Road Dogs

SEVEN

THERE WERE PHOTOGRAPHS OF DAWN NAVARRO ALL OVER the house, blown-up prints in the front room, Dawn not bothering to smile but patient, blond hair across her eyes lined in black like the eyes of a pharaoh, Dawn the psychic staring at Foley from photos taken more than seven years ago. And yet he had the feeling she was looking at him now. Her Egyptian eyes telling Foley she could see him, Foley standing there in his prison underwear, the room dim. Dawn saying, I can see you, Jack. She even knew his name. He said to her face in the photo, "No, you can't." She kept staring at him and he said, "Can you?"

There were shots of Dawn taken on the walk along the canal, on the patio, on the concrete steps to the second-floor veranda. Foley could see Cundo following her with his camera saying, "Look at me." Saying, "Yes, tha's it, just like that." Dawn looking over her shoulder.

The property, little more than thirty feet wide, ran back a hundred or so feet to Cundo's garage in the alley. Here he had shot Dawn behind the wheel of his Volkswagen convertible, twelve years old but looking good, dark green with the tan canvas top. Or maybe it was hers. But why keep it here if she lived in the pink house? Foley didn't use the car until his second day in Venice.

The first day he drank rum from Puerto Rico and listened to Carlos Jobim until he passed out in Cundo's king-size bed.

There was a painting of Dawn in this master bedroom on the third floor, close to life size, though at first he didn't realize it was Dawn, now with dark hair, no exotic eyeliner, a more natural-looking Dawn than the ones with the eyes in the photos.

The painted Dawn lying in this bed looking at him, her hands at her sides, was a naked dark-haired Dawn on the wall next to the bed. He saw Dawn when he closed his eyes and when he opened them in the morning, Dawn still looking at him now from the painting.

In all the photos of her she was blond.

The next day he put the VW's top down-anybody who wanted to look at him it was okay-and drove through the streets of Venice to see what they had here, all the million-dollar homes that wouldn't sell for a quarter of that anywhere but on the California coast. It didn't matter. According to Cundo everybody living in Venice was happy to be here. "There rich people and not rich people, but they all have class. Everybody is included except the gangs. They here, but not invited to the block parties." Foley didn't see any gangs. He drove around, stopped and walked up one of the streets that was a sidewalk separating front yards facing each other, each house with its own idea of what the landscaping should look like, from tropical plants and palms to thick patches of bougain-villea.

Foley drove along Lincoln Boulevard until the sign

lured him to the lot behind the store. He used his prepaid credit card to buy new clothes, the first time in more than ten years: three pairs of faded Levi's, white T-shirts and briefs, tennis shoes, sweat socks, a green cotton sweater, an off-white drip-dry sport coat, limp, no shape to it, for sixty-nine dollars, then had to pick out some dark T-shirts and a couple of silky black sport shirts to wear with the coat. He drove up Lincoln to Ralphs supermarket and bought bathroom supplies, shampoo, a skin cleaner, a pair of flip-flops, in the habit of wearing them in the shower at Glades; he bought four bottles of Jack Daniel's, fifths, a case of Dos Equis he remembered he liked, six bottles of red from Australia, six rib-eye steaks, Wheaties and bananas, a sack of oranges, apples, cheese, popcorn, milk, French bread and real butter. He asked a clerk if there was a sporting goods store around. The clerk said you bet, the Sports Chalet in Marina del Rey, and he stopped there to buy a basketball before going home. There were courts on the beach. He liked feeling a basketball in his hands. He wanted to shoot hoops while the sun was bringing down a red sky to sink off the edge of the ocean.

Cundo owned a pair of Zeiss field glasses he'd told Foley one time he always had with him he went to Santa'nita for the horses. Or when he went up on the roof, three stories high, man, and looked down into these homes so close together, into people's lives and see what they doing. "These glasses, man, you see a guy on his porch looking at a newspaper? These glasses you can read the fucking paper yourself."

Foley used the glasses to look around, see if anybody was watching him. Like the same guy in the same place three days in a row not doing anything. Who knew he was here? Nobody, but it didn't matter, if that wacko fed wanted to find him, he would.

What do you do, put up with it? There was no way Lou Adams could get the feds here to put a surveillance on him during banking hours. Or watch to see if he leaves town. They couldn't do it. Could Lou hire his own crew on a government paycheck? Who would he get to work for free? And Foley thought, Jesus Christ, who do you think? Some asshole he'd threaten to put in jail if he didn't.

That was an idea right there. Get some gangbangers to help him out. He wondered if Lou was already here.

During the first three days Foley went up on the roof with the Zeiss glasses that put you wherever you were looking. He checked on who was around all three days, in plain sight working construction, little Mexican guys doing yard jobs, hanging out in the alley. He didn't see anything going on that he wondered about.

Once he swept the places for people who could be watching, he'd swing the glasses over to the pink palace where Dawn had been living the past almost eight years by herself, settle on the roof, adjust the focus and come down to the front yard, the patio, poke around through the shrubbery and try to see in one of the windows. He never saw a soul over there. He was hoping the dark-haired Dawn Navarro liked to lie in the sun.

Cundo called from Glades the morning of the fourth day, Foley about to go up on the roof. "How you think about it?"

Foley said it was the home he'd always dreamed of. "You like it, uh? You see Dawn?"

"Not yet. I just finished counting the pictures of her. You know how many you have?"

"Man, I took a hundred. I couldn't stop."

"Thirty-seven, not counting the ones you taped to walls as you ran out of time, thinking of her right up to the end. You're a beautiful guy, Cundo. I saw the shots of you and your Hollywood buddies. I even recognized one or two. But all the shots of Dawn she's alone."

