True Romance

The problem with the old Jeep was that you had to be sure to park it on a hill if you wanted to start it again. The alternator turned to no decent result and even if it did, the old battery couldn’t hold a charge. The flywheel of the starter was so sticky that if you tried to crank it over, a good battery would have drained anyway. Sometimes, finding a hill was a hell of a job. I was okay at my place on the mountain, but when I drove down to Taos, I was in trouble. There was a little slope about a mile from the plaza, outside a business called The Chicken Lady. The Chicken Lady, who sold chickens, geese, and ducks, allowed me to park on the hill, all 250 pounds of him. In exchange, I allowed him to put a FOR SALE sign on the windshield of my truck. He loved to dicker about price and tell great lies about its history to Texans and Oklahomans who romanticized such relics.

“Rawley,” he said, greeting me as I backed up the hill.

“Chick.”

He watched as I set the brake, climbed out, and put my rock in front of the rear tire. “Why don’t you get your rig fixed up?” the Chicken Lady asked me. He was holding a big black rooster under one arm and an unlit cigar in his free hand. He looked at the end of the cigar as if surprised it was cold.

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t mind the walk when I come down here. And on the mountain, it’s never a problem.”

“Seems like a hassle to me,” he said.

“What’s wrong with a hassle? Besides, I know it’s coming.”

“Still, the thing looks like hell.”

I looked at my truck. “True enough.”

The rooster pecked at a button on the Chicken Lady’s shirt.

“I’ll be back in an hour or so,” I said. I watched as he slipped the sign under a wiper. “What if somebody meets your price?”

“It ain’t happening,” the big man said.

I never much warmed to Taos with all its galleries, which might have been one for all the sameness, with its trendy air and restaurants charging a fortune for what you could buy at the bowling alley for nickels. But the town was there and it had a grocery market better than the convenience store in Questa. It also offered a fly-fishing shop and I guess I owed a thank you to yuppies and the Orvis catalog for that. Before lunch and shopping on my bimonthly visits, I’d stop in and shake the expensive graphite rods and run my fingers along the even more expensive bamboo sticks. There were always a couple of guys in there engaged in fish talk with the owner.

“I hear they’re hitting on stonefly nymphs up in the Box.”

“So, what do you think of these new four-hundred-dollar waders?”

To that question, that day, I had to chime in and say, “It’d be a shame to get them wet.”

The owner, a squirrely looking fellow despite his pudginess, a bearded transplant from Vermont, shot me a face. He hadn’t liked me since I told him I couldn’t find a place to fish the Battenkill where I couldn’t see a house or a road. And he couldn’t believe I actually fished with a turn-of-the-century Abercrombie and Fitch bamboo rod.

I had said to him, “What do you expect me to do? Stick it in some silly display case?” Then I happened to glance up at the wall behind him and saw a 1930 Wright and McGill rod behind glass. Basically, since then he thought I was nuts.

One of the fisher guys said, “Somebody told me there’re cutthroat in the Rio Grande.”

“That’s a myth,” Vermont said.

“I ate a myth the other night.” I put back the $150 metal fly box. “Fish the confluence of the Grande and the Hondo.” Then I thought to have a little fun. “Wait until right after the rafters go by and throw a weighted zug bug behind one of the big rocks.”

“That’s where you catch cuttthroats?” the man who had brought up the subject asked.

“Browns and rainbows, too. If it’s cold enough, you might get lucky and see a flash of red. But, hey, they all taste the same.” I tossed the last bit in to get under their skins. I catch and release as much as the next guy, but I despise religions of all kinds.

I left the shop seeming a little like a bully, which was a bad feeling, but like most feelings, I knew it would pass. I was having one of my what-the-hell-am-I-doing-in-this-stinking-town epiphanies when a big man threatened to slap handcuffs on me.

“Kiss me first,” I said.

Deputy Jack filled most doorways and I felt happy to call him a friend. He fished and camped with me and was always asking to go elk hunting, but I told him gunfire hurt my ears. He said, “Didn’t I just see you down here three weeks ago?”

