The Deader the Better (12 page)

“Somebody local?”

“Fella named J.D. Springer.”

His eyes checked the immediate area. He leaned over, his face in
mine.

“I’ll tell you, mister,” he said in a low growl. “I don’t
have much of a stake in it one way or the other. I don’t fish, and
I never met this Springer guy.” A bell rang down by the food
service window. He straightened up, checked the shelf and then leaned
back over. “But I’m tellin’ you, lotta people around here got
strong feelings regarding this Springer guy. Real strong.”

“So it seems.”

“If I were you, I’d keep his name under my hat.”

He straightened up. “Thanks for the advice,” I said as he
walked off.

I turned my stool around and nursed a beer while I waited for the
burger. About a dozen state highway workers in their orange overalls
had pushed three tables together over by the ladies’ room. They
were beginning to clean up after themselves, so lunch break must be
just about over. A pair of heavyset women wearing black stretch pants
and voluminous flowered blouses played pool at the center table.
After each missed a shot, they heckled each other in shrill voices.
The older woman drew back a large loose arm and sent the cue ball
rocketing the length of the table. Missed.

“Too hard,” the younger one squeaked.

“Ain’t no such thing, honey,” trilled the other. Their
laughter could only be heard by dogs. The action was over in the far
corner, where a game of partners for pitchers had drawn a crowd.
Maybe a dozen. Twice as many men as women. Half as many tattoos as
teeth. A skinny guy in a Megadeth T-shirt stalked the table looking
for a shot. He’d just called and made a long rail shot but had left
himself stymied behind a trio of stripes. His partner was trying to
get him to play safe, but Megaman just kept chalking his cue and
circling the table. They were paired against a pair of brothers.
Twins. Every Anglo-Saxon mother’s bullet-headed sons. They were
under six feet, but thick all over, with mean little eyes and the
kind of Popeye forearms you get from repetitive manual labor. If the
mill were still open, I’d have bet they pulled green chain—and it
doesn’t get worse than that.

“You gonna shoot or what, man?” the nearest twin demanded.
Megaman curled his lip and said, “When I’m ready, man. When I’m
ready.”

“I come over there, you’ll be ready.”

A couple of uneasy giggles rose from the spectators.

“Take it easy, Dexter,” his brother said. The counter over by
Megaman’s partner held four pitchers of beer, three of them full.
The brothers were nursing foam. Megaman called a bank shot. “Six
ball in the corner, cue ball off the rail.” He sighted down the cue
and rolled the ball slowly toward the other end of the table, where
it eased behind the twelve ball, which seemed to be blocking the
pocket, bounced softly off the cushion and deposited the six ball in
the corner pocket, leaving the cue ball positioned so that the eight
was child’s play. The crowd stomped and whistled. “Bad hit,”
Dexter said.

“What?” yelled Megaman’s partner.

“You heard me. It hit the twelve. I seen it.”

“Bullshit,” said Megaman, lining up the eight ball. Dexter
stepped over and jerked the cue from his hands.

“It’s Mickey’s shot.”

“Cut it out, Dex,” his brother said.

Megaman must have seen the act before, because he got his hands
out of the way before Dexter slammed the cue back down on the table,
shattering it, sending shards of wood flying in all directions. The
crowd covered their beers and ducked their heads.

From behind the bar, a shout. “Goddammit, Dexter, quit it.”

“I’m tellin’ ya,” he persisted. “I seen it.”

When the crowd hooted him down, Dexter moved several paces from
the table and stood there tapping the bottom of his cue on the floor,
talking to himself under his breath. Megaman picked the splinters
from the table, got another cue from the wall and made the eight ball
in the corner. The applause was spotty.

“Make these two Rainier,” crowed the partner. Mickey bumped
himself off the wall and walked over to Dexter. Dexter’s cheeks
were cherry red. They huddled and swapped money. Dexter leaned his
stick against the wall and headed to the bar for beer. The brother
fished in his pockets for quarters and then went over to rack the
balls. When Mickey stepped out of the way, for the first time I saw
the counter against the back wall. Standing there, with a burger in
one hand and a paper cup in the other, was the weasel from the gas
station. Linc, as I recalled. I looked down the bar to the serving
window. My burger was nowhere in sight, so I grabbed my beer and
walked across the room.

