High Hunt (34 page)

“So long, Lou,” I said.

He waved, winked at Clydine, and started out. Then he stopped and came back, his face flat again.

“Hey,” he said, “I owe you five, don't I?”

I'd forgotten about it.

“Here.” He pulled out his billfold and fumbled awkwardly in it. He was carrying quite a wad of cash. He dropped a five on the table. “We're all square now, right?”

“Good enough, Lou,” I said.

He poked a finger at me pistol-fashion by way of farewell, turned, and went out.

“Wow,” Clydine said in a shuddery voice, “I don't want to play cops and robbers anymore.”

“I shouldn't have brought you along,” I said.

“I wouldn't have missed it for the world,” she said. “He's a real starker, isn't he?”

“He's got all the makings,” I said, picking up the five-dollar bill. I looked it over carefully.

“What's the matter?” she said. “You think it may be counterfeit?”

“Nobody counterfeits fives,” I said.

“What are you looking for then? Blood?”

“I don't know,” I told her. “I think he was pretty close to broke when he came out of the woods, though.”

“Maybe he went to the bank.”

“That's what worries me,” I said, still looking at the bill.

“OK, Knucks,” she said, “I told you I didn't want to play cops and robbers anymore. What's on for the afternoon?”

“Let's go to Seattle.”

“Why?”

“I'm going to have to go house hunting.”

“Oh,” she said. I don't think either of us liked the reminder that I'd be leaving soon.

O
N
the first of October I moved to Seattle and began the tedious process of getting enrolled for classes and so forth. I'd found a little place the landlord referred to as a cottage but for which the word “shack” might have been more appropriate. Even when compared to the shabby little trailer I'd been living in, the place was tiny. The fold-down couch that made into a bed was perhaps the most uncomfortable thing I've ever slept in, but the place was close enough to the university to compensate for its other drawbacks.

Even though Clydine and I had both been convinced that my move to Seattle would more or less terminate what some people chose to call our relationship, it didn't work out that way. I kept coming across reasons why I just
had
to make a quick trip to Tacoma, and I think she made seven shopping jaunts to Seattle during my first month up there.

I guess when you get right down to it, I got out of Tacoma
just in time to miss the big messy bust-up between Jack and Marg—or maybe Jack just held off until I left town, though that was a kind of delicacy you just didn't expect from my brother.

About ten o'clock on a drizzly Saturday morning I came down the steps of the library with a whole dreary weekend staring me in the face. The bibliographical study for Introduction to Graduate Studies that I'd assumed would take from twelve to fourteen hours had, in fact, been polished off in just a shade under forty-five minutes. I spent another half hour trying to figure out what I'd done wrong. As far as I could see, the job was complete, so I left the library feeling definitely let down and vaguely cheated somehow.

I had absolutely nothing to do with myself, so I decided, naturally, to bag on down to Tacoma. At least down there I should be able to find somebody I knew to drink with.

The highway was dreary, but it didn't really bother me. Without even thinking, I swung on over to Clydine's place. Who the hell was I trying to kid? There was only one reason I'd come down to Tacoma, and it sure wasn't to find somebody to drink with.

I went up the stairs two at a time and knocked at the door.

Her folks were there.

“Danny,” she said in surprise when she opened the door, “I thought you had to work this weekend.” She was wearing a dress and her hair was done up.

“I finished up sooner than I thought,” I said.

“Well, come on in,” she said. “Meet my folks.” She gave me one of those smark-alecky grimaces that conveyed a world of condescension, sophomoric superiority, and juvenile intolerance. It irritated the piss out of me for some reason, and I made a special effort to be polite to them.

Her father was a little bald-headed guy with a nervous laugh. I think he was in the plumbing supply business, or maybe hardware. Her mother was short and plump and kind of bubbly. I think they liked me because of my haircut. Some of Clydine's friends must have looked pretty shaggy to them.

I could see my little leftist smoldering in the corner as I talked about fishing with her father and Europe with her mother. I knew that about all I was doing was mildewing the sheets between the little nut and me and breeding a helluva family squabble which would probably start as soon as I left. I told
them I had to run across town and see my brother and then left as gracefully as I could.

I snooped around the Avenue a bit, but I really didn't feel like seeing Jack yet, and the pawnshop had a whole platoon of guys lined up inside, so I took a chance and drove on over to Parkland to see Mike. Surprisingly, he was home, and the two of us went into his living room and sprawled out in a couple of chairs and drank beer and watched it rain.

