The Dog of the South Read Online Free PDF Page B

business and go back to Little Rock like a whipped dog. There was no way I could beat him to San Miguel in the little Buick.
    I said, “How are you going to get Dupree out of Mexico? Your warrant won’t be any good down there.”
    Jack was scornful. “ Warrant . That’s a good one. Warrant’s ass. I don’t need a warrant. All I need is a certified copy of the bond. I’m a party to the action. That’s better than a warrant any day. I can take custody anywhere. The dumbest person in this motel knows that.”
    The woman at the organ was singing. She had been singing for some time but this was no background stuff; this song was a showstopper and we had to take notice: “And then they nursed it, rehearsed it, . . . And gave out the news . . .”
    The old man with the big shoes came back and this time he was wearing a bellboy’s cap with a strap under his chin. He ran through the place waving a scrap of paper and shouting, “Phone call! Phone call for the Sheriff of Cochise! Emergency phone call! Code ten!” The bartender ducked under the bar flap and popped a rag at him and chased him out again and I could hear the old man’s shoes flopping down the hall.
    Jack said, “Who was that old guy?”
    I said, “I don’t know.”
    â€œThey ought to lock that son of a bitch up.”
    â€œI think it’s Halloween.”
    â€œNo, it’s not. A guy like that wouldn’t know what day it was anyway. This place smells like a kennel. Did you eat here?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œCan you recommend anything?”
    â€œI can’t recommend what I had.”
    â€œSome hot-tamale crap?”
    â€œI had fish.”
    â€œThat’s a mistake. A place like this. Let’s go to some nice steakhouse. I’m hungry.”
    â€œI’ve already eaten.”
    â€œHow about the track? Why don’t we take a run out to the dog track and make some quick money? Let them dogs pay for our trip.”
    â€œThey don’t have dog races here, Jack.”
    â€œI think they do.”
    â€œThey don’t have legal gambling in Texas.”
    â€œI think they have dog races.”
    â€œI don’t think so. Out in the streets maybe. Among themselves.”
    â€œAcross the border then. I know they have some kind of racing in Juárez.”
    â€œThat’s way up there at El Paso.”
    I still didn’t see how Jack could take Dupree out of Mexico without going through some sort of legal formality. He kept telling me he was “the surety” and “a party to the action” and that such a person could go anywhere in the world and do just as he pleased. He said, “I don’t care where they are. I’ve taken these old boys out of Venezuela and the Dominican Republic.”
    We sat there and drank for a long time. Jack showed me his handcuffs, which he carried in a leather pouch on his belt. He also had a blackjack, or rather a “Big John” flat sap. He didn’t carry a gun. He said he loved the bail-bond business. His wife thought it was sleazy and she wanted him to give it up and devote all his time to the practice of law, which he found dull.
    â€œI was in the army and nobody wanted to see me,” he said. “Then I was a salesman and nobody wanted to see me. Now they’re glad to see me. Let me tell you something. You’re doing that old boy a real service when you get him out of jail. Sure, everybody has to go to jail sometime, but that don’t mean you have to stay there.”
    I asked Jack if he could help me get a job as an insurance adjuster. I had often thought of becoming an investigator of some kind and I asked him if he could put me on to something, perhaps a small shadowing job. The paper had once given me a trial as a police reporter, although hardly a fair one. Two days! Jack wasn’t interested in this subject and he wouldn’t discuss it with me.
    He wanted to