“Hey, Linc,” I said. “Remember me?”

He stopped midchew. “Can’t say as I do,” he said.

“Remember, I stopped in a couple of months ago and asked you how
to get over the river so I could visit the Springers. You told me
there wasn’t anything over there.”

“I might recall,” he hedged.

I heard the slide go in and then the unmistakable sound of pool
balls dropping and then rolling and finally being racked.

“Mind if I ask you a few questions?”

He waved the burger. “I got to get back to the—”

“Mr. Springer buy that gas from you?”

“Wha—”

“You remember Mr. Springer, don’t you? Guy that bought the
Bendixon place. Died in that car accident on West River a couple of
weeks ago.”

He took a sip of his drink. “What gas would that be?”

“The gas he was carrying in the car with him.”

“Why’d you think a thing like that? Like I sold it to ’im.”

“As far as I can tell, you’re the only gas station in town.
Kinda figures if he bought gas, he must have bought it from you.” I
took a chance. “Could be I misunderstood Sheriff Hand.”

You could practically see the gears turning in his narrow head.

“Sheriff Hand says I sold it to ’im, then I musta,” he said.

“So then—” I started.

From behind me: “What about that Springer asshole?”

Dexter.

I ignored him. “He get the cans from you, too?” I asked. A
hand dug into my shoulder. I grabbed it by the wrist, took it off and
turned to face him. He had his nose stuck in my throat. “I asked
you a question,” he said.

“This is a private conversation.”

His brother: “Dex…cut it out.”

I looked back over my left shoulder. Linc was missing. The bar was
about half as noisy as it was a minute ago.

“Dexter, goddammit,” yelled the bartender.

“You a friend of that Springer asshole?” He wasn’t talking
to me anymore; he was talking to the bar. We were having an E. F.
Hutton moment.

“As a matter of fact, I am,” I said with a smile. It wasn’t
the answer he expected. I was supposed to wheedle. Not be standing
there looking down at him grinning.

“Well…you the only one,” he said. He thought it was a great
punch line and looked around the bar for a laugh. Silence. I raised
my voice. “He had another friend in town.”

Dexter played to the crowd. “Yeah, who’s that?” he demanded.

“Probably shouldn’t count her, though,” I went on, “’cause,
you know”—I gave him a filthy wink—“she’s everybody’s
friend, if you know what I mean.”

I had him going now. “Yeah, who’s that?”

“Your mother,” I said.

His brother stopped fiddling with the rack and stood up straight.
Deep-space silence, then somebody coughed. In my peripheral vision, I
was aware of people clearing the area. He grinned and made like he
was going to turn away and say something to his brother. “Hey,
Mickey,” he yelled. “Did you hear—”

I kept my eyes on his hands. When he shifted his grip on the cue
stick, I started to move. He brought the cue straight over the top
like I was a nail and he was going to drive me into the floor. I
ducked down, took two strides forward and brought my head up between
his descending arms, using the power of my legs to drive the top of
my head into his chin. I heard his jaw snap shut, heard the cue
shatter somewhere behind me and then felt the sharp pain at the top
of my head. I kept my head wedged under his chin and my legs driving
until he went over backward onto the floor, with me on top of him.

After that, it was standard barroom brawl. Within five seconds,
ten people were piled on top of Dexter and me. On the way down, I’d
gotten my right hand up under his chin and was still pushing for all
I was worth. Other than that, neither of us could move a muscle.
Dexter was whimpering and making gargling noises. The air was filled
with shouts and screams and curses. I kept trying to bench-press
Dexter’s lower jaw.

After a while, the pile began to lighten and then suddenly strong
hands had me by the ankles, dragging me from the writhing mass of
humanity. I came out rolling, shielding my head, ready to fight, but
it was the bartender. I showed him my palms, got to my feet and
backed over against the wall. He stood there facing me, making sure I
wasn’t going to start again. “What did I tell you?” he said.
“Didn’t I just tell you?”

“That cheeseburger ready yet?” I asked.

He couldn’t help it; he smiled.

