times as I had laid eyes on Ma, the sight was always rough on the motor functions.
“Didn’t expect you before lunch. Place is a mess.” She let the screen door bang and shuffled past me in bunny slippers to lift last night’s News off a sofa with doilies on the arms and birds of paradise needlepointed on the cushions. Something else, much smaller, went into the pocket of her kimono before I could get a look at it. The living room had been decorated straight out of the furniture commercials on the afternoon Charlie Chan movie, beginning with one of those revolving-shade forest fire table lamps and ending with glow-in-the-dark bullfighters on black velvet in phony gilt frames on the printed wallpaper. Knickknacks were everywhere, but except for the newspaper there wasn’t a scrap of unplanned clutter or a streak of dust in sight. The place was a mess, all right.
Ma crammed the newspaper into a lacquer wastebasket with a peacock on it and took a seat in a big overstuffed rocker that left her feet dangling. “Sit yourself down, son. Only not so hard you can’t get your wallet loose.” She laughed and started coughing. The cigarette teetered.
“It’ll be quick.” I chose a maple upright, the only seat in the room that didn’t look as if it would swallow me whole. “I need to know if you ever had business with a man named Thayer, or if anyone you know had business with him. I’m not looking to put anyone in Dutch. It’s worth something to my client.”
She stopped coughing. “How much?”
“That depends on what you can tell me.”
“I won’t tell you till you pay me and you won’t pay me till I tell you. I sure hope you brought lunch.”
That was it for a while. I sat, she rocked, an antique oscillating fan perched on a windowsill swooped back and forth. I began to look forward to the breeze on the back of my neck.
“Five hundred,” I said. “If you can tell me something about Thayer I don’t know, or point me in the direction of someone who can.”
She rocked a little more. “What’s to stop you from saying you knew it already after I tell it? If I got it to tell.”
“If I didn’t pay my freight you wouldn’t be talking to me now.”
“Folks change.”
“Like hell they do.”
She rocked. Then: “Well, I never dicker. Either it’s the right price or it ain’t, and Ma’s too old to sit here in the heat trading horses.”
I lit a cigarette and waited.
“Hubert!” she bellowed.
I said, “Who’s Hubert?”
“One of the darlings.”
I was turning that one over when the screen door banged and a big man with greasy blond hair came in chewing gum with his mouth open. He was wearing a brown polyester suit that bagged in the knees. He had a pale, pockmarked face, flat blue eyes, and a hearing aid in his right ear. I knew him, of course. I thought I even knew the suit.
“Yeah, Ma.” He hesitated when he saw me, but showed no recognition, only an impersonal sort of suspicion that went with his Georgia drawl.
“Hubert Darling, this here’s Amos Walker. Hubert’s been useful around here with the boys away. He’s going to see if you’re wearing a wire. You won’t mind.”
I said, “How’s he going to do that?”
She hopped off the rocker; for a woman of her age and figure she had plenty of spring. “It’s time Ma went up and got dressed. This here northern living’s making her lazy. You be thorough, now, Hubert. There’s plenty other places to tape them on besides the chest.” She shuffled out.
Hubert’s blue eyes looked like painted tin. “Stand up and get ’em off,” he said.
I stood. Face to face, I had an inch on him. The bigness was attitude, nothing more. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
“Am I supposed to?”
“You held me once while your brother Jerry went over me with a set of brass knuckles. It was in a trailer park not far from here.”
“Jerry’s in Jackson. He don’t get out till December.”
“When did they let you out?”
“Get
“Didn’t expect you before lunch. Place is a mess.” She let the screen door bang and shuffled past me in bunny slippers to lift last night’s News off a sofa with doilies on the arms and birds of paradise needlepointed on the cushions. Something else, much smaller, went into the pocket of her kimono before I could get a look at it. The living room had been decorated straight out of the furniture commercials on the afternoon Charlie Chan movie, beginning with one of those revolving-shade forest fire table lamps and ending with glow-in-the-dark bullfighters on black velvet in phony gilt frames on the printed wallpaper. Knickknacks were everywhere, but except for the newspaper there wasn’t a scrap of unplanned clutter or a streak of dust in sight. The place was a mess, all right.
Ma crammed the newspaper into a lacquer wastebasket with a peacock on it and took a seat in a big overstuffed rocker that left her feet dangling. “Sit yourself down, son. Only not so hard you can’t get your wallet loose.” She laughed and started coughing. The cigarette teetered.
“It’ll be quick.” I chose a maple upright, the only seat in the room that didn’t look as if it would swallow me whole. “I need to know if you ever had business with a man named Thayer, or if anyone you know had business with him. I’m not looking to put anyone in Dutch. It’s worth something to my client.”
She stopped coughing. “How much?”
“That depends on what you can tell me.”
“I won’t tell you till you pay me and you won’t pay me till I tell you. I sure hope you brought lunch.”
That was it for a while. I sat, she rocked, an antique oscillating fan perched on a windowsill swooped back and forth. I began to look forward to the breeze on the back of my neck.
“Five hundred,” I said. “If you can tell me something about Thayer I don’t know, or point me in the direction of someone who can.”
She rocked a little more. “What’s to stop you from saying you knew it already after I tell it? If I got it to tell.”
“If I didn’t pay my freight you wouldn’t be talking to me now.”
“Folks change.”
“Like hell they do.”
She rocked. Then: “Well, I never dicker. Either it’s the right price or it ain’t, and Ma’s too old to sit here in the heat trading horses.”
I lit a cigarette and waited.
“Hubert!” she bellowed.
I said, “Who’s Hubert?”
“One of the darlings.”
I was turning that one over when the screen door banged and a big man with greasy blond hair came in chewing gum with his mouth open. He was wearing a brown polyester suit that bagged in the knees. He had a pale, pockmarked face, flat blue eyes, and a hearing aid in his right ear. I knew him, of course. I thought I even knew the suit.
“Yeah, Ma.” He hesitated when he saw me, but showed no recognition, only an impersonal sort of suspicion that went with his Georgia drawl.
“Hubert Darling, this here’s Amos Walker. Hubert’s been useful around here with the boys away. He’s going to see if you’re wearing a wire. You won’t mind.”
I said, “How’s he going to do that?”
She hopped off the rocker; for a woman of her age and figure she had plenty of spring. “It’s time Ma went up and got dressed. This here northern living’s making her lazy. You be thorough, now, Hubert. There’s plenty other places to tape them on besides the chest.” She shuffled out.
Hubert’s blue eyes looked like painted tin. “Stand up and get ’em off,” he said.
I stood. Face to face, I had an inch on him. The bigness was attitude, nothing more. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
“Am I supposed to?”
“You held me once while your brother Jerry went over me with a set of brass knuckles. It was in a trailer park not far from here.”
“Jerry’s in Jackson. He don’t get out till December.”
“When did they let you out?”
“Get
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