A Perfect Crime

18

A pretty girl got on the bus in Bridgeport, just after dawn. The only empty seat was on the aisle beside Whitey, so she took that, might have taken it anyway, he thought, catching the way she checked out his leather jacket from the corner of her eye. It was a cool jacket, no doubt about that, the coolest article of clothing he’d ever owned. He’d also bought himself a pair of cowboy boots from his first week’s salary, made in Korea, but very cool as well, black with silver stitching and thick heels that must have made him at least six-four. And he still had two hundred dollars and change left over, plus what remained of his gate money. Yeah, babe, he thought, giving her another look, check me out.

A pretty girl, but kind of cheap-looking: spiky hair, lots of earrings, and-as she shrugged herself out of her coat-a little snake tattoo coiling up from her cleavage. Whitey got hard right away. There was a bathroom at the back of the bus. Was it possible to get her behind that door and fuck her brains out? Things like that happened. He remembered that exact scene from one of Rey’s videos, except it took place on a plane, not a bus. The girl on the plane had made the first move, dangling her long red fingernails in the guy’s lap.

This girl didn’t do that. Neither did she have long red fingernails; hers were unpainted and bitten to the quick. Whitey made himself interesting by staring out the window for a while, like a guy having deep thoughts, then sat back and glanced at her as if noticing her for the first time, and if she happened to glance back and see how built he was under the leather jacket or even better the bulge in his pants, they’d be on their way. But she didn’t.

“Where you headed?” he said at last.

“Providence.”

He nodded. “Rhode Island,” he said. Nothing else came to mind. A few miles went by. “Just passing through?” he said.

“I’m sorry?”

“Providence. Just passing through?”

“I go to Brown.”

Brown-what the hell was that? He thought back, all the way back to his high school days on the ice.

“The college?” he said.

“I’m sorry?”

“Brown. The college.”

“Yes.”

Now they were getting somewhere. He noticed that her neck wasn’t completely clean. Necks-where had he heard that if you squeezed a woman’s neck while she was coming she had a better orgasm? Why not just say to her: Hey, ever hear about this neck thing? And then they’d be in the bathroom at the back of the bus, trying it out. He licked his lips a couple of times, getting ready to say it.

The girl took out a book, some kind of art book. She opened it to a picture, one of those pictures any kid could do, just a bunch of rectangles, and stared at it. He squinted at the title, Entrance to Green. There wasn’t even any green in it, for Christ’s sake. She took out a pencil and wrote in the margin, Anuszkiewicz: geometric recession counterbalanced by tonal shift-cool? warm. His hard-on went away.

She studied the art book the rest of the way, gazing at one bullshit picture after another. Whitey stole sidelong peeks at the coiled snake rising and falling in its soft, springy lair as she breathed. Only as the bus was pulling into Providence station did Whitey get an idea. It’s the recovery of stolen objects. Paintings, for example. Why hadn’t he thought of that earlier? The girl gathered her things and started up the aisle. “I’m in the art business myself,” he called after her. She didn’t seem to hear. He thought of the steel-tipped pole he’d left behind, and that snake, rising and falling on her breast.

Whitey got off the bus in Boston. He’d been there once before to play in a tournament at the Garden, but all he remembered was eating oysters, the first and only time he’d ever tasted them, horrible slimy things that were supposed to make you horny but hadn’t; he’d puked in the locker room that evening, and they’d lost to one of the big Catholic schools, the way they always did. So he had to ask some loser on the street, “Hey. Where’s the Garden?”

“Ain’t no more Garden, pal. Where you been? It’s the Fleet.”

“Huh?”

“Fleet Center, now. But the same location. What you do, you-”

“The Public Garden,” said Whitey, realizing his mistake. The man looked at him funny but gave him the directions. The Garden, gone. For a few blocks that pissed Whitey off, more than pissed him off, reminding him of the big percentage they’d cut out of his life. But after a while he began to see the bright side. If Gardens could come and go, then anything was possible, and that included a big score.

Whitey followed the directions, soon found himself walking on a street lined with fancy shops, their windows full of Christmas displays. He saw a leather jacket, a lot like his, went closer: identical to his, right down to those little V — shaped upturns on the chest seams. He checked the name of the shop-Newbury Leather-then took off his own jacket to examine the label. It had been cut out. He stood there wondering about that until he felt the cold, noticed that snow was falling. He hadn’t seen snow since they’d sent him down south. Whitey gazed straight up into the sky. From that angle the snowflakes were black against the cloud cover. He’d grown up in snow and never seen that effect before. Change was possible. He was changing, getting smarter. Black snow was an interesting idea, for example, the kind of interesting idea someone in the art business might have, someone like him. Someone like me, you bitch, he thought to himself, meaning the girl on the bus. He crossed a street and entered the Public Garden.

Roger was waiting under the statue of George Washington, just as he’d said he’d be. Snow clung to the brim of George Washington’s bronze hat, and to Roger’s hat, too, a black fedora, or some other hat with a name. Roger even looked a little like Washington, except he was smiling. He held out his hand, gloved in black suede. Whitey shook it, squeezing harder than normal because his own hand was bare, so it was a bit of an insult, like Roger was a prince and he was a peon or something.

