Horace Afoot (32 page)

“Roulette? With the gun?”

He grins stupidly.

“I don’t believe you.”

“Then don’t, dude.”

The vet strides up the walk carrying a little black bag. “Where’s the patient?” she asks in a friendly, down-to-business voice. She is young and tall with long, fiery red hair. Schroeder, hands crammed conspiratorially into his jacket, nods to her and stands aside as she marches up the steps. By some instinct she ignores him and directs her attention to me.

I point to the basket. Schroeder backs up a few paces and sits down at the other end of the porch.

“Didn’t you say your dog was shot?”

“Yes, I did.”

She regards my swollen, stitched-up eye. Finally she kneels down next to the basket, turns to me. “Why’d you tell me that?”

“Because nobody would come out here for an injured crow.”

She returns her attention to the bird in the basket and for a few moments says nothing. Then she stands up. “Is there a place I can work inside? A table?” Her tone suggests that she is irritated and that I had better not bother her.

I watch from the doorway, fingering the stitches at the corner of my eye, as she works at the kitchen table. She examines and dresses the wing, working swiftly and without comment. A splint is fashioned from a
tongue depresser. The bird submits to her competent hands as if by instinct. “This is a wild bird,” she finally says, gently winding the wing with gauze. “Where did you find it?”

“In the backyard.”

When she is finished she places the bird in the basket. “I’ll take her back to the clinic. When the wing is healed we’ll let her go.”

“I want to take care of her.”

The woman says nothing and begins repacking her bag. “Caring for an injured animal is not easy,” she says. “Especially a wild one.”

“I’d like to try.”

The woman continues packing her bag. A brass nameplate on the side reads
Jane
. No last name, no initial. Just Jane. “You were right, the bird was shot. With a .22, I’d say. The bullet broke the bone and passed through the wing. It should heal fairly well.”

“You’ll let me keep her?”

Jane shrugs. “If you want to.”

“Thanks.” I feel silly and a little overly enthusiastic. My eager gratitude seems to break the ice a little, and Jane smiles. An uncomplicated, straight, bright smile that makes me realize I am in the presence of an utterly direct person. She exudes clarity, seems wise. By contrast, I feel all convoluted and contorted, unspontaneous and foolish.

“Crows eat carrion,” she says at last. “Put some hamburger in a dish and leave it in the basket. Some water too.”

“Should I keep her inside?”

“Where you had her is fine. If it gets cold at night you can bring her in. The less you do, the better.”

“What if she tries to get out of the basket?”

“She won’t. The splint is too cumbersome.”

“How long will it take to heal?”

I follow her back through the house to the front door. “I’ll come back toward the end of the week to check on her. We’ll see.”

I hold the door open and step out on the porch. Schroeder is still sitting there, a leather-bound malfeasance. I ignore him and walk with Jane to her car. Before getting in she gives me a business card. “Call me if there are any problems.”

I take the card. “What do I owe you?”

Jane puts on her seatbelt and thinks for a moment. “Let’s see how she does first.”

“Let me pay you for your time.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Are you sure?”

She starts the car. “You can pay me if the wing heals,” she says.

“And if it doesn’t?”

She pulls away without an answer. I watch as she turns into the neighbor’s driveway, backs out. “By the way,” she calls out the window, “I would have come out for a crow.” Then, without a glance back, she whips up the street. The card in my hand reads
Jane’s Veterinary Services
. No last name, just an address and a phone number.

Schroeder has not moved from the porch. “What are you still doing here?”

He drops his chin into the palm of his hand and scowls. All I can think of now is the gun in his pocket. It makes him more pathetic than dangerous, and his confession of contemplated murder angers more than frightens me.

“I need money, man.” He has adopted the tone of a downtrodden teenager.

“For what?”

“My bike. The cops towed it. I need three hundred bucks to get it back.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem for a man about town like yourself.”

“Fuck you, man.”

“What about Dad?”

“The fucker won’t help me out.”

“Gee, that’s tough.”

“Fuck you,” Schroeder grunts.

