Stick

  Stick looked over and Barry was waiting, gave him a wink. With his thick dark young-movie-star hair down over his ears and forehead the guy looked like he was acting into the phone.

  “Yeah, due in July, the fifteenth.” He paused, listening. “Why June?” Writing something on the legal pad now. “Yeah, okay, I’ll see what he says. Hey, Kyle? . . . Love you, babe.” He listened for a moment, a grin forming. “Hey, come on. Don’t say it less you mean it.” He listened again. “Wait. When do you get back? . . . Then why don’t you come into Miami? Save some time. I’ll pick you up . . . Sure, no problem . . . Okay, babe, have a nice trip. I’ll see you.”

  He rang off and punched another phone number. “Lemme have Arthur.” Waited and said, “Arthur? Gimme a June fifteen come-due on the Parkview note I’ll do you a special favor, take the whole load.” He waited, but not long. “End of June I’m into”—he searched over the yellow pad with his pen—”housing or some goddamn thing. Or is it soybean futures? I don’t know, I can’t find the . . . What?” He listened and then said patiently, “ ’cause the funds’re promised, Arthur, earmarked. Out of this into that. It never sleeps, man. It doesn’t even stop to fucking catch its breath. Don’t you know your business, for Christ sake?” Glancing at Stick, but getting no reaction. “Yeah, all right. Lemme know.” Near the end now, trailing off. “No, call me at home . . . Hey, Arthur? No more government securities. Keep that shit to yourself for a while . . . Yeah, all right.”

  Stick let him make a few notes and put the yellow pad in the case before he glanced over.

  “You do a lot of investing, uh?”

  “You want a simple yes or no or an in-depth answer?” Barry said, reaching around to drop the case and the newspaper on the backseat. He crossed his legs then, got comfortable. “What you should ask is what I do when I’m not investing, trading or speculating in this and that. And the answer is, nothing. ’cause whatever I’m doing, I’m also at the same time investing, trading or speculating. It’s like it’s my life force. You understand what I mean? Like you’re breathing while you’re doing other things, but if you weren’t breathing, man, you wouldn’t be doing anything.” He seemed mildly pleased with himself. “That answer your question?”

  Stick wondered why he’d asked it. He gave Barry a nod. Barry was looking at him, staring.

  “What do you do? When you’re not hot-wiring cars.”

  “Same as you,” Stick said. “Nothing. Only when I’m doing it I’m not investing, trading or speculating. When I do nothing, I believe in doing nothing.”

  “How many cars you steal in your career?”

  “Somewhere between three and four hundred.”

  “There any money in it?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t do it anymore,” Stick said. “That was a long time ago.”

  “You just happen to have the jump-wire in your bag.”

  Stick didn’t say anything to that. Why bother.

  “Lemme try an easy one,” Barry said. “You live here? In Florida?”

  “I used to.”

  “You do any time?”

  Stick kept his eyes on the road. “Some.”

  “Raiford?”

  “No. Up north. You ever hear of Jackson?”

  “No shit,” Barry said, impressed. “That’s heavy duty.”

  Stick glanced over at him.

  “For car theft?”

  “Robbery.”

  “What kind? From a building? Little B and E?”

  “Armed.”

  “No shit. Don’t tell me a bank . . .”

  “No banks,” Stick said, beginning to warm up, not caring what he told the guy, or maybe wanting to impress him. “Banks are for thrill-seekers.”

  “How many convictions?”

  “I did a bit in Milan before. Wasn’t much, ten months.”

  “What’s Milan?”

  “Federal. It’s up near Detroit.”

  “UDAA?”

  “No, but I got probation on one of those. The next one I went to Milan on. You go, normally, from joy-riding to unlawfully driving away; then you go big-time, transporting across a state line and you get the feds after you. Familiar?”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Well, before you started not doing anything while you’re playing the stock market,” Stick said, “I think you were a lawyer.”

  “That’s very perceptive of you,” Barry said. “I practiced a couple years, picked up on contracts, all that corporate bullshit, how to avoid paying taxes . . . So you had two raps up in Michigan, you come down to where the action is . . . You going for three?”

