by Jas. R. Petrin
“My opinion,” Little D. J. said, “you get to be our age, you need to start thinkin’ about your health.” He worked the broom in under Benny’s bar stool to reach a particularly elusive stir stick, banging the steel shank against the chromium legs. “It’s like you live in this old house, had it since it was new an’ been in it all your life. Things start to go wrong.”
“What’s this ‘our age’ business?” Benny said. “You got eight, ten years on me.”
Little D. J. leaned on his broom. Skinny biceps under rolled up shirtsleeves—he’d tuck his cigarettes up in there if he had any. Tats across the bony knuckles of the fist gripping the broom spelled PRUNO. The man from yesterday.
“Plumbing goes first,” little D. J. said. “You got to baby it. Lay off the hard stuff, watch what you eat. Electrical—sometimes the lights flicker, you know? Kinda things you never thought about when you was a kid thirty, forty years ago.”
“Fifty, sixty in your case,” Benny said.
“That’s what I’m talking about.” He went after the stick again like a terrier, jabbing and banging. “Now a lotta folks, they got their health care plans, pick up the extras when things go wrong. If they can find a doctor, this country nowadays.” He gave up on the broom, crouched down, old sinews popping, and clawed the stir stick out with his fingertips. Straightening, he tossed it on the litter he had collected. “Find a doctor here now, you need to rob a bank, get sent to the slam. There they got doctors. They’ll get you one. No waiting neither.”
“You would know.”
“Darn straight I would. Dunno how many years I spent Dorchester, Springhill, places out west—Headingly. You get kinda spoilt. Good food there, my opinion. Dental care. Doc when you need one. Out here, nothing.”
“You’re leading up to something.”
“Just my back’s been acting up lately. Something down there in my back. An’ my leg.” He lifted a knee. “My hip, I dunno what’s up with that. Tried the clinic next block over, they tell me I got to go see a specialist, guy knows all about it. Turns out there’s a waiting list, eighteen months before I can even talk to the guy.”
“Brutal.”
“Sore back eighteen months. Leg. So I’m thinking, you know, try an’ get down to Mexico, they got a place there, no waiting. Fix you up with a total refit. Guy I know, met him one time in Dorchester, told me about it. His old mom went there. Like a resort hotel. I’m not kiddin’. Swimming pool, the works, eh? An’ cheaper than anything you’re gonna find inna States. I figure go down there, get a overhaul, be good to go again for twelve thousand dollars.”
Benny looked at him. “Twelve thousand.”
“About that. Plus the airfare, some living expenses.”
“And you just happen to have twelve large lying around, drag it outta your sock, and beat it for Mexico?”
“Well no,” Little D. J. said. “But I got an idea.”
* * * *
“Little D. J.’s got an idea,” Benny told Beemer, owner-manager of the Rob Roy.
Beemer stepping back from the brass-trimmed front door after locking it down, his thick hairy forearms pale in the glow of the lights from the bar. He looked at Benny. “Is that a warning or an invitation? What’s the reason you’re sharing this bombshell?”
“Well, it sounds like it might be something to think about, that’s all.”
“Last time I listened to one a his ideas,” Beemer said darkly, “I wound up with three cases of wine, I had to hose them down because of the mileage. What is it this time?”
“Not wine.”
“That’s good to know.”
“Metal.”
“Say again?”
“Metal.”
Beemer heaved a sigh, moved behind the bar, and punched the cash drawer open. “Gold and silver, you mean. Fort Knox.”
“Not exactly, no. Just the regular stuff. Copper, lead, aluminum—that kinda thing. Big money these days.”
“You kidding me?”
“Never. That’s what D. J. said, an’ he’s right. I looked into it. Listen. Scrap is hot right now. Third World countries buying it by the freakin’ boatload. Drives the value up, anything made of metal.”
“Get a good price, then, that cast-iron skull of yours. Little D. J. had an idea!” Beemer counted out the bills with practised authority, then started on the coins.
Benny said, “I thought the same thing when he brought it up. D. J. got an idea? Where’d that come from? Cryin’ about his aches and pains, the national health care, how he can’t get a doctor, all kinda crap like that. Said he hooked up with this wheeze so he could finance a trip down to Mexico. One of them body shops for high rollers. Get himself took apart and put back together again. Add years to his life.”
“What for? So he can spend them in the slam? Guy’s got a screw loose, you ask me.”
“I guess you don’t pay him enough, carting a beer tray around. He’s got to come up with the cash some other way. The twelve large he needs, I’m talking about.”
Beemer had finished bagging the cash receipts. Now he paused. He lowered his eyelids. He very carefully set down the canvas sack, turned, and looked Benny full in the face.
