The Heavenly Table(97)

“Sure did.”

The barber shook his head sadly, then glanced over at the father-in-law still sitting in the chair by the window. “Boy, whatever you do, don’t get married. Me, I had to go home and listen to that goddamn Nancy bitch about money the whole evening. Shit, she even had ol’ Jim there ready to crack, didn’t she, Jim?”

“I don’t remember,” the old man said stiffly.

“Listen to him,” the barber said, as he made the boy’s change. “She could poison the both of us with that slop she calls supper, and he’d still take up for her.”

Just then another customer walked in, and Chimney slipped out the door. He stopped at the McAdams and drank a couple of beers and ate a sandwich of bloody roast beef topped with a thick slab of onion, then returned to his room to take a bath. As he soaked in the hot, soapy water, he fell asleep and started to dream that he was back in the shack with his family at Tardweller’s. They were trying to decide whether or not to eat a groundhog that had crawled into the yard and died under the front steps. It seemed that he and Cane were arguing against it, but Pearl and Cob were for it. Then a car horn honked outside the hotel, and he jerked awake and scrambled out of the tub. He leaned against the sink panting, his heart pounding against his rib cage. Must have been that damn onion, he thought. They never had agreed with him.

Cane was seated on the park bench reading another newspaper and smoking a cigarette, while Cob stood at the edge of the pond again, tearing off pieces of bread from a loaf and tossing them to some geese. For every piece he fed the birds, he ate one. A teenage boy and girl in a small boat kept rowing around in a circle out in the middle of the water, and every time they turned his way, Cob waved like he’d never seen them before. He had to give Cane credit, Chimney thought as he walked toward them, they looked more like a schoolteacher and his pet dunce than a couple of outlaws with a bounty on their heads.

“Anything about us in there?” Chimney said.

Cane put down the newspaper and dusted a spot of ash off the front of his suit. He glanced over at Cob, then across the pond at the storefronts and bars that lined Water Street. “They’re still calling us cowboys,” he said.

“Well, I guess it’s a good thing we changed our looks then,” said Chimney.

“And they’re speculating we’re in Ohio now.”

“So? They can speculate all they want.”

“Yeah, but the trouble is they just happen to be right. Did ye take it out today, the car?”

“I must have drove it a hundred miles or better,” Chimney said.

“So you got the hang of it?”

“Not much to it, really. Shit, Cob could probably drive it if you tied a pork chop to the steering wheel.”

“I’m thinkin’ we might be ahead to get on out of here,” Cane said. “Sooner we get to Canada, the better.”

“Oh, no,” Chimney said. “You promised me if I helped ye with that old man, I could have some fun. Hell, we’ve only been here two days. I’m just startin’ to know my way around.”

“Yeah, but shit, brother, you could—”

“I don’t care. I’m not leaving till I get my fill out at the Whore Barn.”

“Well, how long do you need for that?”

“I don’t know,” Chimney said. “At least another night or two.”

Cane sighed, watched Cob toss the last of the loaf into the dirty water. “All right, you got until Saturday morning, but then we’re leaving. I don’t care if you got one of ’em dog-knotted.”

“What’s today?”

“Thursday.”

“Fair enough,” Chimney said, “but I’m goin’ to need some more money.”

“Jesus Christ, you’ve spent that five hundred already?”

Actually, he still had at least a hundred left, but Chimney liked the feeling that carrying a wad of cash in his pocket gave him. “Most of it,” he said. “Remember, the car was two-fifty. And I went ahead and bought a couple gas cans and a gallon of motor oil for when we’re on the road. Plus there was—”

“Okay, okay,” Cane said. He reached into his coat pocket, pulled out a roll of bills, counted some off. “Here’s two hundred. Even at four dollars a shot, that’s fifty pieces of ass.”

“Yeah, but what about—”

“No, that’s it. You run through that, I expect to see you walkin’ bowlegged.”

“You sure you don’t want to go with me tonight? Try out that fat one?”

“No,” Cane said, shaking his head. “We’re gonna go see that show at the theater, the one with the monkey.”

“Well, suit yourself,” Chimney replied. Secretly, he was relieved. He’d been thinking that he might spend the entire night with Matilda if the pimp was agreeable, and having his brother along would just complicate things up. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“Be careful out there,” Cane said. He finished reading the newspaper, and thirty minutes later he and Cob each paid the fifty-cent admission fee and entered the Majestic. The place was packed and their seats were near the back under the balcony. A shiny-faced man in a tuxedo came out and told a few jokes, including one about a farmer with a homely daughter who put the Jewett Gang up for a night, thinking they were traveling salesmen. Thankfully, Cob wasn’t paying any attention, the main thing on his mind at the time being the popcorn he was eating. But as soon as he swallowed the last kernel, he started asking Cane when the monkey was going to appear until finally an old woman with an ear trumpet seated in front of them told him to keep quiet.