Stories (2011) (21 page)

Mulroy scratched the back of his neck, looked out the
doorway. The ants were at the steps, following the trail of syrup.

"They'll be on him before I get back," he said.

"So," Babe said, "I've heard a grown man
scream before. He tells me somethin', you get back, we'll go, eat the pizza on
the way."

Mulroy used a finger to clear the tobacco out of his cheek.
He flipped it into the yard. He said, "All right. I guess I could
eat." Mulroy put on his coat and hat and smiled at Babe and went out.

When Mulroy's car was way out on the drive, near the
highway, Babe opened her purse and took out a small .38 and pointed it at
Standers. "I figure this will make you a more balanced kind of partner.
You remember that. You mess with me, I'll shoot your dick off."

"All right," Standers said.

Babe put the revolver in her other hand, got a flick blade
knife out of her purse, used it to cut the sheets around Standers's ankles. She
cut the lamp cord off his wrist.

Standers stood, and without pulling his pants up, hopped to
the sink. He got the hand towel off the rack and wet it and used it to clean
the syrup off his privates, his feet and head. He pulled up his pants, got his
socks, sat on the couch and put his boots back on.

"We got to hurry," Babe said. "Mulroy, he's
got a temper. I seen him shoot a dog once for peeing on one of his hub
caps."

"Let me get my car keys," Standers said.

"We'll take my car," she said. "You'll
drive."

They went outside and she gave him the keys and they drove
off.

* * *

As they drove onto the highway, Mulroy, who was parked
behind a swathe of trees, poked a new wad of tobacco into his mouth and
massaged it with his teeth.

Babe had sold out immediately, like he thought she would.
Doing it this way, having them lead him to the treasure was a hell of a lot
better than sitting around in a hot trailer watching fire ants crawl on a man's
balls. And this way he didn't have to watch his back all the time. That Babe,
what a kidder. She was so greedy, she thought he'd fall for that lame pizza
gag. She'd been winning too long; she wasn't thinking enough moves ahead
anymore.

Mulroy rode well back of them, putting his car behind other
cars when he could. He figured his other advantage was they weren't expecting
him. He thought about the treasure and what he could do with it while he drove.

Until Babe came along, he had been a private detective,
doing nickel and dime divorces out of Tyler; taking pictures of people doing
the naked horizontal mambo. It wasn't a lot of fun. And the little cons he
pulled on the side, clever as they were, were bullshit money, hand to mouth.

He made the score he wanted from all this, he'd go down to
Mexico, buy him a place with a pool, rent some women. One for each day of the
week, and each one with a different sexual skill, and maybe a couple who could
cook. He was damn sure tired of his own cooking. He wanted to eat a lot and get
fat and lay around and poke the senoritas. This all fell through, he thought he
might try and be an evangelist or some kind of politician or a lawman with a
regular check.

Standers drove for a couple of hours, through three or four
towns, and Mulroy followed. Eventually, Standers pulled off the highway, onto a
blacktop. Mulroy gave him time to get ahead, then took the road too. With no
cars to put between them and himself, Mulroy cruised along careful like.
Finally he saw Standers way up ahead on a straight stretch. Standers veered off
the road and into the woods.

Mulroy pulled to the side of the road and waited a minute,
then followed. The road in the woods was a narrow dirt one, and Mulroy had only
gone a little ways when he stopped his car and got out and started walking. He
had a hunch the road was a short one, and he didn't want to surprise them too
early.

Standers drove down the road until it dead-ended at some
woods and a load of trash someone had dumped. He got out and Babe got out. Babe
was still holding her gun.

"You're tellin' me it's hidden under the trash?"
she said. "You better not be jackin' with me, honey."

"It's not under the trash. Come on."

They went into the woods and walked along awhile, came to an
old white house with a bad roof. It was surrounded by vines and trees and the
porch was falling down.

"You keep a treasure here?" she said.

Standers went up on the porch, got a key out of his pocket
and unlocked the door. Inside, pigeons fluttered and went out holes in the
windows and the roof. A snake darted into a hole in the floor. There were
spiders and spider webs everywhere. The floor was dotted with rat turds.

