The Hot Kid

  She said, “Does this happen much?”

  Carl looked up. “What?”

  “Somebody wanting to pay you back?”

  “Uh-unh, but I had a feeling about this one. You saw me hand the rifle to Venicia? I said, ‘You aren’t gonna shoot me with this, are you?’ I was kidding. But you notice she didn’t say anything.”

  “She just stared at you,” Louly said.

  “The poor woman has nothing in her life to smile about.”

  Carl seemed himself again, like a big kid, grinning, an idea coming to him.

  “Why don’t we give my dad his present? Isn’t this a perfect time?”

  “What is it?” Virgil said, sounding anxious now, sixty years old today.

  “You’re gonna love it,” Carl said. “What you always wanted.”

  “But it’s out in the car,” Louly said.

  “Take me half a minute,” Carl said.

  They had come up through the trees along one side of the pasture and now Venicia was crouched behind a pile of firewood, not thirty feet from the back of the house. Through the window she could see the table set, the Indian woman busy at the stove. Venicia turned and motioned to Billy, then hunched her shoulders at the noise he made moving through the leaves. He sunk down next to her and raised up enough to look past the woodpile.

  “They haven’t sat down yet?”

  “Another few minutes, the cook’s just put the bacon on.”

  “They sure get up late.”

  “It’s his daddy’s birthday, they slept in.”

  “Soon as he shows his face in the kitchen,” Billy said, “I’m on step up to the window and bust him.” He had taken the scope sight off the Winchester and left it in the car. Now he pulled a Browning automatic from under his sheepskin coat saying, “This close, I don’t know which to use.”

  Venicia was retying her crepe-sole Keds good and tight, getting ready, thinking she might have to run for the car. The longer she was with Billy Bragg, the less confidence she had in him. He was jumpy and trying not to show it. When they were still down at the bottom of the pasture he’d said, “What if he has his gun on the table?”

  She said, “Having his breakfast?”

  Billy said, “You don’t know anything about him?”

  Things like that gave Venicia pause.

  Carl came in with the birthday present, stayed long enough to see his dad’s eyes light up and went out again with the shotgun, saying he’d keep close to the house, since this was where they had to come. He’d work his way around back.

  Louly looked worried, saying to Virgil, “But he hasn’t any idea where they are. They could be way off in the trees and shoot at him.”

  “The way I got shot at Guantánamo,” Virgil said, looking over the five-shot Krag-Jorgensen, raising it to his shoulder to sight down the barrel. “I went up a hill to flush a sniper, but not paying attention, thinking of something else, and the don sent me home with a bullet through my side. Carl, he keeps his mind on what he’s doing, he’s always wide awake. This Krag’s a good rifle, the army carried it all through the Spanish-American War, as it was called. But I was with Huntington’s Marines, clearing that Guantánamo area for a coaling station and we were issued Lee rifles. Carl must’ve forgot that for some reason. Hey, but don’t tell him. This Krag’s a honey, I’ll hang it on the mantel.”

  Louly was anxious. She said, “Shouldn’t we keep a watch out the front?”

  “You’re right, let’s get to a window.”

  They’re in the house,” Billy said. “Where else’d they be? If they’re home.”

  They hadn’t looked to see if Carl’s car was still there.

  Venicia said, “They’re waiting on that woman to call them. The bacon’s done, she’s laying it out.”

  Billy said, “It looks good, don’t it? We should’ve ate when we got to Okmulgee. I told you, didn’t I?”

  “She’s putting the grits in a bowl.”

  “I like to crumble my bacon in it when I have grits,” Billy said.

  “I imagine they’re just in the next room,” Venicia said. “She wouldn’t of started breakfast if they weren’t all downstairs near ready to eat. Would she?”

  Billy said, “She fry any eggs?”

  “I think she’s waiting on the eggs, see how they want them fixed. The toaster’s on the table. Jelly. What else? Lea and Perrins.”

  Billy, watching Narcissa, got up on his knees behind the woodpile. “She’s bringing the coffeepot over…filling the cups.” He said, “I’m going in. Be standing there when he walks in.”