  “I came here to visit my little girl.”

  “Really? I love it—an early Robert Mitchum. Nice guy gets fucked over . . . ‘It’s a bum rap, I didn’t do it, I swear.’ “

  “I did it,” Stick said.

  “And now you’re sorry for all your past sins?”

  “Most of ’em.”

  “Most of ’em,” Barry said, “the ones you got nailed for. I love it. How’d you make out in the joint?”

  Stick looked over. “How’d I make out?”

  “You have to take a lot of shit?”

  “There isn’t anything else they offer.”

  “But you made it okay? Got rehabilitated?”

  “Yes sir, I’ve learned my lesson.”

  Barry said, “You want a job?”

  Stick glanced at him. “Doing what?”

  “What you’re doing. Driving.”

  “You mean be a chauffeur? I’ve never done it.”

  “Well, if you’ve driven three, four-hundred different cars, right, that’s what you said? You must have a pretty good feel for it.”

  Stick was watching the green freeway signs. “Bal Harbour, where do we get off?”

  “Hundred and twenty-fifth. It’s the next one. Goes over to Broad Causeway.”

  “What happens when we get there?”

  “What do you want to happen?”

  “I mean if I don’t take your offer? You going to give me bus fare or what?”

  “Jesus, you’re already into me for a hundred bucks.”

  “You owe me a hundred, but I haven’t seen it yet,” Stick said. He looked at the rearview mirror and began edging over, into the lane to his right.

  Barry said, “Don’t worry about it, you’ll get it.”

  Stick got over to the far-right lane, followed the exit ramp off, descending, turned left on 125th Street and moved along slowly—in more traffic than he could ever remember, it seemed everywhere you went down here—until he was able to swing in next to the curb at an Amoco station and set the hand brake.

  He turned to face Barry now. “When?”

  “When what?”

  “When do I get the hundred?”

  “Jesus Christ,” Barry said. “You don’t trust me?”

  “I don’t know you,” Stick said. “You could’ve come in first in the bullshit finals and I didn’t hear about it. Last week I was in a deal with a friend of mine, we didn’t ask for our pay up front and we missed out. My friend, I can’t tell you how he missed out. Now, I don’t know. It wasn’t the kind of deal you can take the guy to court, you know, and sue him.”

  Barry seemed amazed and Stick wasn’t sure if he’d been listening.

  “You don’t trust me . . .” Barry said.

  “If I did I’d have to trust everybody I meet, wouldn’t I?”

  “You’re the one did time, for Christ sake, not me!”

  “That’s right,” Stick said, “and I’ll tell you how it works in a place like that. You owe somebody you better fucking pay up as quick as you can. You make people wait in there or they get the wrong idea about you, your mom gets a letter, you passed away in surgery. The way it works here, I get out of the car, take my jumper and go home.”

  “Hey,” Barry said.

  “What?”

  “It’s cool.” Giving him the level-eye look now. One of the boys. “You want me to pay you right this fucking ins
tant? All right, I’ll pay you. I thought, I guess it was my presumption, you understood.” Very serious now. Rolling to one side as he spoke, digging into his back pocket to bring out a fold of currency in a silver clip.

  “Where I’m coming from. Understood what?”

  “That my word—when I give my fucking word, when I tell a guy on the phone I’m putting up a million and a half for a tax anticipation note it means I’m going to come across with a million and a half and he knows it. I don’t have to sign anything, he knows it. You follow me?”

  “I should’ve upped the bet,” Stick said.

  “I say I owe you a hundred, here . . .” Barry snapped off a clean new bill and extended it. “Here’s the hundred. Are we all right? We square?”

  Stick took the bill. He said, “Thank you very much.” Put the Rolls in gear and they continued west on 125th Street, followed the causeway across the upper neck of Biscayne Bay, passed through Bay Harbour Islands and came to the Atlantic Ocean at Collins Avenue, a much different Collins Avenue from the one down in South Beach—a fifteen-minute ride from the Amoco station on 125th and neither of them opened his mouth, made a sound, until they were looking at the ocean and Barry said, “Left.”