“Out of toilet paper and I figured they must have a lot of it down here. With so many assholes and all.”

“A buddy and I are driving over to the Chama on Saturday. Wanna go?”

“I’ve got to work.”

“You don’t work,” he said.

“It doesn’t look like I work.”

“You know you ought to just tell people you write that shit. Right now they think you’re a pot farmer, or worse, that you’re just rich.”

“I’m not telling anybody I write romance novels.” I glanced up and down the street. “And you promised not to tell anybody either, remember.”

“Your secret is safe with me, Lance.”

“Call me Friday about fishing,” I said. “Maybe I will go.”

“You bet.”

I shopped, then lugged some of my goods back through town. I nodded to a couple of people and responded to offers of rides by shaking my head. The heavy stuff, bags of animal feed and the like, I left to pick up with the truck, motor running all the while. When I got back to the Chicken Lady’s, he seemed troubled. I asked what was wrong.

“Remember when you asked me what if somebody met my price?” He was still holding the rooster.

“You didn’t sell my truck?”

“No, I didn’t do that. But this fella wants it real bad. Says he’s making a movie or some shit and, anyway—” Chicken reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a business card, and gave it to me. “That’s the guy’s name.”

“What’s bugging you so bad?” I set my bags in the back of my truck.

“I never had to give in that it weren’t my truck before.”

“How much did he offer?”

“I hate losing. Even if I’m pretending, I hate losing.” The Chicken Lady shook his head.

“How much?”

“He said he’ll pay twenty grand for that hunk of shit.”

“The guy’s a nut. Don’t let it bother you, Chick.”

“You gonna call him?”

I looked at the card. “Leighton Dobbs,” I read the name aloud. “Sounds made up to me. I don’t know. I might call him. Do you think I should?”

“Twenty thousand dollars? Hell, yeah.”

I moved to fall in behind the wheel. “Are you going to carry that rooster around all day long?”

“He’s upset today.” The Chicken Lady put a finger to the bird’s beak. “His friend died and he’s lonely. So, I’m his company.”

“Lucky chicken,” I said. “You take care now. And thanks.”

I arrived home to find my cat and dog stretched out on the porch as if they weren’t sure I was coming back. But after an eager lifting of heads to note my arrival, neither got up to greet me.

“Spoiled rotten, both of you,” I shouted through the window as I backed into my parking spot.

I put away my supplies, fed the dog and cat, then went out to tend to the horses. I turned my jacket pocket inside out to get rid of loose hay and found the card of the man who wanted my truck. First of all, I couldn’t believe the offer and second, I didn’t want a crazy person knowing where I lived. As I shoved the card back into my pocket, I lamented the fact that too many crazy people already knew where I lived.

I sat down to write, or at least type, some more of my latest, ever-more-like-the-last-one, piece-of-crap novel, this one about an air-traffic controller and her affair with a pilot who had been seeing two flight attendants on the side. Shelley, that was her name, Shelley, learned about the second affair just as Brad’s plane disappeared from the radar on his approach to O’Hare. Writing these things paid my bills and a bit more and I had decided, however much I hated writing them, I wasn’t hurting anyone, not even art itself, not even myself. I gave up trying to write serious fiction because I wasn’t any good at it. My limitations were unfortunately noted also by my then-wife who took it as a personal affront when I moved to romance.

Writing this stuff always bored me, but bored was bored and it was the same boredom I’d experienced having to talk to corporate fellows I’d guided fishing, the same boredom I’d felt walking irrigation pipelines for ranches and welding shut leaks. The only thing about my job I found amusing was the list I’d receive every couple of months from my editor. The list was of hot names. Shelley was big again, but it had to be Shelley with an e-y and not Shelly with a y. Brad and Lars were always good. Brittany, Brandy, Sydney, Lucas, and Tasha were hot. I wanted so much to call my characters Agnes, Angus, Gertrude, and Gisela.