  Venicia said, “Give me the rifle.” She took it from him and cocked it and said, “Ready? I’ll count to three.”

  Carl was in the trees forty feet behind them and to one side. He wanted to work closer before telling them to drop the guns. But now they were moving toward the house and Carl went after them. He saw them enter through the back door—leaving it open—and were out of his sight until he reached the door and looked inside.

  He saw Venicia holding the front sight of the Winchester under Narcissa’s chin, Narcissa holding her face raised as she tried to do what Venicia wanted, call to the next room, “Come and sit down now. It’s all ready.”

  Both of them, Billy and Venicia, faced the door to the sitting room. Carl stepped inside the kitchen. Next to the table now he was about twelve feet from them. Billy was looking around that side of the room. He was turning his shoulders until Carl could see his sunglasses for a moment at an angle, and Billy turned back to see Louly, Louly first, and then Virgil coming into the kitchen.

  They looked right at him like they were wondering what he was doing there.

  Venicia was saying to Virgil, her voice loud, “Where’s Carl? Get him in here or I’ll shoot this girl.”

  What Carl did, he racked the pump on the shotgun back and forth, that ratchety sound telling the two they were about to get a load of double-ought buckshot.

  But so would Louly and Virgil, right behind them.

  Carl did think of giving them his warning: drop the guns or he’d shoot to kill. But they were out of place here pointing guns and Carl could tell they knew it, Venicia pathetic-looking with her red circles of rouge and Boo Bragg looking at Carl through his blue smoked glasses, glancing for help at Venicia. Virgil knew it, too. Virgil’s gaze with a sad look going from Carl to Venicia right next to him and then making his move, Virgil taking hold of the Winchester to wrest it from her as Carl went for Billy, swatted the pistol out of his hand with the barrel of the Remington, then gave him a backhanded swat across the side of his damaged face that might’ve hurt like hell but wasn’t as bad as getting shot. Carl took the poor dazed man by the arm, without his gun or his glasses, pulled out a chair from the table and sat him down. Virgil brought Venicia over, Louly watching, Narcissa saying, “I have to feed them, too?”

  It amazed Louly watching Carl set cups of coffee in front of these two, offer cigarets and hold a match to them. She watched Carl pick up Boo’s dark glasses from the floor and hand them to him. Maybe not as an act of kindness, but so they wouldn’t have to look at his empty, burnt-out eye socket.

  Virgil said this was police business. He’d call Bud Maddox, get him over here.

  “No, it’s settled,” Carl said. “Venicia knows she made a mistake. Talked herself and Boo into a deal that could’ve left them lying on the floor. For what? ’Cause Peyton was so good to her? Brought her whiskey when he remembered?”

  Louly felt the need to speak up.

  “Carl, the woman was going to kill you.”

  Carl said, “She got it in her head I became a marshal so I’d get to carry a gun.” He looked at Venicia. “You said in your house that night, I got a kick out of shooting people. Remember that?”

  Venicia kept looking at him, staring, but didn’t answer.

  Carl said, “I didn’t shoot you, did I? Or Boo? Why don’t you go on back to Bunch and behave yourself?”

  18

  During the past seven mont
hs, while Jack Belmont was making church pews waiting to see the famous lawyer he’d never heard of, Fausto Bassi had been promoted from guard captain to deputy warden of Oklahoma State Prison.

  “This Cecil Guyton,” Jack said, “what kind of case is he on takes this long?” They were in Fausto’s office talking about Jack’s appeal, the sound of wings beating in the rotunda.

  “Guyton has been deciding who to defend next,” Fausto said. “At first he thought George Kelly.”

  “George Kelly?”

  “George Machine-Gun Kelly,” Fausto said, “arrested for kidnapping a millionaire oilman in Oklahoma City. But Cecil found out Machine-Gun Kelly is a phony. His wife, Kathryn, met him he was a bootlegger for the rich people. She bought him his first machine gun and made up the story he is a mad-dog killer. Cecil Guyton talked to Kelly for five minutes, saw who he was and walked out on the case. He don’t want to be surprised in court. So then,” Fausto said, “Cecil Guyton looks at a choice, wait for John Dillinger or Lester Gillis.”

