In Milton Lumky Territory Page 22

  I will never know, he thought. I don’t understand her. So the heck with it.

  At a payphone in a drugstore he called her. “They’ll take them off our hands,” he said.

  “Oh thank god,” Susan said fervently. “At how much?”

  “Forty-five apiece,” he said.

  “Oh what a relief.” She sighed. “Bruce, that’s wonderful. That means we get almost all our money back. How much do we lose? Three hundred dollars? I’m too excited to figure it. We could call that Milt’s money; part of the five hundred he gave us as a wedding present. I called him, incidently. I got hold of him at Pocatello, at a friend’s place. You met her - Cathy Hermes.”

  “How is he?” he said.

  “Much better. He’s back on the road again. He asked me if we got the typewriters and I told him -” She hesitated. “I told him we decided not to.”

  “Why?” he said.

  “Because - well, I thought perhaps it would worry him.”

  “Why should it worry him?”

  “I got to thinking about it and I decided that maybe you’re right. He might have known subconsciously. And then if he knew we’d gone ahead and bought them he’d have guilt to wrestle with. I think that’s why he gave us the five hundred dollars; to appease his conscience. I was wondering about that… it’s an awful lot of money.”

  “I just assumed it was for old times’ sake,” he said. “Because you and he used to be such friends.”

  “No,” she said. “What gave you that idea? I probably don’t know him any better then you do.”

  He said, “Shall I sell the machines to them, then?”

  “Yes, yes,” she said. “By all means. Before they change their minds.”

  “They won’t change their minds,” he said. “They’re going to make something like nine thousand dollars out of this, give or take a few man-hours of repairwork.”

  Susan said, “Did Mr. von Scharf say anything to you about your job?”

  “Why?” he said, chilled.

  “I wondered if he had. If we’re going to close up the office you’ll have to give some thought to that. I mean to close it, Bruce. I talked to Fancourt after you left and he said he thought it would be a good idea. Then I can be home with Taffy.”

  He said, “Did you say anything to von Scharf about it?”

  “I - told him that I thought we might be moving down to Reno.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said your job is open.”

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll see you.” He started to hang up.

  “You’ll be home tomorrow?” she said.

  “Yes,” he said. He hung up.

  By god, he thought, she did talk to them about my job. They probably arranged it among them. Time, salary, duties.

  He returned to his car. For a few minutes he sat, and then he started the motor and drove back to the typewriter repair shop where the short little neatly-dressed man had given him the estimate.

  “I see you’re back,” the man said in his severe, quiet manner, as he entered with the Mithrias.

  Bruce said, “I want you to go ahead and do the work. Can you do it right now?”

  “I suppose I can,” the man said. “Set it down here.” He took the machine and placed it on his work table. “It’s certainly not very heavy,” he said.

  “I’d like to watch,” Bruce said. “It won’t make you nervous, will it?” He got out a ball point pen and paper and placed himself nearby.

  The man said, “You’re going to see how it’s done, right?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Let’s be honest about this. If this is going to help you any, you’re going to have to know more about it than you’ll get by watching me work.” The man considered. “Are you in a hurry? For instance, can you manage to hold your water until tonight?”

  “I guess so,” he said.

  The man said, “Come by here after dinner. Around seven o’clock. I’ll go over it step by step for you, show you what tools you’ll need. And you can do it here on my bench until I’m satisfied you know what you’re doing. Otherwise you’ll wreck your sixty typewriters.”

  “Can I learn, do you think?” he asked.

  “Undoubtedly. It’ll cost you about thirty bucks for my labor. I’ll let you do as much of it as possible. I’ll break about even.” The man put the Mithrias off to one side. “See you at seven, then.”

  Feeling a little better, Bruce left the shop. Behind him, at the bench, the unemotional, ordinary-looking man, his necktie dangling out and in his way, resumed his work on an old IBM electric.

  A person I never saw before, he thought to himself.

