Freaky Deaky

Chapter 20

Woody said, "I guess the place to start, put down I want to cross out Mark's name and anything in it that has to do with him. Say, 'As he is no longer a successor co-trustee of the estate.' I'm pretty sure that's what he was. Put that down under his name, successor co-trustee. But you know something? It must say in there what happens if he dies. I mean before I do."

Donnell, sitting at the library desk with the green lamp on, said, "Cross out Mark," as he wrote it on a legal pad, underlined it and stopped there.

"I got it, Mr. Woody. You understand the lawyer knows who comes out of the will. What we have to tell him is who you want to go in. Hmmm, let's think about that."

The man was pacing in his bathrobe, way over on the other side of the room now, looking at the TV set like he wanted to turn it on. He'd been on his way to the swimming pool for his late-afternoon dog-paddle when Donnell caught him in the sunroom, told him not to go in there. The man asked why not. Donnell said to him, Mr. Woody, the bomb. The man said, Oh yeah, he forgot. He looked in at the pool like a kid looking out the window at rain. What was he going to do now? Didn't know whether to cry or have a drink. So Donnell had lit his face up and said, Hey, I got an idea. . . .

"You thinking, Mr. Woody?"

"The lawyer's also a co-trustee. But that doesn't mean he gets anything. I don't think he does."

"You have to watch those people, Mr. Woody. Who you want in there wasn't in there before?"

"Mark was my only brother."

"Doesn't have to be kin."

"Did I tell you? I decided I'm not gonna take singing lessons."

"I wouldn't."

"You notice I never sing in the morning? I like to sing in the pool, your voice carries. But I never sing in the morning."

"I notice that."

"You know what I used to think?"

"No, sir."

"That red things were best for hangovers, in the morning. A really bad one, I'd drink a bottle of ketchup."

Man was cuckoo.

"You know what I think I might do?"

"What's that?"

"Get married."

"You have to be in love, Mr. Woody. It's the law."

"I mean it. Not right away but pretty soon. There's one I like, too. The redhead."

"You mean the one say you raped her, wants to take you to court and have you thrown in jail?"

"The one that was here--when was it?"

"You had all kind of ladies here, Mr. Woody."

Donnell'd had some, too. Some of the man's, brought here by Mark, and some of his own. Ladies who'd stop by for a late supper and Donnell would take off Ezio Pinza for his own kind of enchanted evening: put on the Whodinis, put on Run-DMC, put on some oldies like the Funkadelics, like the Last Poets, the original rappers rapping to "Wakeup Niggers" and get some live sound in the house. The ladies would be gone in the early morning, before the man had his drinks on the silver tray.

"The redhead, with the red bush."

"Has, huh? You don't tell me."

"Ginger," the man said.

The man remembered her name. "She the one, huh?"

"I'm in love with her."

"Before you get married, how 'bout we get this new will done?"

"I could put her in it."

"You could. Let's see you have anybody closer to you."

"I can't think of any."

"Go through the alphabet. A . . . B . . . C . . . D. Anybody you like start with D, Mr. Woody?"

"Did you know I was suppose to wear glasses?"

"We thinking of Ds, Mr. Woody. Come on, let's think of somebody." Donnell waited. If the man was any dumber you'd have to water him twice a week.

"What do I need glasses for, I can see all right. That's why I'm not gonna take singing lessons."

Man had chicken lo mein for brains. The trouble was, Donnell hadn't slipped him a 'lude at lunchtime, hoping to keep him more awake and get this fucking will taken care of. But the man was too awake, talking with his head wandering all over the place.

"I've been thinking of writing a book. I could dictate it, like we're doing now."

Donnell got up from the desk, went over to the man and eased him into his TV chair, staying over him, Donnell placing his hands on the fat arms of the chair. He was going to get it done and would sit on the motherfucker if he had to.

"I thought of somebody, Mr. Woody."

"Who?"

"Myself. I'd be proud to be in your will."

Donnell had to grin then to get the man to grin, but kept looking at the man's wet eyes to show he meant it.

"Well, yeah, you're gonna be in it."

"I said, whose name start with D? You didn't say nothing."

"I was waiting for you to get to L." The man still grinning.

"Damn. You way ahead of me, huh?" Donnell grinned with the man, wishing to Jesus he could make himself cry at this moment like movie stars. He rubbed one of his eyes anyway, put his hand back on the chair arm and said, "Mr. Woody, how much you have in mind to leave me when you go?"

The man tried to look away to think, but Donnell stayed over him.

"I don't know. . . ."

"About. Gimme a round number."

"How long have you been with me?"

