The Sucker

1

IT WAS early in the morning, not yet seven, when somebody out in front of the garage leaned an elbow down hard on a car horn. I cursed whoever it was and jerked the coffee pot off the rear burner.

Slade!

That was Cleo, in the next room.

I grinned, and shoved the coffee pot back on the fire. In a few minutes she would be up, wandering around in that red robe which kept falling open all the time. Some day, I figured, she was going to lose that robe. I didn’t know what I’d do if she did. I grinned again. Like hell I didn’t know.

Hey, Slade, somebody’s out there!

I hear them, Cleo. Get up. Coffee’s on.

Reluctantly I took my jacket from a nail, listening for her to yell some more, but she didn’t. It wasn’t so much the cold and the rain outside. I guess that after three weeks I just was pretty much fed up with Litchfield. I didn’t much care whether the garage did any business or not. At least, not this early in the morning.

Cleo had the only bedroom in the clapboard living quarters. I’d been losing my sleep on a cot set up alongside the grease pit, wondering all the time how it might be if she wasn’t so innocent and young.

I slid into the jacket, forced myself to go outside into the cold March rain. The car was parked alongside the gas pumps. It was a late Ford convertible, fire-engine red, and a guy had the hood up, stood there looking in at the motor.

I said, The wires will get wet and then it won’t run at all.

Well, it’s not running anyway.

The man stood up and shook the rain out of his hair. He was pretty tall, around six feet, and his face had a smooth, clean look to it.

What seems to be the trouble?

He lowered the hood and it closed with a slam.

Radiator hose came loose, he said. Let all the damn water and anti-freeze out.

The rain was coming down harder now, pouring out of the sky through a low fog. The wind was cold and sharp.

We’ll run it in on the grease rack, I said. Nuts to working out here on it.

The man glanced around, looking uncomfortable.

It won’t cost you much, I said. If that’s what’s bothering you.

No, it isn’t that. Do you have a men’s room?

Sure. We had a men’s room — if Cleo wasn’t already in it. Around the corner, and down to the end of the building. It’s the door with the rope handle on it. The other one goes to the cellar.

He went off through the rain, jumping across the puddles that lay brown and deep in the clay yard. In stormy weather the place looked almost worse than it was, if that were possible. The boards on the side of the shack were weatherbeaten and curled and they took on an ugly black appearance when they were wet. There were two windows in front, close to the ground, and they were both cracked. Some old tires and a couple of rusty car bodies lay scattered around in the high weeds.

I shrugged and went over and opened the door to the grease rack. It wasn’t exactly a rack, just a pit dug into the ground, and the oil down inside smelled like fish on a beach in hot sun. I pushed the cot out of the way, up against the wall.

Walking back to the car, I noticed the fancy wire wheels and the way the thing had been channeled and lowered in the rear. I’d never cared much for those real continental tire kits that stuck out past the trunk, but on this car it looked pretty good. Maybe it was because of the passenger inside.

Hello, I said. I slid in behind the wheel and closed the door. I didn’t know anybody else was in here.

Well, you know it now, she said.

They’d had the heater going and she had slipped out of her coat, down to a black dress with rather long sleeves. The dress was slashed low in front, halfway down to her middle, and she looked as if she was going to crawl out of the top of it any second. She had black hair, as black as the dress, and it fell in deep waves across her shoulders. Her complexion was good, not white and not pink, and her eyes seemed just a shade lighter than her hair. Her eyebrows were naturally arched, not the plucked and penciled kind, and she had a good nose. But it was her mouth that I noticed most. She had full red lips, wet and drooping just a trifle at the corners. Expensive lips. The sultry type that could get a guy in trouble.

I started the car.

Dual exhausts, I said, listening to the rumble. I goosed the engine and it snarled, backing off sharply. Plenty of power. Plenty.

Seventy in second, she said. I don’t know what it will do in low.

I put the car in gear but I kept watching her, the way she stretched out, her legs long and straight, her knees coming out from under the hem of her dress. She yawned, arching her body, and I thought she was going to punch a couple of holes in the top of the convertible.

