I think I done have. I believe I'm due for a change. I might even be overdue.
Yeah? Well you aint.
Why do you say that?
He looked at her. Let me tell you somethin, little sister. If there is one thing on this planet that you dont look like it's a bunch of good luck walkin around.
That's a hateful thing to say.
No it aint. I just want you to be careful. We get to El Paso I'm goin to drop you at the bus station. You got money. You dont need to be out here hitchhikin.
All right.
All right.
Would you of done what you said back yonder? About if I had of took your truck?
What's that?
You know. About beatin the crap out of me.
No.
I didn't think so.
You want to split this last beer?
All right.
Run in there and get a cup. I'll be back in a minute.
All right. You aint changed your mind have you?
About what?
You know about what.
I dont change my mind. I like to get it right the first time.
He rose and started up the walkway. She stood at the door. I'll tell you somethin I heard in a movie one time, she said.
He stopped and turned. What's that?
There's a lot of good salesmen around and you might buy somethin yet.
Well darlin you're just a little late. Cause I done bought. And I think I'll stick with what I got.
He went on up the walkway and climbed the stairs and went in.
The Barracuda pulled into a truckstop outside of Balmorhea and drove into the bay of the adjoining carwash. The driver got out and shut the door and looked at it. There was blood and other matter streaked over the glass and over the sheetmetal and he walked out and got quarters from a change-machine and came back and put them in the slot and took down the wand from the rack and washed the car and rinsed it off and got back in and pulled out onto the highway going west.
Bell left the house at seven-thirty and took 285 north to Fort Stockton. It was about a two hundred mile run to Van Horn and he reckoned he could make it in under three hours. He turned the rooflights on. About ten miles west of Fort Stockton on the I-10 interstate he passed a car burning by the side of the highway. There were police cars at the scene and one lane of the highway was blocked off. He didnt stop but it gave him an uneasy feeling. He stopped at Balmorhea and refilled his coffeebottle and he pulled into Van Horn at ten twenty-five.
He didnt know what he was looking for but he didnt have to. In the parking lot of a motel there were two Culberson County patrol cars and a state police car all with their lights going. The motel was cordoned off with yellow tape. He pulled in and parked and left his own lights on.
The deputy didnt know him but the sheriff did. They were questioning a man sitting in his shirtsleeves in the open back door of one of the cruisers. Damn if bad news dont travel fast, the sheriff said. What are you doin up here, Sheriff?
What's happened, Marvin?
Had a little shoot-out. You know anything about this?
I dont know. You got any victims?
They left out of here about a half hour ago in the ambulance. Two men and a woman. The woman was dead and the one boy I dont think is goin to make it either. The other one might.
Do you know who they were?
No. One of the men was Mexican and we're waitin for a registration on his car settin over yonder. Wasnt a one of em had any identification. On em or in the room either one.
What does this man say?
He says the Mexican started it. Says he drug the woman out of her room and the other man come out with a gun but when he seen the Mexican had a gun pointed at the woman's head he laid his own piece down. And whenever he done that the Mexican shoved the woman away and shot her and then turned and shot him. He was standin in front of 117, right yonder. Shot em with a goddamned machinegun. Accordin to this witness the old boy fell down the steps and then he picked up his gun again and shot the Mexican. Which I dont see how he done it. He was shot all to pieces. You can see the blood on the walkway yonder. We had a real good response time. About seven minutes, I think. The girl was just shot dead.
No ID.
No ID. The other old boy's truck is got dealer tags on it.
Bell nodded. He looked at the witness. The witness had asked for a cigarette and he lit it and sat smoking. He looked pretty comfortable. He looked as if he'd sat in the back of police cruisers before.
That woman, Bell said. Was she anglo?
Yeah. She was anglo. Had blonde hair. Sort of reddish, maybe.
Did you all find any dope?
Not yet. We're still lookin.
Any money?
We aint found nothin yet. The girl was checked into 121. Had a knapsack with some clothes in it and stuff was all.
Bell looked down the row of motel doors. People standing around in small groups talking. He looked at the black Barracuda.
Has that thing got anything to turn them tires with?
I'd say it would turn em pretty good. It's got a four-forty under the hood with a blower on it.
A blower?
Yep.
I dont see one.
It's one of them sidewinders. It's all under the hood.
Bell stood looking at the car. Then he turned and looked at the sheriff. Can you get away from here for a minute?
I can. What did you have in mind?
I just thought I might get you to ride over to the clinic with me.
All right. Just ride with me.
That'll be fine. Let me just park my cruiser a little better.
Hell, it's all right, Ed Tom.
Let me just pull it up here out of the way. You dont always know how quick you'll be back when you set off someplace.
At the desk the sheriff spoke to the night nurse by name. She looked at Bell.
He's up here to make a identification, the sheriff said.
She nodded and rose and put her pencil in the pages of the book she was reading. Two of em were DOA, she said. They flew that Mexican out of here in a helicopter about twenty minutes ago. Or maybe you already knew that.
Nobody tells me nothin, darlin, the sheriff said.
They followed her down the hallway. There was a thin trail of blood along the concrete floor. They wouldnt of been hard to find, would they? Bell said.
