The Big Bounce

“Then, why didn’t he wave?”

“He’s Mr. Jack Ryan in the car now.”

Billy Ruiz shook his head. “No, he didn’t see us. He would have waved.”

“Christ, shut up with the waving! He don’t care about you. He don’t see you anymore.”

Pizarro turned from the doorway into the darkness of the shed. He found a cigarette and lit it and then went down on his blanket to get away from Billy Ruiz and the rest of them so he could think about Ryan and the girl with no clothes on and get something straight in his mind.

All right, he had sold the beer case of wallets to the girl. Last night was something he couldn’t stop thinking about: the girl coming out of the swimming pool and drying herself in front of him, not trying to hide herself, while they discussed Jack Ryan and the wallets. She put on the blouse and the shorts and he told her again, five hundred, that was the price. Then the girl going in the house and coming out with eighty dollars, with her blouse still unbuttoned. He should have kept the beer case until she got more money, but there was the eighty; it wasn’t any five hundred, but she was offering it to him.

He should have sold her the wallets one at a time. Go back once a week and she would have to pay him without any clothes on.

He should have taken her in the house or put her down on the grass. She had been asking for it and it would be something to do it to her, Mr. Ritchie’s girl; but because she was Mr. Ritchie’s girl, he had not touched her, because he couldn’t believe it-the not having any clothes on-and because he had been afraid if he touched her, something would happen. He didn’t know what. Something.

All right, he should have done a lot of things it was too late to do. But he still had one thing left, if he could get it straight in his mind how to say it to her and make her believe it. He still knew about Ryan and he could still call the police and tell them it was Ryan that robbed the place Sunday.

So the idea was to go to her at night when Ryan wasn’t there and tell her how much it would cost for him not to call the police, sticking to the five hundred this time and not coming down to any lousy eighty bucks.

He began to put words together, the way he would say it to her. Like: “If you don’t have the money, have your boyfriend steal you some. I don’t care where you get it.”

The important words: “Get me five hundred or I call the police.”

But as he lay on his blanket smoking the cigarette, in this dim oven of a place with its tin-shed roof and smell of mold, Frank Pizarro said to himself, Wait. What are you talking about the police for? Why the police. Man, you see it? There’s somebody better than the police.

Tell her, she don’t pay, you write a letter to Mr. Ritchie.

13

AT FIRST, opening his eyes and moving, feeling the soreness in his shoulders, Ryan didn’t know where he was. Settling again, stretching his legs and moving his hands over the cool aluminum arms of the lounge chair, he had a good feeling from the soreness, a feeling of having worked and finished something. He was glad he had fought the guy and it was over. He was glad the guy had seen them.

Maybe he was never going in at all and it had been just talk. Maybe if Bob Jr. hadn’t showed up, he would have thought of some other excuse. Or maybe when the time came he would have taken off. He wasn’t sure.

Or maybe he was just tired. No, that wasn’t it. He was tired all right, and sore; but that didn’t have anything to do with it. It was something else.

It was a feeling of relief. He could come right out and say to himself, You don’t have to break into the place. You don’t have to take the money and go through all that. You don’t have to get involved and worry about her bragging about it to somebody. You don’t have to be waiting for something to happen. You don’t have to even think about it anymore.

He felt like a cigarette. He touched his shirt pocket; it was flat. He couldn’t see if there were cigarettes on the umbrella table; it was too dark over there. Turning to look at the table, he turned a little more to look at the house. The room off the patio was dark, though a faint light was coming from somewhere in the back part of the room. The upstairs windows were dark. He wondered if she had gone to bed. He didn’t know what time it was. After ten anyway. He must have slept about three hours. He thought about going for a swim to loosen up but decided it would be too much trouble and it wouldn’t help much. Tomorrow when he woke up, he’d be so stiff and sore it would hurt to move and there wasn’t anything he could do about it. He wondered why she hadn’t left a light on.

Nancy heard him on the outside stairs and now, sitting in the oversized chair in the dark, she saw him on the sun deck; she watched him slide open the glass door and come in; she watched him pause, getting his bearings, then start for the den. When he was within a few feet of her chair, Nancy said, “Hi.”

He didn’t answer right away. She had surprised him and it took a few seconds for him to locate her and think of something to say.

“I was going to surprise you,” Ryan said.

“I don’t sleep in the den.” Nancy waited.

Ryan leaned close to her chair to turn on the lamp.

“Where do you sleep?”

“Upstairs.”

“Show me.”

“After,” Nancy said. “I brought up everything we’ll need.”

“Like what?”

“From the bar.” Nancy watched him, her head slightly lowered, her eyes raised. Ryan stared back at her. It was her half-assed A

“The beer’s in the fridge,” Nancy said. She didn’t move.

“I don’t think I feel like anything.”

“I do,” Nancy said.

“I didn’t think you drank beer.”

“Sometimes. Will you get me one?” She watched him go to the kitchen and in the corner of her eye saw him reach in and turn on the light. She heard the refrigerator door open and, after a moment, close.

From the kitchen he said, “There isn’t any beer.”

Nancy stared at the sliding glass door, at the darkness outside, and the dim reflection of the room. She could see herself sitting in the chair. “Look in the cupboard next to the fridge. Bottom shelf.”

“What’re you English, you like warm beer?”

“Put a couple of bottles in the freezer. It’ll only take a few minutes.”

“Maybe we should have something else.”

“I don’t want something else, I want beer.”

Ryan looked in. “I believe you.”

She waited. She heard him open the cupboard. There were faint sounds. Then silence. She counted a thousand and one, a thousand and two, a thousand and three, a thousand and four-

“You don’t have any beer,” Ryan said.

She looked over her shoulder, past the corner of the backrest, to Ryan in the doorway.

“You’ve got a bunch of old wallets, but you don’t have any beer.”

Nancy twisted around, leaning on the chair arm. “Do you recognize them?”

He stared back at her. He stared thoughtfully, taking his time. Finally he came into the living room. He drew up the ottoman of Nancy’s chair and sat down.