Hardcase

CHAPTER 45

Arlene pulled into the closed and empty Texaco station forty minutes after she'd gotten the phone call. Warsaw was literally a crossroads community, and it was dark this night. Arlene had expected to see Joe's Volvo, but there was only a large, dark Lincoln Town Car parked in the side lot of the Texaco.

Joe Kurtz got out of the Lincoln carrying a dashboard cigarette lighter, fooled around by the big car's gas tank for a few seconds, and began walking toward her in the beams of her Buick's headlights. He was naked, bloody, limping, and smeared with mud. The right side of his scalp hung down in a bloody flap, and one eye was swollen and crusted shut.

Arlene started to get out of the Buick, but at that second the Lincoln Town Car exploded behind Kurtz and began burning wildly. Kurtz did not look back.

He opened the passenger-side door and said, "Blanket."

"What?" said Arlene, staring. He looked even worse with the overhead light of the Buick on him.

Kurtz gestured at the passenger seat. "Spread the blanket. Don't want to get blood on everything."

She unfolded the red plaid blanket she'd grabbed from her window seat, and Kurtz collapsed onto the seat. "Drive," he said. He turned the car's heater on high.

They were a mile or so outside of Warsaw, the burning car still an orange glow in the mirror, when Arlene said, "We've got to get you to a hospital."

Kurtz shook his head. The bloody flap of skin and hair on the side of his head bobbled. "It looks worse than it is. We'll sew it up when we get back to your place."

"We'll sew it up?"

"All right," said Kurtz and actually grinned at her through the streaks of blood and mud. "You'll sew it up, and I'll drink some of Alan's whiskey."

Arlene drove for a moment in silence. "So we're going to my place?" she said, knowing that Joe would never tell her what had happened this night.

"No," he said. "First we go up to Lockport. My car's there and—I hope—my clothes and a certain leather bag."

"Lockport," Arlene repeated, glancing at him. He was a mess, but seemed calm.

Kurtz nodded, pulled the red plaid blanket around his shoulders, and held the flap of scalp in place with one hand while he turned the car radio on with his other hand. He tuned it to an all-night blues station. "So all right," he said when he had Muddy Waters playing, "tell me about this amazing thing that happened at the office today."

Arlene glanced at him again. "It doesn't seem that important right now, Joe."

"Tell me anyway," said Kurtz. "We've got a long drive ahead of us."

Arlene shook her head, but then began telling him about her afternoon as they drove west toward Buffalo, the blues playing hard and sad on the radio and the snow falling softly in their headlight beams.