  That evening he returned to the shop. The man let him in and then began work on the typewriter. It did not look hard. When he had finished he supervised while Bruce tackled a second machine. By ten o’clock he had learned the soldering part, the cutting and rewelding part, and was on the business of splitting a key in half. After that the man showed him how to align the keys, using special tools that pinched and bent the typebars.

  “You’ll have to buy the tools,” the man said. He methodically wrote out the trade names and sizes for him in an old-fashioned formal hand. “Here’s the names of a couple of places you might try; if they don’t have them then you can send out to the Coast or back East. You can use them later on for certain other kinds of service. You know, if you’re going to be selling typewriters you ought to work out your own service. Get a man, set up a bench. Otherwise it’ll cost you too much.”

  He paid the man, thanked him, and left.

  I know I can make the changes myself, he said to himself as he got back into his car. All I need is the tools. He had written everything down, step by step, and then gone over it from the written instructions. A week or a month from now he could pick it up again. According to the man the tools wouldn’t set him back more than fifteen dollars, if he could get a good buy on the alcohol torch. And he knew where he could get that: in the hardware department at C.B.B.

  That night, with the sixty typewriters still in the car, he started the drive back to Boise.

  WHEN SUSAN SAW the cartons still piled up in the car she said, “Why didn’t you sell them? Did they renege?”

  “No,” he said. “I did.”

  “Why?”

  He said, “I’m going to fix them. A fellow down in Reno showed me how.”

  “But you aren’t a typewriter repairman!”

  “I’m only doing this one job.” He had already picked up the tools he needed, back in Reno. “It won’t cost us anything. Unless you want to write the labor down as cost.” Getting the hand-truck he began to load it with the cartons.

  “It’s not up to you to decide,” she said.

  “I already decided,” he said.

  “When I talked to them on the phone,” she said, “I told them you were bringing the machines in to sell to them.”

  “We couldn’t agree,” he said.

  “There was nothing to agree to. We made all the arrangements on the phone. Did you try to talk them up to paying more, is that it? Did you try to get a better price, and they wouldn’t pay it, so you stormed out of there?” She seemed more bewildered than angry; she did not understand why he had come back with the machines and she knew that there had to be a reason. He had done it deliberately; she seemed to grasp that. Watching him carrying the machines, she could not decide between curiosity and outrage. Meanwhile, she kept on with her harangue. He paid no attention to her.

  “I’ll do the work down here at the office,” he said when she paused. “If I can clear a desk. We don’t need them all done at once, just enough to get a few on sale.” In the office window he set down the two that had been worked on. “There’s two already.”

  She bent over them, wondering what had been done. So he stopped the unloading and showed her.

  “You’ll ruin them,” she said.

  “No,” he said.

  Now she had gotten better control of herself. Folding h
er arms she took a deep breath and said in a low, strained voice, “Well, I hired you to make buying decisions.”

  That could have meant anything, he realized. “That’s right,” he said. “And when you hire somebody to do something, the most practical business procedure is to leave them alone and let them do their work. Any big business organization will tell you that.”

  She gazed at him with an expression that he could make nothing of.

  “That’s how President Eisenhower operated in Europe,” he said.

  After a time, Susan said, “Maybe you should keep one of these to use as a model.”

  “It’s all written down,” he said. He spread out his notes. “See?”

  Susan said, “Keep one as a model anyhow.”

  “We’re going to have to figure out some kind of time-payment contract,” he said.

  “Is that right,” she murmured, in a way that might have been sarcastic. But he could not hear her well enough to tell.

  While she stood watching him, her arms folded, he finished up the unloading. Neither of them said anything. But as he worked he thought to himself, She has to recognize that this is what she hired me for. This is my job. I’m the one who decides.

  THAT EVENING he worked late, by himself, down at the office, altering machines. He finished a couple and then, tired, he shut off the lights and drove across town to the house. Susan of course had already gone to bed. How nice to be back, he thought to himself as he took a shower in the familiar bathroom. He put on a pair of fresh pajamas and got into bed beside her.

