Fly Paper (10 page)

Jon let his Dogpatch remark lie; he’d just been thinking aloud, and though Nolan had been very tolerant lately about Jon’s comics hobby, now was no time to put that tolerance to a test by going into the resemblance the Comfort place held to something Al Capp might have drawn.

Nolan said, “You want me to go over it once more?”

“No,” Jon said.

“Okay.” Nolan was sitting back in the seat, loose, apparently relaxed, but Jon thought he sensed an uncharacteristic tightness in the man’s voice, perhaps brought on by concern over Jon’s relative inexperience in matters of potential violence.

They’d been over the plan several times, first at the hotel, in their room, and again on the way here, in the car. Nolan would come up behind the Com¬fort farmhouse, through the pasture in back; the ground was open, open as hell, but there were trees along the property line, and also a barn, and those would provide whatever cover Nolan needed. Jon would allow Nolan five minutes, during which time Nolan would jimmy the basement window open, crawl inside, deposit his calling card, and crawl out After those five minutes were up, Jon would initiate phase two of the plan, in that weed-encroached front yard.

Jon felt sure everything would go without a hitch, but he wished he could also be sure Nolan felt the same way. Jon’s own confidence was undercut somewhat by the lack of confidence he suspected in Nolan, an attitude that stemmed back to that discussion they’d had about firearms, back at the hotel.

“I don’t exactly understand,” Jon had said, “how we’re going to subdue these dudes—I mean, what do we do, brain ’em with the butts of our guns, or what?”

“For Chrissake, kid,” Nolan had answered, eyes narrowed even more than usual, “never go swinging a gun butt around. You got the barrel pointing at you, and you can end up with a hole in your chest big as the one in your damn head. Why do you think I prefer a long-barreled gun?”

“Better aim, you said.”

“Yeah, that. And this too—with a long barreled gun you can put a guy to sleep without firing a shot.”

“So, what then? We brain ’em with the gun barrels?”

“You would if it was called for. But it isn’t. I told you what the plan was, and you didn’t hear any part where you go slugging people with a gun, did you? All right, then. You just leave the subduing to me—and leave the gun in its holster, dig?”

“Look, I’m capable of using it if I have to, Nolan.”

“Maybe, but don’t act like it’s something to look forward to. By now, you been through enough shit like this to tell the difference between what we’re about to do and some goddamn comic-book fairy tale. If we get in a totally desperate situation, sure, use the gun. That’s what it’s there for. But since we got the element of surprise working for us, I don’t see that happening.”

Jon was determined now to make a good showing tonight, to regain Nolan’s confidence by behaving like a cold, hard-ass professional, not like some naive kid. Next to him, Nolan was opening the package of nylons, and Jon listened to the crackle of cellophane and waited for Nolan to hand him one of the stockings.

But instead there was a long moment of silence, and even in darkness Jon had no trouble making out the stunned look on Nolan’s face.

“Kid.”

“Yeah?”

“I think we’re going to have to make a change of plan.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I don’t think we’re going to be able to split up. You’re going to have to follow along pretty close behind me.”

“Why’s that?”

Nolan held up the nylons.

Panty hose.

“Panty hose,” Nolan said.

Jon started to sputter. “Nolan, shit, I mean, that’s all the girls are wearing these days. I should’ve checked to make sure they were the old-fashioned kind. I mean . . .”

Nolan dug in his pocket and got out his knife.

“Nolan—what’re you doing?”

A grin flashed under Nolan’s mustache, a grin so wide and out of character, it startled Jon. “I’m not going to kill you, kid,” he said, “I just got to perform some hasty surgery.”

Nolan separated the siamese twins; he handed one amputated leg to Jon and kept the other. “You know, kid,” Nolan said, “this is a hell of a lot of trouble to go to, just to get your way.”

“Get my way?”

“Yeah. But you win. From now on, I buy all the nylons.”

They both grinned this time, and enthusiasm ran through Jon like a drug. “I won’t let you down, Nolan.”

“I know you won’t.”

Nolan pulled the stocking over his head, immediately disfiguring himself. “Five minutes, Jon.”

“Five minutes, Nolan.”

And Nolan was gone.

Five minutes? Five hours was what it seemed. Jon made a concerted effort not to study his watch, not to follow the second hand around. But he did, of course, and the time was excruciatingly slow in passing, the seconds pelting him like the liquid pellets of the Chinese water torture; the ticking of his watch seemed abnormally loud, as if in an echo chamber, and he wondered how the hell a relic like that (a Dick Tracy watch, circa late ’30s) could put out such a racket.

He thought he saw something moving across the road, over in the Comfort yard, but it was only the tall weeds getting pushed around by the wind. That brought his attention to the farmhouse, which was what he was supposed to be doing anyway—watching the house, keeping alert for anything out of order that might be going on over there. The Comforts couldn’t be expected to stick to Nolan and Jon’s game plan, after all; and as Nolan had said more than once, you never can tell when the human element might enter in and knock a well-conceived plan on its well-conceived ass.