“Twelve large?”
“That’s what he’s saying.”
“He’s talking that kinda dough?”
“The scrap metal, yeah.”
“And he wants us in on it? He’s feeling generous?”
“I thought the same thing. Then I worked it out. One guy prob’ly can’t manage it, this kinda job. It’s not like moving jewelry, some valuable postage stamps, kite a few books of checks or something. This job would take muscle. An’ you know he’s got that back of his. Also, the job came up out of nowhere, according to him. What you call an opportunity. Hasn’t had much chance to make other arrangements, as I understand it.” Benny slid off the bar stool and hitched his pants up. “We could sit down with Little D. J. an’ talk about it. You want to talk about it with the guy?”
“I dunno about that.”
“Twelve Gs, Beem.”
Beemer picked up the bank bag, hefted it, set it down again. Then he turned the bar lights down.
“Little D. J. had an idea. Why do I feel like I should run screaming up Hollis Street? But all right. I’ll give it a listen. I gotta feeling I shouldn’t, I know I’m gonna regret it, but I’ll sit down an’ listen to what he has to say.”
“That’s fair,” Benny said. “One thing, though.”
“What’s that?”
“Don’t get him going on health care.”
* * * *
“Then,” Little D. J. said, “what if your knees give out? Or what if, say, you needed a hip replacement?”
Usually, most mornings, Beemer opened the Rob Roy himself. Today he sat at the small table at the end of the bar, him and Benny drinking tall draft glasses filled with orange juice, Little D. J. studying the tumbler of water Beemer had clunked down in front of him.
“That kinda thing,” Beemer told D. J. gruffly, as though explaining things to a particularly thick individual, “this country we got the socialized medicine. Your doctor sets it up with the specialist, arranges the surgery, they work out a date. You show up at the hospital, they take care of business—Bob’s your uncle. An’ the best part, it don’t cost you a dime.”
“Right,” Little D. J. said. There was an unpleasant, disdainful twist to his lips. “Best health care system inna world. I been hearing that just about forever. Only a guy like me, it ain’t that easy. First off, what doctor you talking about? I don’t have a doctor. I can’t get a doctor. People with doctors, they’re the ones had the health problems all their life, got set up with one years ago an’ they’re milkin’ it. Me? I been healthy till now. So I don’t have a doctor. Why would I?”
He turned to Benny. “You got a doctor?”
Benny shook his head. “Never needed one.”
He looked at Beemer. “You?”
“Healthy as a horse.”
“Big mistake. Both you guys. You shoulda been sick more. You’re not gonna get one now, you ever need one. And you’re gonna need one ‘cause you’re gettin’ older, but the problem is, see, they’re already spoken for.”
“What’s this got to do with scrap metal?” Beemer said, draping his hairy arms over his gut and scowling.
“Everything,” Little D. J. said, “in my case.”
“Because you need the dough to go outta the country an’ get your medical problems attended to?”
“That’s it. That’s exactly it. That’s the reward I get for staying healthy seventy-two years and not bein’ a burden on the system. No free health care. I got to go outta the country, down to Mexico, pick up the check, an’ pay it myself.”
“You been a burden on one system I know about.”
“Corrections? No. I’m always a model prisoner. But listen. Say you do find a doctor, some miracle, how it works you’re gonna go on a waiting list. You don’t have a life-threatening problem, just feels like somebody hacksawing your leg off every day, you go on a list. You’ll be lucky you get something done about it in a year an’ a half, two years.”
“We were gonna talk about a job,” Benny said. “Can we talk about this job you were talking about?”
“Glad to.” Little D. J. edged closer to the table. “Let’s talk about that. What can I tell you guys?”
“Everything,” Beemer told him. “Especially how we’re gonna not get caught. That’s a very important item. You get nailed, no big deal. Back inna slam it’s like rolling home for you, see gramma an’ grampa in there an’ all the other D. J.’s. For me it’s been awhile. I’d feel outta place.”
“Then just relax, okay? Scrap metal, there’s not much risk. That’s the beauty of it, you stop an’ think a minute. You want to lift practically anything, you got locked doors, you got alarms, you got dogs, even guards with guns, say you feel lucky an’ want to try out Brinks’. This is different. This is candy. This is—they leave the stuff lying out in the open. Walk down the street, you see metal everywhere.”
“That’s because it’s not worth nothing.”
“Used to be it wasn’t worth nothing. Prices now have gone up.”
“How much up?”
“Depends what it is. Zinc, lead, brass—you get a pretty good price for them. Zinc now, I think it’s topping out. But that’s not what we’re interested in.”
“Good,” Beemer said, “I’m a little short on zinc.”
“What are we after?” Benny asked.
