fired the .38 at the fat man, hitting him in the shoulder, on the same side as the torn smoking parka pocket. The sound of Lyle’s gun was a crack in the night, which echoed briefly before the howl of the wind—and the howl of the fat man—took its place.

Leo Corliss fell to his knees; the ground didn’t shake, and Lyle wondered why. The fat man’s pumpkin head was lowered. His eyes were squeezed tight and he clutched his shot-up shoulder, getting blood on his hand and smearing it on the parka.

“You have a gun in your pocket,” Lyle said, figuring it out.

“You are one fucking rocket scientist, aren’t you? You autistic son of a bitch . . .”

Lyle didn’t know what being artistic had to do with anything, but he walked over there and pulled the hot weapon, a little .22, a baby gun for such a fat hand, out of the shredded parka pocket, and tossed it, tossed it hard. It splashed into the river; it reminded Lyle of a bar of soap plunking in a tub of water.

“Get up, Mr. Corliss.”

Lyle helped him, pulling on the side of the good shoulder.

When the fat man got on his feet, he pushed Lyle and Lyle went down on the grass, on his butt, kind of hard. The fat man was waddling in the moonlight, trying to run, heading for the Camaro. Lyle shot the gun in the air.

The fat man stopped.

Then he turned and he spread his hands, one of them bloody, from his shoulder. “Why, Lyle? Why?”

“Pa’s getting out of the food stamp business.”

The man’s eyes were round and yellow. “So you’re going to kill me?”

“When Pa gets out of something, he gets out all the way. He don’t leave no trail.”

“What, killing people leaves no trail? Are you crazy as well as stupid?”

“I’m not stupid, Mr. Corliss,” Lyle said. Thinking, he added, “Or crazy neither.”

“You don’t want to kill me, do you?”

“No, sir. Not particularly.”

“I have money. You saw that money, back at my bar. I can give you that. I can give you more.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You can get out from under your daddy’s thumb. A good-looking boy like you should be out in the world, making a life for himself. Not, not living at home with your old man.”

“Pa’s good to me.”

“I’m sure he is, but you got to be your own man, Lyle. Now, put that away, and let’s get in the car.”

“You’d bleed on my ’polstery.”

“No, no I wouldn’t do a thing like that. We’ll, we’ll use my coat, we’ll tear my shirt, we’ll stop up the wound. Take me back where I can get some medical help and I’ll make you a very rich kid.”

“No. I do what my daddy tells me.”

“This is crazy! How many people does your daddy expect you to kill?”

“You’re the last. You’re six.”

The fat man’s mouth was open; he couldn’t seem to think of anything to say to that.

Finally he did: “Over fucking food stamps?”

“My pa takes precautions. Step across the road, Mr. Corliss.”

The wind sounded like a sick animal, crying down a canyon.

The fat man looked determined all of a sudden. Proud, sort of. “No. You do it right here.”

Lyle walked over to him and pointed the gun at him and said, “Turn around then, Mr. Corliss.”

“Fuck you.”

“Turn around.”

Slowly, he did. He was trembling. His jowls were like fleshy Jell-O.

Lyle pistol-whipped him and he went down with a whump. Lyle waited for a moment, listening for cars, didn’t hear any, and dragged the fat man across the road, by the feet, like the carcass of some dead animal, which essentially it was. A slimy trail of blood was left behind, but Lyle figured that wouldn’t last. Traffic and weather would take care of it. That was about as smart as Lyle got, incidentally.

Pulling him through the grass and into the brush and trees was harder than across the mostly smooth highway. Lyle was only sixty yards or so into the woods when he dumped the body. He was out of breath, even though he stayed in shape. Mr. Corliss was real heavy. He thought about pistol-whipping him again, but figured the fat man would stay unconscious long enough for Lyle to go back and get what he needed.

He was right. The fat man was still out when Lyle came back and put on the yellow rubber dish-washing gloves and cut Corliss’ throat with the hunting knife. Lyle was proud of himself. He didn’t get blood anywhere but the ground and the gloves. He’d also brought the shovel, from the Camaro’s trunk, with him. It was hard digging in this cold ground, which had a lot of roots in it. And the hole had to be plenty big, for Mr. Corliss to fit in.

But the fat man did fit. Barely. Lyle kicked him, hard, really having to shove with his foot, to make him tumble into the grave. It was only four feet deep, but he just couldn’t dig any deeper. He poured some quicklime over the bulging body. That would help keep animals away, Pa said. Then he filled the grave in. Patted it down. Found some leaves and things and covered it over. It looked pretty natural when he got done. Lyle smiled to himself.
Maybe I am artistic,
he thought.

Lyle washed up at the Riverview—he really was staying at that particular motel, not having the imagination to lie about it, although his pa was not along (saying so had been Pa’s idea)—and changed his clothes. Just for the hell of it, he decided to drive through the Cities, before catching the Interstate. The night was young —maybe some night spot would catch his eye. Just before he reached the Interstate, one did. Nolan’s.