Dexter was still down. Several people knelt at his sides. I
couldn’t see the top half of him, but his legs moved on the floor
like he was marching in place. He seemed to be mumbling something.
The waitress trotted down from the kitchen with a white towel. Mickey
was yelling at one of the spectators, a heavyset girl with braces on
her teeth.

“Well, get a dish or something, goddammit,” he yelled. She
scrunched up her face. “I’m not touchin’ that thing.”

He tried to backhand her, but she saw it coming and rolled out of
range.

“Get it,” he bellowed.

The waitress accompanied the girl up toward the kitchen. Mickey
got to his feet. He had blood on his hands. “You son of a bitch,”
he growled at me.

The bartender moved his way, keeping his bulk between us.

“You best be getting Dexter to the clinic,” he said. Mickey
leaned out around him. “I’m gonna find you,” he said. “Soon
as I take care a my brother. Don’t think I won’t.”

A rough voice said, “You’re dead, motherfucker.”

The girl came trotting back, carrying a small white dish. Mickey
jerked the dish from her hands and knelt by his brother. Megaman
pulled several napkins from a dispenser and handed them down. The
bartender wandered back my way.

“Bit off the end of his tongue,” he said. When they helped him
to his feet, Dexter made a noise like he was gargling oatmeal. His
eyes were squeezed shut. He held the towel to his mouth with both
hands and seemed to be humming something through his nose as half a
dozen men got him moving toward the door. His legs were bent. His
toes dragged on the floor.

Mickey pulled their jackets from the pegs by the pool table and
started after them. As he mounted the pair of stairs, he pointed back
my way. “We’re comin’ for you,” he shouted. Halfway to the
door, he stopped and turned back toward the girl, who stood
stupefied, her back to the wall, holding the dish out at arm’s
length like she had a weasel in a bag.

“Come on, Melody,” he screamed. “Hustle it up.”

Melody took two steps in his direction and turned back my way with
a malevolent gleam in her eyes. She dropped the dish to waist level
and tilted it toward me. The little plate was bloody around the rim.
At the bottom rested what looked like a piece of raw beef liver about
the size of my thumbnail. She grinned a dull metal grin and started
for the stairs, holding the dish high, like a waiter with a tray.
When the door banged shut behind her, people started moving. The air
was filled with excited conversation and the sound of scraping
chairs. The road crew paid up and filed out. The women went back to
playing pool. The jukebox started again. Jim Croce. “Time in a
Bottle.” I headed for the bar.

Amazing what spilling a little blood will do. Ten minutes ago,
when I’d ordered the cheeseburger, I’d barely had room to sit on
the stool. All of a sudden, I had the whole center of the bar to
myself. Except for the woman in the wig. She’d waited for me.

“They say you’re a friend of that Springer fella.”

“Yes ma’am.”

She chewed a couple of times. “He’s no damn good,” she said.

“He’s dead.”

She grabbed a package of Kents and a Zippo lighter from the bar.

“Any man cheat an old man like Ben…” She stopped and chewed
some more. “No damn good,” she repeated before she waddled off.

The burger wasn’t bad. A bit on the cold side, but I was hardly
in a position to complain. About halfway through, the bartender
slapped a fresh Bud down in front of me. “Slick move,” he said.

“I was lucky,” I said.

“Bullshit,” he said. “Luck had nothing to do with that.”

When the door opened, every head in the place swiveled. Who could
blame them? These days you can’t pick a fight with a
twelve-year-old altar boy for fear he’s got an AK- in his backpack.
You could almost hear the collective sigh of relief when it turned
out to be a woman of about forty. Stunning. Short curly hair worn
close to her head. Tall as Rebecca but not as willowy. Put together
more like one of those old- time pinup girls from the fifties and
sixties.
Lush
would be the word. A Vargas girl.

“Hiya, Glen,” she said to the bartender. Glen sucked in his
gut and walked her way. “Hi, Ramona, how’s it going?”

he said in a voice two octaves lower than the one he’d been
using on me.

“Got your ad ready?”

He reached under the bar and produced a videotape in a black
plastic case.

“Right here,” he said.

“What’s the posse doing outside?” she asked. He didn’t
answer. Instead he walked past her, lifted the gate and let himself
out from behind the bar. He had everyone’s attention as he opened
the door and stepped outside.

“Can I get you something, Miss Haynes?” the waitress inquired.