The Searcher(50)

“Nice bike,” he says.

The guy glances up. “Thanks,” he says, favoring Cal with a half smile. His features are finely modeled enough that plenty of people, himself included, probably consider him good-looking, but he’s got a skimpy jaw and no chin.

“Gotta be tough to keep it looking good, on these roads.”

This time Eugene doesn’t bother to look up from his microfiber cloth. “It’s not a problem. You just have to be willing to put the time into it.”

This guy doesn’t give Cal the same urge to hang around shooting the breeze as Fergal did. “Hey,” he says, struck by a thought. “You Eugene Moynihan, by any chance?”

At that Eugene does take the trouble to look at him. “I am, yeah. Why?”

“Well, that’s a piece of good luck,” Cal says. “I was told you were the man I should talk to, and here you are. It was the bike that gave you away. I heard you had the prettiest bike in these parts.”

“It’s all right,” Eugene says, shrugging and giving the glossy red paintwork an extra swipe. He has a light, pleasant voice with most of the local accent scrubbed off it. “I’m planning on trading up soon enough, but this’ll do for now.”

“I used to have a motorcycle,” Cal says, leaning his arms on the big stone gatepost. “Back when I was about your age. Little bitty fourth-hand Honda, but man, did I love that thing. Just about every cent I made went straight into it.”

Eugene isn’t interested, and isn’t going to bother pretending. He lifts his eyebrows at Cal. “You were looking for me?”

Cal, who is coming to agree with Trey’s assessment of Eugene’s personality, brings out his story about the rewiring and Brendan and Sheila Reddy giving him Eugene’s name. By the end Eugene doesn’t look wary, like Fergal did; he just looks mildly disdainful. “I don’t do electrical work,” he says.

“No?”

“No. I’m doing finance and investment. In college.”

Cal is suitably impressed. “Well then,” he says, “you’re right not to waste your time on odd jobs. I ain’t an educated man myself, but I know that much. If you done earned yourself an opportunity like that, why, you gotta make the most of it.”

He can see the look, wry and guarded, that Donna used to give him when he did that, slouched into the thick backwoods drawl of his granddaddy’s buddies. Rednecking up, she called it, and she hated it—she never said so, but Cal could tell. Donna was a Jersey girl from the hood, but she never leaned on her accent, or hid it either; people could take her or leave her. She thought Cal was lowering himself by playing to people’s dumb preconceived ideas. Cal has his pride, but it doesn’t run in that direction. Acting like a hick can be all kinds of useful. To Donna, that was beside the point.

Donna’s opinions don’t change the fact that Eugene’s glance has just the right dismissive flick to it. “Yeah,” he says. “I’m planning to.”

“Looks like I got the wrong end of the stick,” Cal says, taking off his baseball cap so he can scratch his head thoughtfully. “But Brendan Reddy does wiring, doesn’t he? I got that part right?”

“He did, yeah. But I don’t know where he is these days. Sorry.”

This puzzles Cal. “You don’t?”

“No. Why would I?”

“Well,” Cal says, readjusting his cap, “nobody else seems to. It’s a mystery, seems like. But folk keep on telling me you’re the big genius around these parts. I reckoned if anybody would have an idea where Brendan went, it’d be you.”

Eugene shrugs. “He didn’t say.”

“He got himself in hot water some way or other, didn’t he?”

Another shrug, one-shouldered. Eugene concentrates on buffing his paintwork, squinting along it to make sure there’s not a single streak.

“Oh,” Cal says, grinning. He isn’t going to bother trying the mama-guilt card, not with this kid. “Now I get it. A smart guy like you, it’s easy for me to forget you’re still a kid. You still think you can’t tell tales or you’ll get beat up in the playground.”

Eugene looks up sharply at that. “I’m not a kid.”

“Right. So what the heck did your little buddy do?” Cal is still grinning, propping himself more comfortably on the gatepost. “Lemme guess. He spray-painted bad words on a wall, got scared he’d catch a whipping from his mama?”

Eugene doesn’t lower himself to answer that.

“Knocked up some girl, had to get out of town before her daddy found his shotgun?”

“No.”

“Then what?”

Eugene sighs. “I don’t actually know what Brendan got mixed up in,” he says, tilting his head to examine the sheen from a fresh angle, “and I don’t care. All I know is, he isn’t as smart as he thinks, and that’s a great way to end up in hassle. That’s all.”

“Huh,” Cal says, his grin widening. He registers the isn’t. “You’re telling me this kid Brendan came up with some shenanigans fancy enough that you can’t make head or tail of ’em, but he’s the dumbass here?”

“No. I’m telling you I don’t want to make head or tail of it.”