The Night Gardener

'Tired of waitin,' said Gaskins.

'Just got dark,' said Brock. 'If the mule coming, he coming now. Like Fishhead said, those boys like to run after sun-down, but not too late so they stand out.'

'Fishhead said.'

'Man got a stupid name, don't mean he can't be right.'

A little while later, a car came down the street and slowed as it approached the court. Brock and Gaskins made themselves low as the car passed them and parked, as many other vehicles had done, head-in to the curb. It was a Mercury Sable, the sister to the Ford Taurus.

'What I tell you?' said Brock. 'Fishhead gave us gold so far.'

Brock put his hand to the door handle.

'What you doin?'

'Gonna rush him and bull on in.'

'He might be packing. Then you got nothin but a gun battle in the street.'

'So we do what?'

'Think, boy. If he comin out with cash, we let him come out. Brace his ass then.'

'He still gonna have a gun if he got one now.'

'But then he got something worth taking.'

A young man, cleanly but not loudly dressed, got out of the Mercury and walked toward the house, talking on a cell and looking around as he went along. He did not see the men in the Impala, as their heads were barely above the windshield line and their car was parked far back at the head of the court. The security lights on the house were activated as he moved up the sidewalk. The barred storm door opened as he neared. Then the main door opened as well. The man went into the house.

'You see it?' said Gaskins.

'Wasn't nobody pulling that door open.'

'Right. He called in and it opened by itself. Automatic.'

'I smell money,' said Brock.

'Wait.'

They sat there for another half hour. When the front door to the house opened again, it was not the man who had arrived in the Mercury leaving, but a woman, tall and full up top and in the back, with curls on her head. She carried a small purse in one hand and a cell in the other.

'Uh,' said Brock.

'We ain't here for that.'

'I know, but damn.'

They watched her get into the red Solara, fire it up, and back it out of the driveway.

'Don't tell me to hold up, neither,' said Brock. 'That girl's gonna get us in.'

Gaskins didn't object. When the Solara passed them, Brock turned the key on the SS. He powered the headlights, swung the car around, and followed the woman to the intersection at 8th, staying close to her taillights. As she slowed for the stop sign there, he gave the Impala gas, swerved around her, cut in front of her abruptly, and threw the trans into park. Brock jumped out and went around the rear of the Chevy, pulling his Colt as he moved. Her window came down, and he could hear her giving him attitude already as he stepped up to the Toyota and pointed the gun at her face. Her big, pretty brown eyes went wide but only in surprise. She did not seem afraid.

'What's your name, baby?'

'Chantel.'

'Sounds French. Where you off to, Chantel?'

'To buy cigarettes.'

'That won't be necessary. I got plenty.'

'You fixin to rob me?'

'Not you. Your man.'

'Then let me be on my way.'

'You ain't goin no goddamn where but back in that house.' Brock made a motion with the barrel of the gun. 'Now, get out the car.'

'You got no reason to take that tone.'

'Please… get out the motherfuckin car.'

She killed the engine and stepped out of the Toyota. She handed the keys to Brock, who tossed them to Gaskins, walking their way. Gaskins held a roll of duct tape in his free hand.

'My partner will drive it back,' said Brock. 'You come with me.'

'Look, if you gonna kill me, kill me now. I don't want no tape around my head.'

Brock smiled. 'I got the feelin we gonna get along.'

The woman's eyes appraised him. 'You look like a devil. Anyone ever tell you that?'

'Once or twice,' said Brock.

It was easy to get into the house. Chantel Richards phoned her boyfriend, Tommy Broadus, from outside, and he let her in by pushing a button from a remote in the living room, where he sat with his mule, a young man named Edward Reese. The storm door opened and behind it the main door cracked, and Chantel, Brock, and Gaskins went inside.

They walked into the living room, Brock and Gaskins with their guns drawn. Tommy Broadus sat in a large leather easy chair, a snifter of something amber in his hand. Edward Reese, in white Rocawear polo shirt over big jeans and Timberlands, sat in a chair just like it, on the other side of a kidney-shaped marble table. He was drinking the same shade of liquor. Neither of them moved. Gaskins frisked them quickly and found them to be clean.

Brock told Tommy Broadus that they were there to rob him.

'Clarence Carter can see that,' said Broadus, chains on his chest, rings on his fingers, his ass spilling over his chair. 'But I ain't got nothin of value, see?'

Brock raised his gun. Chantel Richards stepped behind him. He fired a round into an ornate, gold leaf-framed mirror that hung over a fireplace with fake crackling logs. The mirror exploded, and shards of glass flew about the room.

'Now you got less,' said Brock.

They all waited for their ears to stop ringing and for the gunsmoke to settle in the room. It was a nice room, lavishly appointed, with furniture bought on Wisconsin Avenue and statues of naked white women with vases resting on their shoulders. A plasma television set, the largest Panasonic made, was set on a stand of glass and iron and blocked out most of one wall. A bookcase with leather-bound volumes on its shelves took up another. In the middle of the bookcase was a cutout holding a large, lighted fish tank in which several tropical varieties swam. Above the fish tank was empty space.

'Tape 'em up,' said Brock.

Gaskins handed Brock his gun. Brock holstered it in his belt line, keeping the Colt trained on Broadus.

As Gaskins worked, duct-taping the hands and feet of Broadus and Reese, Brock went to a wet bar situated near the plasma set. Broadus had several high-shelf liquors on display, including bottles of Rémy XO and Martell Cordon Bleu. On a separate platform below were bottles of Courvoisier and Hennessey.

Brock found a glass and poured a couple inches of the Rémy.

'That's the XO,' said Broadus, looking perturbed for the first time.

'Why I'm fixin to have some,' said Brock.

'I'm sayin, you don't know the difference, ain't no reason for you to be drinking from a one-hundred-fifty-dollar bottle of yak.'

'You don't think I know the difference?'

'Bama,' said Edward Reese with a smile. Brock locked eyes with him, but Reese's smile did not fade.

'Tape that boy's mouth up, too,' said Brock.

Gaskins did it and stepped back. Brock took a sip of the cognac and rolled it in the snifter as he let it settle sweet on his tongue.

'That is nice,' said Brock. 'You want some, brah?'

'I'm good,' said Gaskins.

Brock drew the Glock and handed it to Gaskins.

'Awright, then,' said Brock. 'Where your stash at, fat man?'

'My stash?'

'Your money only. I don't want no dope.'

'Told you, I got nothin.'

'Look, you seen I got no problem using this gun. You don't talk real quick, I'm gonna have to use it again.'

'You can do whateva,' said Broadus. 'I ain't tellin' y'all shit.'