Hey There (You with the Gun in Your Hand)

Fifteen

I followed Jerry into the warehouse. We were blocking the car headlights from illuminating any part of the room. When Jerry moved aside I followed, and the beams came pouring in like a spotlight. The residual light from the spot lit some of the interior, but not all of it. There were still dark areas and corners. For that, Jerry started using his penlight.

“Looks completely empty,” he said, and his voice echoed, as if to support his statement.

We walked around, the light from Jerry’s flash showing the way. Here and there we found some rags, empty cardboard boxes, a puddle or two-and then something in a corner that looked like more rags, a large pile.

“Jerry …”

“You wanna leave, Mr. G.?” he asked. “Or wait outside?”

“No,” I said, “we’ll either stay together or go together.”

“It’s your call, then.”

Backing out seemed the thing to do, but I said, “Let’s take a look.”

We moved closer to the pile and completely away from the light coming from the car. Now all we had was the thin shaft of light given off by Jerry’s flashlight.

“Damn,” I said, when he moved the light to reveal a head.

“Maybe it’s a drunk, sleepin’ it off,” Jerry said.

He kicked, found something solid beneath the rags. He kicked again, then leaned down to take a closer look.

“Don’t touch-” I started.

“I gotta touch to see if he’s dead,” he said. “Just his neck.”

Jerry handed me his gun, then reached out and put two fingers to the man’s neck.

“No pulse,” he said. “He’s dead.”

“How?”

Jerry moved his light up and down the body.

“I can’t see how he was killed, but he’s dead, all right. And I ain’t about to move these rags. I’m leavin’ this guy just the way we found him.”

He stood up, took the gun back and put it away. Then he shined the light on the corpse’s face.

“Know ’im?”

The face being slack with death, I could only assume this guy had been in his thirties. He was dark-haired, with heavy black stubble. His eyes were closed, his thin-lipped mouth was hanging open.

“Never saw him before.”

Jerry moved the light off the man’s face.

“I guess we should call the police,” I said.

“What for?”

“Well … we found a body.”

“This body doesn’t have to have anything to do with why we’re here, Mr. G.,” Jerry reasoned. “If we call the cops, we’re right in the middle of it, and maybe we don’t hafta be.”

“So we just … walk out? What do I tell Sammy?”

“Tell him the truth,” Jerry said. “What else is there to tell him? You guys’ll just hafta wait to hear from the blackmailers again.”

“And what do we tell them?”

“Also the truth,” he said. “You gotta tell everybody the truth, with one exception.”

“What’s that?”

“The cops,” Jerry said. “You don’t never tell the truth to the cops. It only gets ya in trouble. Nothin’ good can happen if ya tell the cops the truth.”

I thought a moment, then said, “I could call them anonymously.”

“That’s up to you, Mr. G.,” Jerry said. “Right now I say we get the hell outta here. Your car’s been sittin’ in this parking lot with the lights on for too damn long as it is.”

He was right about that. But still I didn’t move. I just stood there staring down at the body.

“What?” Jerry asked.

“Let me have your light.”

He handed it over.

“Whataya gonna do?”

“Just poke around a little bit,” I said, crouching down. Using the tip of the light I poked into the rags that covered the body.

“Whataya lookin’ for?”

“I just want to see if he has anything on him,” I said.

“You think he’s holdin’ what you went after?” he asked.

“Could be.”

I poked and prodded, hoping I wasn’t completely screwing up any evidence. I didn’t feel anything that could be an envelope. I didn’t feel anything hard, or out of the ordinary. And then …

“What is it?” Jerry asked.

“I don’t know.” I felt it again, then tapped it. “Something hard, like metal.”

“Are you curious enough to take a look?”

“Damn it, we’re here,” I said. “And maybe it’s … something.”

“Go ahead, then.”

I used the penlight to move a couple of the rags, revealing what the metal thing was.

“That’s a gun,” Jerry said.

I moved the light up and down the weapon.

“Not just any gun,” I said. “A six-gun.”

“Like in John Wayne movies?”

“Yeah.” Like the ones I had seen Sammy wearing in his room at Harrah’s in Tahoe. “Great.”

Jerry crouched down next to me, took the light and pushed aside some more rags. In for a penny, I thought …

“Okay,” he said, “he was shot, maybe with this gun. See?”

I could see the hole in the guy’s clothes, and the small amount of blood that had soaked his shirt.

“That’s not much blood,” I said.

“He died right away, so he didn’t bleed out. We better get outta here.”

“I want to take it with us.”

“Take what?” He stood up. He was holding the light now and shone it in my face.

“The gun.”

He studied my face with the light.

“You serious?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I’ll explain it to you later.”

Jerry looked around now, as if we were being watched, then back at me.

“You got a pen?” he asked.

“What?”

“A pen, do you got a pen on ya?”

“Yeah, but-”

“Use it to pick up the gun and let’s get the hell outta here.”

I took a pen out of my pocket, stuck it through the trigger guard and picked up the gun. Jerry reached down and, using his flashlight, moved the rags back to approximately where they were before we disturbed them. Then we hurried to the door, the gun swinging to and fro on my pen.