4

THE NEXT DAY,
Sunday, in the afternoon, in Des Moines, Iowa, Nolan’s frequent accomplice Jon—who, like Nolan, had gone straight—stepped in shit.

The shit, dog shit to be exact, a pile of it on the sidewalk just outside the New Wax record shop on University Avenue near Drake University campus, was just the beginning. And Jon, who had sensed storm clouds gathering in his life for weeks now, knew the dog shit for the omen it was. He rubbed the sole of his right tennie onto the curb and went in the door next to the record shop, over which he and Toni shared an apartment.

He and Toni were friends; they slept in separate beds, in separate rooms, though on occasion they made love. Once or twice a week. They met through rock ’n’ roll—playing in a band together—and had been lovers at first, settled into being friends and, now, lived together. But it wasn’t love. Jon wasn’t sure what it was, but it wasn’t love.

Jon was returning after two less than exciting days in Cedar Rapids, where he’d been a guest at a comics convention, that is, an organized gathering of comic-book fans. As a kid, Jon had been a comic-book fan himself—Batman, Superman and Spider-Man had been his best friends in a childhood that had buffeted him from one relative to another while his “chanteuse” mother traveled, playing the Holiday/Ramada Inn circuit—and, as long as he could remember, he’d wanted to be a cartoonist when he grew up. Now he was grown up, more or less, and was the creator of an offbeat comic book,
Space Pirates
, a science-fiction spoof, not a blockbuster bestseller, but a cult item that was making him a modest living. An honest living—unlike those brief, volatile days when he and Nolan had . . . well, that was behind him.

He was short but had a bodybuilder’s build, which made sense, because he worked out three times weekly at a health spa, and had lifted weights and such since high school, where he’d been a wrestling champ. His hair was short and blond, a curly skullcap, and he had a wisp of a mustache. On this crisp winter day, he wore chinos and a long blue navy-color coat with a big collar, a military-looking coat which he had, in fact, purchased at an army-navy surplus store. Under the coat he wore a short-sleeved T-shirt, despite the time of year; on it was one of his own drawings, as the T-shirt was quite literally the first merchandising spin-off from
Space Pirates’
cultish success: Captain Bob, the klutzy hero of his book, posed with a clunky ray gun in one hand and a bosomy alien broad in the other. He wore no gloves (Jon didn’t—neither did Captain Bob, for that matter).

It was only one floor up, the only apartment up there, and the door was unlocked, which made Jon grimace. His drawing board was set up in the living room, near the stereo and nineteen-inch Sony TV. It was a spacious flat, drywall walls painted a pale green and decorated with huge posters, promo stuff from the record shop, where Toni worked during the week, when they weren’t out on the road with a band, which they hadn’t been for several months now. Gigantic Elvis Costello and Blondie and Devo and Oingo Boingo and Kate Bush faces stared from the walls. Blondie was old history, now, but Toni’s vague resemblance to Debbie Harry kept the defunct group hanging on, at least on the apartment walls.

Toni had been the lead singer of a group called Dagwood, several years ago, a mock-Blondie group formed out of the remnants of Smooch, a mock-Kiss group; like the various imitation Beatles bands—a number of which were still around—such groups could turn a steady buck on the Midwest club circuit. For six months Toni had done nothing in life but imitate Debbie Harry; even now she still admired the singer, and her own style remained heavily influenced thereby.

Jon knew that Toni had the talent to go far. She had looks and brains and drive, too. She was twenty-three, a year younger than Jon, and was in her bedroom packing her suitcase. That was the other thing she needed, to go far: a suitcase.

She was packing stage clothes—sexy lacy gypsy-looking things she ordered from Betsey Johnson’s in New York City. Right now she was in jeans and a Bruce Springsteen sweatshirt, a small woman with zoftig curves and dark spiky Pat Benatar hair.

“I was going to complain about you leaving the door unlocked again,” Jon said, the words sounding empty to him.

“You still think your wicked past may catch up with you someday,” she said, not looking at him.

Jon sat on the bed. “It might. I made enemies.”

She looked up from her packing and gave him a condescending smile. “Don’t go all macho and mysterious on me, or I may just faint. Or puke.”

“What are you mad about?”

“Who said anything about being mad? Look out.” She was moving past him, toward the closet, where she was getting more of her stage clothing, Cyndi Lauper-type apparel, but sexier.

“You seem to be packing.”

“You are one observant little man, aren’t you?”

“Any special reason?”

“I’m leaving. Going.”

“Where?”

“Minneapolis.”

“And do what? Go down on Prince?”

She gave him a cold look. “I got a new gig lined up.”

“What about our new band?”

They’d been rehearsing for about a month with a drummer and a guitar player, both of them college kids from Drake. Toni sang, of course, Jon played keyboards, switching off between an old Vox Continental organ and a Roland synthesizer.