Little D. J. glanced around the room.
“Copper,” he said, and he looked at them.
Beemer sat there. A furrow developed on his brow. Eyebrows like tiny untrimmed hedges, silvery shoots jutting every which way.
“Copper.”
“That’s right.”
“I’m gonna draw something to your attention. They make pennies outta copper. They do that for a reason.”
“They won’t be doing it much longer. Melt your pennies down, that’d be my advice. Especially the old ones, if you got any. Take ‘em down to the scrap yard, get a better price than at the bank.”
“Well, I’m glad you told me that. I’ll set up a little smelter there in the back room, make, what, three, four dollars on a good day easy.”
Little D. J. threw the Beem an injured look.
“It ain’t gold or silver. I know that. But in large amounts it can be big money.”
“What do you mean by large amounts?”
“In this case, a pretty good whack of it. This particular job, the one I been thinking about, we’re talking quantity, all right?”
“You’re gonna rob all the piggy banks in town, that it?”
“No.”
“Well, what then?”
Little D. J. studied his water. Then he looked up.
“The roof off the old law courts building. About twelve thousand pounds of it anyway.”
Nobody said anything. The bar fridge came on. In the men’s somebody flushed a toilet.
Finally Beemer let out a wheezing sound. “Well,” he said, “now I see why you came to us. You want some company down there in Mexico.” He heaved himself to his feet. “I’m already taking a chance, my age, shifting beer kegs around. Twelve thousand pounds of copper, I’ll wind up on a crutch. Hernia, slipped disk, massive coronary, I dunno what else. Fallen arches. Not to mention the judges are gonna be something hostile, you strip the roof off their cozy hidey-hole. They’ll be flyin’ around like hornets. Count me out.”
“Beem, listen—”
“No, you listen. Read my lips.”
He stalked away to the front of the room to slam the deadbolt open and rattle the locks.
“I think he’s interested,” Benny muttered to D. J.
* * * *
It wasn’t until the lull after the lunch crowd that they got Beemer to sit back down at the table. “Couple of things I didn’t make clear,” Little D. J. said, “some things I shoulda said up front. Cross my heart, no heavy lifting. We aren’t stripping the roof off the building, some contractor’s doing that. We’re just gonna relieve him of it after the hard part’s done. He’s gonna load it, watch the trucks roll away, but one truck won’t be going where he thinks it’s going. It’ll be going where we want it to go.”
“And where’s that?” Beemer still looked scornful, plenty of attitude, muscular arms crossed, back stiff as a pole, tilting sharply away from the table.
“A wrecking yard.”
“A wrecking yard. Sure you don’t mean a scrap yard?”
“Of course there’s a scrap yard at the end of it. Has to be. The wrecking yard is a temporary stash. See, the scrap yard guy’s brother-in-law owns the wrecking yard. The wrecker’s the guy I met up in Springhill. He’s the guy clued me in. See, the one brother-in-law, the scrap guy, he didn’t get this job, some other dealer got it. And he don’t like the way they awarded the contract. The way he sees it, he figures the fix was in. He woulda settled, you know, for part of the action, but he got nada. So he’s hot about it.”
“Understandable,” Benny said.
“You can’t blame a guy, he expects some honesty.”
“No, you can’t,” Benny agreed.
“An’ being in the business, he’s got all the details, so he knows the best way to work the thing.”
“And how is that?”
“The one brother-in-law, the one that I know, is gonna store the stuff out at his place. Out back of the Chevies, Fords, and piled-up Volvos. That’s a safety measure in case the cops come around the other brother-in-law’s place, the scrap yard. Checkin’ out scrap dealers, sniffin’ around for the stuff. An’ that’ll be just fine. No rush. When things cool off, it goes down the harbor, gets put on a ship, winds up in China, they make frying pans out of it, battleships, whatever turns their crank. These guys got it worked out. They got all the angles covered.”
“Not all the angles,” Beemer put in.
“Huh?”
“Not all the angles. If they did they wouldn’t need you.”
Little D. J. straightened up, flexed his wiry arms, and worked his bony hands. The skin on his fingers looked as thin as parchment. “Well, there is that one little snag, you’re right. How the goods come into their possession. But that snag turns out to be our opportunity. It kinda brings us into the picture.”
“I’m not lifting no twelve-thousand pounds,” Beemer said.
“You won’t have to. I just told you that. I mean we’re gonna lift it, but we’re not gonna lift it, if you get where I’m coming from. No grunt work. All we have to do is provide the truck. I can get us a flatbed take the weight easy—maybe a double-drop if we need it. Rental is gonna run three big ones, including the tractor, no questions asked.”
“Uh-huh,” Beemer said.