There was a red sign at the end of the hall that read Exit. Before they got there she turned and fitted a key to a steel door on the left and opened it and switched on the light. The room was raw concrete block, windowless and empty save for three steel machinist's tables on wheels. On two of them lay bodies covered with plastic sheets. She stood with her back to the open door while they filed past.
He aint a friend of yours is he Ed Tom?
No.
He took a couple of rounds in the face so I dont think he's goin to look too good. Not that I aint seen worse. That highway out there is a goddamn warzone, you tell the truth about it.
He pulled back the sheet. Bell walked around the end of the table. There was no chock under Moss's neck and his head was turned to the side. One eye partly opened. He looked like a badman on a slab. They'd sponged the blood off of him but there were holes in his face and his teeth were shot out.
Is that him?
Yeah, that's him.
You look like you wished it wasnt.
I get to tell his wife.
I'm sorry about that.
Bell nodded.
Well, the sheriff said. There aint nothin you could of done about it.
No, Bell said. But you always like to think there is.
The sheriff covered Moss's face and reached and lifted back the plastic at the other table and looked at Bell. Bell shook his head.
They'd rented two rooms. Or he did. Paid cash. You couldnt read the name on the register. Just a scrawl.
His name was Moss.
All right. We'll get your information dow
n at the office. Kind of a skankylookin little old girl.
Yeah.
He covered her face again. I dont reckon his wife is goin to like that part of it neither, he said.
No, I dont expect she will.
The sheriff looked at the nurse. She was still standing leaning against the door. How many times was she hit? he said. Do you know?
No I dont, Sheriff. You can look at her if you want. I dont mind and I know she wont.
That's all right. It'll be on the autopsy. Are you ready, Ed Tom?
Yeah. I was ready fore I come in here.
He sat in the sheriff's office alone with the door shut and stared at the phone on the desk. Finally he got up and went out. The deputy looked up.
He's gone home, I reckon.
Yessir, the deputy said. Can I help you with somethin, Sheriff?
How far is it to El Paso?
It's about a hundred and twenty miles.
You tell him I said thank you and I'll give him a call tomorrow.
Yessir.
He stopped and ate on the far side of town and sat in the booth and sipped his coffee and watched the lights out on the highway. Something wrong. He couldnt make sense out of it. He looked at his watch. 1:20. He paid and walked out and got in the cruiser and sat there. Then he drove to the intersection and turned east and drove back to the motel again.
Chigurh checked into a motel on the eastbound interstate and walked out across a windy field in the dark and watched across the highway through a pair of binoculars. The big overland trucks loomed up in the glasses and drew away. He squatted on his heels with his elbows on his knees, watching. Then he went back to the motel.
He set his alarm for one oclock and when it went off he got up and showered and dressed and walked out to his truck with his small leather bag and put it behind the seat.
He parked in the motel parking lot and he sat there for some time. Leaning back in the seat and watching in the rearview mirror. Nothing. The police cars were long gone. The yellow police tape across the door lifted in the wind and the trucks droned past headed for Arizona and California. He got out and walked up to the door and blew out the lock with his stungun and walked in and shut the door behind him. He could see the room pretty well by the light through the windows. Small spills of light from the bulletholes in the plywood door. He pulled the little bedside table over to the wall and stood and took a screwdriver from his rear pocket and began to back the screws out of the louvered steel cover of the airduct. He set it on the table and reached in and pulled out the bag and stepped down and walked over to the window and looked out at the parking lot. He took the pistol from behind his belt and opened the door and stepped out and closed it behind him and stooped under the tape and walked down to his truck and got in.
He set the bag in the floor and he'd reached for the key to turn on the ignition when he saw the Terrell County cruiser pull into the lot in front of the motel office a hundred feet away. He let go of the key and sat back. The cruiser pulled into a parking space and the lights went out. Then the motor. Chigurh waited, the pistol in his lap.
When Bell got out he took a look around the lot and then walked up to the door at 117 and tried the knob. The door was unlocked. He ducked under the tape and pushed the door open and reached and found the wallswitch and turned on the light.
The first thing he saw was the grille and the screws lying on the table. He shut the door behind him and stood there. He stepped to the window and looked past the edge of the curtain out at the parking lot. He stood there for some time. Nothing moved. He saw something lying in the floor and stepped over and picked it up but he already knew what it was. He turned it in his hand. He walked over and sat on the bed and weighed the little piece of brass in his palm. Then he tilted it into the ashtray on the bedside table. He picked up the telephone but the line was dead. He put the receiver back in the cradle. He took his pistol from the holster and flipped open the gate and checked the shells in the cylinder and closed the gate with his thumb and sat with the pistol resting on his knee.
You dont know for sure that he's out there, he said.
Yes you do. You knew it at the restaurant. That's why you come back here.
Well what do you aim to do?
He got up and walked over and switched off the light. Five bulletholes in the door. He stood with the revolver in his hand, his thumb on the knurled hammer. Then he opened the door and walked out.