  “John Dillinger hasn’t been arrested?”

  “Lester Gillis hasn’t either. But you know J. Edgar will find them pretty soon. Or they be shot coming out of a bank.”

  “Who’s Lester Gillis?”

  “Known better as Baby Face Nelson. This one is a mad-dog killer. He’s shot two bank guards, a guy he got in an argument with on the street—Lester ran into the guy’s car—and shot three FBI agents, one of them when Lester was hiding out at Little Bohemia. But since these two are roaming the countryside, Cecil Guyton has decided to take a rest, go to Hot Springs for the baths and maybe get laid, uh? Now he’s ready to defend the famous Jack Belmont, with permission to meet you at the Aldridge, the newest hotel in town. He’s taking a suite on the top floor.”

  “How many times I get to meet with him?”

  “Once, anyway. And I’ll be as close as a Siamese twin, so don’t get any ideas.”

  “If this hotshot lawyer’s setting me free, what kind of ideas would I have? I’m thinking I’ll need something to wear besides these striped pajamas.”

  “You get a new pair of overalls.”

  “You could get my suit out of the inmate storage room. I can wear it to the hearing.”

  “You get a pair of overalls,” Fausto said.

  “I thought we were friends.”

  “Where did you get that idea?”

  This time at the prison Jack had complained about a Creek Indian being in the same cell with him. But then when he found out the Creek had worked for Carl Webster’s dad harvesting pecans he shut up. The Creek told Jack that when he got out in a few years he was going to rob Virgil’s house, break in while Virgil was working in his orchard and clean him out. He said the man had a pile of money he kept in there. The Creek said he heard the man telling newspaper reporters who came to talk to Carl but was never there, the banks could close, it wouldn’t bother him none. He had a rich oil lease and there was always money coming in.

  Jack asked him how he knew he kept the money in the house.

  The Creek said, “If he don’t keep it in a bank, where else does he hide it but someplace close to where he’s at?” The Creek heard the man tell the newspaper reporters he was as rich as some kind of king. He heard the reporters ask him what he thought of his son going after bank robbers. And the man saying he was surprised there was any money in the banks to rob.

  It sounded good if it was true. Jack asked the Creek, “Yeah, but how much does he have?”

  The Creek said, “If you a millionaire oilman, how much would you put someplace so you never be poor as long as you live?” It was what he told the reporters. They’re out resting from shaking trees and the reporters squatted down in the weeds to ask him questions. “He said he had some guns, too, so he wasn’t afraid of being robbed.”

  “Has guns, uh?”

  “He was in that war in Cuba.”

  They brought Jack to town in a Chevrolet Suburban Carryall, a gray one with oklahoma state prison stenciled on the doors. It was like a panel truck with windows and two rear seats. Fausto sat in front with the guard driving, Jack in the far backseat away from the door. Fausto might not be his friend but had given Jack an old suitcoat out of inmate storage to wear with his overalls.

  It hit Jack between the eyes, as soon as they reached the center of town, he was dressed like most of the working men milling along Choctaw Avenue. Hundreds of them.

  Some in a procession of cars creeping along past every parking place taken on both sides of the street, men in the parade holding American flags out the car windows.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Coal miners putting on the dog,” Fausto said. “The United Mine Workers showing off. They holding meetings at the fairgrounds, talking about if they want to strike.”

  Jack watched a streetcar stop at the corner of Choctaw and Second Avenue, in front of them, and a mob of coal miners rush the narrow front door, shoving and fighting one another to get aboard, the motorman dinging his bell, wanted to get started.

  Jack said, “How’d you like to be a coal miner?”

  Fausto said, “A man chooses what he does.”

  “And you didn’t want to be one?”

  “These miners, a lot of Italians like me, they get drunk and demonstrate, walk picket lines with ‘unfair’ signs, ‘We want more money.’ Don’t they know times are bad, the owners aren’t making what they should?”

  Jack would bet his dad sounded just like that.

  “They get arrested for unlawful assembly and are taken up to the prison to be housed.”