Standers went carefully across the floor and into a bedroom.
Babe followed, holding her revolver at the ready. The room was better kept than
the rest of the house. She could see where boards had been replaced in the
floor. The ceiling was good here. There were no windows, just plyboard over the
spots where they ought to be. There was a dust-covered desk, a bed with ratty
covers, and an armchair covered in a faded flower print.

Standers got down on his hands and knees, reached under the
bed and tugged diligently at a large suitcase.

"It's under the bed?" Babe said.

Standers opened the suitcase. There was a crowbar in it. He
got the crowbar out. Babe said, "Watch yourself. I don't want you should
try and hit me. It could mess up my makeup."

Standers carried the crowbar to the closet, opened it. The
closet was sound. There was a groove in the floor. Standers fitted the end of
the crowbar into the groove and lifted. The flooring came up. Standers pulled
the trap door out of the closet and put it on the floor.

Babe came over for a look, careful to keep an eye on Standers
and a tight grip on the gun. Where the floor had been was a large metal-lined
box. Standers opened the box so she could see what was inside.

What she saw inside made her breath snap out. Gold bars and
a shiny wooden box about the size of a box of cigars.

"That's what's got the hair in it?" she asked.

"That's what they say. Inside is another box with some
glass in it. You can look through the glass and see the hair. Box was made by
the Catholic Church to hold the hair. For all I know it's an armpit hair off
one of the Popes. Who's to say? But it's worth money."

"How much money?"

"It depends on who you're dealing with. A million. Two
to three million. Twenty-five million."

"Let's deal with that last guy."

"The fence won't give money like that. We could sell
the gold bars, use that to finance a trip to Germany. There're people there
would pay plenty for the box."

"A goddamn hair," Babe said. "Can you picture
that?"

"Yeah, I can picture that." Babe and Standers
turned as Mulroy spoke, stepped into the room cocking his revolver with one
hand, pushing his hat back with the other.

Mulroy said, "Put the gun down, Babe, or I part your
hair about two inches above your nose."

Babe smiled at him, lowered her gun. "See," she
said. "I got him to take me here, no trouble. Now we can take the
treasure."

Mulroy smiled. "You are some kind of kidder. I never
thought you'd let me have fifty percent anyway. I was gonna do you in from the
start. Same as you were with me. Drop the gun, Babe."

Babe dropped the revolver. "You got me all wrong,"
she said.

"No I don't," Mulroy said.

"I guess you didn't go for pizza," Standers said.

"No, but I tell you what," Mulroy said. "I'm
pretty hungry right now, so let's get this over with. I'll make it short and
sweet. A bullet through the head for you, Standers. A couple more just to make
sure you aren't gonna be some kind of living cabbage. As for you, Babe. There's
a bed here, and I figure I might as well get all the treasure I can get. Look
at it this way. It's the last nice thing you can do for anybody, so you might
as well make it nice. If nothing else, be selfish and enjoy it."

"Well," Standers said, looking down at Babe's
revolver on the floor. "You might as well take the gun."

Standers stepped out from behind Babe and kicked her gun toward
Mulroy, and no sooner had he done that, than he threw the crowbar.

Mulroy looked down at the revolver sliding his way, then
looked up. As he did, the crowbar hit him directly on the bridge of the nose
and dropped him. He fell unconscious with his back against the wall.

Soon as Mulroy fell, Babe reached for her revolver. Standers
kicked her legs out from under her, but she scuttled like a crab and got hold
of it and shot in Standers's direction. The shot missed, but it stopped
Standers.

Babe got up, pulled her dress down and smiled. "Looks
like I'm ahead."

She turned suddenly and shot the unconscious Mulroy behind
the ear. Mulroy's hat, which had maintained its position on his head, came off
as he nodded forward. A wad of tobacco rolled over his lip and landed in his
lap. Blood ran down his cheek and onto his nice Western coat.

Babe smiled again, spoke to Standers. "Now I just got
you. And I need you to carry those bars out of here."

Standers said. "Why should I help?"