“Ever play any tennis, Whitey?”

“Tennis?”

“You’d have been good.”

Whitey wasn’t sure how to take that: tennis was for fags. “Well, here I am,” he said.

“I never doubted you.” Roger handed him an envelope. “A week’s salary, plus an advance I hope you’ll find suitable.”

Whitey took it. Was he supposed to open the envelope and count the money? Only an asshole would take money without counting it. But the envelope stopped him, although he didn’t know why. Whitey stuck it unopened in his pocket.

“Familiar with the city, Whitey?”

“Yeah.”

“Then why don’t you take the day to get situated? Saturdays are difficult for me, this one especially.”

“Okay,” said Whitey, who would have bet anything it was Friday.

“Come here tomorrow, same time. If it’s convenient. I may have something for you by then.”

Something? Convenient? Whitey was a little lost, but he said, “Sure, I can make it.”

Roger’s smile faded. “Tomorrow, then,” he said, and walked away.

Whitey watched him go. Roger followed the path around a frozen pond and headed across the park. He wore a long black coat that matched his hat and gloves, looked rich, untouchable; and was almost out of sight, obscured by distant trees and thickening snowfall, when Whitey’s mind finally processed what his eyes had seen at once: Roger had been wearing slippers, plaid ones lined with sheepskin. What did that mean? That Roger couldn’t be trusted? Whitey ripped open the envelope, found ten fifties. What had Roger called it? An advance? What did that mean? Five Cs for something he didn’t even understand: that bought a lot of trust. But slippers? Whitey tapped the bills against his palm: slippers. And then he thought of the cut-out label from the leather jacket and realized this had to be Roger’s neighborhood-he was close to home. And where would that be, exactly? Whitey went after him.

Roger came to a street that bordered the park, crossed it. Whitey closed the distance between them until he could distinguish the red of Roger’s slippers. Too close, probably. If Roger glanced back he would certainly recognize him. But Roger didn’t glance back. Whitey knew why: because he was a prince and Whitey was who he was. Roger kept to a steady pace, up a hill lined with big brick houses, all with fancy grillwork, fancy doors, fancy knockers. He turned left on a street that mounted still higher, stopped at a door, took out his keys, opened it, and went inside. Whitey walked past, noted the number and street name, kept going.

He’d accomplished something; what, he wasn’t sure, but it gave him a good feeling. He walked to the top of the hill, down the other side-stepping carefully, because his cowboy boots were slippery on the snowy bricks-found a bar at the bottom. Money in his pocket and a day to kill. Whitey went inside and ordered breakfast: a draft and a large fries. Same again. Then another draft. He was free, and feeling good.

The bar began to fill up. Someone next to him ordered oysters. Whitey eyed them, glistening on crushed ice, felt a little funny. He started thinking about Sue Savard. Strange, how the mind worked: he hadn’t thought about her in years, would have supposed he’d completely forgotten what she looked like, but now that he was back up north, back up north and free, he could picture her, especially her eyes the moment he’d gotten himself inside her. The truth was that he’d never had sex like the sex he’d had with Sue Savard. And he hadn’t meant to hurt her at all-that business with the glass cutter had been mostly just to tickle her, give her a little added pleasure. Women had an enormous capacity for pleasure, according to Rey, and his amateur housewife videos proved it; real housewives, even the social worker said so, real housewives with video cameras. Someone-a mustached man with thick lips-slurped down one of those oysters. Whitey paid his bill and left.

Money in his pocket. A day to kill. Whitey returned to the bus station, got on the bus to Nashua, took a taxi to Lawton Ferry, 97 Carp Road.

A dump, as he knew it would be. He knocked on the door five or six times, called, “Ma,” then walked around the side, peering in the windows. He saw dirty dishes, dirty clothes, pictures of Jesus, but no one was home. Fine. He didn’t really want to see her anyway. What he wanted was the pickup.

He found it in the rotting barn behind the house. His old pickup, but painted white now, with LITTLE WHITE CHURCH OF THE REDEEMER stenciled on the side. That, and the fact she’d never mentioned it, pissed him off, so much that he started kicking with his new cowboy boot, kicking a hole right through the wall of the barn. What gave her the right to do that? He calmed down when he realized that if the pickup hadn’t been used he’d never have gotten it started after all these years. Besides, he’d soon be able to afford something much better. Whitey opened the door, saw a cat curled up inside. He yanked it out, found the keys under the seat, fired up his old car.

Whitey drove east to Little Joe Lake, took the rutted road that led to the far end. Nothing had changed, or if it had, the snow was hiding all the signs, but everything seemed strange. He had changed: he was bigger, stronger, smarter, and that made all the difference.

Whitey parked by the footbridge to the little cabin on the island. He sat there for a long time. Square one, and he was back. If only Sue Savard was inside now, everything would be different. This bigger, stronger, smarter him would make sure of that, would know how to stop the screaming in some harmless way.

Not that it had been his fault, all that screaming. Why hadn’t she realized what it would lead to? Why hadn’t she been able to stop it herself, to keep her own goddamn mouth shut and not force him to do it for her? Her fault, but still Whitey was filled with regret-he’d blown his chance with Sue Savard, the sexiest woman he’d ever known. What would Sue Savard have been like now?