Trouble in Paradise

Twenty-Five

“We need more walking-around money,” Macklin said.

“How much you figure?” Crow said.

“Got a lot of mouths to feed,” Macklin said, “including yours. Still got some preparation time. I figure maybe twenty, twenty-five would do it.”

“You got any thoughts?” Crow said.

“Nope. You’re the force guy — go force us some money.”

When Crow smiled, deep vertical lines indented on each side of his mouth. “Small bills?” Crow said.

“Be nice,” Macklin said.

“See what I can do,” Crow said.

When Crow was gone, Macklin went into the kitchen and had coffee and raspberry pie with Faye.

“Think he’ll come up with the money?” Faye said.

“Yeah. Crow’s the best.”

“I thought you were the best, Jimmy.”

“Well, yeah, I am, but Crow thinks he’s some kind of fucking Apache warrior, you know?”

“Is he Apache?”

“Hell,” Macklin said, “I don’t know. Says he is.”

“I don’t like him,” Faye said.

“Faye, nobody fucking likes Crow. But he’s good at his work and he keeps his word.”

“Has he got anybody?” Faye said.

“You mean like a wife or a girlfriend?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know,” Macklin said. “I don’t know anything about Crow, except what he can do.”

“Which is kill people?”

Macklin nodded.

“He can kill you with his hands, with a gun, with a knife, with an axe, with a stick, with a length of rope, a sock full of sand, a brick. He can kick you to death. He can drop you from fifty feet with a knife, fifty yards with a hand gun, five hundred with a rifle. He can shoot a bow and arrow. He can probably throw a spear.”

“Does he like it?” Faye said.

“He doesn’t mind it,” Macklin said.

“Neither do you.”

“That’s right, but he’s not like me. He’s... I’ve seen guys that like it. I seen guys come off when they kill somebody. He’s not like them, either. It’s that warrior thing. It’s like this is what he does because that’s who he is, you know?”

Macklin cut another piece of pie and slid it onto his plate. Faye poured more coffee into his cup.

“You scared of him?” she said.

Macklin looked startled.

“Me? No. You know me, Faye, I don’t give enough of a shit to be scared of anything.”

Faye smiled and nodded. She had only eaten a bite of her pie.

“What do you give a shit about, Jimmy? I’ve known you since I was a kid, and I’m not sure if there’s anything.”

“You, Faye. You gonna eat the rest of that pie?”

Faye shook her head, and Macklin slid her plate over in front of him.

“You do,” she said. “Don’t you.”

“Care about you?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t care about much else.”

“Money,” Faye said.

“Oh yeah,” Macklin said.

“Actually that’s not even exactly right,” Faye said. She sipped a little coffee and held the cup up in front of her face with both hands, looking at Macklin over the rim. “It’s not quite the money.”

“Money’s good,” Macklin said. “We got any cheese?”

“Refrigerator,” Faye said. “In the door thing.”

Macklin got up and got the cheese from the compartment in the door of Faye’s refrigerator.

“What you really like is stealing it,” Faye said.

“If I had to earn it, we’d be poor,” Macklin said.

“I doubt it, but that’s not the point. You don’t want to earn it. You love this — planning, putting together a crew, drawing maps, buying guns, stealing money to keep us going. You like this better than anything.”

“No,” Macklin said. “I like you better than anything.”

“If I asked you to give this up, would you?”

Macklin put down his fork and sat quietly for a moment while he thought about that.

Then he said, “Yes.”

Faye sat quietly for longer than he had.

Then she said, “Well, I won’t ask you to.”