"Mood shots," Cundo said. "I take them when I see her in different moods."

"I'd look at her," Foley said, "and have the feeling she was looking out of the picture at me."

Cundo's voice on the line said, "Yes."

"I mean like she could actually see me."

"Yes, I know what you mean, she can see you looking at her."

"Even though she's looking from seven years ago."

"Almost eight. It's her gift, man, she knows you there. Listen, when I'm taking the pictures I look in her eyes and see like she's thinking something. Or even I look at a print of her, the same thing. This is when we come back from Vegas and I can't stop taking pictures of her. I hold one up and say, 'Baby, what are you thinking about in this picture?' I wait for her to make a face, say how can she remember that? No, Dawn say she wasn't thinking, she was feeling love for me. All these years by herself, man, she still waiting for me, still saying she loves me. You believe it?"

No, he didn't. Foley said, "You can't ask for more'n that. When'd you start taking pictures?"

"Remember, I tole you the guy that shot me three times in the chest, barely missing my heart, took pictures? Negroes in church waving their hands in the air. A cemetery, people there in the rain. An old Jewish woman putting on her lipstick. Joe LaBrava, man, use to be in the Secret Service, quit and became famous taking pictures. I thought, Tha's all you have to do? Take some real-life shots like that, things you see every fucking day and you become famous? But all I've done so far is take pictures of Dawn."

"They're good," Foley said. "I like the painting of her too."

And knew as Cundo said, "What painting?" he'd made a mistake.

Foley said, "Oh, you haven't seen it?" The dark-haired Dawn bare naked had nothing to do with Cundo, eight years and three thousand miles away.

Now he wanted to know, "Who painted her?"

Foley said, "I don't know. But didn't you tell me one time she paints?"

"I don't know, maybe," Cundo said. "I don't remember. But listen, Jack? I like you to do something for me. Keep an eye on her till I get out. See does anybody come to visit her and let me know."

Foley said, "Isn't the Monk watching out for her? I thought he might come by here, but I haven't seen him."

"The Monk say she's fine, no problem," Cundo said, "what he always say to me, 'Yeah, Dawn is fine.' Sometimes he say, 'She wants me to tell you she misses you very much,' but I don't hear her saying that."

"They aren't her exact words," Foley said, "but it's what she meant."

"The Monk can't remember what she said? Why you making excuses for him? You don't know him."

"I don't want you to worry," Foley said, "get upset, with your release coming up."

"I can't help if I worry about her, what she's doing." Cundo raised his voice saying, "For Christ sake, all right," to someone watching him on the phone, and to Foley, "Fucking guardia. He makes a sign like he's cutting his throat for me to get off the phone, line of guys waiting to use it."

"That's what I'm talking about," Foley said. "Stay calm, will you? Don't fuck up now you're ready to get out."

"I want to know Dawn is a saint," Cundo said, "not fucking some guy for painting her picture."

"You don't think it's a self-portrait."

"She don't fucking paint, Jack, her gift is to tell fortunes. I want to know she's a saint when I come home, I want you to see she's without sin, like a virgin. We road dogs, man, we do for each other no matter what."

It was a custom to pair off as road dogs inside, living among gangs with their own signs and tats; inmates who weren't with them were against them; gangbangers could make living inside a daily chore, watching not to look any gangsta in the eye. A five-foot home-boy, a new arrival, said to Foley in the yard, "What chew looking at, butt-fuck?" Foley said, "I'm looking at you, asshole," and nodded to the gangbangers watching. They took the kid away telling him not to fuck with Foley, he was the real thing, the star bank robber at Glades, respected, you could talk to him. While Cundo was the jive Cat Prince with money, lots of money he used for favors, Jack Foley watching his back.

"I see us more as social road dogs," Foley said. "We don't need to be that serious about it."

"How you see it don't matter," Cundo said. "Is how the population sees us. They know, even if you making a wrong move, do something stupid, they know I back you up. Con sees you come at him with a shank, he knows your road dog is right behind, also with a shank. Is how it is."

"When did I ever have a shank on me?"

"I'm telling you what is a road dog, tha's all. If I go to stick some guy bothering me, I know you right there to back my move."

"When did you ever stick anybody? You pay guys to take care of your business."

"I'm talking about the principle of it, of being road dogs. We road dogs as long as we together, here or outside."

Like being on call, Foley thought. Because Cundo had eased him out of doing thirty years with a check to Megan for thirty grand. What still bothered Foley as much as not having any money: why was Cundo giving him a free ride? Because Foley was the only gringo Cundo could talk to? Believe that, he could believe the little bugger's heart bleeds. He put money on you for the future. Watch over Dawn for now. It's when he's released he'll get down to the gritty. "Do a job for me, man, an easy one." He'll say, "Jus' this one, okay?" Then another one. Wait and see.

The only thing to do, get out from under him, out of this house that was a shrine to Dawn. Dawn everywhere.

Dawn in bed with the dark hair, his favorite.

He was thinking he should get in touch with Karen. Call the Miami's marshals' office, let her know he missed her. If she wanted him to do anything for her-like come back to Florida, rip her clothes off and throw her on a bed-he'd be happy to. When she came on the phone he'd say, "Is this my little zoo-zoo by any chance?" And she'd say-

The phone rang.

He was thinking, staring at the painting of Dawn in the giant bed, that lust could be part of love, or it just meant you were horny.

The phone rang again. Foley knew who it was without knowing why. He did, he picked up the phone and said, "Dawn? I was about to call you."

He heard her say, "Don't tell me you're psychic," sounding pleased in a quiet way. She said, "You're right, Jack, it's time we got together."