52 pickup

"I'm not saying that. We know Alan isn't dumb. He's got a weird fucking mind, but he isn't dumb."

"We finding out maybe the man ain't so dumb either," Bobby Shy said. "So what you trying to say?"

"I'm saying either Alan's lying or the man is."

Bobby Shy walked on a few paces, thinking about it, before he said, "Or both of them."

"Or both," Leo said. "I thought of that."

"It's a shame, ain't it?" Bobby said. "Everybody trying to mess up everybody."

"We picked the wrong guy," Leo Frank said. "That's the whole thing. We picked the wrong fucking guy."

It took Bobby Shy the rest of the day to locate a whole lid of Colombian reefer. It was Doreen's favorite. He brought it to her and said he was sorry he doubted her word. No, he hadn't doubted her really, it was only he had to be sure. It turns out, he told Doreen, it was Leo told the man. Because that's what the man told Alan, and why would the man lie about it?

Doreen looked up at him with the eyes, sitting on the edge of the flowery couch, rolling two professional joints, and said, "You never know who you can trust, do you?"

"Deal we been working fell through," Bobby Shy told her.

And Doreen said, handing him a lighted joint, "I admire you, love, but please don't tell me about it. They some things I don't want to know."

"Man was going to pay us a hundred and five grand so we don't tell stories on him," Bobby went on. "But Alan talk to the man, he say he find out the man don't have any money. Owe it all to Uncle Sam."

"Alan told you that, huh?"

"He's the only one talk to him."

"You believe it?"

"That's where we're at," Bobby Shy said.

"Well, you could talk to Alan again, put a pillow over his face."

"Yeah, I could do that."

"Or," Doreen said, "you could go see the man."

"I could do that too."

"Ask him, how come if he's broke he's carrying all that money around in an envelope."

Bobby Shy held the reefer, about to take a drag. "You see that envelope of his?"

"He took it out of his pocket and put it back," Doreen said. "It was thick."

"Leo say ten grand in it."

Doreen nodded. "I believe it."

"What I want to know," Bobby Shy said, "why he showed it to you."

Doreen drew in on the joint. It calmed her and gave her confidence. She said, "He mentioned something about he wanted to give it to Alan. I forgot to tell you that the time you ask me."

"You forgot to tell me."

"He just mentioned wanting to see Alan. It didn't seem like any big thing."

"He showed you the money?"

"Little bit of it."

"And he gave you some?"

"He took it out, peeled off a hundred. That's when I told him I was busy."

"That's all, huh? You didn't tell him anything about Alan. Where he lives or works-"

"Hey, Bobby," Doreen said. "What're you worried about Alan for? He tell you the deal's off-he's not worried about you, is he?"

"That's a point," Bobby said.

"Alan saw the man's money? In the envelope?"

"I believe he did."

"And he's just going to forget about it?"

"That's another point."

"Something's going on, baby, Alan hasn't told you about."

"As I said a minute ago, that's where we're at."

"And as I mentioned," Doreen said, "you could go see the man. Find out if he's still got his envelope laying around someplace? You understand what I'm saying?"

Bobby Shy nodded. "Could do that."

"Like at night. Late."

"After everybody's asleep."

"Man, that little envelope," Doreen said. "It holds more than a whole bus full of people, don't it?"

They were back where they had been for twenty-two years and it was even better than it had been for a long time. He wanted to be with her He felt good with her. There was nothing to hide now, no excuses that had to be made.

It was Sunday, sixty degrees and a clear sky, and they decided not to think of anything or anybody but themselves today. They played three sets of te

Several times, working to beat Barbara, he had thought of Cini. Cini alive. He wasn't sure why. He couldn't picture Cini playing te

Lying on the bed, looking at each other, Barbara said, "It's better than that dumb movie, isn't it?"

And Mitchell said, "Way better. You have to be in love to find out."

"Do you feel that?"

"Of course I do."

"Tell me."

"I love you."

"There isn't any other way to say it, is there?"

"I don't know of any."

"It's good to hear. That's something," she said. "It's always good to hear. I get a feeling inside when you say it."

"Even after-?" He paused.

"Don't."

"I was going to say, even after all these years?"

"It gets better."

"I guess if you want it to it does."

"Do you remember when you used to come home from trips? Even if you were gone only a day or two, we couldn't wait."

"I was thinking about that the other day."

"Were you really?"

"Why would I lie? I'd rather make love to you than-I don't know, name a good-looking movie star."

"Than Paul Newman."

Barbara smiled. "You really do love me, don't you?"

"What do you think I've been trying to tell you?"

"It's different now, isn't it? Do you feel it?"

"Like starting over."

"Being in love rather than just loving."

"I guess there's a difference."

"You were letting me win the third set, weren't you?"

"I got tired about in the middle."

"Mitch, I love you."

And he said, "Then we've got nothing to worry about."

They stood at the counter in the kitchen to eat hot homemade chili with French bread and hard butter-Barbara wiping her eyes, Mitch blowing his nose-and drank ice-cold Canadian beer from stem glasses. Late Sunday lunch was chili or hot dogs. Saturday Mitch fried hamburgers and onions. Today was the first time they had observed either of the rituals in almost three months. It was good to be back.

It was good to sit on the couch in the den and watch an old Gary Cooper movie, Good Sam, and remember they had seen it together before they were married. It wasn't so good-not at first-when the friends dropped in, three couples who were close friends, coming from a cocktail party. But it did get better with good talk and drinks and the chicken they sent out for, and by ten o'clock the house was quiet again. At eleven-thirty, after the late news, they went to bed and for a little while longer it was the way it had been for so many years, holding each other as they went to sleep.

She said very quietly, "Mitch?"

"What?"

"There's somebody downstairs."

"I know there is."