Lucky Strikes (11 page)

So each day got a little easier, and before too long, I'd be hearing, “Oh, man, Hiram better have my coffee waiting” or “Where's that Hiram with my joe?” or “Hey, Melia, tell Hiram I like his new blend. That ol' chicory takes me back.”

One morning—it was a Friday in mid-May, I think—I was pumping diesel into a Chevy Confederate when I heard a shout and a crash. Now, Elmer and Dutch was already hustling into the store, and me, I weren't but three steps behind. The first thing I seen was Hiram flat against the icebox and a pair of hands pressed hard—
hard
—against his chest.

Didn't take long to see the hands belonged to Glenmont, one of the biggest, baddest mothers on the road. The kind of feller showed up every Monday with a black eye and half a tooth missing and dried-up blood on his knuckles.

“Hey, now!” I said. “Quit that!”

Truth be told, I was less fearful for Hiram than the icebox, which had customized glass panels.

Well, it took two fellers to pry Glenmont off, and even so he kept coming at Hiram like a drunk reaching for his last whiskey.

“What the hell's gotten into you two?” I said.

“This bastard just 'cused me of stealing,” said Glenmont.

“I didn't accuse him,” said Hiram, panting. “I saw him.”

“Like hell you did.”

“He took three quarters right out of that drawer.”

The anaconda tattoo on Glenmont's neck was pulsing like a fist. “You're a goddamn liar, old man. You didn't see nothing.”

“I can even tell you the years on those coins. They're 1929, 1932, 1933. The thirty-three's got some kind of green oxidation on it, and the twenty-nine's black around the rim, like someone rolled it in coal dust.”

Even in the midst of the ruckus, I had to wonder how a body could make such a study of a quarter.

“That so?” shouted Glenmont. “You wanna look for them there quarters?” With a slow smile, he turned out all his overall pockets, front and back. “See?” he said. “Nothin'.” Then he rolled up both of his shirtsleeves far as they would go. “Ain't nothin' up there, neither.”

By now, the driver of the Confederate had followed us into the store, and a whole knot of truckers come hard after. Jake and Colton, Rance and Elwood. All tense in the jaw, squared off in the shoulders. The sight of 'em seemed to give Glenmont a head of steam. He started strutting round the store, yanking on his overalls.

“I tell you what, boys! I tell you what! That old coot is touched in the head!”

“Well, now,” I said, clearing my throat. “I can see how there might've been a mistake.”

“No mistake,” Hiram said, soft and low.

“What I mean is if there's been, like—I mean, like, a misunderstanding—I'm sure we're all real sorry about it.”

Glenmont's lip curled up. “Sorry don't cut it, Miss Melia. You want to keep my business, this old man here's gotta go.”

“Come on, now. Ain't no need for that.”

“Pointing a finger at honest folk. I ought to punch his lights out.”

And boy, did he try. Come back swinging free and hard. It was all Elmer and Dutch could do to pull him off again.

“Say, now,” I heard Elmer whisper. “You can't ask her to can her own daddy, Glenmont.”

“Don't care who it is! She don't toss him out, I ain't never coming back. And I'll tell all my buddies to do the same.”

I could see Hiram leaning back against that wall, studying his fingernails. I could see Glenmont, clawing his tattoo like a bull pawing at a patch of grass. Each second was a drum pounding in my head. Then, from the back of the store, come a voice even deeper than Hiram's.

“Hold on, now.”

The other truckers parted like hair before a comb, and out stepped Warner. Without a word, he grabbed Glenmont—all two hundred pounds of him—took him by the collar, lifted him straight up in the air, and then flipped him like he was an egg timer.

“What the hell?” gasped Glenmont.

There came a ping, bright as a song. It was a quarter, falling from some deep, secret well of Glenmont's overalls and twanging on the oak flooring.

Warner give Glenmont a little shake, and out come another quarter. One more shake, one more quarter.

With a measure of gentleness, Warner set Glenmont back on the floor, then scooped up the coins. Lifted 'em, one by one, to the light.