Oh, man. . . . "Mr. Woody, how long doesn't have nothing to do with it. All by myself, who takes care of you? Feeds you, cleans your mess, keeps people from running games on you?" Keep going, the man was nodding. "Who protects your life from people that send you bombs?"

"You do."

"What is a man does all that worth to you after you gone and you don't need the money anyway?"

"I don't know."

"Or have anybody else to give it to."

"Twenty-five thousand?"

Shit.

"Mr. Woody, you giving that to a woman you don't even know."

"A hundred thousand?"

"Your lawyer gets that for taking you to lunch and you pay for it, at your club." Donnell paused but stayed over him. "Think a minute. Would you pay this woman two million dollars so she won't send you a bomb, blow you up?"

"If I have to."

"Then wouldn't you want to give the same amount, at least, to the person that's gonna keep it from happening? You understand what I'm saying, the person being me?"

Look at the man's glassy wet eyes, all the busted blood vessels in his nose, his face; the man was a mess. Yeah, but he was nodding, agreeing.

"I guess that's fair."

Donnell hurried back to the desk and sat down.

"Okay, I'm putting in--how's this? You being of sound mind . . ."--pausing to write--"you want to leave Donnell Lewis . . . at least two million dollars . . . if and when . . . you ever die." Donnell finished, read it over--man, look at it--was about to say, Ready for you to sign, Mr. Woody.

The doorbell rang.

And what he said was, "Shit."

Got up and went out to the front hall hoping it was the paperboy come to collect, Donnell in a mood to kick the kid's ass across the street. He peeked through the peephole as he always did, cautious, and the dark cloud parted and the sun came out to shine on--lookit who's here--Sergeant Mankowski and the redhead name Ginger.

Chris said, "I hope we're not interrupting anything. If Mr. Woody's floating in the pool we'll come back."

"No, he's not floating today. Come in, come in."

"Miss Wyatt would like to have a word with him."

"Yeah, that's fine. He be glad to see you." Donnell full of life in his silky yellow shirt and pants, smiling white teeth at them, saying hi, Ginger, saying to Chris he'd been trying to get hold of him but nobody seemed to have his number; was he hiding or what? Giving them all this chatter crossing the hall to the library, saying yeah, this was nice they dropped by, saying, "Mr. Woody, look who come to see you. Ginger, Mr. Woody, and her friend." All talk and motion all at once.

Greta was giving Chris a look. He shrugged, no help. Donnell was going over to the desk, Woody was pulling himself out of his chair, straightening his bathrobe, making himself presentable, Donnell shoving papers into a desk drawer and opening another one. Now he was holding what looked like a leather-bound commercial checkbook. Greta's voice, kept low, said, "What's going on?" Chris said, "Beats me." Woody was creeping toward Greta on his swollen legs, arms bent but outstretched. "Boy-oh-boy . . . Ginger, is that you? Sit down and we'll have a drink. Donnell?" Chris watched Donnell move close to the man to say something to him and the man said, "Oh, yeah, that's right." Donnell came over with the checkbook and said to Chris, "Mr. Woody will fix Ginger up. He's got the bar there has a fridge in it"--looking at Greta--"if you like some wine. Or he'll make you a nice drink."

Chris said, "You have any peanuts?"

"Yeah, those peanuts, we fresh out. Listen, she be fine with Mr. Woody. Can watch some TV."

Chris liked the way Greta said, "I wasn't fine with Mr. Woody the last time I was here." Turned to the man creeping up in his bathrobe and said, "Are you gonna behave yourself?"

"Boy-oh-boy," Woody said.

Donnell touched the man's shoulder. "Yeah, that means he's mellow, feeling good. He'll be nice. Huh, Mr. Woody? Sure." Donnell looked at Chris again. "Come with me, I'll show you something will interest you."

Greta motioned to Chris, Go on, and that took care of that.

Once they were in the hall Donnell stopped and opened the checkbook. "See?" There were three green-tinted checks to the sheet, issued by Manufacturers National Bank, each imprinted with Ricks Enterprises, Inc. and bearing Woody's signature at the bottom.

"I have him sign three at a time when he's able to," Donnell said, "for whatever needs might come up. You being a need. You understand? This is opportunity looking at you." He closed the checkbook. They walked down the hall and through the sunroom to the shallow end of the swimming pool. "Go look on the bottom by the diving board."

Chris saw the black athletic bag floating in the clear water. He walked along the edge to the deep end, looked down and studied the dark shapes on the bottom, Donnell's voice filling the room now, telling him from a distance how he'd found the bag, brought it in here and thrown it, and the bag must've hit the board and those things came out of it.

Chris looked at his watch. "What time was that?"