“What do you mean ‘uh-huh?’”
“You don’t know what I mean?”
“I know how you said it.”
“What I mean is, now we’re gettin’ to the short strokes. The real reason why you want us in on this.”
“Yeah?”
“You don’t need us for the muscle. You just guaranteed that, right? And not to drive. It can’t be that. You can handle a rig yourself, air brakes, no problem. So what do you need us for? The three bills, right?”
Little D. J. hiked his bony shoulders. “Well, the rental, of course, would be under the table. It would have to be paid up front—”
“I knew it,” Beemer said, getting louder. “It’s like last time. You come to us for the grease. We’re the money in it. Something goes wrong, the whole thing falls apart, we’re the ones take the hit in the wallet.”
“No one’s gonna take a hit,” Little D. J. said. “No one’s gonna have to. Calm down, okay? As I remember things, it seems to me, you got your dough back last time, every penny of it. An’ some cases of very good wine. So you come out of it all right. An’ this time, like I mentioned, there’s really not much risk. You won’t put up three big ones to make twelve large, then I dunno. Seems sweet from where I sit.”
“Twelve large, Beem,” Benny prompted. His eyes were bright.
“Twelve large? You mean four. We got a three-way split going here, or am I missin’ something?”
“Twelve large each of us,” Little D. J. said. “I need twelve myself, remember? My health problems? The whole job, thirty-six large.”
While Beemer sat digesting this, a kid shuffled up to the bar. Denim jacket with the arms ripped off. Biceps. Tattoos. Face like a three-cheese pizza. Tough guy. “Anybody work in this dump?” he bawled out loud.
“Hold that thought,” Beemer told D. J. and Benny. “Looks like I got an unhappy customer.”
Beemer lurched to his feet and trudged to the bar. The customer turned to face him. He had an odd array of body piercings. Safety pins in one eyebrow, a clunky carabiner through a nostril. Smaller objects glinting here and there as if he’d been peppered with shrapnel from an explosion. “I need change,” he snarled, “to play the machines. You know how long I been standin’ here?”
“Whadda you want?” Beemer said. “Quarters?”
“Whadda you think I want?” tough guy said. “Are you dumb or somethin’? They’re your machines, you oughta know!”
Beemer had been trying to squeeze past, get at the till, and break a roll of quarters. Now suddenly he changed his mind. Reaching up, he grabbed a handful of denim and brought tough guy’s head down hard on the table next to them, the two guys sitting at it, watching the TV, back-pedaling out of the way in a hurry. Tough guy’s skull made an odd “bonk” sound as it rebounded off the Arborite. One of the men said, “Whoa,” and rescued his beer.
Beemer frog-marched his customer past the bar stools, keeping him bent double at the waist. Muscular arms flailed like those of a swimmer in over his depth. Nearing the door, the guy reared up. Beemer snapped his denim coattails over his head. He pulled the door open with his left hand and slung the guy out into the street. Tough guy pirouetted, the jacket still over his face, bounced off a parking meter, and sat down.
Beemer slammed the door and came back down the aisle. He paused at the table where the two men were regrouping, glanced at the TV and said, “Go, Sox,” then came back to his chair and sat down.
“That any way to treat your clientele?” Benny said.
“I was thinkin’ of saving him for you guys,” Beemer said. “You see the metal in that face? Worth a fortune, according to you. Boil him down a couple days, see what’s in the bottom of the pot.” He narrowed his eyes at Little D. J. “Thirty-six large.”
“That’s right.”
“For a load of old copper?”
Little D. J. said, “Don’t matter how old it is. An’ you can do the numbers yourself. Twelve thousand pounds, prob’ly a little more, an’ buddy pays three dollars a pound.”
Beemer didn’t say anything. He squinched his mouth left and right. Then he said, “Well, I think I get it now. Maybe I oughta start melting pennies after all.”
* * * *
The sign was in their faces as soon as they topped the hill and started down the spruce-lined slope. Out in the boonies here, taxes low, plenty of room for eighteen-wheelers. The sign had lettering as tall as a man, but it was faded and spattered with daubs of road dirt:
QUICKSTREAM INC.
HEAVY HAULING
Repairs and Rentals
Yard Hustlers and Donkeys
The sign was leaning at a threatening angle.
“That list I was talking about?” Little D. J. was saying. He was in the back seat, Benny driving. Beemer up front with one hand braced on the dash to prevent any sudden stops from turning him into a bullet. “That waiting list, hip replacement? Good thing that list is onna computer. Take three men an’ a boy to carry it, you put it down on paper like they used to. Size of the Hong Kong phone directory.”
“No list is that big,” Beemer said.
“A phone directory is a list,” Little D. J. pointed out.
