No Country for Old Men (15 page)

They wont stop us, Moss said.

How do you know?

There’s too much shit still down the road that I got to deal with. It aint goin to end here.

I hope you’re right.

Trust me, Moss said.

I hate hearin them words, the driver said. I always did.

Have you ever said them?

Yeah. I’ve said em. That’s how come I know what they’re worth.

He spent the night in a Rodeway Inn on highway 90 just west of town and in the morning he went down and got a paper and climbed laboriously back to his room. He couldnt buy a gun from a dealer because he had no identification but he could buy one out of the paper and he did. A Tec-9 with two extra magazines and a box and a half of shells. The man delivered the gun to his door and he paid him in cash. He turned the piece in his hand. It had a greenish parkerized finish. Semiautomatic. When was the last time you fired it? he said.

I aint never fired it.

Are you sure it fires?

Why would it not?

I dont know.

Well I dont either.

After he left Moss walked out onto the prairie behind the motel with one of the motel pillows under his arm and he wrapped the pillow about the muzzle of the gun and fired off three rounds and then stood there in the cold sunlight watching the feathers drift across the gray chaparral, thinking about his life, what was past and what was to come. Then he turned and walked slowly back to the motel leaving the burnt pillow on the ground.

He rested in the lobby and then climbed up to the room again. He bathed in the tub and looked at the exit hole in his lower back in the bathroom mirror. It looked pretty ugly. There were drains in both holes that he wanted to pull out but he didnt. He pulled loose the plaster on his arm and looked at the deep furrow the bullet had cut there and then taped the dressing back again. He dressed and put some more of the bills into the back pocket of his jeans and he fitted the pistol and the magazines into the case and closed it and called a cab and picked up the document case and went out and down the stairs.

He bought a 1978 Ford pickup with four wheel drive and a 460 engine from a lot on North Broadway and paid the man in cash and got the title notarized in the office and put the title in the glovebox and drove away. He drove back to the motel and checked out and left, the Tec-9 under the seat and the document case and his bag of clothes sitting in the floor on the passenger side of the truck.

At the onramp at Boerne there was a girl hitchhiking and Moss pulled over and blew the horn and watched her in the rearview mirror. Running, her blue nylon knapsack slung over one shoulder. She climbed in the truck and looked at him. Fifteen, sixteen. Red hair. How far are you goin? she said.

Can you drive?

Yeah. I can drive. It aint no stick shift is it?

No. Get out and come around.

She left her knapsack on the seat and got out of the truck and crossed in front of it. Moss pushed the knapsack into the floor and eased himself across and she got in and put the truck in drive and they pulled out onto the interstate.

How old are you?

Eighteen.

Bullshit. What are you doin out here? Dont you know it’s dangerous to hitchhike?

Yeah. I know it.

He took off his hat and put it on the seat beside him and leaned back and closed his eyes. Dont go over the speed limit, he said. You get us stopped by the cops and you and me both will be in a shitpot full of trouble.

All right.

I’m serious. You go over the speed limit and I’ll set your ass out by the side of the road.

All right.

He tried to sleep but he couldnt. He was in a lot of pain. After a while he sat up and got his hat off the seat and put it on and looked over at the speedometer.

Can I ask you somethin? she said.

You can ask.

Are you runnin from the law?

Moss eased himself in the seat and looked at her and looked out at the highway. What makes you ask that?

On account of what you said back yonder. About bein stopped by the police.

What if I was?

Then I think I ought to just get out up here.

You dont think that. You just want to know where you stand.

She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. Moss studied the passing country. If you spent three days with me, he said, I could have you holdin up gas stations. Be no trick at all.

She gave him a funny little half smile. Is that what you do? she said. Hold up gas stations?

No. I dont have to. Are you hungry?

I’m all right.

When did you eat last.

I dont like for people to start askin me when I eat last.

All right. When did you eat last?

I knowed you was a smart-ass from the time I got in the truck.

Yeah. Pull off up here at this next exit. It’s supposed to be four miles. And reach me that machinegun from under the seat.