"Was about quarter of eleven."

"You thought if you dropped dynamite in water it wouldn't go off?"

"I was hoping."

"You were wrong."

"Then why didn't it?"

"It still might. Or it could've shorted when it hit the water, blown you through the window. Why don't you come here, so I don't have to yell."

"I been as close to it as I want."

Chris walked back to the shallow end. "We don't know what time it's set for, do we? If it was put there early this morning, within the past twelve hours. . . ." He reached Donnell and said, "You know you could be arrested, withholding evidence of a crime."

"Man, I didn't make the bomb."

"Doesn't matter. Why didn't you call Nine-eleven?"

"Have the police come, the fire trucks? Pretty soon we have the TV news. Mr. Woody don't want none of that. Man likes his privacy and is willing to pay for it." Donnell brought a ballpoint pen out of his pants pocket and opened the checkbook. "Tell me what your shakedown price is these days."

Chris said, "Anything I want?"

"Long as it seems to be right."

"I say ten thousand?"

"I write it in."

"What if I say twenty?"

"I write it in. But now twenty you getting up there. I'd have to sell that figure to the man, convince him."

"He's already signed the check."

"Yeah, but that don't mean the money's in the bank. See, he keeps only so much in there. It gets low, the man calls a certain number and they transfer money from his trust account to his regular business account. I think I could talk the man into paying twenty, but I'd have to have a cut, like ten percent. Two grand for the service, understand?"

"I don't know," Chris said, looking out at the pool. "I'd have to take my clothes off, dive in there . . . the bomb could go off any time. I'm fooling with a fast high explosive under water, can barely see what I'm doing--"

"You cut the wire," Donnell said.

"Is that all?" Chris brought out the Spyder-Co knife that was always in his right-hand coat pocket. "Here, you do it."

"The shakedown pro. I should've known," Donnell said. "Drive up in your Cadillac, twenty don't meet your greed. Gonna go for what you can get."

"The way I have to look at it," Chris said, "I make a mistake, I'm floating face down in a fucking swimming pool, something I never thought of before." He paused. "You'd have to look in the Yellow Pages, see if you can find another bomb disposal man."

"For what, if the bomb's gone?"

"The next one. They'd have to try again."

Donnell stared at him. "You think so, huh?"

"You don't seem to understand what this is about. It's a payback," Chris said, "get even for getting snitched on and doing time. Mark and Woody's mom told the feds where to find Robin and her boyfriend, Skip. The mom's dead, so they go after the boys, thinking, Well, they probably told the mom anyway."

Donnell said, "Robin, huh?" and started to smile. "First time we met I said you must be dumb as shit, didn't I? I'll tell you something now that we talked again. You still dumb as shit. You live in your little get-even bomb world, down there bent over taking wires apart. See, that's why people like you get hired by people like me. I write down 'Mr. Mankowski' and 'twenty-oh-oh-oh' on one of these checks, man, you'll dive in with your clothes on. It don't matter who's doing what or why and don't tell me different. 'Cause once you on the take, man, you on it, for good."

Chris said, "Let's go sit down."

He walked off, going to the lounge area half-way up the length of the pool--the arrangement of chairs and low tables by the bar and stereo system--and poured himself a scotch. There was water in the ice bucket. A buzzing sound came from the phone sitting on the bar and a light went on. Chris took his drink to a table and sat down.

Donnell said, from the shallow end of the pool, "That's Mr. Woody. Wait half a minute, he'll forget what he wants."

Chris sipped his whiskey. The phone buzzed a few more times. Donnell was staring at the clear water.

"Say that thing could still go off?"

"You never know," Chris said. The phone had stopped buzzing. "Come on, sit down. Tell me what Robin said when she called."

That got his attention. Donnell looked over but didn't say anything.

"I'm dumb as shit," Chris said, "you have to straighten me out. So it's not a payback, it's a pay up or get blown up. The anarchist turned capitalist. It used to be political, now it's for money." He thought about it a moment, nodding. "It makes sense. Get out of that dump she's living in. Or she's bored, uh? Tired of writing those books. . . ." Chris sipped his drink.

Donnell was still watching him.

"So why didn't you call Nine-eleven? You find a bomb, you call the police, fire, anybody you can get. The only reason I can see why you didn't," Chris said, "you must be in on it. You're working it with her."

Donnell came away from the shallow end now. "I let somebody send me a bomb? Am I crazy? Then get you to get rid of the motherfucker? Explain that to me."

Chris said, "Maybe you got involved after the bomb was delivered . . . when she called. It was Robin, wasn't it?"

