No Country for Old Men

Pot metal?

  What did I say?

  Were you in Nam?

  Yeah. I was in Nam.

  So was I.

  So what does that make me? Your buddy?

  I was in special forces.

  I think you have me confused with somebody who gives a shit what you were in.

  I was a lieutenant colonel.

  Bullshit.

  I dont think so.

  And what do you do now.

  I find people. Settle accounts. That sort of thing.

  You're a hit man.

  Wells smiled. A hit man.

  Whatever you call it.

  The sort of people I contract with like to keep a low profile. They dont like to get involved in things that draw attention. They dont like things in the paper.

  I'll bet.

  This isnt going to go away. Even if you got lucky and took out one or two people--which is unlikely--they'd just send someone else. Nothing would change. They'll still find you. There's nowhere to go. You can add to your troubles the fact that the people who were delivering the product dont have that either. So guess who they're looking at? Not to mention the DEA and various other law enforcement agencies. Everybody's list has got the same name on it. And it's the only name on it. You need to throw me a bone. I dont really have any reason to protect you.

  Are you afraid of this guy?

  Wells shrugged. Wary is the word I'd use.

  You didnt mention Bell.

  Bell. All right?

  I take it you dont think much of him.

  I dont think of him at all. He's a redneck sheriff in a hick town in a hick county. In a hick state. Let me get the nurse. You're not very comfortable. This is my number. I want you to think it over. What we talked about.

  He stood and put a card on the table next to the flowers. He looked at Moss. You think you wont call me but you will. Just dont wait too long. That money belongs to my client. Chigurh is an outlaw. Time's not on your side. We can even let you keep some of it. But if I have to recover the funds from Chigurh then it will be too late for you. Not to mention your wife.

  Moss didnt answer.

  All right. You might want to call her. When I talked to her she sounded pretty worried.

  When he was gone Moss turned up the photographs lying on the bed. Like a player checking his hole cards. He looked at the pitcher of water but then the nurse came in.

  VI

  Young people anymore they seem to have a hard time growin up. I dont know why. Maybe it's just that you dont grow up any faster than what you have to. I had a cousin was a deputized peace officer when he was eighteen. He was married and had a kid at the time. I had a friend that I grew up with was a ordained Baptist preacher at the same age. Pastor of a little old country church. He left there to go to Lubbock after about three years and when he told em he was leavin they just set there in that church and blubbered. Men and women alike. He'd married em and baptized em and buried em. He was twenty-one years old, maybe twenty-two. When he preached they'd be standin out in the yard listenin. It surprised me. He was always quiet in school. I was twenty-one when I went in the army and I was one of the oldest in our class at boot camp. Six months later I was in France shootin people with a rifle. I didnt even think it was all that peculiar at the time. Four years later I was sheriff of this county. I never doubted but what I was supposed to be neither. People anymore you talk about right and wrong they're liable to smile at you. But I never had a lot of doubts about things like that. In my thoughts about things like that. I hope I never do.

  Loretta told me that she had heard on the radio about some percentage of the children in this country bein raised by their grandparents. I forget what it was. Pretty high, I thought. Parents wouldnt raise em. We talked about that. What we thought was that when the next generation come along and they dont want to raise their children neither then who is goin to do it? Their own parents will be the only grandparents around and they wouldnt even raise them. We didnt have a answer about that. On my better days I think that there is somethin I dont know or there is somethin that I'm leavin out. But them times are seldom. I wake up sometimes way in the night and I know as certain as death that there aint nothin short of the second comin of Christ that can slow this train. I dont know what is the use of me layin awake over it. But I do.

  I dont believe you could do this job without a wife. A pretty unusual wife at that. Cook and jailer and I dont know what all. Them boys dont know how good they've got it. Well, maybe they do. I never worried about her bein safe. They get fresh garden stuff a good part of the year. Good cornbread. Soupbeans. She's been known to fix em hamburgers and french fries. We've had em to come back even years later and they'd be married and doin good. Bring their wives. Bring their kids even. They didnt come back to see me. I've seen em to introduce their wives or their sweethearts and then just go to bawlin. Grown men. That had done some pretty bad things. She knew what she was doin. She always did. So we go over budget on the jail ever month but what are you goin to do about that? You aint goin to do nothin about it. That's what you're goin to do.

