All Hat (4 page)

“Never better.”

“Where have I heard that before?”

She sipped at the coffee, watched as he fumbled in his pocket for his cigarettes. When he produced the pack she walked over and took one. He lit both, and she retreated to her chair.

“This place is going to hell in a handbasket,” he said.

“Well, you'd be the one to know about that particular destination.” She inhaled and blew smoke above her head. “We're doing all right.”

“How's Homer?”

“He's fine. Slowing down a little, I guess.”

He took a first drink of coffee and realized that it was instant. She saw him look into the cup, and then—as if in rebuttal—she took a long sip from her own, watching him over the rim with her eyes narrowed.

He put the cup on the table and looked away. The lawn, he saw now, was half cut. There was a riding lawn mower stalled beside the house, its hood up.
Nothing Runs Like a Deere
advised the decal on the side.

“What was Sonny Stanton doing here?”

“Limping noticeably.”

Her smile caught him unawares; he'd not known how much he'd wanted her to smile until after she'd done so. He felt defenseless in her presence, even more so now with the whiskey he'd drunk.

“Stopped to see Dad,” she said then. “Sonny and Dad have become bosom buddies, it seems.”

“Oh?”

“Sonny's trying to buy this place. For some reason he's trying to buy up the whole concession. He already owns a pretty good piece of it.”

“I heard. What's Homer think about that?”

“My father has always been impressed by money. He likes the fancy cars and the talk. He thinks he likes Sonny because Sonny's telling him all manner of shit, no doubt. But my father won't sell this farm. And if he tried, I'd stop him.”

Ray was watching her now, hoping that she would smile again and knowing that she wouldn't.

“Have you been painting, Etta?”

“No, I don't seem to have the time or…” She shrugged.

“Or what?”

“I don't know.” She looked away.

“He's not safe to be around,” he said after a moment.

“Sonny? I know that. But don't worry; he won't mess with me.”

“Don't be so sure.”

“He wouldn't dare. He knows who my friends are.”

There was a sudden roar from the interior of the house, a man's voice calling her name. Etta stood, her expression one of resignation rather than alarm, then tossed the remainder of her coffee on the grass and started for the back door. Ray looked inquisitively toward the door for a moment, then slid from the table.

“You saying we're friends?” he asked.

“What do you think?” she said. “You shouldn't be driving, by the way. But I guess you can negotiate another mile to Pete Culpepper's. One of these days you're gonna have to start thinking about acting your age, Ray.”

*   *   *

Pete was standing over the stove, drinking a beer and stirring a pot of chili, when Ray walked in. The smell of the chili and the unmistakable odor of sourdough biscuits filled the kitchen—the acrid bite of the peppers and spices afloat on the soft yeasty air of the sourdough. Ray was immediately famished. He tossed the truck keys on the table, walked over to look in the pot. The steam from the stew made his eyes run, cleared his sinuses. He crossed the room and sat at the table.

“That's got some heat to it.”

“I ever tell you 'bout the rattlesnake chili we used to make down in El Paso?” Pete asked. “We'd find them big old diamondbacks, sunning themselves on the rocks, and pick 'em off with a .22. Cook 'em up with that local chili pepper, so hot you could light a cigar with it. You want a beer?”

“No.” Ray had heard about the rattlesnake chili many times, although the locale had a habit of changing. “What were you doing in El Paso?”

Pete poured a little beer into the pot. “Working for a quarter-horse trainer, man was a great-nephew of Pat Garrett. That's no guff. His family had the gun that Garrett used to shoot the Kid with. Sold it to a dentist over in Austin for $125,000. It was the genuine article.”

“It had better been, for that kind of dough.”

Ray picked up a newspaper from the table, glanced at the headlines without interest. Pete watched him from his chili pot.

“How's your sister?”

“I don't know.” Ray pushed the paper away. “She's not there, you want to know the truth. She's living inside her head, Pete. And I guess that's what she wants. Or maybe that's all she can do.”

Ray was suddenly tired. He wasn't used to any of this—the hay baling, the driving, the drinking, the talking. He'd only gotten through the past two years by forcing himself to think of nothing. Now it seemed he had to think of everything at once. It occurred to him that his brain was out of shape.