“The year is 1932, check … oxidized green, check … coal dust round the rim. Check.” Nodding, he handed the quarters back to Hiram.

Well, by now, every single eye in the store was boring down on Glenmont.

“Come on now, boys,” he said. “Don't be that way. Old man, he probably planted 'em on me. He's sly that way. Got that funny eye, don't he?”

A few more seconds, he might've left on his own, but Warner decided to move things along. Grabbed Glenmont by the stitches on his overalls and flung him out the door.

The morning rush was done by eleven, but I took another hour or so to sweep away the elm pods and stack some tires. Finally, there weren't nothing for it but to take myself into the store, where Hiram was back on his stool.

“At it again,” he said.

I swung my head toward the window. There was that crazy redbird, pounding his idiot self against the glass.

“I used to think he'd kill himself doing that,” said Hiram. “Now I think it's the thing that keeps him going.”

For a good while, I studied that bird. Then I give the floor a good once-over.

“Listen,” I said. “I want you to know—well, I just wanted to say I
believed
you. Back there with Glenmont.”

“You did, huh?”

“It's just—I don't know how to—how to handle a
scrap
. I mean, I can change your oil, put in new brake pads, but a ruckus—I mean the kind menfolk get into—I don't know my way around that.”

“Is this your way of saying sorry, Melia?”

“Close as I get.”

He set for a spell, watching the redbird.

“You don't need to apologize,” he said. “Girl like you shouldn't have to adjudicate squabbles amongst grown men.”

“Adjudicate?”

“Means
judge
.”

“Oh.” I stuffed my hands in my pocket. “Guess you'd know a word like that. Seeing you was once an actor.”

“Actors only know what you tell 'em.”

I stood there awhile, rocking on my heels.

“Can I ask you something?” I said.

“Sure.”

“You're bringing in two, three bucks more every day, and it makes me kinda sad.”

His head tilted. “Why is that?”

“'Cause it means Mama and me was wrong about trusting people. Folks like Glenmont, they must've been stealing from us all along.”

“Not necessarily. If you ask me, ninety-nine percent of your customers are honest folk.”

“Then how come we're getting more money with you in the store?”

“Because I'm suggesting things they didn't know they wanted.”

“How's that work?” I said.

“Well, now,” he said, giving his knuckles a crack. “Imagine some lady comes in here of a Saturday afternoon. One of those tourist ladies with the beaver coat and the Leica camera.”

“Sure.”

“She walks through that door there, and all she wants is a pack of Wrigley's Spearmint. So she can freshen up her breath for her fella, who's back in the car. 'Course you get her the gum, but before you hand it over, you say, ‘Hey, now, are you sure you've got enough film for that camera?' ‘Well,' she says, ‘I think so.' And you say, ‘Oh, my maiden aunt, I'd hate to have you run out of film when you're standing on top of Signal Knob and nowhere to buy more.' And she says, ‘Maybe you're right.' And you say, ‘Now, you sure you got an up-to-the-minute map?' And she says, ‘I don't know.' And you say, ‘Well, they're changing the roads every day in these parts, so you'd best take care. Now this map here is the most up-to-date map there is. Can't go wrong with H.M. Gousha.' And she says, ‘Okay, I'll take it.' And then I say, ‘Now, are you ready to get nibbled on? 'Cause the bugs are getting awful bitey right around now.'”

“Not so much in May…”

“‘Excuse me, miss, but in the Blue Ridge, bugs are a year-round menace. How about I fix you up with some Flit? You can take it back to DC, too, use it when the skeeters come calling. And I'll tell you what, since you're such a valued customer, I'm gonna throw in a couple postcards free of charge. For your sweet mama and papa back home.'” He shrugged. “That's how ten cents becomes two dollars.”

“How'd you learn that?”

“Used to sell ladies' hats.”

“Where?”

“I. Magnin and Company. San Francisco.”

If he'd told me he'd sold flying carpets to Aladdin, it couldn't have sounded any stranger. What sort of lady would've bought a hat off of Hiram Watts?

“I wonder if I could take a nap now,” he said.

