Heart of Barkness Page 5

  Two-lane blacktop through desert hills and canyons: it doesn’t get any better. To the metal, Bernie, to the metal! The big engine howled. I howled! Did Bernie howl, too? Hard to tell over all that howling. A sign flashed by and he eased off the pedal a bit.

  “State line,” he said. “New Mexico’s a different kettle of fish—keep that in mind.”

  Fish? That got my attention. As a rule, I stay away from fish, having had a bad experience involving a trash bin in the kitchen of All Things Fishy, a restaurant where we’d gone with Suzie—Suzie! I missed her!—and I’d perhaps done some exploration by myself, ending up with a bone, tiny but nasty, wedged in my throat. I sniffed the air, picked up all kinds of scents, the lovely rainy smell of creosote bushes most of all, but not the slightest hint of fish. Fish meant water, of which I saw not a drop. But if Bernie said there were fish here in New Mexico then that was that. I sat up straight and kept watch on the fishless scenery gliding by, all the way to a little town backed against a mountain.

  “Phantom Springs,” Bernie said. “They took fifty million dollars’ worth of silver out of that hill.” We drove down the main drag, past a few solid-looking brick buildings, then turned up a street where all the buildings got less solid. “And used so much mercury doing it that the wells are still polluted, a century later.”

  All that sounded pretty complicated. Had they left any silver for us? Just enough to fill our trunk, not very big? That was my only thought.

  We made a few more turns and started up the hill, passing a trailer park and a few shacks. The pavement ended, the way pavements often did out in the desert, and then we were on a dirt track, switchbacking up and up. A mailbox appeared. Sometimes you see bullet holes in mailboxes in these kinds of places, but not this time. I was a bit disappointed. We turned up a bumpy, rutted driveway, and parked in front of a small, low wooden house, maybe blue in the past but now sandblasted by the desert wind. The windows of the house were all dusty, but I thought I saw movement behind one.

  We hopped out of the car, Bernie not actually hopping. The air was still, the sun hot, but not as hot as back in the Valley. Way down below in the town, a glass shattered on someone’s hard floor.

  “Here’s the question,” Bernie said. “Why would Lotty Pilgrim make that call to Nixon when the driver of the car robbed her tip jar?”

  Wow! Bernie had all that figured out? I understood the situation like no other situation I’d ever been in. But that was Bernie. Just when you think he’s done amazing you, he amazes you again.

  We walked up to the house, side by side. The front door opened and a young barefoot woman stepped onto the porch. She had big blue eyes, a long ponytail, and a shotgun in her hands. The muzzle wasn’t exactly pointing at us, but neither was it not exactly pointing at us. I had an unsettling thought: no bullet holes in the mailbox but now this? Were we walking into a trap? That happened in our business, actually kind of often, now that I thought about it. So it had to be one of the things that made the Little Detective Agency what it was.

  Six

  Bernie smiled a friendly smile. “Expecting someone dangerous?” he said.

  The young woman’s eyes hardened, like they’d become blue metal.

  “That’s not us,” Bernie said.

  The shotgun muzzle stayed where it was, close to pointing at my muzzle but not quite. I had a strange moment when my muzzle suddenly became very itchy, and even worse, like that other muzzle was making it happen. All I wanted to do was lie down and give my muzzle a nice good scratching with one of my back paws. Was this a good time? I thought not but what can you do when you’re itchy? And then I got the idea of snatching that shotgun right out of the young woman’s hands. I changed positions a little. The itching went away.

  “Get off my property,” the young woman said.

  The smile stayed on Bernie’s face, still friendly. He’s the friendly type. So am I! No way I was going to hurt the young woman. I was planning a very gentle encounter.

  “My name’s Bernie Little and this is Chet. Are you Rita Krebs?”

  “Let’s see a warrant,” the young woman said.

  “I’m not a cop.”

  “You look like one. Kinda.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment,” Bernie said.

  “Take it however you want. Just get the hell out of here.”

  Bernie nodded, like we were just about on our way. But we actually didn’t move an inch, if I’m right in thinking that’s not much. In fact, I kind of edged a little closer to the shotgun. At the same time, I noticed that she was one of those humans—there aren’t many of them, no offense—with very nice feet. Giving them a quick lick? Was that in the cards? Maybe later.

