One Good Deed(89)

She stuck the burned match in an ashtray on the coffee table and watched him blow smoke sideways from his mouth. Then Jackie pulled a cigarette from her pack and lit up, too.

“What else did you hear today at my father’s?”

“He believes that Hank Pittleman hypnotized you or something.” Archer took the cigarette from his mouth. “Did he hypnotize you or something?”

“Yeah, Archer, if you clap your hands just right, I’ll get on the floor and bark like a dog.”

“I guess that means no.”

“You miss being in the Army?”

His jaw went slack at this abrupt inquiry. “You trying to be funny?”

“No. I’m being serious.”

“Why does that matter to you?”

“Remember I told you I was a psychology major? I like figuring people out.”

“You said I was complicated even though I don’t think I am.”

“It’s the complex ones who think they’re simple, Archer. The simple ones think they have all this deep meaning in everything they do and say. And for the men it’s mostly trying to get into a woman’s bed.”

“Well, I can certainly be guilty of that.”

“But that’s not all that makes you tick. Not by a long shot. So, the Army? Do you miss it?”

“You think I wanted to keep spending my days and nights killing and nearly being killed?”

She blew smoke out before answering. “You were part of something, Archer. Something big and important. Now?” She shrugged. “What do you have, really? What do any of us have?”

“I just got outta prison. Give me a chance. I mean to make something of myself.”

“Must’ve felt good, though, being part of that.”

“Didn’t think about that while I was doing it. Then, when I got home, I started thinking about other things. So I must have missed that part.”

“I’d like to be part of something like that. Bigger than any one person, I mean.”

“Let’s hope if you are, it has nothing to do with a damn war.”

“What are you going to do now?”

“I need to find work.”

“Why not try my daddy?”

Archer smoked his Chesterfield down as he thought about this. “He did pay me an extra hundred dollars. So he must’ve liked what I did.”

Jackie tapped her ash into the ashtray and nodded. “He’s a hard man to please, and don’t I know it.”

“What are you saying, that I should go back out there and ask for a job?”

“You got any other prospects?”

“Shaw is paying me a few bucks to help him on the case.”

“Really? Is that allowed? I mean, you’re not with the police. And you told me that he thought you might have killed Hank.”

“Well, he doesn’t think that anymore, thank God. But he believes I might have the right qualities to be a good gumshoe.”

“Is that what you want to do with your life?”

“How the hell do I know? Does anybody know what they want to do after the world went to war and everything got blown up? What do you want to do?”

She didn’t answer right away. She took a final drag on her smoke, tapped it out, finished her Rebel Yell, and looked squarely at him.

“I just want to be happy, Archer. And every day I’m alive it seems like it’s getting to be too much to hope for.”





Chapter 37



ARCHER WISHED JACKIE LUCK with her father that night and then headed back to downtown Poca, making a stop at the Checkered Past for dinner, then taking another brief detour before he walked on to the Derby carrying a paper bag in one hand. He had gotten his things from Ernestine’s and, using his newfound wealth, rented back his old room at the hotel. He took the stairs up to 610, cast his hat onto the bed, hung up his other clothes, and lifted the bottle of bourbon from the paper bag, along with a fresh pack of Lucky Strikes. Shaw had taken his drinking glasses, so Archer sat in a chair, put the heels of his new shoes up on the windowsill after opening the window, and drank straight from the bottle.

He lit a cigarette and blew smoke out the open window, tapping his ash onto the sill. He smoked down two cigarettes. Around eight o’clock, when the light was dimming, something happened that Archer had never once seen since he’d been here. An unholy storm came in, the sky turning to a mass of ugly, darkened clouds, and the winds fiercely picked up. A few moments later the heavens opened up and the rain poured down, forcing pedestrians on the street to make a run for it. After that the lightning flashed, and the thunder boomed. And it went on and on as Archer sat there and watched this spectacle of Mother Nature unleashed on Poca and its inhabitants. It was like she’d been saving up all her energy for the longest time to unleash it right this minute.

How much he drank, Archer wasn’t sure. And he wasn’t sure when he fell asleep in the chair. He did remember checking his watch at one point, and seeing it was about nine o’clock. He recalled praying that the meeting between father and daughter would go off without a hitch. He thought about going over there, but if Jackie spotted him it would not be good.

He woke much later due to the pounding on his door, not from the storm still raging unabated outside. His eyes popped open, his feet came down to the floor, and he looked around, momentarily disoriented. It was fully dark outside now, but a hint of light was emerging. He looked at his watch as the pounding on the door continued. It was nearly five in the morning.