The Executioner's Song (6 page)

Sure had a different personality at poker than he did in the shop. Rikki could see right off that Gary wasn’t too honest. He had a lot of habits that were just bad manners. Like he would lean over to see what a fellow had in his hand, and was a real lawyer about rules,

always interpreting them in his favor. He also kept putting down the other players because they didn’t know the poker rules that con victs used. Since it was tencent ante, quarter raise, a pot could go to $io.oo. Gary’s interest in poker was obviously the money. He was making no friends.

After that evening, a couple of Sterling’s buddies said they were going to stop coming over. Sterling told them, Fine with me. He was certainly being loyal to Gary. Yet when Rikki was alone with him, Sterling started to put Gary down. Rikki went along. There wasn’t too much they would take from him, they agreed. Still, Rikki had a funny feeling about the man. Didn’t want to make an enemy of him for too little. He figured if Gary gave trouble, he wouldn’t be afraid to just right-out fight him, but he was a little uneasy of what Gary might pull from his pocket.

They agreed, however, that they also felt sorry for him. Gary had a problem. No patience.

The poker games continued. Different people. By the third night, Sterling got Rikki aside and asked if he would take Gary somewhere. The guy was really getting on everybody’s nerves.

So Rikki asked if he wanted to chase down some girls. Gary said Yeah.

Rikki soon decided this was the horniest guy he had ever met. He was crazy.

Rikki had split up with his wife again. He had been with Sue for six years ever since he was 17 and she was 15. They had three kids, and they knew how to fight. So Rikki now started to kid Gary. Told him how beautiful Sue was, big beautiful mean-looking blond yet a nice chick. Now that she was mad at her husband, maybe she’d like to meet Gary.

In fact, Rikki had been so mad at her the last time he left that he took all the money in the house plus the food stamps and the welfare check. It would put her out of her mind for sure if he was to send over a steamed-up dude like Gary. So Rikki had said it, kind of half joking.

Once the possibility was there, though, Gary wouldn’t quit bug ging Rikki about it. Rikki told him he had only meant it as a joke, it was his wife, man! But Gary kept asking when Rikki would take him

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THE EXECUTIONER’S SONG

over to Sue’s house. When Pdkki finally told him, No way, Gary got so mad they almost did have a fight. Rikki had to get Gary off the subject by saying they could go drag Center Street. Rikki was pretty good at chasing girls, he let Gary know.

So they went up and down in Rikki Baker’s GTO. Would pass girls cruising in their cars and try to wave them over, then circle around and go down Center Street again, see the same girls, try to wave them over a second time, just driving side by side in traffic, part of a long line of other dudes in their cars, and pickup trucks, and the chicks in theirs, everybody’s radio going real loud.

Gary got bored with the lack of positive results. When they came to a red light behind one carful of girls who’d been teasing them, he jumped out and stuck his head in their window. Rikki couldn’t hear what he was saying, but when the light turned green and the girls tried to take off, Gary wouldn’t get his head out of their window. Didn’t care about the cars stuck behind, or anything. After the girls finally got going, Gary wanted Rikki to chase them down. “Ain’t no

way,” said Rikki.

“Do it!”

With all the traffic, Rikki couldn’t catch up. All the while, Gary was yelling to make a move and show he was as good as he said.

They had started too late in the evening, however. There were a lot of cars with guys but only a few with girls, and they were just fooling around and very cautious. One had to come up on them easy, not scare them right out of the water. Gary made him promise to go out earlier next time.

As they were saying good night, Gary had a proposition. What would Rikki think about learning up? Make a little money at poker.

Rikki had already heard about this from Sterling. He gave Gary the same answer Sterling had given: “Well, Gary, I couldn’t cheat against my friends,” he said.

For reply, Gary said, “Can I drive your car?” Being a GTO, it was a fast automobile. This time, he said yes. Figured he’d better. Not getting his way, bent Gary too far out of shape.