  “If you are Rita Krebs,” Bernie said, “we’ve got news about your car.”

  Her eyes shifted, a real quick shift and then they were back on us. Bernie’s good at making those quick shifts happen. What they’re all about is a bit of a mystery, but they usually mean we’re starting to roll.

  “We’ve just come from Nixon Panero’s shop in the Valley. Don’t know how you found him, but you went to the best.”

  She looked Bernie in the eye. “You’re not a cop?”

  “I’m a music lover,” Bernie said. “Country music in particular.”

  She opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I’m guessing you already know, Rita,” Bernie said.

  “Well, you’re guessing wrong,” Rita said, her voice rising. She had to be Rita or else she would have said … something or other. Bernie didn’t make mistakes at times like this. He didn’t make mistakes at all. Except for the Hawaiian pants and the Bolivian tin play. And … and … maybe somehow Suzie? What a bothersome thought! I wished it hadn’t come at all. And it wasn’t showing any signs of forgetting itself, if that makes any sense. There’s really only one way to get rid of bothersome thoughts that won’t forget themselves. You’ve got to move. I moved.

  The next thing I knew I had the shotgun, holding it nice and tight at the wooden end. Bernie was on the move, too, catching Rita as she fell and setting her back on her feet. Had she fallen because of me? Oh, no! I went over to maybe give her a nuzzle, but that wasn’t going to be easy with the shotgun in my mouth.

  “Good job,” Bernie said. “If, um, a little on the spontaneous side. How about sitting for a moment or two?” He took the shotgun, broke it open, pocketed the shells, and offered it to Rita. She didn’t take it, backing away instead. “You’ve got no goddamn right to trespass in here and—”

  A man’s voice came from inside the house. “Rita? What’s goin’ on?”

  Out on the porch, everything went still, even the air. I sniffed it and picked up the man’s scent: a rather pleasant combo of old sneakers and not showering very often. Hey! A dude I knew. A friend? Not a friend? My mind came up empty on that question. But the door to this nice little faded and lopsided house was open so I trotted inside.

  “What the hell?” said Rita. “Stop him!”

  Bernie stepped past her and entered the house.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Can’t stop him from out here,” Bernie said, which was kind of strange since all he had to do was say, “Chet, come,” or “Back outside, big guy,” or even just “Che—et?” if he said it in a certain way. But before I could tackle this puzzle, Bernie was beside me, the shotgun under his arm, and we were doing a little recon of the house, recons being one of our specialties. Rita followed us, hopping around a bit, maybe grabbing once or twice at the back of Bernie’s shirt, and saying things I’m sure she didn’t really mean.

  Meanwhile Bernie was being a very nice guest. Very nice guests always said very nice things about the house. “Love these old shotgun houses,” he told Rita.

  Shotgun house? Because Rita had welcomed us with a shotgun in her hands? Did that make any house with a shotgun in it a shotgun house? If so, just about every house in some parts of the Valley was a shotgun house, includ
ing ours. Did that mean Bernie loved so many, many houses? Probably: there’s lots of love in Bernie, even if most people don’t see it right away, or ever.

  We moved through a front room with a sagging couch and a big flat-screen, down a narrow corridor with a messy kitchen on one side and a messy bathroom on the other, and into a bedroom at the end. A dark bedroom, the curtains drawn. Humans are just about blind in the dark, but not me and my kind. The dresser, the bed, and the man lying on it were all visible to me, if a little on the dim side. I went over to the bed, making what Bernie calls a mental note to circle back to that messy kitchen if I got the chance.

  “Rita? Rita?” said the man on the bed, the sound of his voice actually more of a shriek.

  “Sorry, Jordan,” said Rita, somewhere behind us. “They just barged in. There was nothing I could—”

  Bernie whipped open the curtains. Light came flowing in, bright desert light, extra-bright if it comes at you all at once.

