(42)

I looked up Buck’s garage in the yellow pages, and though he said he didn’t like being reminded of the legacy of that other Buck Rogers, his advertisement for towing, mechanic, and body work had rockets sketched on it and were used in part to form the letters of his name.

Recognizing the address as being on the western side of town not far from where Buck had picked me up, I decided to walk over and not bother calling. The day had heated up under the heavy cloud cover and the threat of more rain. A slight warm wind was sighing, carrying with it the satisfying aroma of damp earth.

Though it was late afternoon, and it might seem strange for a man to take his ax handle for a walk, I can’t say as it worried me much. I already had a target on my back. Being out of the library and away from the crumpled rulers of their little world, it all seemed a bit dreamlike and silly.

I went along and didn’t see any copper-colored Fords or goons in white- and blackface. Though I suspected they were the sort that confined their activities and colorful disguises to the nighttime.

When I got to Buck’s garage, I was steamed but still felt a lot better than I had earlier. Only the knots on my head still throbbed. The warm walk had loosened the rest of me up.

Buck’s garage was a good size. My car was parked out to the side. It had new tires on it, and though I had forgotten to mention it to him, he had replaced the windshield wipers that had been twisted off.

Inside the garage there were tools on the wall and some inflated car inner tubes on hooks and a calendar with a long-legged black model dressed only in her skin. It drew my attention immediately, and I would be a liar to say otherwise. I didn’t look at it too embarrassingly long, but what drew me away from it wasn’t my sense of modesty. In fact, the calendar had kept me from focusing on something that should have been immediately obvious.

There was a car in one of the stalls that made me tingle to see it, and not in the same way the calendar had. I immediately found Buck’s office, which was in the back with the door partially open. I could hear a small fan whisking the air in there. I went in.

Buck was sitting at his desk. He looked up at me with his good face and his nice smile.

“I see you got me some tires and wiper replacements,” I said.

“Just making you out a bill. See you still got your ax handle.”

“Never leave home without it.”

I sat in the hardwood chair in front of his desk. The little fan was on a windowsill and it was struggling with the heat like a child trying to pin a professional wrestler. Still, it was a smidgen of comfort after my walk.

I lay the ax handle on the floor. Buck gave me the bill. I pulled a check out of my wallet and wrote it out and gave it to him.

When I passed it across the desk, I said, “I see you got a car in there up on a lift.”

“Observant.”

“It’s copper-colored and a Ford.”

“So it is.”

“Crashed out near the lake?”

“That’s right.”

“May I ask who it belongs to?”

He lifted an eyebrow, opened his center desk drawer, placed my check in there, and closed the drawer.

“Jefferson Davis,” he said.

“President of the Confederacy. He’s still alive?”

“That’s funny, Danny. That must be some of that writerly wit. If it was that Jeff Davis, I’d kill him on general principle. No, a black guy named Jefferson Davis. Why do you ask?”

“This Jefferson Davis have a tall white fellow come in with him?”

“He did.”

“They walked in, right? Were roughed up, like me? Like maybe someone had hit them with some punches and an ax handle?”

“That’s quite a list you have there.”

“It is.”

“Would the ax handle in question be the one you’ve been carrying around?”

“One of two. I’ve lost track of which is which.”

“Yeah, they were banged up. Faces were stained with something. You could see they had tried to wipe it off.”

“It was burnt cork and greasepaint,” I said.

I hesitated to do what I was going to do next, but then I thought, Well, I’ve already jumped out of the airplane without a chute.

“Let me tell you a little story,” I said.

“Will it have bears in it? I like stories about bears.”

“There’s at least one bear with a flashlight.”

I told him what had happened to me last night. I told him I thought the city council was behind a lot of not-so-good things. I told him about some of those things, but I didn’t mention my evidence. I left most of it out. I did add that Ronnie might be in danger, then I watched his expression.

He perked up. “You think?”