Bell drove slowly across the cattleguard and got out and closed the gate and got back in the truck and drove across the pasture and parked at the well and got out and walked over to the tank. He put his hand in the water and raised a palmful and let it spill again. He took off his hat and passed his wet hand through his hair and looked up at the windmill. He looked out at the slow dark elliptic of the blades turning in the dry and windbent grass. A low wooden trundling under his feet. Then he just stood there paying the brim of his hat slowly through his fingers. The posture of a man perhaps who has just buried something. I dont know a damn thing, he said.

When he got home she had supper waiting. He dropped the keys to the pickup in the kitchen drawer and went to the sink to wash his hands. His wife laid a piece of paper on the counter and he stood looking at it.

Did she say where she was? This is a West Texas number.

She just said it was Carla Jean and give the number.

He went to the sideboard and called. She and her grandmother were in a motel outside of El Paso. I need for you to tell me somethin, she said.

All right.

Is your word good?

Yes it is.

Even to me?

I’d say especially to you.

He could hear her breathing in the receiver. Traffic in the distance.

Sheriff?

Yes mam.

If I tell you where he called from do you give your word that no harm will come to him.

I can give my word that no harm will come to him from me. I can do that.

After a while she said: Okay.

The man sitting at the little plywood table that folded up from the wall onto a hinged leg finished writing on the pad of paper and took off the headset and laid it on the table in front of him and passed both hands backwards over the sides of his black hair. He turned and looked toward the rear of the trailer where the second man was stretched out on the bed. Listo? he said.

The man sat up and swung his legs to the floor. He sat there for a minute and then he rose and came forward.

You got it?

I got it.

He tore the sheet off the pad and handed it to him and he read it and folded it and put it into his shirtpocket. Then he reached up and opened one of the kitchen cabinets and took out a camouflage-finished submachinegun and a pair of spare clips and pushed open the door and stepped down into the lot and shut the door behind him. He crossed the gravel to where a black Plymouth Barracuda was parked and opened the door and pitched the machinegun in on the far seat and lowered himself in and shut the door and started the engine. He blipped the throttle a couple of times and then pulled out onto the blacktop and turned on the lights and shifted into second gear and went up the road with the car squatting on the big rear tires and fishtailing and the tires whining and unspooling clouds of rubbersmoke behind him.

VIII

I’ve lost a lot of friends over these last few years. Not all of em older than me neither. One of the things you realize about gettin older is that not everbody is goin to get older with you. You try to help the people that’re payin your salary and of course you cant help but think about the kind of record you leave. This county has not had a unsolved homicide in forty-one years. Now we got nine of em in one week. Will they be solved? I dont know. Ever day is against you. Time is not on your side. I dont know as it’d be any compliment if you was known for second guessin a bunch of dopedealers. Not that they have all that much trouble second guessin us. They dont have no respect for the law? That aint half of it. They dont even think about the law. It dont seem to even concern em. Of course here a while back in San Antonio they shot and killed a federal judge. I guess he concerned em. Add to that that there’s peace officers along this border gettin rich off of narcotics. That’s a painful thing to know. Or it is for me. I dont believe that was true even ten years ago. A crooked peace officer is just a damned abomination. That’s all you can say about it. He’s ten times worse than the criminal. And this aint goin away. And that’s about the only thing I do know. It aint goin away. Where would it go to?

And this may sound ignorant but I think for me the worst of it is knowin that probably the only reason I’m even still alive is that they have no respect for me. And that’s very painful. Very painful. It has done got way beyond anything you might of thought about even a few years ago. Here a while back they found a DC-4 over in Presidio County. Just settin out in the desert. They had come in there of a night and graded out a sort of landin strip and set out rows of tarbarrels for lights but there was no way you could of flown that thing back out of there. It was stripped out to the walls. Just had a pilot’s seat in it. You could smell the marijuana, you didnt need no dog. Well the sheriff over there—and I wont say his name—he wanted to get set up and nail em when they come back for the plane and finally somebody told him that they wasnt nobody comin back. Never had been. When he finally understood what it was they was tellin him he just got real quiet and then he turned around and got in his car and left.