  “Aargh!” cried the man on the bed, covering his face with his arm. This, as I already knew, was my pal the fuzzy- and baby-faced dart player, but looking not as good as he had back at the Crowbar. His face was purplish and the one eye not hidden under his arm was swollen just about shut. We went through a time, me and Bernie—the first Christmas when Charlie was with Leda and Malcolm and not us—of watching old fight films on TV. The face of the man on the bed reminded me of Carmen Basilio after Sugar Ray Robinson was done with him.

  Bernie sat on the bed.

  “Aargh!” the man cried again.

  “That bad, Jordan?” Bernie said. “What happened?”

  Jordan moved his arm slightly, exposing his other eye, also swollen, but very slightly open, just a narrow slit, somewhat oozy. That eye, what there was of it, shifted toward Bernie.

  “Who are you?”

  “Don’t remember me? Maybe you’ll recognize Chet here.”

  With a loud groan, Jordan raised his head a tiny bit off the pillow and turned it in my direction. Then he groaned again and laid his head back down. The narrow, damp eye slit stayed open. So—he recognized me or not? After we meet, just about everyone is happy to see me the next time. But not Jordan? Was there some way to make him like me a little better? Playing a fun game of tug-of-war with his sheets was my first and only idea.

  Bernie turned to Rita. “Has a doctor seen him?”

  “Huh? Like we have a doctor on call?” Rita said.

  Jordan’s mouth opened. There was dried blood on the inside of his lips. “Don’t want no doctor.”

  “I know one who’ll come out here,” Bernie said.

  He did? I waited to find out who.

  “Yeah?” said Rita.

  “Rita!” said Jordan. “For god’s sake!”

  “But you’re hurt,” Rita said.

  “Bullshit!” Jordan yelled. Then he groaned again and his slit eye almost closed. The swollen lid quivered and he kept that eye on Bernie, its gaze dull and damp.

  Bernie, still sitting on the bed, gave Jordan a very light shoulder pat. A wincey sort of look rose on Jordan’s face and then vanished when he realized that it really was a very light shoulder pat, not hurting at all. Lots of perps—hey! maybe even most!—aren’t tough guys. Jordan was in that group.

  “Not hurt, maybe,” Bernie said, “but a little nicked up.”

  Jordan thought about that. “Yeah, nicked up,” he said.

  “Who did the nicking?” said Bernie.

  “Huh?”

  “Who,” said Bernie, making a little gesture toward Jordan’s face, “did this to you?”

  “I ran into, um, a telephone pole.”

  “Yeah? Where was this?”

  “It was dark. I couldn’t see.”

  “Where did you go after our little encounter in the parking lot?”

  Even though Jordan’s face was pretty beat up, it now got a look on it that reminded me of … of a fox! Yes! Jordan was the foxish type. The fox and human mix never turned out good. I ramped up to high alert. “It was still dark,” Jordan said. “So I still couldn’t see.”

  Bernie laughed, a soft laugh he has when he’s enjoying himself.

  “What’s funny?” Rita said.

  Exactly my own thought! I took another look at her feet. I was starting to like Rita, had almost forgotten the not-so-friendly way she’d welcomed us.

  “Nothing,” Bernie said. “Well, maybe just life itself, and its little details.”

  “Huh?” said Jordan again.

  “Little details like the fact that when last seen by us you were pantless. Pantless and a hundred miles from here. So what happened in between?”

  Jordan and Rita exchanged a quick look, her two big blue eyes meeting his one open eye, moist and slitty. Rita turned to Bernie.

  “If you’re not a cop, what are you?”

  “Just someone trying to understand,” Bernie said.

  Wow! Had I ever heard anything so important? I made another mental note: never forget what Bernie had just said, never ever, the thing about being someone who … who …

  “Here’s a recent problem, Rita,” Bernie was saying. “First, Jordan makes off with one hundred dollars that doesn’t belong to him. Second, the rightful owner of the money arranges the repair of Jordan’s ride, damaged in the course of the theft. Third, someone beats the crap out of him.” Bernie spread his hands. “What’s the explanation?”

  Jordan’s and Rita’s gazes met again. Neither spoke.

  “A Christ-like level of forgiveness,” Bernie said, “but I didn’t spot him at the Crowbar.”

  Jordan and Rita remained silent, which was what perps were supposed to do but hardly ever did.

