“
“Christ,” Faye said in a different voice. “I didn’t know that, Harley. I’m sorry-”
“Ah, fuck your sorry!” Pedersen cried, and ripped his arm out of Stan Eberly’s grip. He lunged toward Faye, who raised his fists and then lowered them again as Pedersen went blundering past without looking at him. He took the path through the trees which led back out to the Extension and was gone. What followed his departure was thirty seconds of pure shocked silence, broken only by the waspwhine of an incoming Piper Cub, 3
“Jesus,” Faye said at last. “You see a guy every few days over five, ten years, and you start to think you know everything. Christ, Ralphie, I didn’t know how his wife died. I feel like a fool.”
“Don’t let it get you down,” Stan said. “He’s prob’ly just having his monthlies.”
“Shut up,” Georgina said. “We’ve had enough dirty talk for one morning.”
“I’ll be glad when that Day woman comes n goes n things can get back to normal,” Fred Zell said.
Doc Mulhare was down on his hands and knees, collecting chesspieces. “Do you want to finish, Faye?” he asked. “I think I remember where they all were.”
“No,” Faye said. His voice, which had remained steady during the confrontation with Pedersen, now sounded trembly. “Think I’ve had enough for awhile. Maybe Ralph’ll give you a little tourney prelim.”
“Think I’m going to pass,” Ralph said. He was looking around for Dorrance, and at last spotted him. He had gone back through the hole in the fence. He was standing in knee-high grass at the edge of the service road over there, bending his book back and forth in his hands as he watched the Piper Cub taxi toward the Genera Aviation terminal.
Ralph found himself remembering how Ed had come tearing along that service road in his old brown Datsun, and how he had sworn
(Hurry up! Hurry up and lick shit.)
at the slowness of the gate. For the first time in over a year he found himself wondering what Ed had been doing in there to begin with. than you did.”
“Huh?” He made an effort and focused on Faye again.
“I said you must be sleepin again, because you look a hell of a lot better than you did. But now your hearin’s going to hell, I guess.”
“I guess so,” Ralph said, and tried a little smile. “Think I’ll go grab myself a little lunch. You want to come, Faye? My treat.”
“Nah, I already had a Coffee Pot,” Faye said. “It’s sittin in my gut like a piece of lead right now, to tell you the truth. Cheer, Ralph, the old fart was crying, did you see that?”
“Yes, but I wouldn’t make it into a big deal if I were you,” Ralph said. He started walking toward the Extension, and Faye ambled along beside him. With his broad shoulders slumped and his head lowered, Faye looked quite a lot like a trained bear in a man-suit.
“Guys our age cry over just about anything. You know that.”
“I spose.” He gave Ralph a grateful smile. “Anyway, thanks for stoppin me before I could make it worse. You know how I am, sometimes.”
I only wish someone had been there when Bill got zito ZI, Ralph thought. Out loud he said, “NO problem. It’s me t hat should be thanking you, actually. It’s something else to Put on my resume when I apply for that high-paying job at the U.N.”
Faye laughed, delighted, and clapped Ralph on the shoulder.
Yeah, Secretary-General! Peacemaker Number One! You could do it, Ralph, no shit!”
“No question about it. Take care of yourself, Faye.
He started to turn away and Faye touched his arm. “You’re still up for the tournament next week, aren’t you? The Runway 3 Classic?”
It took a moment for Ralph to figure out what he was talking about, although it had been the retired carpenter’s main topic of conversation ever since the leaves had begun to show color. Faye had been putting on the chess tournament he called The Runway 3 Classic ever since the end of his “real life” in 1984. The trophy was an oversized chrome hubcap with a fancy crown and scepter engraved on it. Faye, easily the best player among the Old Crocks on the west side of town, at least), had awarded the trophy to himself on six of the nine occasions it had been given out, and Ralph had a suspicion that he had gone in the tank the other three times, just to keep the rest of the tourney participants interested. Ralph hadn’t thought much about chess this fall; he’d had other things on his mind.
“Sure,” he said, “I guess I’ll be playing.”
Faye grinned. “Good. We should have had it last weekend-that was the schedule-but I was hopin that if I put it off, jimmy V. would be able to play. He’s still in the hospital, though, and if I put it off much longer it’ll be too cold to play outdoor and we’ll end up in the back of Dully Sprague’s barber shop, like we did in ’90.”
“What’s wrong with Jimmy V.?”
“Cancer come back on him again,” Faye said, then added in a lower tone: “I don’t think he’s got a snowball’s chance in hell of beating it this time.”
Ralph felt a sudden and surprisingly sharp pang of sorrow at this news. He and jimmy Vandermeer had known each other well during their own “real lives.” Both had been on the road back then, jimmy in candy and greeting cards, Ralph in printing supplies and paper products, and the two of them had gotten on well enough to team up on several New England tours, splitting the driving and sharing rather more luxurious accommodations than either could have afforded alone.
They had also shared the lonely, unremarkable secrets of travelling men. Jimmy told Ralph about the whore who’d stolen his wallet in 1958, and how he’d lied to his wife about it, telling her that a hitchhiker had robbed him. Ralph told jimmy about his realization, at the age of forty-three, that he had become a terpin hydrate junkie, and about his painful, ultimately successful struggle to kick the habit.
He had no more told Carolyn about his bizarre cough-syrup addiction than jimmy V. had told his wife about his last B-girl.
A lot of trips; a lot of changed tires; a lot of jokes about the travelling salesman and the farmer’s beautiful daughter; a lot of late night talks that had gone on till all hours of the morning.
Sometimes it was God they had talked about, sometimes the IRS.
All in all, jimmy Vandermeer had been a damned good pal. Then Ralph had gotten his desk-job with the printing company and fallen out of touch with jimmy. He’d only begun to reconnect out here, and at a few of the other dim landmarks which dotted the Derry of the Old Crocks-the library, the pool-hall, the back room of Dully Sprague’s barber shop, four or five others. When jimmy told him hortly after Carolyn’s death that he had come through a bout with cancer a lung shy but otherwise okay, what Ralph had remembered was the man talking baseball or fishing as he fed smoldering Camel stubs into the slipstream rushing by the wing-window of the car, one after another.
I got lucky was what he had said. Me and the Duke, we both got it neither of them had stayed lucky, it seemed. Not that
“Oh, man,” Ralph said. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“He’s been in Derry Home almost three weeks now,” Faye said.
“Havin those radiation treatments and getting injects of poison that’s supposed to kill the cancer while it’s half-killing you. I’m surprised you didn’t know, Ralph.”
I suppose you are, but I’m not. The insomnia keeps swallowing stuff, you see. One day it’s the last Cup-A-Soup envelope you lose track of,next day it’s your sense of time,-the day after that it’s your old
???? friends.
???? Faye shook his head. "Fucking cancer. It’s spooky, how it waits.”
???? Ralph nodded, now thinking of Carolyn. "What room’s Jimmy in, do you
???? know? Maybe I’ll go visit him.”
????
“Just so happens I do. 315. Think you can remember it?” Ralph grinned. “For awhile, anyway.”
“Go see him if you can, sure-they got him pretty doped up, but he still knows who comes in, and I bet he’d love to see you. Him and you had a lot of high old times together, he told me once.”