“Don't see why not.”

He put his feet on the counter and tipped himself back until his head rested against the wall. It was about the scariest position a man could find to sleep in—one tip in the wrong direction, the stool would've gone right out from under—but Hiram, he kept his balance, and when I checked back a half hour later, he was sleeping in the exact same position. Soon as he heard the bell over the door, though, his eyes sparked open and the stool come back down, and the words was out of his mouth before he'd even quite woke up.

“How may I help you?”

 

Chapter

ELEVEN

The letter from First Bank of Virginia came in the next day's mail. It was addressed to a dead woman.

Dear Miss Brenda Hoyle,

It has come to this bank's attention that you are three months in arrears on payments relating to Account #3231A.

Previous communications have met with no response. We ask therefore that you consider this your final notice. Please be advised that, should you fail to remit one hundred and thirty dollars by June the first, your account shall be considered in default, and repossession proceedings shall be undertaken.

Most sincerely yours,

Mr. Wallace Paxton

Commercial Loans

So here's the thing that I haven't made crystal clear yet. For all the green Hiram was bringing in through the store, we was drowning in debt.

It started from the day Mama bought the place. She had to take out one loan for the station, another for the house. We owed the bank, we owed the jobber. We owed the Pillsbury supplier, the Coca-Cola supplier. We owed the cheese man, the iceman, the Kelvinator man. We owed Ma Bell, we owed Standard Oil. We was okay on taxes, but we didn't have a scrap of insurance. We couldn't even afford to pay ourselves wages.

The only thing we owned free and clear was the truck, and that was about nine months away from being a piece of junk—it was held together by chewing gum and pagan prayer—and if I'd gone and sold it that very day, I'd have got maybe forty bucks. Ninety bucks less than what I needed to find in two weeks.

And I wouldn't have had no truck.

Well, first thing I did was call Chester. He got there toward sundown, looking damp and wilted in his blue blazer.

“Let's walk,” I said.

We couldn't walk very far, 'cause I had to keep an eye on the station. So we'd travel 'bout a hundred feet down the road's shoulder, then cross and walk back the other side. We did that a couple times, then I handed him the letter.

“It's a pickle,” he said after reading it.

“That's one word.”

He folded the letter back up. Tapped it against his temple.

“We could go to court,” he said. “Buy you a little time.”

“How much?”

“Depends on the judge. A month, maybe two. Worse comes to worse, we declare bankruptcy.”

“Shit.”

“That's not the end of the world, Melia. It just gives you a little breathing room, keeps your creditors at bay.”

“For how long? How long you think before Harley Blevins comes swooping in? You don't think he's got half this county's judges in his pocket?”

We angled our heads toward the road. Watched a mare drag an old hay wagon up the hill.

“I can help,” said Chester.

“Yeah? You're telling me you got a hundred and thirty dollars right there in your trousers.”

“Well, not in my trousers…”

“Come on, Chester, you can't even afford to paint your house. You spend your days keeping poor crackers out of jail. You telling me they're paying in
cash
now? I thought it was quilts and moonshine, mostly.”

“I could call people.”

“Listen. It means a lot you trying, but you don't even know what we're up against here. I mean, we're deep in it.”

“Then let me do something.”

I kept walking.

“At least give me credit for trying,” he said, following after.

A crow landed on a split-rail fence, give us the eye.

“I'm at my wit's end,” I said. “I mean, how long do we keep trying? Mama used to say if you can't make a go of a thing, it weren't never meant to be.”

“You think she honestly believed that?”

“Hell if I know.” I swung my head back toward the station. Hocked a gob of spit on the ground. “I could never be sure what was goin' on in that head of hers. Brenda's Oasis—this is just another one of her damned dreams. And I'm the one who gets to clean up after.”

Once Chester had gone, I headed back to the house to make sure Earle was on top of his homework. (Boy's all right with sums but will do anything to get out of reading.) From the edge of my sight, I caught a little figure out there between the tire swings. It was Janey, her hands full of linen bandages and an old tangerine peel cupped like a stethoscope to her ear.