Jon sat studying the old gray two-story, and thought back to the verbal tour of the place Breen had given him last night. Though from the run-down exterior you’d never guess it, the Comfort castle was, according to Breen, expensively furnished and equipped with modern appliances and gadgetry galore. Its shabby appearance was no doubt partially purposeful at least; as a thief himself, old Sam Comfort would have an unnaturally suspicious and devious mind, certainly capable of devising a defense of this sort: that is, living in a house that looked like a junk heap on the outside, but was a palace on the inside. Crafty as hell, because judging from what he could see, Jon could hardly imagine a less likely prospect for a robbery. Looting a place like that—why, you’d be lucky to come away with a six-pack of beer and a handful of food stamps.

Not that they had in mind stealing any of the possessions the Comforts had acquired through years of applied larceny; the creature comforts the Comfort creatures had assembled for themselves were of no interest to Jon and Nolan. There was only one thing in that house that interested them: the strongbox of cash kept somewhere within those deceptively decayed walls. Breen had reported that old Sam kept a minimum of fifty thousand in that box at all times, and there was a good chance the Comforts (having just returned from Iowa City) hadn’t yet banked their latest parking meter bonanza. Which meant, in all probability, that some two hundred grand was locked up within that metal box.

He checked his watch.                                                

Thirty seconds shy of five minutes.

He withdrew the gun from the holster, hefted it, put it back. Took a deep breath. Another. The butterflies in his stomach began to disperse.

Ten seconds.

He pulled the nylon mask down over his face. It didn’t impair his vision particularly, though he could feel it contorting his features, feel it tight on his face. It was a strange feeling, like pressing your face against a window.

Five minutes, and he left the Ford, got down in the ditch, and walked till he was across from the house, then crawled across the gravel road, moved up and over the opposite ditch, and into the high weeds of the Comforts’ front yard. The weeds were more than sufficient cover; he traveled on his hands and knees and couldn’t be seen. He was within a few yards of the house when he heard a muffled pop, and after a moment smoke began to fill the air. Nolan had said the smoke would penetrate, and penetrate it did, in spades. The smoke was curling out through openings the house didn’t know it had, from around windows and between paint-peeling boards and from every damn where—gray, creeping smoke—and if Jon didn’t know better, he’d have sworn the house was on fire.

Which was, of course, the idea.

To convince the Comforts their house was burning.

To panic the old man into grabbing his treasure box of loot and abandoning his ship.

By this time, Jon was right up by the cement steps that rose to the front door, and he pulled the pin on his little olive-drab can, which made it pop and sprayed out smoke, blowtorch fashion, to the accompaniment of a loud hissing sound. As he retreated to the tall weeds, Jon wondered how so much smoke could fit into one little can. Earlier, he’d asked Nolan about the canisters; why, he’d wanted to know, was the top of the can gray and the rest green? Because, Nolan explained, the green was for camouflage purposes, while the top of the can was marked the color of smoke it made. Jon almost wished they’d used one green smoke bomb and one red one; it wouldn’t have looked like a fire, but it sure would’ve freaked out that pothead Billy Comfort. The poor burned-out bastard would’ve thought he was hallucinating.

Nolan should be coming around the house any time now. The smoke was thickening, but Jon wasn’t having too much trouble maintaining a reasonable level of vision, even with the nylon mask. A figure was coming around from the left of the house. Must be Nolan, Jon thought, but then he saw the outline of the figure’s head: it was a head with a bushy mane of hair, Afro-bushy.

It was Billy Comfort, speak of the goddamn devil.

The shaggy-haired figure was moving toward Jon, and Jon ducked behind the cement steps. Billy was carrying a pole of some sort, and though he apparently hadn’t spotted Jon, he was heading straight for the smoke grenade, which was still spewing its gray guts out, hissing away like a big sick snake. As Billy approached, Jon suppressed a cough, covering his already nylon-covered mouth, wondering where the hell Nolan was, or, for that matter, old man Comfort.

Billy knelt beside the smoke grenade, fanning the fumes away with his free hand. He nudged the blisteringly hot canister with one foot, like a Neanderthal trying to figure out what fire was. Finally, he said, “Far fuckin’ out,” and began to laugh and cough simultaneously.

Jon’s hand touched the butt of the .38 lightly. Nolan had said leave the subduing to me, but Nolan wasn’t around. Somebody had to subdue Billy Com-fort, and right now, before Billy went screaming out the truth of the deception to his old man.

So Jon did what he thought best.

He tackled Billy, burying his head in Billy’s balls.

Billy yelped accordingly, and his foot connected with the smoking can and he slipped on it, like a contestant taking a fall in a log-rolling contest, and he went down hard, the air escaping from him in a big whoosh. Jon clasped a hand over Billy’s mouth and grinned in what proved to be a premature victory, because Billy managed to swing something around that caught Jon on the side of the head and blacked him out.

When Jon awoke, seconds later, he saw right away what it was that had put him to sleep: the handle of that pole Billy was carrying, only it was more than just a pole: it was the wooden shaft of a five-pronged pitchfork. And Jon looked up through the smoke-and-nylon haze and saw in Billy’s eyes a haze of another sort: a druggy haze. Billy was high, and Billy was on to the game. Maybe he’d even witnessed Jon and/or Nolan planting the smoke bombs; perhaps he’d been back in that barn, smoking or snorting or doing God-knows-what sort of dope, when he’d spied suspicious things going on up by the house, and had grabbed a pitchfork as a make-do weapon and come rushing to the rescue of home and hearth.

So that’s how it stood: Billy with one foot on Jon’s chest, smoke floating around them like a choking fog, Billy raising the pitchfork to impale Jon and put him to sleep again.