  Now they were in Florida postcardland, surf and sunny sky, lush tropical greenery. Stick took it all in, watched it get better and better. They turned left again, off Collins, and came to a gatehouse. A guard in a white shirt with epaulets and a blue pith-helmet—the guy was armed— waved the Rolls through, not even ducking down to look in, and now it got even better than before, though with a manicured look: a maintained tropical park of white walls and high trimmed hedges, palm trees against the sky, all kinds of flowering plants, occasionally a black-topped drive and a glimpse of wonderland . . . worlds away from a bleached house in Norman on an oil lease or a flat on the west side of Detroit, playing ball in sight of railroad switchyards and the stacks at Ford Rouge.

  “Next one on the right,” Barry said, “we’re home.”

  Stick turned into the drive, 100 Bali Way, followed the blacktop through a patch of jungle and came in view of the house, white with a whiter roof; it reminded Stick of a mausoleum, neat and simple. Barry said, “Around back.” They came to a turnaround area of cobblestones, four garage doors, a covered walk leading to the house and Stick couldn’t believe the size and sprawl of the place. Like an assortment of low modules stuck together, open sides and walls of glass set at angles, the grounds dropping away from the house in gradual tiers, with wide steps that might front a museum leading down to the terraced patio and on to the swimming pool. A sweep of manicured lawn extended to a boat dock and a southwest view of Biscayne Bay, downtown Miami standing in rows of highrises beyond. On the far side of the swimming pool, past shrubbery and palm trees, Stick saw a red tennis court with a red striped awning along one side and beyond that a second house that was like a wing of the main house, a module broken off and moved two hundred feet away. Stick’s gaze came back to the row of garage doors.

  “How many cars you have?”

  “Four,” Barry said, “at the moment.” He got out, then stuck his head back in and reached for his attaché case. “It’s all right to be impressed. I am and I own the joint.”

  Stick sat behind the wheel taking it in. He saw a woman in a green robe standing on the terrace, looking this way, brown hair with gleams of red in the sunlight.

  Barry yelled at her, “Babe, how you doing!” Then ducked into the car again and glanced at Stick as he got his Journal. “The lady of the house. You’ll have to drive her around too, but usually just over to the club. Leucadendra. It’s in Coral Gables, if you don’t know where it is. I doubt if she knows how to get there. But I’m the one you have to impress. You’re not an alcoholic, are you?”

  “I never thought about it,” Stick said.

  “That’s a good answer. Cecil’d say he was going to an AA meeting and come back smashed. Well, you get a guy out of a rehab center you take your chances.”

  Stick said, “Why do you want to hire me?”

  Barry stood slightly bent over, looking in. “What do you mean, why do I want to hire you? I’m offering you a job. You’re sitting in the car already, I don’t have to go to the service.”

  “What’s the job pay?”

  “Jesus Christ,” Barry said. He straightened and bent over again. “Two bills a week, room and board. All you can eat—got a great cook. But no fucking the maids, they’re nice girls. The broad that comes in does the laundry, that’s up to you. What else you want to know? . . . Clothes, I buy the uniforms.”

  “I have to wear a uniform?”

  “Jesus Christ,” Barry said, “what is this? Yeah, you wear a uniform. A three-button, single-breasted suit. You wear a black one, a dark gray or a light tan, depending. That sound okay to you?”

  “Where do I live? I have my own room?”

  “I don’t believe this,” Barry said. He half-turned, nodding toward the garage wing. “There’s a two-bedroom apartment in there you share with the houseman but, yes, you have your own room. Now, you want the job or not? Jesus . . .”

  “Let me explain something so you understand,” Stick said. “See, I did seven years straight up day to day in a room six and a half feet wide by ten feet deep. I know I have to overcome stumbling blocks, bad luck of all kinds and a tendency now and then to take shortcuts, you might say, or I could go back there or a place like it. But while I’m out, and as long as I stay out, I can choose where I live. So why don’t I look at the room and then I’ll let you know. How’ll that be?”