A couple days later, as I was saddling my mare, a fancy coupe with far too short clearance came creeping up the dirt lane to my place. I left the horse hitched to the post and met the car. A tall, good-looking man got out and so did a tall, good-looking woman.

“Can I help you?” I asked.

But the man had already spotted my truck and was staring at it. I knew that this had to be Leighton Dobbs.

“Are you Rawley Tucker?”

“I am.”

“I’m Leighton Dobbs.” He shook my hand. “I believe the man with the chickens told you about me.”

“He did.”

“So, what do you say?”

“It’s not a twenty-thousand-dollar truck.”

Dobbs smiled at his companion. “Mr. Tucker, this is Devra Filson, my associate.”

I nodded a greeting to the woman, then to Dobbs, “I need my truck. I don’t want to sell it.” As I spoke to them I realized that I knew these people all too well, had seen them before, lunched with them, had drinks with them, had even tried to be one of them, spinning my wheels in L.A. trying to meet the bills by writing screenplays.

Dobbs looked around my property. Though it was neat, it was modest. The barn some fifty yards away was considerably larger and in better repair than the house. I hadn’t yet taken down the weeds along the edge of the front pasture, so the place might have seemed a little shabby.

“With twenty thou you could buy a couple of trucks,” Dobbs said.

“No doubt. But I like my truck.”

“Twenty-three thousand.”

“What do you want it for?”

“We’re making a film and this is the perfect vehicle.”

“The perfect look,” Ms. Filson said. Filson then whispered something to Dobbs.

“There are plenty of trucks out there like mine. Have your makeup people do a job on one. What kind of film are you talking about?”

“It’s a feature with a major studio,” he said as if I should take note. I didn’t take note and he shook it off and went on. “Twenty-five.” He and Filson talked without speaking for a few seconds. “Another thing, we might be interested in renting your place here.”

“Out of the question.” All I wanted to see was their dust.

“Five thou a day for—” he turned to Filson.

“Fourteen or better,” she said.

“For at least fourteen days. That’s at least seventy thousand dollars.”

I whistled. I looked over at my horse and saw she was pawing at the ground. “Listen, my horse is getting antsy. I appreciate the offer, but my answer is no.” I smiled at them and turned away.

“You’re refusing nearly a hundred thousand dollars?” Filson said.

“Yes, ma’am. I’m happy. I don’t need the money. And I sure as hell don’t need a bunch of people running around my home. Why do you think I decided to live way up here?”

Dobbs coughed into his fist. “Listen, if you’re growing pot or something, we could care less.”

“I’m not growing anything. This is my home.” Then I said, slowly, “This is where I live.”

“Two hundred thousand.” Dobbs shifted his weight.

“You don’t get it.” I stepped closer to them and pointed at the side pasture and the view beyond it. “What do you see out there?”

“I see a nice landscape,” Dobbs said.

“Yes, sir. And no people.” I pointed to the front pasture. “And there?”

“A couple of horses,” Dobbs said.

“And?”

“No people,” Filson said.

“How many people do you think your movie will bring up here? The crew and the actors and the caterers?”

“Sixty, seventy,” he said. “But we’ll bring in crews to clean up.”

“I won’t allow you to mess it up in the first place. I don’t know why I’m wasting my time telling you this, because the bottom line is no.”

Dobbs and Filson were looking at me like I was crazy. “Three-fifty and we’ll just be renting the truck.”

“Beat it.”

I watched them drive away. I mounted and rode to a section of stream I never fished because it was just too pretty. The spot was well above a sharp bend in the flow where the real pot growers in the canyon had repeatedly dammed the creek to divert the water to their crops. For a while I was riding up daily to check the stream and destroy their handiwork. After finding a couple of big fish dead below the dam, I got mad and camped out with my shotgun. I parked myself on a short ridge and waited. I felt like a fool because, in truth, those people scared me, but the Forest Service wouldn’t help and Fish and Game just laughed. I saw the sweeping beams of their flashlights in the dawn haze first, then heard their loud talking. Once they had set to work, I fired above them, three shells, then I moved along the ridge and fired three more, which I’m not sure they appreciated because of their running. My heart was racing and my ears were ringing. I slept there three nights in a row and they never came back.