“Damn shame about Jack and Marg,” he said.

“Yeah, but it was bound to happen, Mike. It was just a question of time really.”

“I've never really been able to figure out what it is about Jack,” he said thoughtfully. “I
like
him—hell, everybody
likes
the son of a bitch, but he just can't seem to hang in there the way most guys do.”

“I think maybe Cap Miller came closer to Jack's problem than anybody else really,” I said.

“Oh?”

“He said that the way he saw it Jack isn't ever really going to grow up. Maybe that's it.”

“Not much gets by old Miller,” Mike commented.

“It's funny, too,” I said. “It's the one thing Jack's been obsessed with ever since I can remember—growing up. He used to think about that more than anybody I ever knew.”

“Maybe he tried too hard.”

“I think he tried too soon, Mike. Have you ever seen one of these girls who start going out on dates when they're eleven—lipstick, high heels, the whole bit?”

“Yeah, but what's the connection?”

“Have you ever known one of them that ever really grew up? I mean one who wasn't still pretty damned juvenile even when she got to be twenty-three or twenty-four?”

“I always thought that kind of girl was just stupid.”

“Maybe that enters into it,” I said, “but there's a kind of immaturity there, too.”

He shrugged. “I still don't get the connection.”

“Well,” I said, “I've got a hunch that the patterns we set up when we first start doing something are usually going to be the patterns we're going to follow for the rest of our lives. Now, if you start out trying to be grown-up—or adult, if you prefer that term—while you're still physically and mentally a child, you're going to start the whole business all wrong. You'll start a pattern of
playing
grown-up. You'll contaminate all of
your adulthood with that juvenile pattern. I think that's what happens to the little girl with her gunked-on makeup and wobbly high heels. She spends the rest of her life
playing
grown-up. I sort of think that the same thing happened to Jack.”

“You mean he's just playing?”

“The worst part of it is that he doesn't know he's playing,” I said. “He just doesn't know the difference. He's impatient, he's flighty, he's self-centered, he's intolerant—he's got all the classic traits of immaturity.”

“Shit, man”—Mike laughed—“you've just described about three-quarters of the people in the whole damn country.”

“Including you and me, probably,” I said. “That's another thing Old Cap said. I asked him when
anybody
really grows up, and he told me that if he ever made it, he'd let me know.”

“Sounds like you and old Cap got along pretty well,” he said.

“I don't think I've ever met a man I liked or respected more,” I said, “except maybe my old man.”

“He kinda hits a guy that way, doesn't he?”

I nodded. “Say, how's Sloane doing? I was going to stop by the shop, but the place was mobbed.”

“Christ”—Mike laughed—“you wouldn't recognize the old fart. He's lost thirty pounds and gone teetotaler on us. He doesn't even drink beer anymore.”

“He got a pretty good scare up there, I guess.”

“It musta been pretty hairy.”

“You know it, buddy. Between him and McKlearey it was a real nervous trip.”

“Lou took off, you know.”

“Yeah. He told me he was going to.”

“That damned trip sure changed a lot of things around here,” Mike said.

“I guess it was sort of a watershed. Maybe we were all due for a change of some kind, and the trip just brought it all to a head.”

“I sure wish I could have gone along,” he said wistfully.

“So do I, Mike.”

We talked for another hour or so, and then Betty wanted Mike to take her to the grocery store, so I took off.

I went on by the trailer court, but Jack's trailer was gone. That's always kind of a jolt. The damn things look sort of permanent when they're set down on a lot with fences and grass around them, so you forget that they've got wheels on them.
I dropped down to the trailer sales lot and Jack was sitting in the grubby, cigarette-stinking office with his muddy feet up on the desk.

“Yeah,” he said, grinning tightly at me. “I moved Sandy in with me, and I didn't want Marg to pick up on that with the divorce comin' on and all.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” he said, lighting a cigarette. “We got things all kinda hammered out to where I don't get nicked too bad for support money, and I don't want her gettin' the idea that she's the aggrieviated party in this little clambake. I'm not about to get screwed into the wall with alimony payments.”

“Where'd you move to?”

“I'm in a court out toward Madrona.”

“Where'd Marg go?” I asked.

“She got an apartment out in Lakewood. Not a bad place. I found it for her.”

“Sounds pretty civilized,” I said.