Donnell didn't answer that one but kept coming, not taking his eyes off Chris.

"I think what happened," Chris said, "she thinks the bomb's already gone off, outside. That's the warning shot. Now she tells you on the phone how much she wants and you're thinking, Man, why don't I get in on this? Or you don't think she's asking enough, so you tell her you'll be her agent, get her a better deal. Extortion, though, I imagine you'd want more than ten percent."

"What I want," Donnell said, laying the checkbook on the table, "is to know how much you want. That's the only business we have, understand?"

Chris sipped his drink, in no hurry. "I'll tell you what I have a problem with, and I'll bet you do too. The first bomb, the one that took out Mark. That wasn't a warning shot, was it? That one had Woody's name on it. Yours, too, if you open doors for him. But how do they make any money if Woody's dead?"

Donnell didn't move or say a word.

"Unless their original idea," Chris said, "was to get Woody out of the way and go after Mark. Only Mark went after the peanuts. That can happen, something unforeseen. But you get down and look at it, I don't think Robin knows what she's doing. It seems to me she and Skip are as fucked up as they ever were. Back when they were crazies. I think about it some more and it doesn't surprise me. You know why?"

Donnell kept looking at him, but didn't answer.

"Because people don't get into crime unless they're fucked up to begin with."

Donnell said, "The policeman talking now."

"You know what I'm saying. Think of all the guys you used to hang out with are in the joint. You've been trying to think of ways yourself to fuck up, haven't you?"

Chris reached over to open the leather-bound book on the table and look at the three checks signed by Woodrow Ricks, the name written big, all curves and circles.

"You could write 'Donnell Lewis' and some big numbers on one of these, you must've thought of that. But first you have to get him to transfer enough money into the account to make it worthwhile, huh? And you haven't figured out how to work that."

Donnell said, "How much you want?"

"Twenty-five," Chris said, "nothing for you, no commission on this one. And if Woody stops payment, I put the bomb back in the pool."

"Gonna take the man for all you can get."

"Why not? Everybody else is."

In that big dim library Greta was saying to Woody, "You're trying to be nice to me now, because of what you did." He was making her nervous.

Telling her, Sit here. No, sit there, it's more comfortable. What could he get her, another drink? Did she want to watch a movie? Did she like Busby Berkeley? Ever see his banana number? But he didn't know how to put on the video cassette, and when he tried calling Donnell on the phone there was no answer.

Greta said, "Would you sit still so I can talk to you? That other time you hardly moved. Would you wipe your mouth, please? Doesn't that bother you? Look at your robe, it's a mess." He seemed to be listening now, but it was hard to tell. His face was like a road map, all the red and blue lines in it. If that liver spot on his cheek was Little Rock, there was U.S. 40 going over to West Memphis. The Mississippi came down his nose full of tributaries and drainage canals, curved around O.K. Bend at his mouth and went on down to the Louisiana line. Did he like being the way he was?

"Remember at the Seesaw audition, right after I tried out Mark had me sit with him? You were in the row behind us. I felt you touch my hair a couple times. I should've realized what the deal was, but I was busy listening to Mark talking to the director, being smart. That girl with the little plastic derby finished her number, she did 'Little Things' and the director goes, 'She must get a lot of love at home to have the confidence to come here.' That was okay; the girl really wasn't very good. But Mark said nasty things like 'She ought to have her vocal cords removed,' and I remember you laughing, thinking it was funny. You and Mark had no feeling for the person, what it's like to get up there with your legs shaking, trying to remember the words. . . . That one girl did 'The Sweetest Sounds I've Ever Heard' and Mark goes, 'Throwing up'd be a sweeter sound than that.' Trying to be funny, but everything he said was mean. I stayed and listened 'cause I wanted to play Gittel so bad, not knowing the deal was I'd have to play with you. Nobody asked me, okay, if I did, if I agreed to be humiliated, how much would I charge? See, you just went ahead, like buying something without asking the price. Well, now I'm gonna tell you what it is."

Chris went in the pool in his white briefs, dove straight down to the bottom, saw only one wire connected to the clock and made sure of it, a wire that ran to the dry-cell battery. He went up for a breath, dove again, removed the blasting cap from the dynamite and this time pushed off the bottom with the five sticks taped together, holding them over his head as he surfaced. Donnell was no help. He stayed at the shallow end, inside the doorway to the sunroom. On his third dive, Chris brought up the clock and the battery and placed them next to the dynamite on the tiled edge of the pool. Donnell approached as Chris swam over with the black athletic bag, swung it at him and let go, and Donnell jumped back as he caught the bag and dropped it, quick.

"Man, you get me all wet."