"Cause I'll let you go."

Standers snorted.

"All right then, because I'll shoot you in the knees
and leave you here if you don't. That way, you go slow. Help me, I'll make it
quick."

"Damn, that's a tough choice."

"Let's you and me finish up in a way you don't have to
suffer, babycakes."

Standers nodded, said, "You promise to make it
quick?"

"Honey, it'll happen so fast you won't know it
happened."

"I can't take the strain," Standers said. He
pointed to the room adjacent to the bedroom. "There's a wheelbarrow in
there. It's the way I haul stuff out. I get that, we can make a few trips, get
it over with. I don't like to think about dying for a long time. Let's just get
it done."

"Fine with me," Babe said.

Standers started toward the other room. Babe said,
"Hold on."

She bent down and got Mulroy's gun. Now she had one in
either hand. She waved Standers back against the wall and peeked in the room he
had indicated. There was a wheelbarrow in there.

"All right, let's do it," she said.

Standers stepped quickly inside, and as Babe started to
enter the room, he said sharply, "Don't step there!"

Babe held her foot in mid-air, and Standers slapped her
closest gun arm down and grabbed it, slid behind her and pinned her other arm.
He slid his hands down and took the guns from her. He used his knee to shove her
forward. She stumbled and the floor cracked and she went through and spun and
there was another crack, but it wasn't the floor. She screamed and moaned
something awful. After a moment, she stopped bellowing and turned to Standers,
she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

Standers said, "What's the matter? Kind of run out of
lies? There ain't nothing you can say would interest me. It's just a shame to
have to kill a good-lookin' piece like you."

"Please," she said, but Standers shot her in the
face with Mulroy's gun and she fell backwards, her broken leg still in the gap
in the floor. Her other leg flew up and came down and her heel hit the floor
with a slap. Her dress hiked up and exposed her privates.

"Not a bad way to remember you," Standers said.
"It's the only part of you that wasn't a cheat."

Standers took the box containing the hair out of the closet,
put the closet back in shape, got the wheelbarrow and used it to haul Babe, her
purse, and the guns out of there and through the woods to a pond his relatives
had built fifty years ago.

He dumped Babe beside the pond, went back for Mulroy and
dumped him beside her. He got Mulroy's car keys out of his pocket and Babe's
keys out of her purse.

Standers walked back to Babe's car and drove it to the edge
of the pond, rolled down the windows a little, put her and Mulroy in the back
seat with her purse and the guns, then he put the car in neutral. He pushed it
off in the water. It was a deep, dirty pond. The car went down quick.

Standers waited at the shack until almost dark, then took
the box containing the hair, walked back, found Mulroy's car and drove it out
of there. He stopped the car beside a dirt road about a mile from his house and
wiped it clean with a handkerchief he found in the front seat. He got the box
out of the car and walked back to his trailer.

It was dark when he got there. The door was still open. He
went inside, locked up and set the box with the hair on the counter beside the
sink. He opened the box and took out the smaller box and studied the hair
through the smeary glass.

He thought to himself: What if this is the Virgin Mary's
hair? It could even be an ass hair, but if it's the Virgin Mary's . . . well,
it's the Virgin Mary's. And what if it's a dog hair? It'll still sell for the
same. It was time to get rid of it. He would book a flight to Germany tomorrow,
search out the right people, sell it, sock what he got from it away in his
foreign bank account, come back and fence the gold bars and sell all his land,
except for the chunk with the house and pond on it. He'd fill the pond in
himself with a rented back hole and dozer, plant some trees on top of it, let
it set while he lived abroad.

Simple, but a good plan, he thought.

Standers drank a glass of water and took the box and lay
down on the couch snuggling it. He was exhausted. Fear of death did that to a
fella. He closed his eyes and went to sleep immediately.

A short time later he awoke in pain. His whole body ached.
He leaped up, dropping the box. He began to slap at his legs and chest, tear at
his clothes.

Jesus. The fire ants! His entire body was covered with the
bastards.

Standers felt queezy. My God, he thought. I'm having a
reaction. I'm allergic to the little shits.