The moment he got the wheel, he almost killed them. Took a corner fast and nearly hit a stop sign. Then he didn’t slow down at the intersection and went cata-humping over the drainage ditch that was there to slow you down. Next he almost ran some people off the road, in fact, one car coming toward them had to go onto the shoulder. Rikki kept yelling at him to stop. It felt like an hour with a madman. Gary kept telling him all the while that it was not bad considering how long it had been since he drove, and Rikki was near to having a heart attack. Couldn’t get him to stop until Gary popped the clutch without enough gas and the motor conked. Then he couldn’t get it started. The GTO had a bad battery.

That’s what it took for Rikki to get behind the wheel again. Gary was awful depressed the battery had died on him. Got upset about it the way people can brood over bad weather.

Next day around lunchtime, Toni and Brenda picked Gary up at the shoe shop and took him out for a hamburger. Sitting on each side of him at the counter, talking into his left ear and his right ear, they got right to the topic. What it came down to was that he had been borrowing too much money.

Yes, said Toni gently, he’d been hitting Vern for a five-dollar bill here, ten there, once in a while twenty. He hadn’t been going to work a full number of hours either. “Vern and Ida said this to you?” Gary asked.

“Gary,” said Toni, “I don’t think you realize Daddy’s financial situation. He’s got too much pride to tell you.”

“He’d be furious if he knew we were talking to you about this,” Brenda said, “but Dad isn’t making a whole lot right now. He created a job so the parole board would help you get out.”

“If you need ten dollars,” said Toni, “Daddy will be there. But not just to buy a six-pack and then come home and sit around’and drink

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Toni would put it this way. She and Brenda understood it was difficult for Gary to know what to do with his money. After all, he had never had to manage his w, eekly pay before.

Gary answered, “Well, yeah, I don’t seem to know. I go to buy something, and like I don’t have enough left. Suddenly I’m broke.” Toni assured him, “Gary, I figured once you understand Daddy doesn’t have money to keep loaning you, you will never put him in the position of asking him.”

“I feel bad,” said Gary, “about this. Vern has no money?”

“He has a little,” Brenda said. ,’But he’s hurting for money. He’s trying to save for his operation. Vern doesn’t carry on, but that leg gives him pain all the time.”

Gary sat with his head down, just thinking. “I didn’t realize,, he said, “I was puttingVern on the spot.”

Toni answered, “Gary, I know it’s hard. But try to settle down, just a little. What you spend for beer doesn’t sound like much, but it would make a difference to Mother and Daddy if you took five dollars and went and bought a sack of groceries, ‘cause, you know, they’re feeding you, and clothing you, and board and room.;’

Brenda now moved to the next topic. She knew Gary had needed time to unwind and work with somebody like Vern, whom he didn’t have to regard as a boss all the time. Yet the moment had come, maybe, to start thinking about a place of his own and a real job. She had even been doing some looking for him.

Gary said, “I don’t think I’m ready. I appreciate what you’re try ing to do, Brenda, but I’d like to hang in with your folks a little longer.”

“Mother and Dad,” said Brenda, “haven’t had anybody living in their house since Toni got married. That’s been ten or twelve years. Gary, they love you, but I’ll be frank. You are-starting to get on their nerves.”

“Maybe you better tell me about that job.”

“I’ve been talking,” said Brenda, “to the wife of a fellow who has an insulation shop. He’s Spencer McGrath. From what I hear, Spencer doesn’t act like a boss at all. He’s right in there with his men.”

While Brenda had not met him, she had spent, she explained, an

THE FIRST MONTH

enjoyable few minutes with McGrath’s wife, Marie. She was a pleas ant woman, Brenda said, kind of heavyset, always smiling or chuck ling, a strong Ma Kettle type.

Marie had said to Brenda, “If you don’t reach out your hand to someone coming out of prison, they’re going to turn right around and be frustrated and start getting in trouble again.” Society had to open up a little bit, she had said, if anybody was going to get rehabilitated.

“All right,” said Gary, “I’ll go meet the man. But,” he looked at them, “give me another week.”

After work, Gary came in with a sack of groceries. Just odds and ends and nothing to do with putting a meal together, but Ida took it as a happy gesture. It turned back her thoughts to a time thirty years ago and more when she had loaned Bessie $4° because Frank Gil more was in jail. It took Bessie almost ten years, but she paid back that forty. Maybe Gary had the same characteristic. Ida decided to tell him about Margie Quinn.