Beemer closed his eyes.
They drove in under the sign.
“Don’t stop out front,” Little D. J. told Benny. “Guy we gotta see is out back inna yard.”
“Is he a hustler or a donkey?” Beemer asked.
“You’re a kidder, you know that?”
“I wasn’t kidding,” Beemer said.
They stopped beside a flatbed trailer with soot and blistered paint disfiguring twenty feet of its forward metalwork. Thick rubber hoses fanned out at the hookup, ending in charred, burnt-off stubs. No wheels.
“This one ours?” Beemer said as they got out of the car.
D. J. was unperturbed. “I wish it was. All aluminum. Worth bags of cash, you melted it down.” He strode off to meet a muscular, pint-sized man who was trotting toward them and pulling gloves off his hands. “Hey Peppie,” D. J. said. “Howzit?”
“Good,” Peppie said. His shirt and trousers were splotched with oil stains, and he had large, sad, and soulful eyes. “On’y my wife’s got the flu. I was up with her all last night.”
“Long time since that happened, I bet,” Little D. J. said, showing his dentures and making a honking sound. “Stayin’ up with her, I mean.” He clapped Peppie on the shoulder. “Got that Aardvark you was talking about?”
“Sure, sure, buddy, got it right over here. Oughta do the job.” Peppie led them into the depths of the yard, gutted monster trucks looming around them. Elephant’s bone yard. Where the rigs came to die. They approached a Kenworth, bedraggled but with all its parts intact. “Had a nice cab-over you coulda had,” Peppie said, “but you wanted a diesel-car so I thought of the long-nose.” He directed his doe eyes at Benny and Beemer and leaned in closer to Little D. J. “These two bubbas all right?”
“Yeah,” Little D. J. said, “they’re okay.”
“Hope so. I could lose my job, you know.”
“Wouldn’t be so bad,” Little D. J. said, jostling him again. “Then you could stay up more with the wife at night.”
Benny said to Beemer, “Little D. J.’s a comic. Him an’ this guy, you could have an act for the Roy. Call them Eighteen Wheeler and an Ex-Con.”
“Call them a jerk and a jolt,” Beemer growled.
They reached the Kenworth, stopped, and gazed at it. Chromium characters on the flared snout told them the model number: T-60. Anything else that might once have been chrome was turning a mottled shade of rusty orange.
Beemer said pugnaciously, “You want three hunnerd bucks an hour for this?”
“Three hunnerd for three hours,” D. J. said. “Let me do the talking here.”
“You can do the talking,” Beemer said, “when you got three big ones to lay onna table. When you’re on my dime, I’ll talk all I want.”
“Easy,” the little man said, raising grease-stained hands. He had the soothing manner of a marriage counselor. “This here’s a good piece. She’ll do the job for you.” He patted the bumper with some affection. “Hell, she’ll move six times what you want her for, on a big road, all bundled out. Tall rubber, notice? Run her up into boogie, she’ll fly hammered down.”
“Do you speak English?” Beemer said.
It was Little D. J.’s turn to conciliate. He said to Peppie, “What about the tail?”
“Had a bit of a problem there.”
“Here we go,” Beemer said.
Peppie was walking again, keeping his distance from Beemer, watching him out the side of his neck. He led them back the way they had come, directing his salesman’s patter at Little D. J. as they went. “Said you needed a flat. Scratched my head a while. Then I remembered I had something coming up.” They cleared the tandem wheels of the Kenworth, and Beemer groaned. “This some kinda joke?”
Here was the burnt-out flatbed again.
Even D. J. looked unsettled. “You kidding me, Peppie?”
Peppie appeared unconcerned, but he didn’t turn his back on Beemer. “It’s what, Tuesday? You want your package ready to roll by Friday, right? This skateboard’s goin’ into the shop today, come out Thursday just as bright as a nail. I’m telling you guys, you got nothing to worry about.”
“Maybe I got nothing to worry about,” Beemer said, “but Little D. J. better worry. He better worry a lot.”
* * * *
The days dragged by with plodding slowness. Beemer watched D. J. with a lingering menace. On Friday morning D. J. entered the Rob Roy with a radiant smile that almost hurt the eyes. Beemer told Benny, irritation igniting a glow in his grizzled cheeks, “Look at him. Musta found a penny. You listen, he’s gonna give us a song an’ dance, the reason the truck isn’t ready to go.”
“The truck’s ready to go,” Little D. J. said. He was practically bouncing on the tips of his black, pointy, lace-up shoes.
* * * *
Beemer arranged for Mako to watch the bar while Benny fetched his car from the Sobey’s lot. Then Beemer sat up front next to Benny where he could advise him on how to avoid an accident. Little D. J. squeezed into the back seat.
