Cold in July

39

When we got back to Jim Bob’s place late that evening, Russel met me at the door with, “Your wife called.”

“Oh,” I said. “What did she say?”

“She didn’t want to talk to me, as you can imagine. Wouldn’t have, if she hadn’t had to. She asked you to call her after five.”

It was, of course, well after five then. I said, “Jim Bob, can I drive the Rambler to the store? I’d prefer to use the pay phone.”

Take the truck and use the goddamn air-conditioning. This heat has damn near made me sick. Hell, take the Red Bitch if you want.”

“The truck is fine.”

I drove over to the store and got some change and called Ann. She answered on the first ring.

“How are you?” she asked.

“I’m fine.”

“Come home.”

“I can’t. Not quite yet.”

“You’ve got to.”

“Is Jordan okay?”

“He’s fine. It’s me that isn’t okay. Come home. Quit playing cops and robbers and come home.”

“This is serious, Ann.”

“All the more reason to come home. Haven’t you played this out enough? Who cares who you shot? He had it coming. As for it not being Freddy, that’s Russel’s problem.”

“We’ve been through this.”

“And you’ve had your fun. Come home.”

“Things have changed. It’s a lot worse than we thought.”

Silence.

“It’s seems that Freddy is into some really bad stuff.”

“What do you expect from an organized crime informer?”

“Really bad stuff, Ann.” And I told her all that we had found out and what Russel and Jim Bob were planning. “And I’m going to help them do it. I thought at first I was just going to go along for part of the ride, but I can’t. When I saw Freddy today, I knew I had to go all the way.”

“It’s not your place to do anything about it.”

“Whose place is it? The law? They won’t touch him. Not unless he gets totally out of hand, and even then as long as it’s Mexicans they won’t bother. They want to keep their reputation intact.”

“Then let Jim Bob and Russel do it. They want to do it and they know how. You’re not a gunfighter.”

“I can’t just let them do something like that and pretend I’m not part of it because I didn’t pull the trigger. I’ve got to go in there with them, back their play.”

“Back their play. Jesus, will you listen to yourself, Richard. Back their play. That’s gangster talk.”

“Westerns.”

“I don’t give a damn. It’s childish. It’s vigilante.”

“There’s nothing childish about it, unless you want to include the little whore he killed. She was childish. About fifteen, I think. Maybe younger. That’s a good age for him. He can trick them easier, less experience. Even if they are whores. And I don’t give a fuck if it’s vigilante. I’d be glad to let the law do it, but they don’t want to.”

“Richard. I love you. But I’m not going to sit around here and wonder if you’re dead in some ditch somewhere. You come home now, or don’t come home. When it’s over, if you’re okay you tell me, but you don’t come home. Ever.”

“Ann-”

She hung up.

· · ·

I drove back to Jim Bob’s, my stomach feeling like an empty pot. Maybe, like Russel, there was a hole in me and my soul was oozing out.

But I knew any attempt to talk myself out of what I was planning to do would be useless. This sense of honor I carried was a blind thing. It didn’t deal in common sense. It was made up of something I heard my dad say once, one of the few things I truly remembered about him. He said, you do what’s right because it’s right and you don’t need a reason.

Man’s got to do what a man’s got to do.

I wondered if dad was thinking that way when he put the gun in his mouth.

Man’s got to do what a man’s got to do.

I got back to Jim Bob’s feeling small enough to walk under a snail’s belly on stilts, and when I went inside, Jim Bob said, “Your wife’s on the phone. She sounds a little distressed. She’s been holding for you till you got back.”

“Thanks,” I said. I started for the phone. Jim Bob reached out and took me by the shoulder.

“Dane, you got a problem at home, you go home and take care of it. This ain’t your business. Not really. You’re a frame builder from LaBorde, Texas, not a shootist.”

“That’s what Ann says.”

I picked up the phone. “Hello.”

“Richard,” Ann said, “I think you’re a big, dumb, foolish sonofabitch that’s seen too many John Wayne movies and read too many cowboy books, but I’ll be waiting. You do what you got to do, damnit. And please, please, be careful and don’t get yourself killed. Jordan and I love you.”

“Love you too,” I said.

When I hung up, I turned to Russel and Jim Bob. “I’m going to need a gun too,” I said. “I’m in. All the way.”