I walk into the house and close the front door as a signal for him to leave. The crow is still in the basket, splinted wing akimbo. The white bandage and the black sheen of its feathers contrast beautifully and make the contorted bird look like some sort of appliquéd Maltese Falcon. I sit down and watch it for a few minutes, wondering why Jane
refused payment. I decide that she is one of those people who are able to act without needing a motive and whose actions always seem right and proper and balanced. I lift the basket carefully and carry it back out onto the porch.

Schroeder has still not moved. “How about lending me the money?”

I ignore him and place the basket under the window on top of the small stack of firewood left over from winter. It is not completely stable. After a slight reshuffling of logs the basket sits nicely.

“What do you say, man? I can pay you back in a week.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t even want to explain why not.”

Schroeder stares out into the yard. “Look,” he says after a short silence, “I’m sorry about the notebook. I should have returned it right away.”

“The notebook has nothing to do with it.”

“Then I’m sorry I told you I wanted to kill you. I probably wouldn’t have anyway.”

“Well, at least you came prepared.”

“Very funny,” Schroeder grunts.

I reach for the broom leaning next to the front door and begin to sweep the porch.

“If I had my bike back I could get my shit together, man. Get the fuck out of here. And take Sylvia with me too. She wants to go to Mexico.”

“Why not get the money from her, then?”

“She’s broker than I am. Lost her job at the pharmacy. Even had to sell her truck.”

A cloud of dust has picked up. I move toward Schroeder, trying to keep it away from the bird. “Just out of curiosity …”

“Out of curiosity what?”

“What is it between you and Sylvia?”

Schroeder lifts his knees and crosses his arms around them. “What do you mean?”

“How long have you and she been—an item?”

Schroeder casts me a why-the-hell-do-you-care look. “We been together on and off for a couple of years.”

“She’s older than you are.”

“She’s thirty-one.”

“That’s quite an age difference.”

Schroeder rests his chin on top of his knees. “In lots of ways I’m older than she is. Less fucked up, too.”

I continue to sweep. Schroeder looks more and more pathetic the longer he sits there—despite or because of his concealed weapon, I can’t decide. “We’re both fuckups,” he says after a short pause. “She’s totally fucked up. Very, totally fucked up. I mean it. I’m fucked up too. That’s probably why we’re in love.”

I put the broom back and go over to look at the bird. It cocks its head, wary. Its vigilance is astounding. The effort must be exhausting. It stares at me. I stare back, a game to see who blinks first. “Tell me what you know about the rape,” I finally say.

Schroeder looks over at me. “Will you lend me the money?”

The bird blinks. “I’ll think about it.”

Schroeder rearranges himself so that he is leaning up against a corner post. He stretches his legs out in front and makes himself comfortable, boots, chains, concealed weapon, and all. “Promise?”

“I said I’ll think about it.”

“No money, no story.”

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?”

“When you hear it you’ll know it’s the truth, man.”

“Tell me one thing first.”

“What?”

“Did your mother really kill herself in front of you?”

Schroeder doesn’t bat an eye. “Yup.” He fixes me with a level gaze, ready for another.

The unnecessary cruelty of the question hangs heavily, but Schroeder shows no sign of anger. “Sorry.” I look away. “I’ll lend you the money.”

“Fucking perfect,” he says and settles back against the post. He pulls a pack of Marlboros from the interior of his jacket and lights up with a studied expression. Inhales deeply and holds it as though the beginning,
222, and end of his story will condense in his lungs. “The names have been changed to protect the guilty,” he begins. A long exhalation of smoke.

“Why not change the story while you’re at it too?”

Schroeder flicks his ash, grins. “Maybe I already have. The guilty need as much protecting as anybody.”

Who am I to argue the matter of names? Symbol and thing and the copula is—the third singular present form of
to be
and a terrifying predicament all around. I let him continue.

“It all started when she got fired from Semantech.”

“She said she was laid off.”

“She got fired, her and another line worker. For fighting.”

“She said she was a manager.”

“She worked the line. Assembling whatever the fuck it is they assemble there. Bombs, I think.”

