Gargantuan (25 page)

“No, no one else has tried to drown him,” I say. “But I’m not sure he’s okay.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“A lot,” I sigh.

“Tell me about it,” he says. He sees my hesitation. “I’m not gonna go repeating your troubles to anyone. I barely ever talk to people. You know me, I got my music. Most of the time, that’s enough.”

I look him in the eye. It’s hard to tell how old he is. Maybe forty-five. He’s got an in-between black man’s complexion. Neither dark nor light. Though he’s over six feet and has some meat on him, his face is small, the features delicate and almost pretty. He has enormous eyes and a mouth that curls up at the edges. His hair is cropped short and he’s wearing a nice dark wool overcoat.

I don’t know if it’s his good taste in overcoats or the fact that it’s unlikely he’ll repeat what I say to anyone, but I find myself spilling the whole story to him.

“I knew your man friend had to be a jockey,” Rite of Spring Man says when I reach the end of the tale.

I feel deflated. I’ve told him the whole story, from meeting Attila to finding out he probably has a price tag on his head, to the debacle last night. And all he has to say is that he knew Attila was a jockey?

“My name is Lionel, by the way,” he adds.

“Ruby,” I say, still feeling a bit upset with him.

“That’s quite a story, Ruby. But I knew you were a girl with a story. Never mind this jockey business. That’s bad enough. But you’re carrying a lot of other things around too.”

“I am?”

“We all are. Some more than others. You, you’ve got sad eyes. You got joy in you too. I’m not saying you walk around moping and spreading misery all over but you got some serious sad. And I don’t think you and that jockey gonna make it fly.”

“What makes you say that?”

“The way you talk about him. You admire him. But you know it ain’t long for this world.”

“I do?”

“Maybe not,” Lionel backtracks. “Listen, I know next to nothing about what makes people stick together. I’m just telling you my hunch.”

“Oh,” I say. “And what should I do? Call the cops just to try and protect him from himself? The only thing he really loves is horses. I don’t want to put his riding career in jeopardy.”

“No, I don’t guess anyone would want to do that.” Lionel shakes his head. “I don’t know what you should do, girl. That’s why I got out of the world.”

“What?”

“That’s why I live like I do. In that shitty SRO over there on Seventeenth Street,” he says, motioning in the distance. “I couldn’t take it anymore. The decisions and the maintenance and the difficulty. I never found my way in the world but I love music. I work a little here and there, but mostly, I just listen to music.”

“Where’s your boom box?” I ask since it’s the first time I’ve seen him without it.

“Somebody stole it.”

“That’s awful.”

“Don’t go offering to buy me a new one.”

“Oh,” I say, “I don’t think I was going to.”

“That’s good. I don’t want it to be like that with you and me. Chances are, we ain’t gonna talk again much. I’ll wave at you when I see you and maybe you’ll give me that pretty smile of yours but we ain’t gonna hang out much ’cause I don’t do much hanging. I wouldn’t want that nice distant acquaintanceship ruined by your having bought me a new boom box. I can work. I’ll get a new one.”

“Okay,” I shrug.

“You’re gonna be all right, Ruby,” Lionel says as he stands up. He pulls his overcoat tighter around himself, smiles, and then walks off.

I stare after him for a moment. Eventually, the wind kicks up and throws sand in my face.

I walk down the beach all the way to Brighton where I go into a diner and order pancakes. The waitress is tall and fair. The skin is
pulled tightly over her broad face and her eyes are tiny and light blue. She seems to dislike me. She violently scratches my order into her pad then turns away. There aren’t too many other customers in here right now. Two old guys in hats picking at a plate of fries. A teenaged girl eating an omelet. The surly waitress brings my pancakes and slams the check down in front of me, as if daring me to order anything else. I douse the pancakes in syrup and dig in. The comfort food isn’t particularly comforting though. I finish my meal, leave an excessive tip because the waitress was mean to me, and get up and walk. I go to the water again. The sky looks like it’s aching. I don’t know if it’s from being in proximity to where Attila was nearly drowned but I’m suddenly having a bad feeling. Sal’s out at Aqueduct with Attila but that’s not reassuring me much. I turn my phone on to try reaching Sal, but before I dial his number, I find that there’s a message. It’s Sal telling me to call him, that it’s urgent. My stomach seizes up. I dial Sal’s number but it goes straight to voice mail. I then try Attila’s cell phone with the same result. Although I have bad knees and can’t do much running, I break into a fast jog, heading for home.