“I may have told you too much, but I wanted to tell you because I might need any information you have about Jeff Davis, about the other man with him. And Ronnie seems to trust you.”

Using Ronnie’s name to pull Buck in was perhaps a bridge too far, but if Buck was working on Jefferson Davis’s car, was Buck his friend or just a businessman doing a job? I had begun to suspect everyone had connections to the city council, even a tow-truck driver and mechanic. I wanted to chalk it up to excess paranoia, but I was too paranoid to totally do so.

Buck leaned back in his chair, pursed his lips, said, “And you think this is the same car that followed you?”

“Copper-colored. You picked it up near where I was last night? Wet night. Slid off the road. They walked in. Yeah, that’s the car.”

“Jeff has always been an Uncle Tom. But I don’t know. That stuff about the tunnels. You sound like a man that might wear an aluminum-foil hat to keep the aliens from reading your brain waves. Jeff, though, he’s sketchy. His grandfather’s slave master was a Confederate. As a joke, they named one of the slave children Jefferson Davis. White folks frequently named black kids in slavery days if they chose to. Hell, maybe one of the white folks was his father. How’s that sound? You have a kid and someone else names it? That’s got to be some shit. The name got passed down, though. You’d think it wouldn’t. Not after slavery ended. But Jeff’s family has always worked for and kowtowed to the Parkers. It’s a family tradition, like black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day.”

“That right?”

“Jeff would wave the Stars and Bars and sing ‘Dixie’ if the city council asked him to. He’d eat shit and hope to get some gravy on it. Eat shit enough, you can learn to like it. With or without gravy. He likes it. Of course, sometimes you eat so much of it, you can’t eat anymore.”

“Like you?”

“Came back here, didn’t I? Went off, got some education, but came back like a goddamn homing pigeon. What’s up with that, huh? I’m back here eating shit again. Smaller amounts and farther apart, but I still got the taste in my mouth, and I don’t even get any gravy on it. Scared to death I might learn to like it the way Jeff does.”

“Who’s the white guy with Jefferson Davis?”

“Coolie Parker. From the family of Judea Parker. A cousin. He’s low on the totem pole, but he’s on the pole.”

“That makes him kin to Estelle Parker too?”

“She the babe at the library?”

“She is.”

“Yep. They’re kin. Here’s something to love: Coolie is a cop.”

“Oh, hell.”

“Exactly. Now you know how we black folks feel when we deal with the cops. Shoe is on the other foot, hoss.”

“Not all of us white folks were born with silver spoons in our mouths. Chief Dudley? What about him?”

“He’s friendly enough, but he’s been around too long not to have their fingers up his ass at least some of the time. Listen here, we can call Jeff, have him come around, and have a polite talk with him. Ronnie’s in danger, I’d do that. Just a chat.”

“No need to pee in your own soup. I’ve told you more than I should.”

“Let me ask again: Why did you?”

“Maybe I’m looking for allies. I’m making a guess with you and hoping it’s a good one.”

“That’s almost it, but I think it’s more that I got Jeff’s car here, and you’re thinking I might know something about him, right? You told me some stuff, but you told me just enough stuff, not all of it. Some of it you want to know if I already know it. You’re fishing for information about who is who.”

“Maybe.”

“I haul and work on cars. That’s it. I’m not inside a nefarious secret organization. I’m not sure yet there is an organization to be inside or outside of. But I believe there are a lot of assholes out there, that the town’s full of them. But I get into this, I may have to leave town with what’s left of my tail between my legs.”

“You’ve done enough. Told me what I needed to know.”

“You’re still leading me along, aren’t you, Danny boy? Sure I’ll regret it later, but you may have picked your man right. All goes sideways, maybe you and me can move away. Open a garage anywhere but here. You could have a stall to write in, and you could bring me coffee and cook for the rent.”

“Would we snuggle at night?”

“Why wouldn’t we?”

“Would I have my own desk?”

“Why not? And your very own rotating fan. I’m going to phone Jeff.”