Ride the lightning

XXIV

Claudia's south St. Louis neighbors were passing the summer evening in their usual fashion. The men were outside mowing already mowed lawns or cleaning their cars, while the wives were inside cleaning ovens or going around baseboards with knife points to get all the dirt out. Scrubby Dutch, the predominantly German Catholics and Lutherans in this part of town were often called. It was a traditional, conservative area, maybe the character and backbone of the city, where everyone got along with everyone else as long as nobody marched out of step.

An old gray-haired guy wearing shorts and a sleeveless white undershirt leaned down to buff his Buick's hubcaps and glanced over at Nudger, then looked away. Somebody had the ball game tuned too loud on his radio. Jack Buck and Mike Shannon, the sports announcers whose voices permeated St. Louis summers, were shouting about a great play while the crowd roared.

As Nudger entered the building and climbed the stairs to Claudia's apartment, the nattering of the radio outside faded from his consciousness.

At Claudia's door, he cocked his head to the side and stood still, listening.

A violent thumping sound was coming from inside the apartment, and there were faint voices. And music. Something heavy was striking the floor regularly, hard enough for Nudger to pick up vibrations out in the hall.

He slowly rotated the doorknob and pushed in on the door. There was no give; it was locked. He fished his key from his pocket, inserted it in the lock, and twisted. Then he quietly opened the door a few inches and peered inside.

The first thing he saw was a husky, perspiring man standing with his fists on his hips. He was wearing only sweat-stained red jogging shorts, and he was staring down at the floor, at something out of Nudger's line of sight, grinning with handsome animal savagery. Nudger edged the door open an inch wider and saw the bare feet and legs of a woman lying on the carpet.

He threw the door full open and stepped inside, hearing the knob crack a chunk of plaster out of the wall.

"Nudger!" Claudia said.

Bare arms and legs flailed and she scrambled to her feet. She was wearing shorts and a T-shirt lettered STOWE SCHOOL across the chest. She was breathing hard.

The man continued to stand hands-on-hips, jut-jawed, and healthy enough to die of rosy cheeks. He was staring inquisitively at Nudger.

Claudia raked her fingers straight back through her tangled dark hair, moved to the stereo, and switched off the soft-porn rock number that was throbbing through the speakers.

Silence now. Heavy. Nudger experienced a falling sensation. "We were doing aerobics," Claudia said. There was a bead of perspiration on the very tip of her nose. "This is Biff Archway. Biff, this is-"

"Aerobics?" Nudger interrupted.

"Sure," Archway said. "Aerobic exercises." He glanced over at Claudia's rapidly rising and falling chest. "Great for the heart and lungs."

Archway looked almost exactly as Nudger had imagined: medium height with a weight lifter's tapered body, clean-featured and aggressively handsome in the way of a college football hero grown to middle age and taking the best care of himself. Just a hell of a guy. Nudger noticed the living room had about it a musky smell of stale perspiration, like the bedroom after he and Claudia had made love.

"Claudia and I know each other from Stowe School," Archway said amiably.

Nudger nodded. "I know. You teach sex education out there. Isn't that the sort of thing that requires research?"

Archway looked again at Claudia, as if for some sort of signal to let him know how to treat this unwelcome intruder. Beyond him Nudger saw Claudia's clothes, including her panties and bra, laid out neatly on the sofa.

"Did the two of you change clothes in here?" he asked.

"I did," Claudia said. "Biff changed in the bedroom." She'd regained her composure and was giving Nudger her dark cautioning look. He was angering and embarrassing her. "Try to keep from making an ass of yourself," she told him.

"Too late for that," Nudger said. He knew that was true.

"Listen, sport," Archway said, stepping toward Nudger.

"Out!" Nudger said sharply, gripping him firmly by the arm. "Time for everyone named Biff to leave."

Archway didn't budge. Nudger was surprised by the hardness of the upper arm he was trying to clamp his fingers around.

"Don't!" Claudia warned. "Biff has a brown belt in karate, Nudger. Please, take it easy!"

Easy, hell! Nudger thought. He hunkered down and tried to push Archway toward the door. Archway shifted his weight subtly and Nudger stumbled a few feet beyond him, grasping empty air as he caught his balance. So the guy knew judo too, apparently.

"I suggest that you should be the one to leave," Archway said calmly.

Nudger charged him, swung with a looping right hand, found himself upside down in the air, then on his back on the floor.

All so sudden.

"Time for Nudger to leave," Archway said.

"Don't hurt him, Biff!" Claudia pleaded.

That got Nudger furious. He was on his feet again, moving in on Archway in a crouch. He shot out a straight left jab. Archway somehow grabbed his wrist, yanked, and Nudger found himself on the other side of the room.

"I'm finding it harder and harder not to hurt this jerk," Archway said. He assumed a distinctly Oriental fighting stance; even his features suddenly appeared Oriental.

Nudger went at him again. Archway shouted something that sounded like "Hii-yah!"

Nudger saw him shift his body sideways, then drop low and extend a hip. Archway had a hand beneath Nudger's arm, against his side, and Nudger was in the air, again about to land hard on his back. His injured rib seemed to catch fire and he drew in a breath that was almost a harsh scream. A lamp that must have been teetering on the edge of a table finally fell and dangled half on the floor by its stretched cord.

Something seemed to have snapped at the base of Nudger's spine this flight.

"Hey, you got some kind of bandage wrapped around you," Archway said, as if annoyed that he'd been tricked into not playing fair. "You better take it easy, sport."

Nudger got up slowly, a fist doubled behind him and pressed to the small of his back. He limped to the door, pain jolting through him with each step.

"Nudger!" Claudia called.

But Nudger was into the hall, on his way down the stairs. Archway was saying something he couldn't understand. Didn't want to hear, anyway.

Claudia again: "Damn you, Nudger, come back here!"

He could still hear her calling to him as he pushed through the vestibule door and lurched across the street to his car. Some of the neighbors stopped polishing and mowing to look. He drove a few blocks down the street, then pulled to the curb. His side and back had almost stopped hurting. Now his hands were trembling; he was too upset to drive farther. He sat in the parked Volkswagen, glad that it was darker and people couldn't see the rage and humiliation that he knew were distorting his features.

This was one of the few times he wished he owned a gun. He knew that any other weapon against Archway would probably be useless, or turned against him. But a gun, death from ten feet away with the twitch of a finger on the trigger, almost as impersonal as fate, that was different. So very different. Thunder and deadly destiny. Archway could do nothing against that.

Nudger imagined the two of them, Archway and Claudia, turning their heads, surprised to see him again as he burst into the apartment. He could see their startled expressions, the fear in Archway's wide eyes when he saw the gun in Nudger's hand. Maybe he'd beg. Crawl. Maybe the bastard-

Nudger shook himself. "Jesus!…" he whispered harshly. What was he thinking? What was he considering?

And he was glad he didn't own a gun. He might have killed Archway.

He actually might have.

He wiped his hand over his perspiring face. There was no real difference between him and Curtis Colt, he realized. No difference.

A teenage boy and girl strolled past on the sidewalk, walking with difficulty because their arms were around each other, and stared at Nudger.

He felt sick. He started the engine and drove home.