“I always thought that kind of girl was just stupid.”
“Maybe that enters into it,” I said, “but there’s a kind of immaturity there, too.”
He shrugged. “I still don’t get the connection.”
“Well,” I said, “I’ve got a hunch that the patterns we set up when we first start doing something are usually going to be the patterns we’re going to follow for the rest of our lives. Now, if you start out trying to be grown-up — or adult, if you prefer that term — while you’re still physically and mentally a child, you’re going to start the whole business all wrong. You’ll start a pattern of playing grown-up. You’ll contaminate all of
your adulthood with that juvenile pattern. I think that’s what happens to the little girl with her gunked-on makeup and wobbly high heels. She spends the rest of her life playing grown-up. I sort of think that the same thing happened to Jack.”
“You mean he’s just playing?”
“The worst part of it is that he doesn’t know he’s playing,” I said. “He just doesn’t know the difference. He’s impatient, he’s flighty, he’s self-centered, he’s intolerant — he’s got all the classic traits of immaturity.”
“Shit, man” — Mike laughed —”you’ve just described about three-quarters of the people in the whole damn country.”
“Including you and me, probably,” I said. “That’s another thing Old Cap said. I asked him when anybody really grows up, and he told me that if he ever made it, he’d let me know.”
“Sounds like you and old Cap got along pretty well,” he said.
“I don’t think I’ve ever met a man I liked or respected more,” I said, “except maybe my old man.”
“He kinda hits a guy that way, doesn’t he?”
I nodded. “Say, how’s Sloane doing? I was going to stop by the shop, but the place was mobbed.”
“Christ” — Mike laughed —”you wouldn’t recognize the old fart. He’s lost thirty pounds and gone teetotaler on us. He doesn’t even drink beer anymore.”
“He got a pretty good scare up there, I guess.”
“It musta been pretty hairy.”
“You know it, buddy. Between him and McKlearey it was a real nervous trip.”
“Lou took off, you know.”
“Yeah. He told me he was going to.”
“That damned trip sure changed a lot of things around here,” Mike said.
“I guess it was sort of a watershed. Maybe we were all due for a change of some kind, and the trip just brought it all to a head.”
“I sure wish I could have gone along,” he said wistfully.
“So do I, Mike.”
We talked for another hour or so, and then Betty wanted Mike to take her to the grocery store, so I took off.
I went on by the trailer court, but Jack’s trailer was gone. That’s always kind of a jolt. The damn things look sort of permanent when they’re set down on a lot with fences and grass around them, so you forget that they’ve got wheels on them.
I dropped down to the trailer sales lot and Jack was sitting in the grubby, cigarette-stinking office with his muddy feet up on the desk.
“Yeah,” he said, grinning tightly at me. “I moved Sandy in with me, and I didn’t want Marg to pick up on that with the divorce comin’ on and all.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah,” he said, lighting a cigarette. “We got things all kinda hammered out to where I don’t get nicked too bad for support money, and I don’t want her gettin’ the idea that she’s the aggrieviated party in this little clambake. I’m not about to get screwed into the wall with alimony payments.”
“Where’d you move to?”
“I’m in a court out toward Madrona.”
“Where’d Marg go?” I asked.
“She got an apartment out in Lakewood. Not a bad place. I found it for her.”
“Sounds pretty civilized,” I said.
He shrugged. “I didn’t want her gettin’ the idea she had any kinda claim on my trailer. I guess her lawyer was pissed-off as hell about it. I got her all moved out before he got the chance to tell her to stay put. Now that she abandoned me, it kinda cuts down on her share of the community property.”
“You figure all the angles, don’t you, Jack?”
“I been through it all before,” he said. “If a guy uses his head, he don’t have to get skinned alive in divorce court. Hey, you want a drink?”
“Sure.” I didn’t care much for that particular conversation anyway.
“Come on.” He got up, hauled on a coat and led me across the soggy lot to a fairly new trailer. “Try to look like a customer,” he said, leading the way inside. The trailer was clammy, but it was a little more private than the office. Jack went into the little utility room and pulled a fifth of cheap vodka out of one of the heating ducts.
“The boss can’t smell this on me,” he explained. “I have a coke afterward, and I’m pure as the driven snow.” He laughed flatly.
We each had a couple of pulls from the bottle and then sat around in the chilly living room talking.
“Did McKlearey get that business with the gun straightened out with Sloane before he took off?”
“Yeah,” Jack said, “he and Sloane dummied up the paper work and got it all squared away with the police department.”
“Did you see him before he took off?”
“Naw, I got a gutful of that motherfucker up in the woods.”
“The silly bastard had blood poisoning in that hand,” I said. “He claims he was out of his head with the fever and the damned infection.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that. I think he just plain flipped out.”
“It’s possible,” I said. “He was carrying that .38 when I saw him. Had it tucked under his belt.”
“That silly bastard! He’s just stupid enough to try to use it, too. He’ll get about half in the bag some night and try to knock over a liquor store or a tavern. I hope somebody shoots him.”
“At least he’s out of our hair,” I said.
“Yeah.”
Somehow Jack and I didn’t really seem to have much to talk about. I guess we never had really. I got the feeling that splitting up with Marg had hit him a lot harder than he was willing to admit to me.
“Hey,” he said suddenly, “you wanna do me a favor?”
“Sure.”
“When I moved the trailer, I found a bunch of stuff that belongs to the kids. I got it all in a box in the trunk of my car. You think you could run it on over to Marg’s place for me? I think it’s better if I stay away from there for a while.”
“Sure, Jack.”
“I’ll give her a call and let her know you’re comin’.”
We went over to his car and transferred the box from his trunk to mine.
“Hey, Dan, look at this.” He popped open his glove compartment. That stupid .45 automatic was in there.
“Shit, Jack,” I said, “you’ll get your ass in a sling if they catch you carrying that thing in your car that way without a permit.”
He shrugged. “I got kinda stuck on it up in the brush, you know? Shit, a man oughta own himself a pistol — home protection and all that bullshit.”
“Maybe so,” I said, “but you sure as hell shouldn’t be carting it around in your glove box.”
“Maybe,” I said. We went back in the office and he called Marg.
“She’ll be there,” he said after he hung up. He gave me the address and I took off again.
It took me a while to find the place. It was one of those older houses that had had the second floor remodeled into a self-contained apartment that you reached by way of an outside staircase. I went on up and knocked.
“Hi, Dan,” she said, smiling blearily at me. She smelled pretty strongly of whiskey. “Come on in.”
“I can only stay a minute,” I said, carting in the box.
“Just set that down,” she told me. “The girls are asleep. How about a drink?” She didn’t wait for any answer but whipped me up a whiskey and Seven-Up almost before I got the box put down. “Come on in the living room,” she said.
I pulled off my wet jacket, and we went on in and I sat on the couch. She sat in the armchair just opposite me and crossed her legs, flashing an unnecessary amount of thigh at me. “How’s school?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Takes a while to get back into it,” I said. “I think I’m doing OK.”
“That’s swell.”
“I wish I’d gotten here sooner,” I said. “I’d have liked to get a chance to see the kids.”
“They’ll be up in an hour or so,” she said, leaning back to stretch her arms. She was wearing a sleeveless blouse, cotton, I think, and when she pulled it tight like that, her nipples stood out pretty obviously. Margaret was too big a girl to run around without a bra.