By the time I get back to my place my knees hurt and my stomach is in knots from running on a full stomach but it’s the least of my worries. The cats, who came to greet me at the door, seem aware that something is wrong. They keep out of my way as I press the Play button on the answering machine. Another message from Sal. Again, I try his cell phone. Still nothing. I have to go to the track.

I run into the bedroom to put on warmer clothing. I’m just getting my red down jacket out of the hallway closet when the phone rings. I race over to get it on the second ring.

“Yes?” I answer breathlessly.

“Ruby?” says a female voice.

“Who’s this?”

“Violet Kravitz.”

“Oh, hello.”

“There’s been some unpleasantness at the track,” Violet says.

“Unpleasantness? What?”

“Murder,” Violet says quietly.

“What?” I feel like I’m going to vomit.

“Layla, an exercise rider. She was murdered during morning works.”

“Oh,” I say, feeling relieved and then immediately guilty for my relief.

“I nearly scratched Jack from his race. I feel very strangely about running my horse on such a terrible day. However, Henry thinks we should run.”

“He’s probably right,” I offer, still not sure what any of this has to do with me and half expecting worse news to be forthcoming.

“You’re not working today?” Violet asks.

“No, my boss sent me home.”

“That’s good.”

“How so?”

“I’m calling because I understand that you and Attila have had some sort of disagreement and I assumed you weren’t planning on coming to watch the race. I can’t say that the atmosphere here is particularly good but I would like to see you and I’d like it if you were here to cheer Jack on. The horse was so fond of you and I admit to having small superstitions. I feel your being there would help him somehow.”

“I’m actually on my way,” I tell Violet. I’m aching to tell her exactly
why
I’m on my way. I bite my tongue though.

“That’s wonderful,” she says, sounding genuinely delighted. “You’ll come find us on the backstretch then? We’ll be in the receiving barn. I’ll leave your name at Security.”

“Thanks, Violet, yes, I’ll be right there. Oh, and have you seen my friend Sal?”

“The big fellow? Attila’s friend?”

“Yeah, him.”

“I saw him earlier, yes. He was with Attila after this morning’s terrible events. I haven’t seen either of them in a while though.”

“All right, I’ll be there soon, Violet, and thank you.”

I hang up and realize that the only way I can conceivably get to
Aqueduct quickly is to take a car service. I put a jacket on, check that the cats have fresh water, then throw money, keys, and cigarettes in my pocket and leave. I glance over at Ramirez’s door and wish it were open. I don’t know that I’d tell him what I’m up to, but just having a “Hello, lady” from him would give me strength. The door is closed though and there aren’t any sounds emanating from his apartment. I go down the stairs two at a time and jog over to the car service on Mermaid Avenue. There are two cars parked outside the tiny storefront, waiting for something to do. A lively Dominican man ushers me into his beat-up white Lincoln Town Car and I tell him my destination.

“You playing the ponies?” he asks with interest.

“No, I mean yeah, maybe, but I’m going to see a horse I know in a race.”

“Oh yeah? You got a hot tip for me, girl?”

This makes me wonder. Do I? Will Attila ride well?

I tell my driver to bet Jack Valentine in the fifth.

