PIGGS - A Novel with Bonus Screenplay (17 page)

Get on the good side of Gloria, the clothes would help with that.
 
So would whacking Ricky Chavez, but he'd have to be careful, she'd really be pissed if she ever found out.

That's maybe four things to do, Jack thought, if you counted Cecil and his crew as just one.
 
Four things is a lot, but what else did he have to do?
 
Besides scrubbing pots and waiting tables in Piggs?
 
Waiting for Rhino to think of some shit for him to do.
 
You don't ever reach for something bigger than you are, you're never going to get a fucking star.

H
e heard Grape walk up the stairs to Cecil's place, saw the dust drift from the cracks with each step he passed by.

He wasn't dozing off this time, he was wide awake now, and it didn't take any time at all to get where he wanted to go.

A concrete slab, one of the old cellar walls, had slots near the top where someone meant to put beams sometime.
 
There were eight or ten slots Jack had found, wandering about the old dog pens with a flash.
 
One of these was less than two feet beneath the boards of Cecil's floor.

It wasn't a comfortable perch, and your ass froze off on the cold concrete, but he didn't mind that.
 
He could hear Cecil talk, hear him breathe, hear him on the john if you didn't stick your fingers in your ears.

Jack knew the two were drinking, you could hear the bottle click against the glass, you could smell the smoke from Cecil's cheap cigar.

Cecil wasn't happy, he was pissed, but there was nothing new about that.

"He says he's going to come, he better come," Cecil said.
 
"Junior Ambrose wants to work with me, he better get a guy up here, stop fucking around."

"You heard what he said," Grape told him, "he said the guy was coming.
 
Said he'd send him right away."

"Said he's comin' from where?
 
He's coming from New Orleans, he's coming from fucking Mars?"

Grape laughed, and shook the ice in his glass.
 
"Maybe Ambrose's kid, he's sending some guy got a little smarts.
 
He isn't sending no Hutt Kenny this time, some asshole isn't smart enough to see if he's maybe got something shouldn't ought to be in his trunk.

"A guy don't check his car, a guy don't check his trunk, don't look under the hood, a guy like that's going to wind up in a dumpster somewhere, he's got no more smarts than that."

Grape felt he was on a roll now, that a story like this was worth telling twice, or maybe more than that.

"A guy like Kenny, he don't think about shit like that. He's thinking, he's thinking about Alabama Straight, what she's doing in his lap.
 
He's thinking he gets back quick, he's got somebody that'll do that again.
 
What he's thinking is–"

"I'm calling Junior.
 
Fuck this."

"What, you mean now?
 
You callin' him now?"

"What'd I say?
 
I say, I'm calling him now, I'm calling him Easter, I'm calling him Christmas day?"

Jack could hardly hear Cecil's voice, even a few feet away, but when he started talking like that, you could figure the blood was pumping into his Lone Ranger face, turning it from cherry-red to black.

Grape, Jack knew, was aware of this too, because he wasn't real smartmouth now, he was talking extra quiet, like a yard guy maybe, or a waiter in a fancy restaurant.

"I was saying, what I was saying is it's awful late, Mr. Dupree, I don't give a fuck you're disturbing this guy, fuck him, he don't get to sleep all night.
 
I'm thinking, an' you set me straight if I'm wrong, I'm thinking, even if the old man's kid he isn't too bright, he's maybe goin' to wonder, why is Mr. Dupree callin' in the middle of the night?
 
Somethin's wrong up there, he's got somethin' on his mind, he's pulling some shit on me?
 
I'm just sayin' what he's maybe thinking, I don't even know the guy's smart as that."

After a minute, Cecil said, "I think he's maybe not. I think he's a stupid fuck, or he wouldn't send someone like Kenny the Hutt up here to deal with me."

"I think you're absolutely right, Mr. Dupree–"

"I'm talking. I'm still talking, I'm saying maybe you're right, maybe the old man's watching the kid now, the kid screws up with Hutt.
 
Maybe he's unretiring for a minute, even if his dick's falling off.
 
I'm calling tomorrow.
 
I'm calling after breakfast, I'm not calling Junior, I'm calling Ambrose, I'm talking to the old man myself.
 
I'm–
 
What?
 
What's that, what you saying now?"

"I didn't say nothing, Mr. Dupree."

"You didn't say nothing, your face said something, okay?
 
Guy's thinking something, he don't want to say it, that's what you're going to see, it's sitting on his face."

"Hey.
 
It wasn't worth saying, I was thinking, you know, about Ambrose, what you said."

"The old man."

"Right, the old man.
 
Not the kid, the old man."

"What?"

"Nothing, Mr. Dupree, I'm just saying, I'm saying up front, you know what you want to do, it's just what I was thinking, which don't mean shit, I'll say it anyway.
 
I got to be straight, I don't feel good talking to Junior or the old man either one.
 
I'm saying, don't give these fuckers nothing, like we give a shit about the buy or not.
 
You don't show up, fuck you.
 
There's lots of guys got merchandise, we'll get it somewhere else."

Cecil didn't answer at all.
 
Jack hoped Grape was suffering, hoped he couldn't breathe, hoped his gut was knotting up.
 
Grape was a cocky little bastard and mean as a snake, but he was scared of Cecil Dupree.
 
Like anyone who had good sense knew Cecil didn't give a shit about anyone's opinion but his own.

"Where's Cat," Cecil said finally, "where's the dummy at?"

"You want him, I'll kick his ass, I'll get him up here."

"I don't want him, you don't want to kick his ass, you aren't as fucking dumb as that.
 