When they was havin them dope wars down across the border you could not buy a half quart masonjar nowheres. To put up your preserves and such. Your chow chow. They wasnt none to be had. What it was they was usin them jars to put handgrenades in. If you flew over somebody’s house or compound and you dropped grenades on em they’d go off fore they hit the ground. So what they done was they’d pull the pin and stick em down in the jar and screw the lid back on. Then whenever they hit the ground the glass’d break and release the spoon. The lever. They would preload cases of them things. Hard to believe that a man would ride around at night in a small plane with a cargo such as that, but they done it.

I think if you were Satan and you were settin around tryin to think up somethin that would just bring the human race to its knees what you would probably come up with is narcotics. Maybe he did. I told that to somebody at breakfast the other mornin and they asked me if I believed in Satan. I said Well that aint the point. And they said I know but do you? I had to think about that. I guess as a boy I did. Come the middle years my belief I reckon had waned somewhat. Now I’m startin to lean back the other way. He explains a lot of things that otherwise dont have no explanation. Or not to me they dont.

M
oss set the case in the booth and eased himself in after it. He lifted the menu from the wire rack where it stood along with the mustard and ketchup. She scooted into the booth opposite. He didnt look up. What are you havin, he said.

I dont know. I aint looked at the menu.

He spun the menu around and slid it in front of her and turned and looked for the waitress.

What are you? the girl said.

What am I havin?

No. What are you. Are you a character?

He studied her. The only people I know that know what a character is, he said, is other characters.

I might just be a fellow traveler.

Fellow traveler.

Yeah.

Well you are now.

You’re hurt, aint you?

What makes you say that?

You cant hardly walk.

Maybe it’s just a old war injury.

I dont think so. What happened to you?

You mean lately?

Yeah. Lately.

You dont need to know.

Why not?

I dont want you gettin all excited on me.

What makes you think I’d get excited?

Cause bad girls like bad boys. What are you goin to have?

I dont know. What is it you do?

Three weeks ago I was a law abidin citizen. Workin a nine to five job. Eight to four, anyways. Things happen to you they happen. They dont ask first. They dont require your permission.

That’s the truth if I ever heard it told, she said.

You hang around me you’ll hear some more of it.

You think I’m a bad girl?

I think you’d like to be.

What’s in that briefcase?

Briefs.

What’s in it.

I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.

You aint supposed to carry a gun in a public place. Did you not know that? In particular a gun such as that.

Let me ask you somethin.

Go ahead.

When the shootin starts would you rather be armed or be legal?

I dont want to be around no shootin.

Yes you do. It’s wrote all over you. You just dont want to get shot. What are you havin?

What are you?

Cheeseburger and a chocolate milk.

The waitress came and they ordered. She got the hot beef sandwich with mashed potatoes and gravy. You aint even asked me where I was goin, she said.

I know where you’re goin.

Where am I goin then.

Down the road.

That aint no answer.

It’s more than just a answer.

You dont know everthing.

No I dont.

You ever kill anybody?

Yeah, he said. You?

She looked embarrassed. You know I aint never killed nobody.

I dont know that.

Well I aint.

You aint, then.

You aint done, either. Are you?

Done what.

What I just said.

Killin people?

She looked around to see if they might be overheard.

Yes, she said.

Be hard to say.

After a while the waitress brought their plates. He bit the corner off a packet of mayonnaise and squeezed out the contents over his cheeseburger and reached for the ketchup. Where you from? he said.

She took a drink of her iced tea and wiped her mouth with the paper napkin. Port Arthur, she said.

He nodded. He took up the cheeseburger in both hands and bit into it and sat back, chewing. I aint never been to Port Arthur.

I aint never seen you there.

How could you of seen me there if I aint never been there?

I couldnt. I was just sayin I aint. I was agreein with you.

Moss shook his head.

They ate. He watched her.

I reckon you’re on your way to California.

How did you know that?

That’s the direction you’re headed in.

Well that’s where I’m goin.

You got any money?

What’s it to you?

It aint nothin to me. Do you?