  Chigurh pulled off of the highway at the junction of 131 and opened the telephone directory in his lap and folded over the bloodstained pages till he got to veterinarian. There was a clinic outside Bracketville about thirty minutes away. He looked at the towel around his leg. It was soaked through with blood and blood had soaked into the seat. He threw the directory in the floor and sat with his hands at the top of the steering wheel. He sat there for about three minutes. Then he put the vehicle in gear and pulled out onto the highway again.

  He drove to the crossroads at La Pryor and took the road north to Uvalde. His leg was throbbing like a pump. On the highway outside of Uvalde he pulled up in front of the Cooperative and undid the sashcord from around his leg and pulled away the towel. Then he got out and hobbled in.

  He bought a sack full of veterinary supplies. Cotton and tape and gauze. A bulb syringe and a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. A pair of forceps. Scissors. Some packets of four inch swabs and a quart bottle of Betadine. He paid and went out and got in the Ramcharger and started the engine and then sat watching the building in the rearview mirror. As if he might be thinking of something else he needed, but that wasnt it. He put his fingers inside the cuff of his shirt and carefully blotted the sweat from his eyes. Then he put the vehicle in gear and backed out of the parking space and pulled out onto the highway headed toward town.

  He drove down Main Street and turned north on Getty and east again on Nopal where he parked and shut off the engine. His leg was still bleeding. He got the scissors from the bag and the tape and he cut a three inch round disc out of the cardboard box that held the cotton. He put that together with the tape into his shirtpocket. He took a coathanger from the floor behind the seat and twisted the ends off and straightened it out. Then he leaned and opened his bag and took out a shirt and cut off one sleeve with the scissors and folded it and put it in his pocket and put the scissors back in the paper bag from the Cooperative and opened the door and eased himself down, lifting his injured leg out with both hands under his knee. He stood there, holding on to the door. Then he bent over with his head to his chest and stood that way for the better part of a minute. Then he raised up and shut the door and started down the street.

  Outside the drugstore on Main he stopped and turned and leaned against a car parked there. He checked the street. No one coming. He unscrewed the gascap at his elbow and hooked the shirtsleeve over the coathanger and ran it down into the tank and drew it out again. He taped the cardboard over the open gastank and balled the sleeve wet with gasoline over the top of it and taped it down and lit it and turned and limped into the drugstore. He was little more than half way down the aisle toward the pharmacy when the car outside exploded into flame taking out most of the glass in front of the store.

  He let himself in through the little gate and went down the pharmacist's aisles. He found a packet of syringes and a bottle of Hydrocodone tablets and he came back
up the aisle looking for penicillin. He couldnt find it but he found tetracycline and sulfa. He stuffed these things in his pocket and came out from behind the counter in the orange glow of the fire and went down the aisle and picked up a pair of aluminum crutches and pushed open the rear door and went hobbling out across the gravel parking lot behind the store. The alarm at the rear door went off but no one paid any attention and Chigurh never had even glanced toward the front of the store which was now in flames.

  He pulled into a motel outside of Hondo and got a room at the end of the building and walked in and set his bag on the bed. He shoved the pistol under the pillow and went in the bathroom with the bag from the Cooperative and dumped the contents out into the sink. He emptied his pockets and laid out everything on the counter--keys, billfold, the vials of antibiotic and the syringes. He sat on the edge of the tub and pulled off his boots and reached down and put the plug in the tub and turned on the tap. Then he undressed and eased himself into the tub while it filled.

  His leg was black and blue and swollen badly. It looked like a snakebite. He laved water over the wounds with a washcloth. He turned his leg in the water and studied the exit wound. Small pieces of cloth stuck to the tissue. The hole was big enough to put your thumb in.