Pete put the lid on the pot, grabbed a towel, and opened the oven door to pull out the tray of biscuits, plumped up like fat little puppies and sweet-smelling in the pan. He set the tray on the table in front of Ray.

“How's Etta?” he asked.

Ray looked up from the biscuits. “How do you know I saw Etta?”

Pete brought the chili over, set the pot on the newspaper so it wouldn't burn the arborite table he'd burned a hundred times before, then went into the cupboards for plates.

“You got that dopey look about you.”

“I can have that without seeing Etta.”

“But you did see her.” Pete put down knives and forks, sat, and ladled out the stew.

“I guess I did. She's doin' all right.”

“You needn't tell me that. She's tough as a cactus, that gal. Eat.”

Ray rousted himself, took a biscuit and broke it open, dragged it through the chili on his plate. Pete got up and got another beer from the fridge.

“Homer there?” he asked.

“He was inside,” Ray said. “I didn't see him. I heard him.”

“I hear he ain't doin' too good.”

“No?”

“That bunch down at the mercantile were goin' on about him having that Old-zimers disease.” Pete uncapped the beer and flipped the lid onto the countertop. “Although I doubt he's any worse off than the dimwits that were tellin' it.”

“Then that's why she's still there. Of course, she'd never let on. Told me he's doing okay. And it's called Alzheimer's disease.”

“Not according to that bunch down at the mercantile.”

Ray took another mouthful. “Why didn't you tell me about Sonny Stanton buying up the concession over there?”

Pete shrugged. “Maybe I was afraid you'd go riding off like the Lone Ranger.”

“That what you were afraid of?”

“Maybe. What's Etta saying?”

“You know Etta; she thinks she can handle anything that comes along. The same with Homer being sick.”

“There's lot of mule in that girl.”

Ray sat chewing the hot chili thoughtfully. Thinking about Etta's smile. Those cornflower eyes, the slight disdain. “Yeah, well I guess she's bucking for saint.”

“I'd say she's got a better chance than me or you.”

4

Paulie was in the passenger seat of the Lincoln, Dean behind the wheel, driving like a lunatic as usual. They were running number 7 west of Brampton, headed for the Slamdance, doing 110 in a 50, Pearl Jam in the tape deck.

Paulie was wearing his porkpie hat, and every few seconds he would lean back, pushing the rear brim into the headrest, causing the front of the hat to pop up. Dean, watching with a peripheral eye, was growing agitated.

“Do you have to do that?” he asked.

“Nope,” Paulie said, but he kept on doing it until the phone rang.

“Don't answer that,” Dean ordered. “It'll be Jackson, sure as shit.”

“So?” Paulie asked, the ringing phone in his hand.

Dean grabbed it away from him. “So? You think he wants to say hello? He's got some shit errand for us to run, like always. You wanna go in and look at pussy, or you wanna go play fetch for Jackson?”

Paulie knew that it didn't really matter what he wanted to do, so he remained silent. They walked out of the sunlight into the dark of the Slamdance, ordered a couple of beers, and then stood at the bar. A stunning blond woman announced as Misty was onstage, naked save for a creatively torn white T-shirt, the shirt flashing brilliantly under the black lights above. Misty's big finish was to “She Works Hard for the Money.” Halfway through the song, the tattered shirt hit the floor, and it became immediately apparent that Misty's plastic surgeon had been infinitely more skilled than her dance teacher.

Dean turned to Tiny Montgomery, working the bar, and said, “Wow, where'd she come from?”

“Depends who's asking,” Tiny replied, watching her with the jaded eye of a man who'd seen too many naked women. “Yesterday I heard her tell some dude she was from Vancouver; the day before it was New York. Saturday she was drawling like a Georgia peach, claiming she hailed from Savannah.”

When Misty quit the stage she went into the back room and emerged ten minutes later, wearing tight jeans and a white tank top. She walked to the bar.

“Gimme an ice water,” she told Tiny.

“Hi there,” Dean said.

She gave him a quick look, her eyes flicking over him like a handicapper looking at a cheap runner, taking in the gelled hair, the gold chain around the neck, the inexpensive leather jacket.