I watch the crow while Schroeder takes long drags from the cigarette and reinvents Sylvia for me.

“She and this dude worked the same shift. He used to sell her blow and it got so they started doing business together. He’d front her and she’d cut it and sell it out at Jack’s and take the profit in product. That’s when I met her. I used to cop from her there. I started getting in there when I was seventeen. First time at the door the guy asks me for ID and I pointed to my Sportster and said, ‘There’s my ID, dude.’ The guy just opened the door right up and nobody ever asked me for ID there again. At Jack’s a Harley is the only ID you need.”

“You had that bike when you were seventeen?”

“My dad gave it to me for a graduation present. Four point oh GPA and the highest SATs in fucking school history. Got scholarships from three colleges.” Schroeder flicks his cigarette into the yard. “I deferred a year. Then I deferred again, and I would have deferred again, but they said I had to start or lose the money, so off I went.”

“Where?”

“Notre fuckin’ Dame, man. And don’t give me that good school shit. They threw me out. That’s why I’m here.”

“I’m sure you deserved it.”

“I’ll tell you about it some other time.” Schroeder takes another
cigarette, lights up, and continues. “So anyway, Sylvia starts fucking up with this dude, and I know all about it because by that time me and her are hanging out together pretty regularly. She gets burned a couple of times and keeps taking her cut anyway. Then she starts getting greedy and stomping on it so bad pretty soon she’s just selling pure inositol and nobody wants to cop from her.”

“What does all this have to do with getting raped?”

Schroeder drags on his cigarette. “I’m getting there, dude.”

“Let me guess. Mr. X raped her.”

“The man’s a fucking genius! How’d you guess? But there’s more to it.” He flicks his ash. “By now Mr. X is all over her big time. He wants his money, and Sylvia doesn’t have it. She blows him off and blows him off until finally it boils over and he smacks her one day at work and they both get fired. So then he starts harassing her at home. I offer the guy my goddamn bike so he’ll leave her alone. He says he’ll take it, but then he decides he wants to get paid his own way, and so one day he drags her out into that field and rapes her and tries to kill her, but she manages to get away. You know the rest of it, dude.”

“You’re lying.”

“I am
not
fucking lying.”

“Why should I believe a word of what you’re telling me when you just told me you thought
I
raped her?”

“
That
was a lie.”

“Why did you lie?”

“Why not? Why should I tell you the truth? It wouldn’t make any difference. Not to me, anyway.”

“Why did you break into my house?”

Schroeder runs a hand through his dirty hair. “Because we thought you saw who raped her and didn’t want you to talk to the cops.”

“Wait a minute.” I stand up and walk to the end of the porch. “You were going to kill me because you thought I would lead the police to the
rapist
?”

Schroeder climbs to his feet. “You don’t get it, do you, dude? I’m rubbing your fucking nose in it and you just don’t fucking get it. You want me to make you up a sign?”

“You’re right. I’m stupid. I don’t get it. So explain.”

Schroeder comes to the end of the porch and stands directly in front of me. His hands are crammed into his jacket, unzipped except at the very bottom. His black tee shirt is spotted with sweat. Besides a gun and the hideous angel tattooed on his chest, I wonder what else he is concealing. “You’re going to have to figure it out for yourself, dude. I can’t tell you any more. I already told you more than I should have.”

“Then you’re going to have to get your three hundred bucks someplace else.”

“I told you everything I can. Not just because I need the money.”

“Why else?”

“Because I figured you’d understand better than most people and because someday, you never know, it might come up again, and I’ll be glad I told somebody.” He holds the end of the cigarette to his lips with pinched fingers, sucks on it, and flicks it away with a macho swagger. “You don’t want to know any more. Believe me.”

The neighbor’s kitchen door bangs shut and the kid runs outside. He stops short at the sight of Schroeder. Then, regaining confidence, he hops over the fence and races up to the porch.

“Some terrorists hijacked a school bus and now they’re surrounded by tanks and army.”

“Where?”

“In the Middle East.”

“Which country?”

“Jerusalem.”

“Jerusalem is a city, not a country.”

“In Israel, I think it said.”