“I dunno about this idea,” Little D. J. said, “you two riding along in the rig with me.”
“Somethin’ you need to understand,” Beemer said, “we need to protect our investment.” He jabbed Benny’s elbow. “Don’t tailgate buddy there.”
“He’s driving a BMW. Your favorite car. I got up close so you could see it better.”
“It won’t be my favorite car if I need surgery to remove one from my face.”
“Prob’ly a lineup for that too,” Benny said.
“Give him room, for cryin’ in the sink!”
“It just don’t look right, that’s all,” Little D. J. told them, “three guys ridin’ in the cab of a semi.”
“A moving van they do it all the time,” Benny pointed out.
“This ain’t a moving van. It’s a flatbed.”
“I’ll tell you what wouldn’t look right,” Beemer said, “it wouldn’t look right you drivin’ away from us with my twelve Gs tucked away in your pocket.”
“So now you’re sayin’ you don’t trust me.”
“I wouldn’t trust your grandmother. I especially wouldn’t trust your grandmother.” Beemer poked Benny again. “That was a yellow light. You know what’s a yellow light? It means clear the intersection, not goose the gas.”
“For a guy who won’t even wear a safety belt, you sure worry a lot,” Benny said.
“I don’t wear a safety belt because they jam sometimes. An’ I worry a lot because you’re driving.”
“It just don’t look right, three guys inna cab,” Little D. J. said.
At the Quickstream lot they found the Kenworth, a shiny new-looking flatbed hooked to it, standing at the back gate just inside the compound.
“There’s our ride,” Little D. J. said, brightening, “just like Peppie promised. If it hadn’t a been here, I’d a been surprised.”
“If it hadn’t been here,” Beemer told him, “you’d be walking back to town with two broken legs. How come it’s not at the front gate, that’s what I want to know.”
“Prob’ly that’s how the yard boss wants it. My guess is he don’t want to know.”
“He wants to know he’s gettin’ his cut, though, I bet.”
“That’s none of my business,” Little D. J. said.
They took the mud road around the fence perimeter and stopped in the ruts at the back of the fence. Little D. J. hopped out. The two big link-steel gates were closed with a heavy chain looped around the posts, but the padlock hung at an angle, not snapped completely shut. Little D. J. rattled the chain out with no difficulty and walked the two big gates open. He climbed up into the tractor, started the engine, then lumbered the big vehicle out of the yard.
Benny grinned. “Keys musta been in the ignition. So far, so good.”
“It don’t take much to cheer you up,” Beemer said.
They watched D. J. get out and close the gates, then clamber back up into the truck. A minute later they were following the rig back into town, watching the twin plumes of black exhaust jet from the stacks whenever D. J. put the pedal down.
Little D. J. pulled up next to the Sobey’s lot, waited while they parked the car, and watched as they climbed up into the cab with him, Benny first, Beemer claiming the window seat.
“Now you’re sure,” Beemer said in a skeptical voice, “that you know how this business is supposed to work. We’re not gonna pull up there in front of the courthouse an’ have every grunt on the lot raisin’ his eyebrows at us.”
“I got it from my guy,” Little D. J. said. “He got it from his brother-in-law. There’s gonna be all kinda trucks there, it’s not just the roof that’s getting redone. The truckers are all indies. No one’s gonna pay no attention to us. Excepting I’ll be the only driver there brought his buddies along for the ride.”
“You still whining about that?”
“It’s a matter of trust, that’s all.”
“I’m surprised that word is in your vocabulary. You go in an’ outta the slam like I go in an’ outta the john. Trust you with my twelve large? I think not. That would definitely be a no.”
They traveled the rest of the way to the old courthouse without saying too much more, except for Beemer giving Little D. J. tips on how to guide an eighteen-wheeler through the streets of Halifax.
The area in and around the law courts building was a maze of detour signs and improvised barricades. Little D. J.’s contact hadn’t been kidding. There were construction crews here of every description. They had no problem spotting the roofing lineup, three flatbed trucks waiting as an enormous boom crane lowered bundles of green copper sheeting from the top of the building. D. J. was flagged into position by a workman, he didn’t even have to get out of the cab.
The truck lurched and shivered with each ragged bundle the crane set down on the trailer. They were underway again within fifteen minutes.
“Real professionals, those guys,” Little D. J. said admiringly, shifting gears and toiling up the hill away from downtown and the harbor.
“Yeah, right,” Beemer said. “Real pros. Only, oops, I think they just lost something. How professional can you get?”
“So now,” Benny said, “we drive straight to the wrecking yard?”