  The following morning he slept late. When he woke up he found that she had already gotten out of bed, dressed and eaten and gone. For a while he lay in the bed, on his back, enjoying the peace. Then he, too, got up. He ate a leisurely breakfast, shaved, put on a clean striped cotton shirt, tie, slacks, and then, savoring his possession of the house, wandered about into the different rooms.

  From the living room window he could see the yard. The grass and rose bushes. The coiled-up garden hose.

  Fine sight, he thought. Up high off the street. A milk truck came noisily along; he watched it stop, the driver hop out. The sight of the milkman hurrying up a long flight of cement steps across the street satisfied something in him. Nice to watch somebody else hustle, he decided. The world’s work. Every man has his niche, and I must say I’m not too dissatisfied with mine.

  End of a long journey, he thought. Hell of a lot of hard driving.

  Putting on his coat he left the house, walked down to his car, got in and started up the motor.

  Presently he was driving along the street, toward the office.

  At the curb, in front of the R & J Mimeographing Service office, a yellow pick-up truck was parked with its tailgate down. As he approached it he thought to himself, That truck’s familiar. He entered a parking slot, stopped his car, and shut off the motor. Sitting there, he watched the pick-up truck.

  The front door of the office was open, propped back with a brick. After a moment a boy wearing a brown khaki shirt and trousers appeared, tugging a hand-truck. On the hand-truck were cartons. The boy wheeled the hand-truck expertly around, worked it up onto the tailgate of the pick-up, and then slid the cartons up into the bed. Cheerfully hopping down he started back into the office with the empty hand-truck and disappeared.

  I know him, Bruce thought.

  The son of a bitch, he thought, is from Consumers’ Buying Bureau, and that truck belongs to them. He’s picking up the typewriters. He’s loading them onto the truck while I’m home sleeping.

  Throwing open the car door he jumped out and ran down the sidewalk to the pick-up truck. “Hey,” he said breathlessly. “What the hell are you doing?”

  The boy, once more appearing from the office with his load of cartons, glanced at him and recognized him. “Hi,” he said, with some confusion. “Let me see - you used to work down at C.B.B. Wait a minute and I’ll think of your name.” Tilting the hand-truck back, he pondered, tapping his forehead. He was about seventeen, with short-cropped hair, heavy cheeks and large, muscular arms.

  Bruce said, “Is she inside?”

  “Mrs. Stevens, you mean?” the boy said. Then he waved his hand and said, “That’s who you are. Bruce Stevens.”

  Bruce went into the office. In the back, Susan sat on the edge of one of the desks, smoking a cigarette. She had on a formal dark-green suit; her hair was made up and she looked somber and controlled. As he entered, she glanced up at him. But she said nothing.

  Making his voice sound as natural as possible, he said, “What’s all this about?”

  Susan said, “I’ve decided to let you go.”

  Oh god, he thought.

  “What you said was true,” she said. That I hired you to make buying decisions.”

  “I’ll be god damned,” he said, and this time his voice shook and was weak. He had to stick his hands in his pockets to keep them from trembling. Meanwhile, behind them, the boy resumed his loading of the cartons; he discreetly wheeled the hand-truck back and forth, saying nothing and being as quiet as possible.

  Facing Susan, Bruce said, “Are we still married?”

  “Oh yes,” she said emphatically, blinking a little as if taken by surprise.

  So she had fired him. He no longer had a job; during the night or the early morning she had thought things over and made up her mind. And she had phoned C.B.B. and now the truck was up getting the typewriters. How had it made the trip so fast? Maybe she had called last night, while he was working on the machines. She had already decided before he even got home and into bed. Made the arrangement with them as soon as possible; gone out of the office and directly to a phone. Possibly she had decided as soon as she saw the machines. But she hadn’t said a word.