I got some.

He finished the cheeseburger and wiped his hands on the paper napkin and drank the rest of the milk. Then he reached in his pocket and took out the roll of hundreds and unfolded them. He counted out a thousand dollars onto the formica and pushed it toward her and put the roll back in his pocket. Let’s go, he said.

What’s that for?

To go to California on.

What do I gotta do for it?

You dont have to do nothin. Even a blind sow finds a acorn ever once in a while. Put that up and let’s go.

They paid and walked out to the truck. You wasnt callin me a sow back yonder was you?

Moss ignored her. Give me the keys, he said.

She took the keys from her pocket and handed them over. I thought maybe you’d forgot I had em, she said.

I dont forget much.

I could of just slipped off like I was goin to the ladies room and took your truck and left you settin there.

No you couldnt of.

Why not?

Get in the truck.

They got in and he set the case between them and pulled the Tec-9 out of his belt and slid it under the seat.

Why not? she said.

Dont be ignorant all your life. In the first place I could see all the way to the front door and out the parkin lot clear to the truck. In the second place even if I was dumb-ass enough to set with my back to the door I’d of just called a cab and run you down and pulled you over and beat the shit out of you and left you layin there.

She got real quiet. He put the key in the ignition and started the truck and backed it out.

Would you of done that?

What do you think?

When they pulled into Van Horn it was seven oclock at night. She’d slept a good part of the way, curled up with her knapsack for a pillow. He pulled into a truckstop and shut off the engine and her eyes snapped open like a deer’s. She sat up and looked at him and then looked out at the parking lot. Where are we? she said.

Van Horn. You hungry?

I could eat a bite.

You want some diesel fried chicken?

What?

He pointed to the sign overhead.

I aint eatin nothin like that, she said.

She was in the ladies room a long time. When she came out she wanted to know if he’d ordered.

I did. I ordered some of that chicken for you.

You aint done it, she said.

They ordered steaks. Do you live like this all the time? she said.

Sure. When you’re a big time desperado the sky’s the limit.

What’s that on that chain?

This?

Yeah.

It’s a tush off of a wild boar.

What do you wear that for?

It aint mine. I’m just keepin it for somebody.

A lady somebody?

No, a dead somebody.

The steaks came. He watched her eat. Does they anybody know where you’re at? he said.

What?

I said does anybody know where you’re at.

Like who?

Like anybody.

You.

I dont know where you’re at because I dont know who you are.

Well that makes two of us.

You dont know who you are?

No, silly. I dont know who you are.

Well, we’ll just keep it that way and they wont neither of us be out nothin. All right?

All right. What’d you ask me that for?

Moss mopped up steak gravy with a half a roll. I just thought it was probably true. For you it’s a luxury. For me it’s a necessity.

Why? Because they’s somebody after you?

Maybe.

I do like it that way, she said. You got that part right.

It dont take long to get a taste for it, does it?

No, she said. It dont.

Well, it aint as simple as it sounds. You’ll see.

Why is that.

There’s always somebody knows where you’re at. Knows where and why. For the most part.

Are you talkin about God?

No. I’m talkin about you.

She ate. Well, she said. You’d be in a fix if you didnt know where you was at.

I dont know. Would you?

I dont know.

Suppose you was someplace that you didnt know where it was. The real thing you wouldnt know was where someplace else was. Or how far it was. It wouldnt change nothin about where you was at.

She thought about that. I try not to think about stuff like that, she said.

You think when you get to California you’ll kind of start over.

Them’s my intentions.

I think maybe that’s the point. There’s a road goin to California and there’s one comin back. But the best way would be just to show up there.

Show up there.

Yeah.

You mean and not know how you got there?

Yeah. And not know how you got there.

I dont know how you’d do that.

I dont either. That’s the point.

She ate. She looked around. Can I get some coffee? she said.

You can get anything you want. You got money.

She looked at him. I guess I aint sure what the point is, she said.

The point is there aint no point.

No. I mean what you said. About knowin where you are.