Get me a couple Mars bars at the 7-'leven, I don't want a Mounds, I don't want a Milky Way, they don't got a Mars, you get it somewhere else."

"Yes, sir.
 
Mars bars.
 
You want me to get Cat go an' get a couple Mars bars, no Mounds, no–"

"I didn't say Cat, you hear me say Cat?
 
You go, and take Cat with you.
 
Get me a Dr Pepper too, they don't have that don't get me a fucking Pepsi, don't get me nothing at all."

"I'm on it," Grape said, "I think they got the Dr Pepper, I told the slope there last time we don't want to be drivin' all over the fucking county, we want him to keep 'em here."

"Do it," Cecil said.
 
"Don't fucking talk about it, do it right now."

J
ack listened to Grape stomp down the stairs, saw his motion through the cracks.
 
In a minute, he heard Cat growling somewhere, then they both were gone.

Jack's back hurt and his legs had gone numb, but he didn't want to move, it was much too quiet up there.
 
Cecil didn't even know he had a cellar under Piggs, and Jack didn't want to tell him now.

Jack tried to rub some feeling in his legs, but he couldn't reach far.
 
Cecil hadn't moved, hadn't breathed as far as Jack could tell.
 
How long did it take to go to the store and back?
 
Ten, fifteen minutes.
 
Maybe ten inside, fifteen back.
 
Two, carry your four...

Cecil moved.
 
The floor creaked when he stalked across the room, bare feet slapping against the floor.
 
He stopped, somewhere to Jack's right.
 
The lock clicked loudly in the door. Clicked once, clicked twice again.
 
Jack had never been in Cecil's rooms, but the locks were no surprise.
 
A gangster of Cecil's stature would want some good locks on the door.

Cecil turned on the TV.
 
It sounded like an all-night movie.
 
Jack thought it might be Ben Hur.
 
Man, that chariot race was something else again.
 
They used to show it in Huntsville all the time.
 
The cons would bet on it, and try to kill each other if their guy didn't win.

Cecil moved across the room.
 
Walked right up above Jack, then stopped.
 
Jack felt the hairs stand up on his neck.
 
Cecil couldn't see him, couldn't guess he was there, but that didn't help at all.
 
Your person of the criminal persuasion could see things regular people couldn't see.
 
Crooks and cops, they could both do that.
 
Jack wished he had some of that extra-sensitive power himself, but he'd never been that good.

Cecil squatted down.
 
The floorboards squeaked, letting in a tiny speck of light.
 
It sounded like Cecil was prying up the floor.
 
Jack held his breath.
 
Cecil was doing something, just past the concrete wall, where Jack couldn't see.
 
And he didn't have to pry, the boards just sort of rolled free.

Cecil lifted something out.
 
Set it down right above Jack.

Another click, another lock.
 
Jack listened, pressed his ear closer to the boards by his head.

A new sound now, a sound like leaves, a whispery, rustly kind of sound.
 
Slick-slick-slick.
 
A crinkle then a snap.
 
A really pleasant sound, nice as it could be. A sound like that could help a person sleep real good...

It struck, him, then, and Jack made a little sound himself, and cut it off quick.
 
Money.
 
That's what it was.
 
Holy shit, Cecil Dupree was counting his money, a whole box full!

Slick-slick-slick.
 
Big, stubby Cecil fingers rifling through the bills.
 
A stack went plop! on the floor, and then another after that.

How high could you go before a stack fell?
 
You wouldn't keep them all in one stack, you'd do a different stack, maybe a different stack for different bills.
 
Cecil wouldn't bother with ones, so they had to be big.
 
Twenties and hundreds, Jack guessed.
 
Your crime boss, even if he lived in Mexican Wells, wouldn't want to mess with little bills.
 
They'd be in little stacks, then, with paper strips around them, or maybe rubber bands.
 
All you had to do was count a stack, you wouldn't have to–

Jack almost fell off his perch.
 
Grape hit the stairs, three at a time, Cat pounding on his heels, a gorilla, Godzilla, a buffalo in heat.

Just above Jack, the stacks hopped quickly back in the box, and the box disappeared.

"Hey, Mr. Dupree?" Grape said, rattling the knob, "I can't get in, I think the thing's locked."

Cecil clicked the locks, opened the door.

"What you got it locked for, Mr. Dupree?
 
Why you lockin' the door?"

"'Cause you don't got any manners, asshole, you or Cat either one.
 
You knock from now on, you don't come walking in, you show a little respect, act like you–
 
What's that, what the fuck you got there?
 
If that's a fucking Mounds, you bring me something with coconut in it, you're headed back to the 7-'leven store."

"They didn't have nothing else, Mr. Dupree."

"That's what they had," Cat said, "they didn't have nothing else."

"Shut up.
 
Shut the fuck up."

Cecil grabbed the sack from Grape.
 
"Don't bother coming in, you're going back out.
 
I'm thinking, I'm thinking this Mescan, this Ricky whatever, he's hanging around, he's messing with the girls.
 
I don't want him in Piggs.
 
What it is, I don't want him anywhere.
 
Do I got to explain this to you or what?"

"No sir, you sure don't.
 
I don't like him, he's all the time, like you said, messing with the girls.
 
He comes in tomorrow, me and Cat, we'll take care of the guy–"

"No.
 
You won't."
 
Cecil poked a finger in Grape's chest.

"You don't fuck with the guy in Piggs.
 
You don't do nothing here.
 
The guy's got a condo in San Antone.
 
He's in the book. You do it there."

"Right.
 
First thing tomorrow, we'll get on it, me an' Cat."