“You got it,” Little D. J. told him. “Easiest twelve grand you ever made. We’ll take the back road up past Spryfield. Keep a low profile.”
They followed the old road, made it three or four miles, then had to pull over and stop. Up ahead some guy was getting his house moved and had decided to pick this day to do it. His bungalow had been raised on enormous timbers, and two huge tow trucks were jigging it out of its lot. The trucks sat at right angles to the road, one of them partly astride the ditch. They blocked the way entirely.
“Great,” Beemer said. “Now what?”
“I guess,” D. J. said, “Plan B.”
“An’ what’s that?”
“Go back, get up on the 102. I can turn around in that brickyard we passed.”
“The 102 wasn’t in the plan,” Beemer said.
“No, but hey, crap happens.”
They backed a quarter mile up the road to the brickyard, turned around, then headed back the way they had come. At the 102 access junction they found the ramp and drove up onto the highway.
“Another scam,” D. J. was telling them, “is the pharmaceuticals these days. You got any idea of the markup on that stuff?”
“No,” Benny replied, “but I think you’re gonna tell us.”
“Three thousand percent.”
“That’s hard to believe.”
“You don’t believe me, look it up.”
Suddenly D. J. took his foot off the gas. The big Cummings diesel belched a clattering exhaust.
“How come we’re slowing down?” Beemer growled.
“I think,” Little D. J. said, eyes sweeping the mirrors, “we got a problem.”
“What are you saying?”
“Some of the load just flew off.”
“What?” Beemer snapped his head around. “You didn’t strap it down?”
Little D. J. shrugged. “Well, you know, when we picked up the copper, the trailer, we were kinda in a bit of a rush. I noticed they forgot to weld the winches on, but I figured that shouldn’t be a problem. We weren’t supposed to drive onna highway, an’ copper, well, copper’s heavy.”
“Freakin’ 747s are heavy! You were gonna fly one to Mexico, remember?”
Benny, craning his neck to see behind them, said, “Jeez, there goes about another ten sheets. Oops, an’ a couple more. Man, I think one of ‘em swiped that telco truck.”
Little D. J. swore softly and leaned harder on the brakes. The binders chirped, then came on hard, sending battered green and copper sheets cartwheeling through the air, past the cab. One of them took a West Coast mirror off.
“What the hell are you doing?” Beemer shouted. “You tryin’ to kill us?”
The rig was doing some horrific tail wagging.
“The driver that telco truck,” Benny informed them, “looks like he’s on his phone, prob’ly calling us in.”
“I’m gonna pull over just before that underpass,” Little D. J. said. “When I stop the vehicle, jump out, and run like hell.”
* * * *
“Little D. J. runs pretty good,” Benny said, “for a guy with a back problem. Didn’t slow down, that ditch full of water, just kinda ran right over the top of it. You know those lizards you see on TV?”
“A lizard, that about sums him up.” Beemer looked disgusted.
“I kept on goin’ through those wild rose bushes.” Little D. J. winced at the recollection. “I think I still got the thorns in me.”
“We can always hope,” Beemer said. “I liked the part where you climbed that ridge an’ ran off the other side into outer space.”
It was just past opening at the Rob Roy. A few of the regulars there. One geriatric nursing a beer and tomato juice, another at the bar staring at the switched-off television, and one obese specimen under the plastic palm tree wearing driving gloves, a red T-shirt, Bermuda shorts, and Day-Glo galoshes. Calvin Klein. Benny, Beemer, and Little D. J. were at their usual table. Little D. J. had gauze wound around his left hand, his wrist, and halfway up his arm. A wad of it was taped to the side of his head, and he had smaller dressings stuck here and there.
“Does it hurt?” Benny eyed the bandages.
“Only when he whines,” Beemer said. He told Little D. J., “Listen. Don’t get the idea ‘cause you got a couple of scratches you’re off the hook about this total screwup. I don’t like almost getting my head took off, and I don’t like that your pal at the trucking yard could put the finger on you an’ drag us into it. Most of all, I don’t like that I’m out twelve large, my share of that load.”
“Well,” Little D. J. said, “I don’t like it either. But that’s how it is in this business. Some days it’s candy, other days it’s a kick in the head. You just gotta go with it, you know what I’m sayin’? Take the good with the bad.”
“Every day with you is a kick in the head, especially when I get dragged into something. There I am, twelve thousand pounds flyin’ at me, crashing through a swamp with a boom truck on my tail. I’m too old for that. I don’t need the stress.”
“Who dragged? I just laid out an offer. Bright side of things,” D. J. said with a lofty smile, “I think I got a doctor out of it.”
“You had half the QEII Emergency staff fawning over you ten seconds after we dragged you in there.”