He looked at her. After a while he said: It’s not about knowin where you are. It’s about thinkin you got there without takin anything with you. Your notions about startin over. Or anybody’s. You dont start over. That’s what it’s about. Ever step you take is forever. You cant make it go away. None of it. You understand what I’m sayin?

I think so.

I know you dont but let me try it one more time. You think when you wake up in the mornin yesterday dont count. But yesterday is all that does count. What else is there? Your life is made out of the days it’s made out of. Nothin else. You might think you could run away and change your name and I dont know what all. Start over. And then one mornin you wake up and look at the ceilin and guess who’s layin there?

She nodded.

You understand what I’m sayin?

I understand that. I been there.

Yeah, I know you have.

So are you sorry you become a outlaw?

Sorry I didnt start sooner. Are you ready?

When he came out of the motel office he handed her a key.

What’s that?

That’s your key.

She hefted it in her hand and looked at him. Well, she said. It’s up to you.

Yes it is.

I guess you’re afraid I’ll see what’s in that bag.

Not really.

He started the truck and pulled down the parking lot behind the motel office.

Are you queer? she said.

Me? Yeah, I’m queer as a coot.

You dont look it.

Is that right? You know a lot of queers?

You dont act it I guess I should say.

Well darlin what would you know about it?

I dont know.

Say it again.

What?

Say it again. I dont know.

I dont know.

That’s good. You need to practice that. It sounds good on you.

Later he went out and drove down to the quickstop. When he pulled back into the motel he sat there studying the cars in the lot. Then he got out.

He walked down to her room and tapped at the door. He waited. He tapped again. He saw the curtain move and then she opened the door. She stood there in the same jeans and T-shirt. She looked like she’d just woken up.

I know you aint old enough to drink but I thought I’d see if you wanted a beer.

Yeah, she said. I’d drink a beer.

He lifted one of the cold bottles out of the brown paper bag and handed it to her. Here you go, he said.

He’d already turned to go. She stepped out and let the door shut behind her. You dont need to rush off thataway, she said.

He stopped on the lower step.

You got another one of these in that sack?

Yeah. I got two more. And I aim to drink both of em.

I just meant maybe you could set here and drink one of em with me.

He squinted at her. You ever notice how women have trouble takin no for a answer? I think it starts about age three.

What about men?

They get used to it. They better.

I wont say a word. I’ll just set here.

You wont say a word.

No.

Well that’s already a lie.

Well I wont say hardly nothin. I’ll be real quiet.

He sat on the step and pulled one of the beers from the bag and twisted off the cap and tilted the bottle and drank. She sat on the next step up and did the same.

You sleep a lot? he said.

I sleep when I get the chance. Yeah. You?

I aint had a night’s sleep in about two weeks. I dont know what it would feel like. I think it’s beginnin to make me stupid.

You dont look stupid to me.

Well, that’s by your lights.

What does that mean?

Nothin. I’m just raggin you. I’ll quit.

You aint got drugs in that satchel have you?

No. Why? You use drugs?

I’d smoke some weed if you had some.

Well I aint.

That’s all right.

Moss shook his head. He drank.

I just meant it’s all right we could just set out here and drink a beer.

Well I’m glad to hear that’s all right.

Where are you headin? You aint never said.

Hard to say.

You aint goin to California though, are you?

No. I aint.

I didnt think so.

I’m goin to El Paso.

I thought you didnt know where you was goin.

Maybe I just decided.

I dont think so.

Moss didnt answer.

This is nice settin out here, she said.

I guess it depends on where you been settin.

You aint just got out of the penitentiary or somethin have you?

I just got off of death row. They’d done shaved my head for the electric chair. You can see where it’s started to grow back.

You’re full of it.

Be funny if it turned out to be true though, wouldnt it?

Is the law huntin you?

Everbody’s huntin me.

What did you do?

I been pickin up young girls hitchhikin and buryin em out in the desert.

That aint funny.

You’re right. It aint. I was just pullin your leg.

You said you’d quit.

I will.

Do you ever tell the truth?

Yeah. I tell the truth.

You’re married, aint you?

Yeah.

What’s your wife’s name?

Carla Jean.