Squinting to see through the snow as Jerzy drove them in, Reggie said it was providence that made him buy the half-truckload of fire-sale boots at 78.4 cents a pair. Jerzy didn’t know providence from apples, but he knew Reggie. Making the old building rumble like some sort of goofity machine, those boots were walking out the door at $7.95 a pair. Reggie had reason to hum.
And when Reggie was happy, Jerzy was happy. Reggie treated him well, took care of everything. Jerzy had worked for Reggie since he dropped out of high school, twelve years now, contented all the time. Except for Agnes, of course. But Reggie had helped him with that too. Jerzy was grateful. He lived rent-free in the basement of Reggie’s house, had a color television and only a two-block walk to the food store for the frozen dinners he microwaved. He’d even saved five thousand dollars. Not much, maybe, for working twelve years, but like Reggie always told him, for what did he need money, with all his needs satisfied?
And regrets? Besides Agnes, he didn’t have any, and that was better than most of the people he saw on television. On TV, everybody seemed to be regretting everything.
Jerzy turned from the window, back to the sales-tax forms on his desk. Reggie had been right, for sure. They were going to sell boots today.
DRIVING IN, DETECTIVE Edrow Fluett got stopped by a traffic accident. He pulled his bubble out of the glove box, stuck it, flashing, on the roof, and radioed Queenie for uniforms. She told him he had to work it himself until the tow drivers got there. She said even the captain was out, working the snow. “And the chief?” Edrow asked, flipping a finger out his open window at a minivan pilot who had stopped to gawk. The chief was at city hall – Queenie laughed – working the mayor, telling him everything was under control.
In no town on the planet did detectives work a traffic accident. No town, that is, save one – the turdweasel burg, stuck like a boil on the west side of Chicago, where his wife grew up.
Edrow got out into the slush, hustled the drivers of the damaged cars – whiners both – to the sidewalk, and stepped back into the center of the highway. And for two hours, he stood in salt-melted snow, waving his arms, screaming into his cell phone for tow trucks, and dodging half-witted drivers. By the time the tow jockeys did arrive – junior turdweasels, both of them full of pimples – his shoes were sodden lumps of pulp, refrigerating the arthritis in his feet.
He headed for his car, eager for the blast of the heater on his toes. But the accident drivers, each a victim, each a liar, were not done. From the sidewalk, they shrieked at him for making them wait outside in the blizzard for their cars to be towed. Edrow stopped the traffic, motioned them to his car in the center of the highway, and, above the blaring horns, told them to report to the station within twenty-four hours so he could ticket them for failing to avoid an accident, driving too fast for conditions, and another dozen charges he had yet to consider. That set them to more yelling, until he raised his arm to restart the traffic. That sent them running for the sidewalk, and Edrow got in his car and drove away.
Now, at his desk, Edrow was watching his shoes change shape on the radiator. Twenty-four ninety-five, Blanche had paid for them, at a place off the interstate where she got lightbulbs. He’d tried polishing them, but like just about everything in Edrow’s life, they never had softened up.
And now they were bubbling up little tumors.
“Edrow?” Queenie buzzed his phone.
“I’m not going out. I’m watching my shoes dissolve on the radiator.”
“Got a report of a break-in at Mart’s Gas Mart.”
“I’m a detective.”
“Yeah, and I’m a queen. I told them you’re on your way.”
He put on his bubbling shoes, drove into the blizzard.
The break-in was to the men’s room.
“I’m standing here, in soaked shoes, because somebody busted into your washroom?” Edrow bent to examine the outside doorknob.
“I need a report for the insurance,” Mart, the turdweasel, said.
Edrow stepped inside, took in the taped-shut heat vent, the black streaks in the sink, and the mildew dots on the walls. He stepped out. “Maybe somebody broke in with a hose, to clean it.”
“Ha-ha. The report.”
“There’s no marks on the door.”
“I need the report to collect.”
“Be at the station tomorrow. I’m going to write you up for attempted insurance fraud, filing a false police report, and other violations I’ve got to look up codes for.”
Driving back, heat vents pointed full at his frozen feet, he checked his cell phone for messages. There was only one, from Blanche. “Seven ninety-five,” she’d said, “not a penny more.”
He took it as a victory. She hadn’t changed her mind, carped about glue instead of new boots. He swung over to Main Street, parked in a handicapped space in front of the Closeout Hut. The red letters on the sign were bright, even through the blizzard: BOOTS, $7.95. Crap for sure, but better than glue. He got out.
“YOU AWAKE UP there?” Reggie shouted from downstairs. Jerzy knew Reg didn’t like to come up much, because at 380, stairs made Reggie’s heart beat funny. But, jeez, if the guy climbed a few more stairs, he could lose that weight, and then his heart wouldn’t beat so funny.
“More boots, Jerzy,” Reggie yelled.
Down below, the sales floor went silent as the babushkas paused like the piranhas in the pet store when the clerk was about to drop the dead goldfish.
“Okay, Reg,” Jerzy shouted back, getting up and clumping loudly across the floor. Reggie liked to hear people being purposeful.
There were only four of the big cartons left, each holding twenty-four pairs of boots. Reggie would be mad. Instead of being happy, selling half a truckload of boots at ten times what he’d paid, all he would think of would be the half he didn’t buy, the boots he didn’t sell because he’d run out. It wouldn’t be a happy ride home.
Jerzy dragged the boxes to the landing, knelt to look over the railing. Down below, the Closeout Hut was jammed with even more shoppers than the time Reggie had dumped those microwave ovens that had been missing UL labels. Jerzy did a quick count, each finger being ten people. There were nearly fifty – babushkas, mostly, but also businessmen in suits, young shopgirls wearing lots of makeup – all of them pushing around the tables, grabbing at the boots. It was going to be impossible to empty the boxes without catching some elbows.
THROUGH THE WINDOW, Detective Edrow Fluett saw Hell – a mob of babushkas in black wool, pawing at tables like they were scratching for gold. He turned, started to walk away, but stopped. As soon as he got to the station, maybe within only a minute of setting the remains of his shoes on the radiator, Queenie would catch something else that would send him back into the storm. Another bogus broken lock or a fender bender; the storm was bringing on a frenzy of turdweasel pain. He looked down at his shoes, half-buried in the slush on the sidewalk. They wouldn’t last the day. He turned around and went in.
The place smelled of wet wool, babushka sweat, and… an old fire. And there was a draft. No, not a draft, a wind. Edrow looked up. The bandit had the ceiling fans running. For the fire stink. For shame.
Edrow never flashed his button unless the job demanded. But that day, the job demanded. He could be called, at any instant, to chase crime into the snow. And for that, he needed dry feet. He held up his badge, pushed his way through the mob to the fat guy behind the cash register. He remembered him from the snowblower, the bandit.
“Jerzy,” the fat man yelled.
JERZY SAW SUICIDE down on the sales floor. “What say I just cut the tops off the boxes, skip the tables?” he shouted from the top of the stairs.