The water where I stood watching flowed around a couple of boulders and then flattened over a bed of rocks. The pool below held a couple of browns that were at least sixteen inches long. I’d watched them for two years now, getting bigger and fatter and growing accustomed to my presence. They would rise to a hatch if I was standing four feet up the bank.

Deputy Jack drove us over to the Chama early. The morning was brisk, but not cold. The water was high and a little muddy and we weren’t sure any fish would find us, but we went at it anyway.

The deputy was in the middle of the river trying to dislodge a fly from a submerged tree, his buddy had wandered downstream, and I was standing at the end of a riffle, bouncing a foam beetle along the bottom.

“That guy find you?” Deputy Jack asked, coming toward me on the bank.

“What guy?”

“That movie fella.”

“So, you’re the one who told him where I live.”

“He asked.”

“Do me a favor and don’t tell anybody else.” I roll-casted to the middle of the riffle and stripped in line. The deputy had his fly and slipped walking back to the bank. “Are you all right?” I asked.

“Yeah, just a little wetter than I’d planned on getting.”

“I’ve got half a mind to try a parachute dragonfly at the top of that riffle.” I looked hard at the sunlight bouncing off the broken water. “But then it is just half a mind.”

“So, if you hate it so much, why do you write it?” the deputy asked.

“That’s an abrupt change of subject.”

“It’s a trick we cops use. Hardly ever works.”

“I write it because I can and I make enough money so that I can live way the hell out here and be happy.” I looked at the mountains in the distance. “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

We were quiet for a while, neither of us fishing. The deputy unwrapped a breakfast bar, offered me one. I declined.

“You gonna sell your truck?” The deputy was closer to me, prowling through his fly box. “Lotta money.”

“You had a long talk with this guy, did you?”

“Naw. The Chicken Lady told me about the truck and how much the guy’s willing to pay. That really shook him up.”

“Yeah?” I reeled in my line to check my fly.

“The Chicken Lady doesn’t understand how there can be that much money in one person’s pocket.” Deputy Jack looked up at a circling hawk.

“Yeah, well, I told the guy to take a hike.”

“You’re crazy.”

“Maybe.”

“You can pass up that kind of money?” Deputy Jack asked. “Maybe you are growing pot up there.”

“I didn’t like that guy. I don’t want to do business with people I don’t like anymore.” Which was a lie, because I pretty much hated my publisher, my editor, and my agent.

“You could take my old pickup. Nobody’s using it.” He folded a stick of gum into his mouth. “It’s one of them newfangled jobs. Starts with a key.”

“Funny man.”

“Just a thought,” he said.

“Thanks anyway.”

We drove home another way, the scenic way Deputy Jack called it. Scenic meant longer and the drive took us into an old town I had always loved, Enrico, through which flowed Enrico Creek. Perhaps sixty people lived in Enrico. The walls of the old buildings were the sides of the road that passed through it. When we reached the other end of the town, I saw an excavated site, a chain-link fence, and a sign announcing the arrival of a Wal-Mart. My heart sank. “What the hell is that?”

The deputy’s friend, whose name I couldn’t remember, but whose job was repairing firearms, shook his head. “They’re blasting open a malachite mine up mountain. Jobs. People. Wal-Mart.”

“McDonald’s, motels, more people,” I said.

No one was working at the construction site, but I caught myself staring at a big yellow grader as if it were a responsible party. I reached down beside me and picked up one of my wading boots. I held it to my nose and inhaled the sour smell of the river water that had soaked the felt sole.

“I’m glad you called,” Leighten Dobbs said as he closed his car door. “To tell you the truth I was a little surprised.”

I was leading my mare and the fat gelding from the barn to a pasture. I was going to worm them and turn them out. “Here, you can help me,” I said.

“How? What?” He looked nervously at the horses.