  When he climbed out of the tub the water was a pale pink and the holes in his leg were still leaking a pale blood dilute with serum. He dropped his boots in the water and patted himself dry with the towel and sat on the toilet and took the bottle of Betadine and the packet of swabs from the sink. He tore open the packet with his teeth and unscrewed the bottle and tipped it slowly over the wounds. Then he set the bottle down and bent to work, picking out the bits of cloth, using the swabs and the forceps. He sat with the water running in the sink and rested. He held the tip of the forceps under the faucet and shook away the water and bent to his work again.

  When he was done he disinfected the wound a final time and tore open packets of four by fours and laid them over the holes in his leg and bound them with gauze off of a roll packaged for sheep and goats. Then he rose and filled the plastic tumbler on the sink counter with water and drank it. He filled it and drank twice more. Then he went back into the bedroom and stretched out on the bed with his leg propped on the pillows. Other than a light beading of sweat on his forehead there was little evidence that his labors had cost him anything at all.

  When he went back into the bathroom he stripped one of the syringes out of the plastic wrapper and sank the needle through the seal into the vial of tetracycline and drew the glass barrel full and held it to the light and pressed the plunger with his thumb until a small bead appeared at the tip of the needle. Then he snapped the syringe twice with his finger and bent and slid the needle into the quadriceps of his right leg and slowly depressed the plunger.

  He stayed in the motel for five days. Hobbling down to the cafe on the crutches for his meals and back again. He kept the television on and he sat up in the bed watching it and he never changed channels. He watched whatever came on. He watched soap operas and the news and talk shows. He changed the dressing twice a day and cleaned the wounds with epsom salt solution and took the antibiotics. When the maid came the first morning he went to the door and told her he did not need any service. Just towels and soap. He gave her ten dollars and she took the money and stood there uncertainly. He told her the same thing in spanish and she nodded and put the money in her apron and pushed her cart back up the walkway and he stood there and studied the cars in the parking lot and then shut the door.

  On the fifth night while he was sitting in the cafe two deputies from the Valdez County Sheriff's Office came in and sat down and removed their hats and put them in the empty chairs at either side and took the menus from the chrome holder and opened them. One of them looked at him. Chigurh watched it all without turning or looking. They spoke. Then the other one looked at him. Then the waitress came. He finished his coffee and rose and left the money on the table and walked out. He'd left the crutches in the room and he walked slowly and evenly along the walkway past the cafe window trying not to limp. He walked past his room to the end of the ramada and turned. He looked at the Ramcharger parked at the end of the lot. It could not be seen from the office or from the restaurant. He went back to the room and put his shavingkit and the pistol in his bag and walked out across the parking lot and got into the Ramcharger and started it and drove over the concrete divider into the parking lot of the electronics shop next door and out onto the highway.

  Wells stood on the bridge with the wind off the river tousling his thin and sandy hair. He turned and leaned against the fence and raised the small cheap camera he carried and took a picture of nothing in particular and lowered the camera again. He was standing where Moss had stood four nights ago. He studied the blood on the walk. Where it trailed off to nothing he stopped and stood with his arms folded and his chin in his hand. He didnt bother to take a picture. There was no one watching. He looked out downriver at the slow green water. He walked a dozen steps and came back. He stepped into the roadway and crossed to the other side. A truck passed. A light tremor in the superstructure. He went on along the walkway and then he stopped. Faint outline of a bootprint in blood. Fainter of another. He studied the chainlink fence to see if there might be blood on the wire. He took his handkerchief from his pocket and wet it with his tongue and passed it among the diamonds. He stood looking down at the river. A road down there along the American side. Between the road and the river a thick stand of carrizo cane. The cane lashed softly in the wind off the river. If he'd carried the money into Mexico it was gone. But he hadnt.

  Wells stood back and looked at the bootprints again. Some Mexicans were coming along the bridge with their baskets and dayparcels. He took out his camera and snapped a picture of the sky, the river, the world.

  Bell sat at the desk signing checks and totting up figures on a hand calculator. When he was done he leaned back in his chair and looked out the window at the bleak courthouse lawn. Molly, he said.