“Hello,” she said and looked past him.

“Buy you a drink?” Dean asked.

“Johnny Walker Blue,” she said to Tiny at once, not even looking at Dean.

Tiny brought the Scotch neat and turned to Dean: “Twelve bucks.” His great belly shook with mirth as he watched the look on Dean's face. But Dean was a trooper; he paid with a twenty and even left Tiny a dollar tip. Misty took the Scotch and smiled at him.

“So you're Misty?” Dean asked.

“Sure—why not?” she said.

“Where you from?”

She turned and looked at Paulie, who was shyly admiring the fabric of her tank top.

“California,” she decided. “The Golden State.”

“I'm Dino,” Dean said. “This is Paulie.”

When Paulie said hello he took his hat off, revealing jug ears and a spring-loaded cowlick. Misty nodded and watched out over the crowd, sipped at her Scotch.

“What d'you boys do?”

“We're in the thoroughbred business,” Dean said.

Misty turned back to him. “Yeah? And what do you do in the thoroughbred business?”

“Well, I don't know about
Dino,
” Paulie said. “But I shovel a lot of horse poop.”

The three of them were sitting at a table and half pissed when Jackson Jones came in. Dean and Paulie watched as he stood just inside the door, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Dean thought about the back door, knew at once there was no chance.

“Shoulda parked in the alley,” he told Paulie.

Jackson didn't bother to sit down. He wouldn't, of course, not in a joint like this. He stood in his jeans and his boots and his faded blue shirt, and he looked at Dean without expression, the look that always pissed Dean off for that very reason. His voice, when he spoke, was as neutral as his look, and that pissed Dean off too.

“I been trying to get you,” Jackson said. “Where's the cell?”

“In the car,” Dean said. “We been here.”

“What good is it if you don't have it with you?” Jackson asked.

“Battery's dead,” Dean said. “So what good is it anyway? Say hi to Misty, Jackson.”

“Hello, Misty,” Jackson said. “You two better get your asses over to the house.”

“Are you a genuine cowboy, Jackson?” Misty asked. “I never saw a black cowboy before.”

“I'm a horseman,” Jackson said.

*   *   *

When Jackson got back to the farm Sonny was on the porch, a Cohiba in his mouth, feet up on the railing, cane hooked over the arm of the wicker chair where he sat. Sonny was looking vacantly at the paddock across the lane, where Silver Dawn was grazing at some tufts of grass along the fencerow. The mare's stomach was large, even though she wouldn't foal for nearly three months. The sun was making the odd cameo appearance from the cloud cover, and when it did it threw specks of light across the gray of her withers, like blue sparks dancing in a bonfire. Sonny watched her and puffed on the Cuban.

Jackson parked the truck in front of the barn and sat there a moment, watching Sonny watch the pregnant mare. Sonny looked like shit, but then he usually did in the morning. He was wearing khaki pants—no matter the weather, he never wore shorts, self-conscious about the scars on his leg—and a short-sleeved shirt, which was unbuttoned to reveal his soft belly. He'd grown his dark blond hair long of late and had taken to treating it with some sort of styling gunk, which left it looking, to Jackson's eyes, more filthy than fashionable. Jackson himself was a meticulous groomer, and he couldn't understand why a good-looking man like Sonny would wear his hair like that or submit to the goatee that he was sporadically growing and then shaving away. It seemed to Jackson that Sonny was a man in search of an image.

Jackson decided he wasn't much in the mood for Sonny today, but he walked over anyway, stepped onto the porch, and leaned the palm of his hand against the post there.

Sonny continued to look past him. Jackson glanced out over the paved lane, which ran to the highway. The grass alongside the lane was plush and manicured, with flower beds planted every fifty feet, the flowers mostly dead with the autumn weather. The beds were Jackson's pet projects, a labor of love. There were rose gardens in front of the barns—pure white Nevadas and Snow Queens mixed with Robert le Diables and Henri Martins. As time-consuming as they were, Jackson looked upon his horticultural interests as therapy. The fact that he was the only one on the place who wasn't in particular need of therapy was another matter altogether.