She knew this nice girl, Marge, the daughter of a friend. About six years ago, Marge had a baby, but she was living alone now, raised her baby nicely. In fact, she stayed with her sister, and worked as a chambermaid down the street.

“Good looking,” Ida told him. “She’s a little sad, but she has beautiful blue eyes. They’re deep set.”

“Are her eyes as beautiful as yours, Ida?” asked Gary.

“Oh, git along, little doggie,” said Ida.

Gary said he’d like to see her right now.

The girl who was working the night shift in the Canyon Inn Motel office saw a tall man walk through the door, He came up with

a big smile. “Oh,” he said, “you must be Margie.” “No,” she said, “Margie.isn’t here this shift.” The fellow just left.

Margie Quinn got a phone call. A pleasant voice said, “I’m Gary, Ida’s nephew.” When she said hello, he replied that she had a nice voice and he’d like to meet her. She was busy that night, she told him, but come over tomorrow. She knew who he was.

Marjorie Quinn’s mother had already mentioned that Ida had a nephew just out of prison and wondered if Marge would consider going out with him. Marge asked what he had been in for, and learned it was robbery. She thought that wasn’t too bad. It was not like murder, after all. Since she was just dating, one fellow at this time and not going steady, she thought, Well, it can’t hurt.

There was a smile on his face as she opened the door. He had a silly hat on, but otherwise seemed all right. She asked if he wanted a beer, and he sat and drank one in the living room, sitting back nicely on the couch. Marge introduced him to Sandy, her sister, who was living with her, and her daughter, and after a while she asked if he wanted to go for a ride up the canyon.

Before they got very far, Gary said, “Let’s get some more beer.” Marge said, “Well, I don’t.care.”

Halfway up the pass, they stopped by Bridal Falls where a narrow stream of water fell for a thousand feet, but they didn’t take the gondola up. It was too expensive.

They sat by the river and talked awhile. It was beginning to get dark and Gary looked at the stars and told her how much he enjoyed them. When he was in prison, he rarely got to see them, he said. You could get out in the yard in the daytime, he explained, and catch plenty of sky above the wall, but the only time you’d ever see the stars was in the winter if you went to Court on some beef or other. Then, you might not be brought back to the penitentiary until late afternoon when it was already dark. On a clear evening, you could see the stars.

He began to talk to Marge about her eyes. They were beautiful, he told her. There was sadness in her eyes but also glints of moonbeam.

She thought he was a pleasant conversationalist. When he asked if she’d like to make a date to see a movie, she consented.

After that, however, a State Police car happened to go tearing up the canyon. His mood shifted. He started talking about cops. The more he spoke, the angrier he got. It came off him like an oven with

THE FIRST MONTH
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the door open. She had second thoughts about going to the movies with him.

After the night got really dark, they continued up the canyon to Heber, stopped for more beer, then headed back. It must have been io:3o by then. As they were coming down the hill into Provo, she

said, “You don’t mind if I take you home now?”

He said, “I don’t want to go there.”

Marge said, “I have to get up for work tomorrow.” “Tomorrow is Saturday.” “That’s a big day at the motel.” “Let’s go over to your house.”

She said, “Okay, for a little while. It can’t be for long.”

Her sister had gone to bed, so they sat in the living room. He kissed her. Then he started to do more.

She said, “I better take you home.”

“I don’t want to,” he said. “They’re not there.”

She insisted. She got him to go. It took all her powers of argument, but she drove him over. It was just a few blocks and when they got there, the lights were out. He said, “They’re not here.”

Now, she realized she was drunk. It came over suddenly that she was smashed. She managed to say, “Where do you want me to take

you ?”

“Over to Sterling’s.” “Can’t you get in here?” “I don’t want to.”

So she took him over to Sterling’s. When they got there he said, teriing isn t up. She said, “You can’t stay at my house.”

Still, they went back to her apartment. She didn’t want to get picked up for drunk driving, and at least she knew the way to her house.