  “What’s the idea of not telling me?” he said. Bits of his voice returned.

  “I was tired of arguing.”

  To that, he could think of nothing to say.

  “It seemed to me,” she said, “that it was a waste of time to talk about it any more. I knew that you had your mind made up and there was no way to reason with you.”

  He said, “I think this is a hell of a thing.”

  “It’s my store,” Susan said. “We both have to accept the fact that I’m the owner.” Looking up at him steadily, she said, “The machines belong to me. Isn’t that right? I hate to be hard about this, but they are mine. They were bought with my money.”

  “Not all of the money was yours,” he said. “What about the money my folks gave us?”

  “Half of that is mine,” Susan said. “That leaves only five hundred dollars.”

  “And the money Milt gave us.”

  “Half of that legally belongs to me.”

  He said, “Some of the machines are mine.”

  To that, she nodded. But it did not seem as if that was very important to her.

  “I’m going to take mine,” he said.

  “Suit yourself,” she said. She smoked her cigarette rapidly.

  He walked outside, to the pick-up truck. There, the boy was putting the tailgate back up. He had tied the cartons down, so that they would not shift around during the trip back down to Reno. “Damn you,” Bruce said. “Some of those belong to me.”

  At the office door, Susan appeared. “That’s right,” she said to the boy. “Some belong to him.” With a pad and pencil she made computations.

  “The hell with it,” Bruce said. He turned and walked off, away from the pick-up truck and the two of them, back to his parked Merc. Getting inside he slammed the door, started the motor, and at once backed away from the curb and out into traffic. He drove by the pick-up truck and a moment later he had left it behind, still at the curb with its load of cartons, Susan and the boy standing beside it on the sidewalk, deep in discussion.

  They can have them, he thought. They can stuff them up their asses.

  Shaking, he slowed down, pulled over to the right and turned the corner. On a quiet side street he coasted to a stop. Traffic noises had
fallen away behind him. Peacefulness. He shut off the engine. The car rolled a trifle. He put on the hand-brake.

  Should I go by the house? he asked himself. And pick up my stuff? No, he thought. I probably will never go back there again. I don’t see any reason for it. Too bad, he thought. After all my work. What a thing to have happen. How could she have done that kind of thinking, figuring out exactly what part of the machines belonged to her, and the reasons why. Maybe she called her attorney.

  Now, he thought, I might as well get back on the road again. But he did not feel like it. Starting up the engine, he drove along, past the houses. Residential section, he thought. Lawns and driveways. For a time he drove at random.

  I never thought it would work out like that, he thought. You never can tell. All those years of knowing her. Back to grammar school. When I knew her in high school and delivered her newspaper to her. That should have tipped me off, that business where I wasn’t invited into the house. It’s the same thing all over again. I should have been warned.

  Maybe the best thing to do, he decided, is to rent a room. I’ll rent one here in town somewhere and stay in it for a while until I can get rested up. Then I can think better and know what to do.

  Right now he did not feel able to think it out.

  Later on I can plan, he decided.

  Accordingly, he turned the car in the direction of the rooming house section of town. He came at last to a large white board building with several doorbells and mailboxes. In one of the front windows hung a sign reading: ROOM FOR RENT. SO he parked and got out.

  Not a bad neighborhood, he thought as he walked up the steps to the porch. On the porch was a carton of empty Coca-Cola bottles. He rang the top bell. Presently the door opened and there stood a fat middle-aged man in trousers and underwear, his huge stomach hanging out over his belt.

  “What is it?” the man said, putting his finger into his eye to rub at it.

  He explained to the man that he was interested in the room. The man said that he was not the manager, only one of the tenants, a fireman who slept during the day. But he led Bruce up a flight of carpeted stairs, past a potted rubber plant, and showed him the vacant room. It was recently painted and it smelled clean. In one corner was a sofa; in the other a gas circulating heater. The windows had both shades and curtains. The fireman stood in the entrance, still rubbing at his eye.