  She came and stood in the door.

  Did you find anything on any of those vehicles yet?

  Sheriff I found out everything there was to find. Those vehicles are titled and registered to deceased people. The owner of that Blazer died twenty years ago. Did you want me to see what I could find out about the mexican ones?

  No. Lord no. Here's your checks.

  She came in and took the big leatherette checkbook off his desk and put it under her arm. That DEA agent called again. You dont want to talk to him?

  I'm goin to try and keep from it as much as I can.

  He said he's goin back out there and he wanted to know if you wanted to go with him.

  Well that's cordial of him. I guess he can go wherever he wants. He's a certified agent of the United States Government.

  He wanted to know what you were goin to do with the vehicles.

  Yeah. I've got to try and sell them things at auction. More county money down the toilet. One of em has got a hot engine in it. We might be able to get a few dollars for that. No word from Mrs Moss?

  No sir.

  All right.

  He looked at the clock on the outer office wall. I wonder if I could get you to call Loretta and tell her I've gone to Eagle Pass and I'll call her from down there. I'd call her but she'll want me to come home and I just might.

  You want me to wait till you've quit the buildin?

  Yes I do.

  He pushed the chair back and rose and got down his gunbelt from the coatrack behind his desk and hung it over his shoulder and picked up his hat and put it on. What is it that Torbert says? About truth and justice?

  We dedicate ourselves anew daily. Somethin like that.

  I think I'm goin to commence dedicatin myself twice daily. It may come to three fore it's over. I'll see you in the mornin.

  He stopped at the cafe and got a coffee to go and walked out to the cruiser as the flatbed was coming up the street. Powdered over with the gray desert dust. He stopped and watched it
and then got in the cruiser and wheeled around and drove past the truck and pulled it over. When he got out and walked back the driver was sitting at the wheel chewing gum and watching him with a sort of goodnatured arrogance.

  Bell put one hand on the cab and looked in at the driver. The driver nodded. Sheriff, he said.

  Have you looked at your load lately?

  The driver looked in the mirror. What's the problem, Sheriff?

  Bell stepped back from the truck. Step out here, he said.

  The man opened the door and got out. Bell nodded toward the bed of the truck. That's a damned outrage, he said.

  The man walked back and took a look. One of the tiedowns is worked loose, he said.

  He got hold of the loose corner of the tarp and pulled it back up along the bed of the truck over the bodies lying there, each wrapped in blue reinforced plastic sheeting and bound with tape. There were eight of them and they looked like just that. Dead bodies wrapped and taped.

  How many did you leave with? Bell said.

  I aint lost none of em, Sheriff.

  Couldnt you all of took a van out there?

  We didnt have no van with four wheel drive.

  He tied down the corner of the tarp and stood.

  All right, Bell said.

  You aint goin to write me up for improperly secured load?

  You get your ass out of here.

  He reached the Devil's River Bridge at sundown and half way across he pulled the cruiser to a halt and turned on the rooflights and got out and shut the door and walked around in front of the vehicle and stood leaning on the aluminum pipe that served for the top guardrail. Watching the sun set into the blue reservoir beyond the railroad bridge to the west. A westbound semi coming around the long curve of the span downshifted when the lights came into view. The driver leaned from the window as he passed. Dont jump, Sheriff. She aint worth it. Then he was gone in a long suck of wind, the diesel engine winding up and the driver double clutching and shifting gears. Bell smiled. Truth of the matter is, he said, she is.

  Some two miles past the junction of 481 and 57 the box sitting in the passenger seat gave off a single bleep and went silent again. Chigurh pulled onto the shoulder and stopped. He picked up the box and turned it and turned it back. He adjusted the knobs. Nothing. He pulled out onto the highway again. The sun pooled in the low blue hills before him. Bleeding slowly away. A cool and shadowed twilight falling over the desert. He took off his sunglasses and put them in the glovebox and closed the glovebox door and turned on the headlights. As he did so the box began to beep with a slow measured time.