‘This is fine,’ I said. ‘We’ve got tents in the van, and the van itself is good for sleeping in.’ He was bending down, lifting the plants and looking at them, sniffing them. ‘We even have a stove...’ My voice died away as he turned a small plant pot upside down and eased the earth and shrub out on to the palm of his hand. There, embedded in the soil and the thin white roots of the plant, was a house-key. Spike winked at me.
‘Friends know where to find the key.’
Inside, the house was fantastic, almost too bright for my liking. Sun streamed through huge louvered windows in the roof. There was unpainted pine everywhere. The walls and furniture were made of it, and the ceiling was panelled with pine tongue-and-groove. There was one large living room, complete with a central stove. Then there were doors off to bedrooms, bathrooms and a kitchen.
‘The bathroom has a whirlpool spa,’ Spike informed us. He flopped on a white sofa. ‘Man, this is the life.’
I didn’t want to sit down. I didn’t want to touch anything for fear of contaminating it. I was amazed to see that when Spike got up again he hadn’t left black smudges on the white material.
Bel had examined the place like a sceptical would-be buyer. She picked up a wastepaper basket and showed it to me.
‘They’ve cleaned the inside of it,’ she said. And so they had.
‘Hey,’ said Spike, ‘you want trash, you come back to my place. This is perfect for our purpose.’
‘And what is our purpose?’ I asked.
‘Follow me and find out.’
He led us back down to the pick-up. I noticed it had a rifle rack behind the bench-seat, but the rack was empty. Spike had opened the door of the cab so we could see in. It wasn’t a pretty sight. The ashtray was brim-full, with cigarette ends lying on the floor where they’d been stubbed out. There was enough lettuce and tomato to make a family a salad. I guessed Spike had been fuelled by service-station subs. There were empty cans and dirty socks and a begrimed T-shirt and maps and cassettes lying everywhere.
‘Nice,’ I said, ‘we’ll take it.’
Spike just smiled and swept everything off the bench-seat on to the floor.
‘Put some carpet down there and it’ll all look spick and span.’
He was still smiling as he unhooked a couple of catches underneath the seat. Then he pulled at the bench-seat, sliding out the actual part you sat on. He pulled the whole thing out and stood it against the pick-up.
‘Well, well,’ I said.
There was a lot of storage space underneath the seat. Spike had filled the space with a lethal array of arms.
‘I think I thought of everything,’ he said.
Bel stuck in a hand and pulled out a cartridge belt. It was full of very long brass cartridges. She held it up like it was a python which had wrapped itself around her wrist.
‘Heavy artillery,’ I said.
‘The time for tiptoeing through the tulips is long past,’ Spike said, pulling out what looked like an Ingram, maybe a Cobray. Beneath it I could see some M16s. My mind boggled at what else he might have in there. ‘No dynamite,’ he said ruefully. ‘Otherwise I couldn’t have taken a chance on ramming that asshole. But I’ve some plastique if you’re in the mood.’ He put his face close to mine. It was a good-looking face, typically American in being well-fed but still hungry. He was wearing one of his sleeveless black T-shirts with black denims. ‘Gun heaven, Wild West, pure gun heaven.’
I hesitated for all of five seconds.
‘Let’s do it.’
We slept the rest of the daylight away. I emerged to find Spike dressed only in fresh T-shirt and shorts, chopping onions in the kitchen. He’d found a marijuana plant in the main bedroom and pinched off a few leaves. The aromas in the kitchen weren’t just cooking herbs. He held up the chopping-knife for me to see. It was a rubber-handled combat knife with a fat nine-inch blade, the last three inches of which were saw-toothed.
‘Chops vegetables great, Wild West.’
‘I’ll take your word for it.’ I looked in the fridge and pulled out a carton of orange juice. I was a lot more comfortable about the place. The condemned man tends to worry less about the state of his cell. I shook the carton and drank from it.
‘Oh, man, cooties!’ Spike complained. ‘Glasses are in the cupboard over the sink.’
So I poured the rest of the juice into a glass, filling it to the brim. I’d drunk half the juice when Bel came in, wearing a long trucker’s T-shirt and not much else that I could see. She’d bought the shirt at a service station. It showed a chrome-fronted truck blowing out smoke like steam from a cartoon bull’s nose. There was a Confederate flag in the background and the legend Ain’t No Chicken!
Spike was trying not to look at her legs as she stood in front of the fridge, bending from the waist to see what there was.
‘Any juice?’
‘Here.’ I handed her my glass. ‘We’re on cootie-sharing terms,’ I told Spike.
‘Cosy,’ he said, still chopping. He scooped the onion into a pan and added oil. Bel went to watch. ‘Uncle Spike’s Texas-Style Chilli,’ he revealed. ‘So long as I can find all the ingredients.’ He opened a tin of tomatoes and poured the lot in, along with half a tube of puree. Then he added chilli powder and some other herbs, and finished with a drained tin of red kidney beans.
‘Can’t find any meat, but what the hell. How hot do you like it?’ He offered Bel a spoonful of the juice. She thought it was hot enough already.
‘Chicken,’ he said to her.
‘Well, Spike, why don’t you pour some into another pan, that can be my pan? Then you two boys can add as much fire as you like to your share. I’ll just sit and watch you tough it out when it comes time to eat.’ She patted his back. ‘It’s food, remember, not an arm-wrestling contest.’
Spike waited a few moments, then howled with laughter.
‘Bel, you’ve got more balls than half the guys I know. Move down to Texas and marry me.’ He got down on one knee and grabbed her hand. ‘I’m proposing right now, proposing to the woman of my dreams.’
She pushed him away with her bare toe and he sat back on the floor, arms behind him.
‘The Good Lord spare me from rejection!’
‘Sorry, Spike. Maybe one day when you’re older.’
‘Come on,’ I said, leading her through to the living area. There was a breakfast bar between it and the kitchen. We flopped on to the sofa while Spike sang a few bars of some country song, then decided to whistle it instead.
‘Bel,’ I said quietly, ‘I want you to stay here while Spike and I—’
She leapt back up. ‘No way, José! I come this far and now you want to dump me?’
‘Sit down, please.’
She sat down. ‘Listen, before you try any other speeches or tactics, Michael, I know why you said what you said, and I appreciate it. It shows you care. But you couldn’t stop me coming with you if you put a gun to my head, not even one of those M16s. If you leave me here, I’ll wave down a car, cosh the driver, and come after you. And I won’t be in a good mood.’
‘Bel, I only want to—’
‘I know you do, sweetheart.’ She stood up, then bent over me and planted a kiss on my forehead. Then she went over to the hi-fi and searched for something suitable.
Well, I thought, that went pretty much as predicted. I’d tried, which didn’t mean I could now progress with a clear conscience. What I’d been about to tell Bel was that if she came along, she’d only be a liability. She might get in the way, or she might cause us to make a critical misjudgment. I knew if I was wounded and there was heavy fire, Spike would leave me... and he’d be right. But would either of us leave Bel under the same circumstances? Spike had already confided that he didn’t want Bel along.