  Barry said, after a moment, “Sure.” He didn’t seem to know what else to say.

  8

  CHUCKY WAITED OUTSIDE. Because when he mentioned Wolfgang’s on the phone Kyle said she didn’t do business in bars. Not snippy about it, fairly low key, in her natural style. Stating a fact. She said she was going to be down this way and wanted to drop something off. Or, if he liked the looks of the stock offering he could sign a letter of intent.

  He told her lay it on him, he’d sign on the dotted line. Told her he had a pressing engagement and had to be at Wolfgang’s and if she’d make an exception this time he’d never let it happen again.

  What he wanted was for Kyle McLaren to meet Eddie Moke, and say something nice to him. A small favor to ask. Also he wanted to impress the boy. He wanted Eddie Moke in his pocket as an Anti-Cuban Protection Guarantee. A white-boy buffer between Chucky and the crazies. Somebody who thought American but worked for the chickenkillers. Chucky did not intend to make any more quarter-million-dollar offerings for honest mistakes.

  He stood there in his size 44 red-white-and-blue striped-T-shirt, boat freak or patriot, talking to the parking attendant who’d come on for Happy Hour, talking about cars. The young-kid attendant, seeing the gray Porsche roll in, said, “Now there’s my idea of wheels. Shit, a Nine-twenty-one.”

  And Chucky knew it was going to be Kyle. Dove gray Porsche with a stylish faint orange pinstripe. She was her own girl, wasn’t she? Palm Beach, stock portfolios and high-performance iron. Mom and dad’d trip over each other getting to her. He got his smile ready and there she was:

  In pale yellow, plain dark sunglasses, a zip-up case in one hand, brushing at her bangs with the other. He liked her hair better this time, it was blonder in outside light, yes, had a nice outdoor look that was her. A good-looking broad with brains. He wondered if Pam and Aurora had finished their drinks yet . . .

  Aware of everything at once moving around in his head, floating in and out of his mind’s vision, pictures and now live action in the pale yellow dress. Ready?

  “Kyle!”

  She flipped up the sunglasses coming over, then removed them. She said, “Chucky,” almost matching the intensity of his greeting. But immediately her expression relaxed, again composed. She said, “Well, are you ready to become a corporate shareholder?”

  Chucky said, “If I don’t have to read any small print. Hey, come on inside, I want you to meet some people.?
?? Going up the steps, his hands lightly touching her back, he said, “Would you do something for me?”

  She looked at him but didn’t seem surprised.

  “What?”

  “Tell this boy I’m going to introduce you to that you like his hat.”

  Chucky brought a chair over to the table, waving at people, asking how they were doing. Both of the girls, Pam and Aurora, made room; but the young guy drinking beer out of the bottle, introduced simply as Moke, didn’t move.

  Very serious, with that official American-cowboy funneled brim curving down on his eyes. Grim. While his body tried to appear casual—the indifferent stud.

  Kyle said, “I like your hat. It has a lot of character.”

  Moke stirred. He looked at her, looked past her, came back to her, then stretched to look out at the room, showing her his pointy Adam’s apple, vulnerable white throat. He might not have heard what she said, with the rock beat, a bell dinging outside, a foghorn blaring inside among cheers and forced laughter—poor timing.

  She leaned close to the table. “I said I like your hat.”

  And got a reaction this time. Moke touched the brim, moved it up and then down on his eyes again. The strands of dark hair to his shoulders didn’t move.

  “It’s an original Crested Beaut,” Chucky said.

  “I like your shirt, too,” Kyle made herself say, though she wasn’t sure why. The shirt was light blue with dark-red roses across the yoke, pearl buttons open almost all the way down the front, bony chest showing. “Are you a cowboy?”

  “Moke’s from Texas, the real article,” Chucky said. “Hey, Moke?”

  Moke shrugged, like it wasn’t anything.

  “I believe it,” Kyle said. And that was enough of that. She wondered what Chucky was doing. If he was putting on a show. If he felt the need to have people around him.