Chris pulled himself out of the pool. He picked up the bag, held it open in the light from the windows and got a surprise. Inside were a pair of pliers, a short coil of copper wire and several clothespins. Maybe left by mistake--the guy forgot the stuff was in there. Or it was a hurry-up job. Maybe the guy had to work in the dark. It was all evidence and Chris knew he should take it with him. Or put it in a safe place--he liked that better--and tell Donnell to keep his hands off, don't go near it. Scare him. He looked around the pool house. Maybe in the library; there were a lot of cabinets in there. And pick it up later on, if he had to.

Donnell said, "It's mean-looking shit, that dynamite." He put his hands on his knees for a closer study. "The clock, hey, only got one hand on it."

"The hour hand," Chris said. "You see the hole punched right next to the 'eleven'? There was a screw in there. Here, it's on the end of the wire that goes to the blasting cap. This wire connects the clock to the battery, and this other one goes from the battery to the blasting cap. You see how it works? The hour hand comes around, touches the screw set for eleven o'clock, the circuit is closed and the dynamite blows. Only the screw came out 'cause somebody did a half-assed job putting it together. It's simpler if you use the old-fashioned kind of alarm clock with the bell on top, you don't need the screw. You run your wires, one from the bell, the other from the hammer, the dinger, set the alarm and when it rings, that's it. You're probably lucky they didn't use that kind. The screw wasn't set in tight enough. You threw the bag, it hit the diving board and that's when it probably came out." Chris picked up the taped sticks of dynamite and placed them in the bag. "Let me have a towel, okay? I'll get dressed and we'll put this somewhere."

Donnell, hands on his knees, began to straighten with a thoughtful kind of frown, his mind working.

"Man, you knew it, didn't you? You look at this shit laying on the bottom, you knew it wasn't gonna go off. You run the price up on me with nothing to worry about."

Chris said, "That's why people like me like to get hired by people like you."

Chris kept glancing at her, waiting, until finally he said, "Well? What happened?"

Greta said, "Have you ever noticed, the corners of his mouth are always sticky? He opens his mouth and you can see, it's like old saliva stuck there. I kept thinking about that time he kissed me."

"Not the other?"

"Well, both, but I was looking at his mouth. He never wipes it. Anyway, I told him I wanted a hundred thousand."

"You did?"

"What's the difference? Whatever I ask for, I'd just be picking it out of the air."

"What'd he say?"

"You won't believe this. He asked me to marry him."

Chris looked at her and the Cadillac jumped lanes and he had to get straightened out before he said, "Come on."

"I'm not kidding. I said, 'Look, let's just settle this and I'll leave. There's no way in the world I'd ever marry you.' "

"Yeah?"

"And then he tells me how he's worth a hundred million dollars and we'd share it, a hundred million."

"Jesus Christ."

"I said, No, I wouldn't. He said, Think about it."

"Yeah?"

"That's all."

"What do you mean, that's all? Are you thinking about it?"

"Of course not. He said we should get to know each other before I decide."

"Jesus Christ."

"And if I'd rather have a hundred thousand than a hundred million he'd give it to me."

"He said that?"

"Well, not in so many words. It took him a while."

Chris turned east on Eight Mile and for several moments had to concentrate on the traffic. Greta was silent.

"What're you doing, thinking about it?"

"No, I'm not thinking about it."

"What're you doing?"

"I'm not doing anything, I'm sitting here."

"What about the settlement?"

"I go back, tell him I've thought about it . . . I guess, and then he gives it to me."

"You mean you're gonna think about it?"

"No, but I have to tell him I did."

"Why? Just tell him you want the hundred thousand."

"I feel sorry for him."

"What does that mean?"

"Why're you so picky? Can't I feel sorry for him?"

"I guess if you want to," Chris said, reaching into his inside coat pocket. "I didn't get a proposal of marriage, but I didn't do too bad." He brought out Woody's check and handed it to Greta. "Twenty-five grand, for cleaning out his swimming pool."

"Hi, it's me," Robin's voice said.

Donnell said, "It is, huh?"

He stood at the desk in the library. Mr. Woody, over watching Arnold Schwarzenegger killing dudes with his big two-hand sword, hadn't even looked up when the phone rang.

"Are you all right?"

"Just fine."

"I waited for the six o'clock news before I called. You want to tell me what happened?"

"I'll tell you something," Donnell said, "but not on the telephone."

"Great, I was hoping you'd say that," Robin's voice said. "Can we meet?"

"You want to take the chance, we can."

"What does that mean?"

"Girl, I don't have nice things to say to you."

"I'll bet you a million dollars," Robin's voice said, "you change your mind."