He shrugged. “I didn't want her gettin' the idea she had any kinda claim on my trailer. I guess her lawyer was pissed-off as hell about it. I got her all moved out before he got the chance to tell her to stay put. Now that
she
abandoned
me
, it kinda cuts down on her share of the community property.”

“You figure all the angles, don't you, Jack?”

“I been through it all before,” he said. “If a guy uses his head, he don't have to get skinned alive in divorce court. Hey, you want a drink?”

“Sure.” I didn't care much for that particular conversation anyway.

“Come on.” He got up, hauled on a coat and led me across the soggy lot to a fairly new trailer. “Try to look like a customer,” he said, leading the way inside. The trailer was clammy, but it was a little more private than the office. Jack went into the little utility room and pulled a fifth of cheap vodka out of one of the heating ducts.

“The boss can't smell this on me,” he explained. “I have a coke afterward, and I'm pure as the driven snow.” He laughed flatly.

We each had a couple of pulls from the bottle and then sat around in the chilly living room talking.

“Did McKlearey get that business with the gun straightened out with Sloane before he took off?”

“Yeah,” Jack said, “he and Sloane dummied up the paper work and got it all squared away with the police department.”

“Did you see him before he took off?”

“Naw, I got a gutful of that motherfucker up in the woods.”

“The silly bastard had blood poisoning in that hand,” I said. “He claims he was out of his head with the fever and the damned infection.”

“I wouldn't bet on that. I think he just plain flipped out.”

“It's possible,” I said. “He was carrying that .38 when I saw him. Had it tucked under his belt.”

“That silly bastard! He's just stupid enough to try to use it, too. He'll get about half in the bag some night and try to knock over a liquor store or a tavern. I hope somebody shoots him.”

“At least he's out of
our
hair,” I said.

“Yeah.”

Somehow Jack and I didn't really seem to have much to talk about. I guess we never had really. I got the feeling that splitting up with Marg had hit him a lot harder than he was willing to admit to me.

“Hey,” he said suddenly, “you wanna do me a favor?”

“Sure.”

“When I moved the trailer, I found a bunch of stuff that belongs to the kids. I got it all in a box in the trunk of my car. You think you could run it on over to Marg's place for me? I think it's better if I stay away from there for a while.”

“Sure, Jack.”

“I'll give her a call and let her know you're comin'.”

We went over to his car and transferred the box from his trunk to mine.

“Hey, Dan, look at this.” He popped open his glove compartment. That stupid .45 automatic was in there.

“Shit, Jack,” I said, “you'll get your ass in a sling if they catch you carrying that thing in your car that way without a permit.”

He shrugged. “I got kinda stuck on it up in the brush, you know? Shit, a man oughta own himself a pistol—home protection and all that bullshit.”

“Maybe so,” I said, “but you sure as hell shouldn't be carting it around in your glove box.”

“Maybe,” I said. We went back in the office and he called Marg.

“She'll be there,” he said after he hung up. He gave me the address and I took off again.

It took me a while to find the place. It was one of those older houses that had had the second floor remodeled into a self-contained apartment that you reached by way of an outside staircase. I went on up and knocked.

“Hi, Dan,” she said, smiling blearily at me. She smelled pretty strongly of whiskey. “Come on in.”

“I can only stay a minute,” I said, carting in the box.

“Just set that down,” she told me. “The girls are asleep. How about a drink?” She didn't wait for any answer but whipped me up a whiskey and Seven-Up almost before I got the box put down. “Come on in the living room,” she said.

I pulled off my wet jacket, and we went on in and I sat on the couch. She sat in the armchair just opposite me and crossed her legs, flashing an unnecessary amount of thigh at me. “How's school?” she asked.

I shrugged. “Takes a while to get back into it,” I said. “I think I'm doing OK.”

“That's swell.”

“I wish I'd gotten here sooner,” I said. “I'd have liked to get a chance to see the kids.”

“They'll be up in an hour or so,” she said, leaning back to stretch her arms. She was wearing a sleeveless blouse, cotton, I think, and when she pulled it tight like that, her nipples stood out pretty obviously. Margaret was too big a girl to run around without a bra.

“Sure has been lonesome around here lately,” she said.

“You have any plans—I mean for after—” I left it up there. Under the circumstances it was kind of a touchy subject really.

“Oh,” she said, polishing off her drink in two gulps, “nothing definite yet. I'm not worried.” She got up, went into the kitchen and came out with a fresh drink.