Hit and Run

The job in Gretna ran behind schedule and over budget, which didn’t really surprise anybody. Both men put in long hours, working seven-day weeks, starting at daybreak and keeping at it until they lost the light. Do

The work was satisfying, especially when Do

When the last of the work was done, with the lawn sodded and new shrubbery in place, he brought Julia to see it. She’d been there earlier, with the work barely under way, and said it was hard to believe it was the same house. Outside of the beams and rafters, he said, it barely was.

They went to the Quarter for a celebration di

If the profit was all Do

“Well, he’s a Wallings,” she said. “They’re enterprising.”

First, though, Do

“Well, of course,” she said. “He’s an Orleanean, isn’t he?”

When they got home she asked him what had gone wrong.

“Because your whole mood changed between when we left the restaurant and when we got to the car. The weather was fine so that couldn’t be it. Did I say something? No? Then what was it?”

“I didn’t think it showed.”

“Tell me.”

He didn’t want to, but neither did he care to keep things from her. “For a minute there,” he said, “I thought someone was looking at me.”

“Well, why not? You’re a nice-looking fellow and… oh my God.”

“It was a false alarm,” he said. “He was looking past me, waiting for the valet to bring his car around. But I remembered a man I heard about who got in trouble because he went to San Francisco, where somebody who just happened to be there saw him and recognized him.”

She was quick, if you gave her the first sentence she got the whole page. “We should probably stay out of the Quarter,” she said.

“That’s what I was thinking.”

“And other places tourists tend to go, but it’s really mostly the Quarter. No more Café du Monde, no more Acme Oyster House. For oysters, Felix’s has a place uptown on Prytania that’s just as good, and they don’t get as crowded.”

“During Mardi Gras—”

“During Carnival,” she said, “we’ll stay home altogether, but we’d do that anyway. Poor baby, no wonder your mood changed.”

“What bothered me,” he said, “wasn’t getting a scare, because it didn’t last long enough to amount to all that much. By the time I knew to be afraid I could tell there was nothing to be afraid of. But I’ve got a whole new life, and it fits me like a glove, and I cut every tie to the past when we shoved that car into the river.”

“And you thought that whole part of your life was over.”

“And it is,” he said, “but what I also thought was that nothing from the past could find me, and that’s not exactly true. Because there’s always the possibility of an accident. Some sharp-eyed son of a bitch from New York or L.A. or Vegas or Chicago—”

“Or Des Moines?”

“Or anywhere. And he happens to come here on vacation, because it’s a popular spot.”

“Not so many tourists since the hurricane,” she said, “but they’re starting to come back.”

“And all it takes is one, who happens to be in the same restaurant, or on the street when we come out of the restaurant, or any damn thing. Look, it’s not very likely. We don’t exactly live the high life here, we keep a low profile by nature. Most of the time we’re home alone, and when we see somebody it’s Edgar and Patsy or Do

“They might,” she said, “when you and Do

“Don’t hold your breath. Neither of us is that ambitious. You know what appeals to Do

That changed the subject, and it stayed changed, but in bed that night, after a long shared silence, she asked if there was any way to get himself all the way off the hook.

He said, “You mean as far as Al is concerned, since the police are only a problem if I get arrested and somebody runs my prints. With Al, well, time’s a healer. The more time passes, the less he’s going to care whether I’m alive or dead. As far as taking action to get him off my back…”

“Yes?”

“Well, the only way I can see is to find some way to learn who he is and where to get hold of him. And then go there, wherever it is, and, uh, deal with him.”

“Kill him, you mean. You can say the word, it’s not going to bother me.”

“That’s what it would take. You couldn’t sign a mutual nonaggression pact with him, settle the deal with a handshake.”

“Anyway,” she said, “he ought to be dead. What’s so amusing?”

“Who knew you’d turn out to be such a tough guy?”

“Hard as nails. Is there any way to find him? You must have thought about it.”

“Long and hard. And no, I don’t think there is, and if there is I sure can’t figure it out. I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

30

Do

He came home with the news, and you’d have thought Julia already heard. The table was set with the good china, and there were flowers in a vase. “I guess someone told you,” he said, but no one had, and she congratulated him and kissed him and said the flowers and all were because she had news of her own. They’d offered her a full-time teaching position for the coming year.

“A permanent position,” she said, “and I wanted to tell them that nothing’s permanent in an uncertain world, but I decided to keep my mouth shut.”

“Probably wise.”

“That means more money, of course, but it also means benefits. And it means not having to make the acquaintance of a new batch of brats every month or so. Instead I’ll get one batch of brats and be stuck with them for the whole year.”