He walked to the cruiser. Studying the cars in the lot. Pickup trucks for the most part. You could always see the muzzleflash first. Just not first enough. Can you feel it when someone is watching you? A lot of people thought so. He reached the cruiser and opened the door with his left hand. The domelight came on. He stepped in and pulled the door shut and laid the pistol on the seat beside him and got out his key and put it in the ignition and started the car. Then he backed out of the parking space and switched on the lights and swung out of the lot.
When he was out of sight of the motel he pulled over onto the shoulder and took the speaker from the hook and called the sheriff's office. They sent two cars. He hung the mike up and put the cruiser in neutral and rolled back down the edge of the highway until he could just see the motel sign. He looked at his watch. 1:45. That seven minute time would make it 1:52. He waited. At the motel nothing moved. At 1:52 he saw them come down the highway and tail each other up the offramp with sirens on and lights blazing. He kept his eyes on the motel. Any vehicle that came out of the lot and headed up the access road he'd already determined to run it off the road.
When the cruisers pulled into the motel he started the car and turned on the lights and did a U-turn and went back down the road the wrong way and pulled into the lot and got out.
They went down the parking lot vehicle by vehicle with flashlights and their guns drawn and came back again. Bell was the first one back and he stood leaning against his cruiser. He nodded to the deputies. Gentlemen, he said. I think we been outgeneraled.
They holstered their pistols. He and the chief deputy walked over to the room and Bell showed him the lock and the airvent and the lock cylinder.
What's he done that with, Sheriff? the deputy said, holding the cylinder in his hand.
It's a long story, Bell said. I'm sorry to of got you all out here for nothin.
Not a problem, Sheriff.
You tell the sheriff I'll call him from El Paso.
Yessir, I'll sure do it.
Two hours later he checked into the Rodeway Inn on the east side of town and got the key and went to his room and went to bed. He woke at six as he always did and got up and closed the curtains and went back to bed but he couldnt sleep. Finally he got up and showered and dressed and went down to the coffeeshop and got his breakfast and read the paper. There'd be nothing about Moss and the girl yet. When the waitress came with more coffee he asked her what time they got the evening paper.
I dont know, she said. I quit readin it.
I dont blame you. I would if I could.
I quit readin it and I made my husband quit readin it.
Is that right?
I dont know why they call it a newspaper. I dont call that stuff news.
No.
When was the last time you read somethin about Jesus Christ in the newspaper?
Bell shook his head. I dont know, he said. I guess I'd have to say it would be a while.
I guess it would too, she said. A long while.
He'd knocked on other doors with the same sort of message, it wasnt all that new to him. He saw the window curtain move slightly and then the door opened and she stood there in jeans with her shirttail out looking at him. No expression. Just waiting. He took off his hat and she leaned against the doorjamb and turned her face away.
I'm sorry, mam, he said.
Oh God, she said. She staggered back into the room and slumped to the floor and buried her face in her forearms with her hands over her head. Bell stood there holding his hat. He didnt know what to do. He couldnt see any si
gn of the grandmother. Two Spanish maids were standing in the parking lot watching and whispering to each other. He stepped into the room and closed the door.
Carla Jean, he said.
Oh God, she said.
I'm just as sorry as I can be.
Oh God.
He stood there, his hat in his hand. I'm sorry, he said.
She raised her head and looked at him. Her crumpled face. Damn you, she said. You stand there and tell me you're sorry? My husband is dead. Do you understand that? You say you're sorry one more time and by God if I wont get my gun and shoot you.
IX
I had to take her at her word. Not a lot else you could do. I never saw her again. I wanted to tell her that the way they had it in the papers wasnt right. About him and that girl. It turned out she was a runaway. Fifteen years old. I dont believe that he had anything to do with her and I hate it that she thought that. Which you know she did. I called her a number of times but she'd hang up on me and I cant blame her. Then when they called me from Odessa and told me what had happened I couldnt hardly believe it. It didnt make no sense. I drove up there but there wasnt nothin to be done. Her grandmother had just died too. I tried to see if I could get his fingerprints off the FBI database but they just drew a blank. Wanted to know what his name was and what he'd done and all such as that. You end up lookin like a fool. He's a ghost. But he's out there. You wouldnt think it would be possible to just come and go thataway. I keep waitin to hear somethin else. Maybe I will yet. Or maybe not. It's easy to fool yourself. Tell yourself what you want to hear. You wake up in the night and you think about things. I aint sure anymore what it is I do want to hear. You tell yourself that maybe this business is over. But you know it aint. You can wish all you want.
My daddy always told me to just do the best you knew how and tell the truth. He said there was nothin to set a man's mind at ease like wakin up in the morning and not havin to decide who you were. And if you done somethin wrong just stand up and say you done it and say you're sorry and get on with it. Dont haul stuff around with you. I guess all that sounds pretty simple today. Even to me. All the more reason to think about it. He didnt say a lot so I tend to remember what he did say. And I dont remember that he had a lot of patience with havin to say things twice so I learned to listen the first time. I might of strayed from all of that some as a younger man but when I got back on that road I pretty much decided not to quit it again and I didnt. I think the truth is always simple. It has pretty much got to be. It needs to be simple enough for a child to understand. Otherwise it'd be too late. By the time you figured it out it would be too late.