  Bernie looked down at Jordan, then across the bed at Rita. “You two married?” he said.

  No response from Jordan, but Rita shook her head, just a tiny movement.

  “Me neither,” said Bernie. “At the moment.” He rose, went to the window, and stared out. For an instant or two I had the craziest feeling that his eyes were about to tear up. But they did not. That was Bernie, of course, not a crier—and besides, what was there to tear up about? We were back at work, kicking ass and taking names, except for the kicking ass part. I went over the names: Rita and Jordan. Did I have those names down pat or what? Chet the Jet! In the picture!

  Bernie turned. “What’s your last name, Jordan?”

  “None of your goddamn business,” Jordan said.

  “Sure it is,” said Bernie. “That was my C-note in the beginning.”

  Rita frowned. “You want it back? Is that what this is about?”

  Bernie shook his head. “I already told you what it’s about.”

  “That bullshit about understanding?” said Jordan.

  “Not everything’s understandable,” Rita said.

  Bernie’s eyebrows rose. Have I mentioned his eyebrows already? The farthest thing from those thin and patchy eyebrows you see on lots of humans. And Bernie’s had a language of their own. Right now they were telling Rita she had his full attention.

  “Where’d you hear that?” he said.

  “In a class.”

  “You’re in college?”

  “I was.”

  “Where?”

  “Rita!” Jordan tried to shout. His voice broke and ended up soft and raspy, but still real angry. “Shut up!”

  Rita closed her mouth.

  “You may be right, Rita,” Bernie said. “But in the end it makes no difference in how you’ve got to live. Did your professor mention that?”

  Rita didn’t speak, although I got the feeling she wanted to. Bernie glanced around the room. His gaze fell on a wallet sitting on the dresser. He went over and picked it up.

  “Didn’t I tell you it was bullshit?” Jordan said, his voice now even raspier. “It’s always about the money.”

  Bernie opened the wallet, took out a driver’s license, read out loud. “Jordan Wells, 299 Bluff Street, Phantom Springs.” He replaced the license, put the wallet back down on the dresser, then ap
proached the bed and looked down at Jordan. “Here’s some free advice, Jordan—listen to Rita.”

  “Huh?” he said, his voice mostly rasps and escaping air. “About what?”

  “Everything,” Bernie said. He made a little click click in his mouth, meaning hit the road. I love that click click—what’s better than hitting the road?

  We were in the car and on the move before I remembered I hadn’t given Rita’s feet that quick lick I’d been looking forward to. Even after I’d made a mental note! That bothered me all the way down those switchbacks. And then it hit me that I’d also forgotten to circle back to the messy kitchen. Had this visit been a complete failure? Whoa! Don’t tell me my mind wanted to go there of all places! Whose side was it on?

  Seven

  We drove down the mountain and into town. Phantom Springs? Was that it? First came one of those enormous holes you see sometimes in the desert, holes surrounded by orange and brown slag heaps which was all the stuff that had been dug out of the hole except for whatever the miners had been digging for, like gold or silver or copper. Or something like that. Bernie had explained all this to Charlie for a class project. Had Charlie wanted to do something else, perhaps the gunfight at the OK Corral? But Bernie had talked him into desert mines. Was C-minus-minus a good result? Had to be. Charlie was a top student—he’d just started all-day school and they already had him in the very first grade.

  After the hole and the slag heaps came a brick school with school buses parked on one side and a baseball diamond on the other. Lots of days aren’t school days and this felt like one of them, no kids to be seen or heard, no one going in or coming out. Too bad. What’s better than a bunch of kids running wild?

  We slowed down, slowed down kind of slowly, like Bernie wasn’t sure about slowing down. But then he pulled over and parked by the backstop. He reached under his seat, felt around, and pulled out a tennis ball. Not just any tennis ball, of course, but one of mine. All the tennis balls found in the Porsche, or at our place on Mesquite Road, inside or out, including all the other houses in all directions, are mine. As well as all other tennis balls I see first, plus ones I see second and possibly even later. In short, tennis balls are mine. But I’m always happy to share. Or at least I’ll do it. Especially if a treat is involved. Maybe only if a treat’s involved. And not for long. Got to be true to yourself—you hear that all the time.