  “You mean locked in a goddamn cell.”

  “You choose what you do,” Fausto said. “Guys who don’t want to cause trouble go home, take the interurban. That trolley line goes to Krebs, Alderson, goes all the way to Hartshorne, sixteen miles.”

  Jack said, “Ain’t the modern world something?” He liked the fact that most of these miners going home were dressed the way he was, the old suitcoat over the overalls they wore to town. But they all had on a cap or a hat, something he was missing.

  They crossed Choctaw while miners were still climbing into the streetcar. Jack turned to look out the back window of the Carryall until they were up the street, turning into the back entrance of the hotel.

  Fausto wore a brown hat with a black band he must’ve had for years, the pinched front of the crown showing signs of a hole wearing through. His suit was black, starting to shine. No vest. His holster was strapped under his left arm.

  The guard driver had stayed with the Carryall.

  Fausto pushed the button for the freight elevator—they’re standing in the back hall—and Jack said, “Don’t you want to see the lobby? Come on, this is a brand-new hotel. Let’s see what they got?” He touched Fausto’s arm and that was all it took.

  Now they stood looking at the furniture, the oriental carpets, palm trees, three cuspidors along the front desk, the cigar counter busy.

  “I know he’s gonna be smoking,” Jack said. “I could join him if I had a pack of cigarets.” He held out his hand, grinning at Fausto.

  It didn’t work. Fausto, the son of a bitch, said, “You want to smoke, bum one off Guyton.”

  They rode up in an elevator with Jack standing close behind the little-girl operator in her uniform, her brown hair giving off the best scent he’d smelled in seven months. He pulled his right hand from his overalls pocket and placed it on the right cheek of the girl’s behind. She stiffened, but then looked up over her shoulder at him and smiled. He leaned closer and whispered something into her hair.

  Fausto saw it. He pulled Jack away from her and yelled in the girl’s startled face, “What’d he say to you?”

  She looked at Jack wide-eyed, like she needed permission to answer. But then must’ve felt it was okay and looked at Fausto.

  “He said he was falling in love with me.”

  Jack waited for Fausto to say something, but he didn’t.

  They came to the eleventh floor. Getting off, Jack
winked at the girl and she smiled back. He believed he had given her something to remember and tell about for the rest of her life. How this good-looking guy put his hand on her fanny and said he was in love with her, and you know who it was, honest to God…?

  Cecil Guyton’s colored man, in a waiter’s coat and black bow tie, opened the door to the penthouse suite and brought them into the moderne sitting room, Jack struck by the sight of white furniture, a peach shade of paint, strange shapes of colors framed on the wall, a tea trolley offering whiskey and seltzer water. The retainer said, “Mr. Guyton, here your guests,” and stood by.

  Cecil Guyton kept his seat, a drink on the table next to him. Jack thought the man would have weight to him, but reminded Jack of a fox, that pointy face and little pencil mustache. He wore braces, a blue collarless shirt but a white silk scarf draped around his neck. The first thing he said, “If you’re the infamous Jack Belmont you must resemble your mother, you sure don’t look like your daddy. I’ve played cards with Oris in the basement of the Mayo Hotel a few times. He wins ’cause he’s so goddamn serious. He’s playing cards, by God he’s gonna pay attention to what he’s doing. Barely speaks. He’s the most serious man I ever met. I won’t criticize him for it, though, it’s made him a rich man. Or you wouldn’t be here, would you?” Cecil Guyton paused and said, “I wonder if that’s truer than I meant. You want a drink?”

  “He’s not allowed,” Fausto said.

  The lawyer turned to him. “You’re Fausto Bassi, assistant to the warden? I’m Cecil Guyton, all this boy’s got. I wasn’t told of any rules of procedure.”

  “Sir, prison inmates aren’t allowed alcohol.”

  “Are you kidding me? They get stone drunk every chance they have. One of the reasons I won’t visit your prison is the smell of home brew cooking. That tomato puree they turn into booze at your joint is the most nauseating smell in the world. I get a whiff of it I gag.”

  “I can’t drink it,” Jack said.