I
stare at the little guy knowing there’s a chance I’m not going to see him again for a long while. Darwin’s groom, Petey is mucking some stalls out down the aisle. He nodded at me when he saw me heading over here. I feel okay about Petey. In the time I’ve been watching him, I’ve seen he’s come to really give a shit about Darwin. Maybe not the way I do, but I know he’ll see to it nothing bad happens to the little guy. Though Petey can’t do anything to keep the
colt safe on the track. It’s up to me to take care of that. Which means I might not be seeing much of Darwin anymore.

Darwin reaches his head over the stall guard, trying to bite at my pockets where he knows I’ve got peppermints for him.

“Hey, no biting,” I tell him, tapping him on the forehead a little. He pins his ears at me. I frown at him. Eventually, he puts his ears forward again. I scratch under his chin and feed him a couple of peppermints, watching him roll them around on his big tongue.

After a long while, I run my hand down Darwin’s face one last time and then walk away. I don’t turn around even though I can feel him looking at me.

I’m back at Carla’s shedrow going over some tack I’ve got hanging on a hook in the aisle. I’m just getting some gunk out of a bit when I hear a loud noise and I look up to see a horse tearing toward the barn. I frown up at the sight and it takes me a minute to realize it’s my boss, Carla, on a runaway and that he’s taking her back to his stall. Before I’ve had time to think, Carla is ducking, trying to flatten herself against the horse’s neck as he shoots for his stall. The stall door is closed and the colt bangs right into it then starts rearing.

“Nester!” Carla screams, sounding genuinely terrified.

I come within a few feet of the flailing horse and start grabbing at his reins. He’s snorting and crazed and can’t figure out which way is up. I’ve got to get hold of him before he hurts himself and my boss.

I try to put myself inside the horse’s mind to send good thoughts there. The horse calms down a little bit. I reach for the reins. Carla’s still screaming which isn’t helping any. I pull the horse’s head toward me but he spooks and tries to rear again. I send him more calmness and in that one moment of quiet, Carla gets her feet untangled from the stirrups and hops down.

“Jesus,” she says, collapsing right there in the dirt.

The horse, a two-year-old named Soft Demon, is terrified and still trying to pull away from me.

“Don’t do it, buddy,” I tell him. “You’re gonna hurt yourself and you won’t like that one bit,” I say.

He suddenly stands completely still, his big eyes and labored breathing the only sign of his chaos.

People have gathered around, some of them having seen the start of the event up in the paddock where Carla was trying to give the colt a schooling session, though why she
rode
the poor colt in the paddock I don’t know. I thought she was just going to lead him around and show him the sights there. Carla gets to her feet and people start asking if she’s all right. I open Demon’s stall door and lead him inside. I stand at his head awhile talking to him and at first he just keeps looking around, expecting something terrifying to suddenly appear in his stall. After a long five minutes, he finally puts his head down and rubs against my chest. The terror has abated. I start taking the tack off him. He’s wet with sweat and I’ve got to walk him off but I don’t want to risk taking him out of his stall again with all the brouhaha going on out there. I feel myself getting angry at the rubberneckers and, as I let myself out of the stall, I glare at them. Carla is evidently enjoying a moment in the sun over it all, holding court, recounting the event. This annoys me. I clear my throat: “Folks, please move along, I got a scared horse I gotta walk off.”

At first Carla looks at me like I’m a fool, but eventually she starts nodding in agreement.

“He’s right,” she says, “we need some quiet here.”

Which is when I notice the big bald guy. The one that’s always hanging around that jockey husband of Ava’s. His is one of at least six faces staring at me, though what the hell he’s doing here I couldn’t tell you. I thought I saw the guy get in his truck and drive away when I was tagging after Attila two hours ago. The guy was upset about the girl dying on the track and I’d watched him yelling at the jockey—seeming to hold him somehow responsible. I had also felt like the shooter was after the jockey—who’d been dressed the same as the girl exercise rider. I wished the shooter
had
offed the jockey—then it wouldn’t be my problem anymore. Now though, I’ve got even more problems. Once I do get the jockey out of the way, I figure I have to find that shooter. After all, he almost killed a horse.