Cold in July Read Online Free PDF Page A

and the other lads laughing, and I didn’t go back in there for a month.
Kathy Counsel got knocked up about six months later by our star quarterback,
Herschel Roman, and they had to quit school and Herschel threw his last ball
and started throwing nozzles into gas tanks down at the Fina on Main. He was
still there. He owned the place now and he watched lots of football on the TV
next to the Coke machine. Kathy had gotten fat and had a tongue sharp as a meat
fork. Their kid played football and was bad at it and hated it, or so the rumor
went. Occasionally, I had the urge to call up Cathy and thank her for that
slap.
    Out back of Kelly’s was where I had my only two fights. Lost
both of them. I couldn’t even remember what they were over. They had both been
with my best high school friend, Jerry Quail. He got drafted after graduation
because he wasn’t college material. He never saw action in Nam. The week before
he went over there he fell out of a helicopter on maneuvers and was killed. I
attended the funeral.
    I didn’t take one of the booth seats. I sat down at the
counter and Kay came over. She was the only waitress in the place that time of
day, and I liked her. She was pretty in a peroxide, too-much-makeup sort of
way, and happily married or not, I couldn’t help but enjoy the way her hips
worked beneath that starched white outfit she wore. She had some of what
Valerie had; an element women wished they could buy bottled and so did their
men.
    I smiled best I could and ordered coffee. She poured it up
and said, “I heard what happened.”
    “Christ,” I said. “People in this town are goddamn
telepathic.”
    “They just have big mouths,” she said. “Anyway, I’m sorry.
I’m sure it’s tough.”
    “That was just the right thing to say, Kay. Thanks.”
    She smiled and I moved over to a booth. I sat with my head
back against the old, red, leather cushion and closed my eyes. Immediately last
night jumped through my head.
    I opened my eyes and drank half of my coffee in one gulp. It
was bitter. I called to Kay to bring me a Coke. I sipped it. It wasn’t any
better.
    “Use your phone?”
    Kay was behind the bar wiping up a water spot “Have at it.
You know where it is.”
    I went through the back door, into the stockroom. The phone
was sitting on the directory on a shelf next to an economy-sized can of
tomatoes. That would be for the chili they served. It said: Good stuff, but
hot as a potbellied stove.
    I leaned on the shelf and used the directory to look up a
number. It was on the first page in big letters. I dialed.
    “LaBorde Police Department”
    “I’d like to speak to Lieutenant Price.”
    “Just a moment.”
    When Price came on the line, I said, “This is Dane. I just
wanted to know what happened to Russel’s body.”
    “He’ll be buried day after tomorrow. Would have been today,
but they did an autopsy.”
    “Why?”
    “Fairly standard procedure. Why do you want to know about
burial?”
    “This Russel, he got any family besides his old man?”
    “I don’t think so. None that we know of. The county is
paying for it. A pauper’s funeral we call it.”
    “Where’s he going to be buried?”
    “Greenley’s Cemetery. You’re not planning on coming, are
you?”
    “It crossed my mind.”
    “Guilt?”
    “Something like that.”
    “I know how you feel, but you’re letting this get out of
hand. You’ve got to accept the fact that you killed him in self-defense. He
broke into your house.”
    “Just got to thinking about it. Doesn’t seem right he’ll be
buried without anyone there.”
    “You think his spirit’s going to feel cheerier with you
there? The man who killed him?”
    I was quiet for a moment. When Price spoke again, his words
seemed packed in ice. “Look, I’m not trying to make you feel shitty, okay? I’m
just saying there’s no point. I doubt if he’d killed you he’d be attending your
funeral.”
    “Not the point—”
    “Maybe it is the point. Just do your best