“An’ I was thinkin’ the whole time too. When they asked me, I said I never had a pain in my life till this happened. That way, see, they got to include my leg, my back when they do repairs, no waiting list.”
“Playing the system.” Beemer snorted.
“No, my health problems are legitimate.”
“An’ what about my problems? Benny’s problems. The problem we got, those three bills we put up for this? I knew we’d wind up takin’ the hit.”
Little D. J. craned to look at the bar. “You think I could have a glass of orange juice? Vitamin C in there. Good for the healing process.”
“Two bucks a glass,” Beemer told him, “drink all you want.” D. J. sat where he was. Benny shoved two dollars at him. Little D. J. got up, went behind the bar, and took a large glass off the shelf. Beemer said to Benny, “See, this is why I shouldn’t ever listen to that goof. I always wind up getting bit inna butt. What we shoulda done, we shoulda left him there in that ditch at the side of the road. But we hadda rescue him.”
“It was the right thing to do.”
“It was the smart thing to do. How else we gonna get our three big ones back, that skug?”
Little D. J. finished pouring his orange juice, a tricky business with one hand. Came back to the table, sat down and drank it, his Adam’s apple gently bobbing. He lowered the glass and wiped his lips with his good hand. Tats on the knuckles there read JUMP.
“Best thing inna world for your health, orange juice. Guy in India, Matt ... Matt somebody. Old guy. I read about him in a magazine. Used to go on these fasts, make the government listen to him. Lived for years on the stuff. What were we saying?”
“We were saying you owe us three hundred bucks.”
“Right. Well, I was just thinkin’ about that.”
“You’d better be thinking about it. There you are like the mummy in The Curse of the Pharaoh, and here we are, we’re out three big ones. Your plan. Your arrangements. That dwarf at the lot speaking in tongues. No reason we should take the hit on the three.”
“I was thinkin’, an’ I got an idea.”
Beemer put his hand over his eyes.
“No,” Little D. J. said, “listen. Just now I’m at the bar pourin’ the orange juice, I notice your beer kegs all stacked up in the back. How much credit you get on those, the deposit?”
“Wait a minute.” Beemer was raising his voice again. “Any deposit, that’s my deposit. It’s tied-up cash for me, I already paid it.”
“I know that,” Little D. J. said. “I’m not talkin’ about that. What I’m talkin’ about, how much return do you get?”
“I shell out twelve bucks, I get back twelve bucks.”
“That’s what I thought. Twelve. But see, those kegs are stainless steel. Take ‘em to the scrap yard, they’ll give you thirty, an’ you’re up eighteen on each one.”
Beemer’s expression became more focused.
“They’re not gonna give me more’n my deposit.”
“‘Course they will. They do it all the time. Price of scrap metal goin’ up every day, but the deposit, see, that stays the same. It don’t keep up with the market value. I see nine empties back there. Add ‘em up. That’s a hundred an’ sixty-two profit.”
“What about the rest of the money?”
“A hundred an’ sixty-two covers your half. I don’t notice Benny here complaining.”
Benny asked, “What about your pal at the lot?”
“I talked to him. The truck was stolen. The insurance. He’ll be okay.” Little D. J. got to his feet. Tucked his bandaged arm to his side. “Well, I won’t be able to work today. I got an appointment to keep with my new doctor. I’m gonna see if I can get took on permanent.”
“Put in a word for me,” Benny said. “I was thinking I should have a doctor. See if he’ll take me on too.”
“It’s not a he,” D. J. said, “it’s a she. Fine lady. I’m gonna have to be sick more.”
He walked to the front of the bar and sauntered out, a brief flash of sunshine and the door swung shut.
“See,” Beemer said, “the kind of a guy he is?”
“Some people always land on their feet,” Benny said.
Beemer swirled his damp cloth around the tabletop, leaving wispy evaporating trails. “Sell my beer kegs. Does he know what he’s sayin’? What do I tell my supplier when he comes to collect them?” He tugged at his chin. “I could say they were stolen, I guess. He’d prob’ly write ‘em off, a one-time thing.”
“Or,” Benny said, “he could raise your deposit.”
“He wouldn’t do that.”
“He could.”
“I’ll have more dough tied up in freakin’ kegs than beer, he starts doin’ that to me.”
“It could happen.” Benny moved to the bar. He spun Beemer’s news-paper around to face him. He began scanning it by the light of the Miller’s clock on the wall over the liquor bottles. “The breweries might have a requirement.”
Beemer went back behind the bar and waved his damp cloth around. “I could say I put them out back like I always do every Monday morning for the pickup. Before the truck arrived, they disappeared.” He shrugged his shoulders. “You can’t trust nobody.”
“That’s a fact,” Benny said.