“Just hold this rope.” I gave him control of the mare. He held the rope away from his body as if it were wet. I pulled the tube of worming medicine from my back pocket, grabbed the gelding’s nose, and pressed it into his mouth.

“I take it you’ve changed your mind,” Dobbs said.

“About your using my place, yes.” I took the mare and had him hold the gelding’s lead rope.

“And your truck?”

“You’ll have to take that up with the owner. It now belongs to the man you tried to buy it from the first time.”

“But it’s right there.”

“Talk to him tomorrow. The truck will be in front of the store. I promise he’ll sell with no problem.” I put the paste into the mare’s mouth and watched her try to spit it out. I put the empty tube in my pocket. “She hates this stuff,” I said. “But we’re done. Thanks.” I took the gelding.

Dobbs was a bit puzzled, but he nodded. “What did we decide on for the use of your place? A hundred thousand?” He followed me to the pasture.

“Three-fifty.” I opened the gate and led the horses in.

“Oh, yes.” He looked around again, at the house, the barn. “Yes, this is it, all right. This is the place I want. It’s done.”

“I’ll need a deposit.” I removed the first halter, then the second, and watched the horses trot off.

His smile was an odd one. “Why?”

“So, I’ll know you’re serious.” I closed the gate. “I might change my mind. You never know. You can bring an agreement here with the check tomorrow and I’ll sign it.”

“Okay,” he said.

“And the truck will be in town.”

Again, he said, “Okay.”

After watching Dobbs head down the mountain, I went inside and called a real estate agent, told him I wanted a list of all the pieces of property for sale in and around Enrico. Tomorrow, I would go to the county clerk’s office and find out who owned what. I would buy all I could, where I could, and get in the way of any development.

Early the following morning, I drove down the mountain to Taos and backed onto the Chicken Lady’s hill. He met me this time without the rooster under his arm.

“Didn’t expect to see you so soon,” he said.

“Complaining?”

“Maybe.”

“Come on, show me the birds.” I followed him through the front gate and into a lath house. Chickens and ducks waddled across the floor, sat on perches, flapped from the rafters.

“Just the plain old birds in here,” he said. “Don’t get me wrong, they’re nice animals and I love them, but they’re common.” He led the way out of the shaded area and into the backyard. There was a hole in the middle, the digging of which had long been abandoned, the pick and shovel covered with dirt. “I was trying to put me a pond in here for the ducks, but I sprained my back. The ducks are going to love it. It’s going to be a sight better than those plastic pools I’ve been using.” He stooped to pick up a black chicken with feathered feet. “This here is a Cochin. She ain’t too special, but she’s a nice one.”

“How many birds do you have?” I asked.

“Don’t know.” He stopped at a coop with a wire top. “These are my fancy babies. There’s a pair of Silver Sussex. That one there is a white Croad Langshan. That breed was almost gone. There’s a black Croad. Indian Game. Silver Dorking. You know, I love chickens.”

“I know you do, Chick.” I looked at his shoes. Black Red Wings with one loose sole. “Thanks for the tour. I’d better get going. Come to my truck with me.” We walked back through the lath house, out the gate, and I stopped at the hood of the truck. “Chick, what’s your real name?”

“Why do you want to know that?”

“Give me five dollars,” I said.

“What?”

“Just give me a five.”

The Chicken Lady fished out a lonely five and handed it to me.

“What’s your damn name?”

“Iverson P. Mowatt.”

“You’re kidding me. What’s the P for?”

“Peyton.”

“That’s a great name, Chick.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He looked at what I was writing. “What are you doing?”

“I’m making out a bill of sale.”

“Why?”

“You just bought my truck.” I handed him the title and the key. “And here’s the card of that movie guy.”

The Chicken Lady looked at the bill of sale and the title and the key, then the truck.

“It’s okay, Chick. It’s your truck now. You can do what you want.”

“Thanks, Rawley. I don’t know what to say.” The big man was starting to mist up.

“Just do me a favor. Hold out for thirty thousand. Okay?”

The Chicken Lady collected himself, stiffened his face, and said, “No problem.”