I drove the car inside and parked it over the pit. The air was cold but I left the door open just to let the stink blow out. By the time I got the hood up and the extension light rigged, the guy was back from the john.

Just a clamp come loose, I told him. It’ll only take a minute.

He nodded and went around the car.

You want to get out, Ruth? he asked the girl.

She said something about her coat and he opened the door for her. He reached in and got the coat and when she held her arms back for it I expected that dress to rip wide open for sure.

I hope we’re not here long, she said. I could feel her nose going to work on that old oil in the pit. She came around the car, glancing down at my cot like it was something that I’d hauled up from the village dump. This place gives me the creeps.

You’re not the only one, I told her.

I put the clamp on and tightened it up. The hose was new, good stuff, and it wasn’t any trouble at all. I noticed the four carbs in a row on the manifold, chromed up bright, and the set of heads that looked like they were polished every morning.

You a rodder? I asked the guy. I was surprised because to me he looked a little old for it; thirty, maybe thirty-five.

I sell the stuff, he said. Mostly mail order.

Looks like apple pie, I said, admiring the engine.

He smiled and nodded. Ever hear of Rockland Motors?

Can’t say I have — but I don’t keep up with things so good.

I told you we spend too much for advertising, the girl said.

The guy started belly-aching about people not reading stuff sometimes and I went to the faucet and filled a can with water. The smell of the perking coffee came through the cracks in the building and I suddenly felt hungry.

You want anti-freeze in this? I wanted to know.

To hell with it, the guy said.

It can get pretty cold in the hills during March, even in lower New York State, but it was no skin off my rump so I dumped in the water.

How about the battery? the guy asked.

Sure, I said. Anything.

And the windshield, the girl said. Inside and out.

She stood there impatiently and I could see that her lines were fast and trim, built for speed and mileage.

You can have anything you want, I told her.

I got the sponge and did the windshield first. She watched me, eyebrows arched, as if she were putting the cot and the smell of the oil together and could not make them quite add up to me. I knew I shouldn’t, but I kept staring at her. I kept staring and it made her smile and that hit me low down in the guts, twisting them. I could almost feel my hands running along the side of her chin, touching the softness, going down her neck, maybe hurting her a little, sliding further down. I started to sweat and I shut my eyes, trying to see Kathy again, trying to hate this one, too. But when I opened them she was still there, only she wasn’t smiling and she’d drawn her coat up tight. And she didn’t look at all like Kathy. She didn’t look like anyone I’d ever seen before.

The water in the battery was all right but I checked the oil and he needed a quart.

I burn it by the gallon, he said, bragging about it. The way I drive.

I punched a hole in a can and stuck it into the chrome spout.

This ought to be able to roll, I said.

You kidding? She don’t peak out until a hundred and nine.

That’s not so fast, I said.

The guy looked at the girl and they both winked.

Maybe you could do better, he suggested.

I pulled out the oil can, holding a rag under it so that it would not drip on the paint.

Maybe, I said.

Mind telling me how?

I lowered the hood. For instance, by shoving in a hundred-and-eighty degree crank, I told him.

He stood there rubbing his chin and glancing at the girl — as if they shared some secret I had suddenly violated.

I know what you’re talking about, he said. They used to use them in the Ford sixties when we were running midgets. They were the only thing that would beat an Offy.

The girl’s face hardened and she pulled her coat tighter.

Dad was running one when he got killed, she said.

Yeah, the guy agreed, I remember.

I was getting ready to give them a nickel so they could play themselves a sad tune when the man looked at me rather sharply and asked a loaded question.

You act as though you know a lot about this stuff, he said. Maybe you know so much that you can set up one of those cranks?

I lit a Camel and let the smoke roll between us.

Wouldn’t be surprised if I could, I said.

Then you’re the only one in the east. And one of the few in the country.

Well, that wouldn’t surprise me either.

It would me, the girl said. She looked around at the junk and the unpainted walls. I don’t think I’d ever get over it.

If you don’t know much about cars, then you don’t know anything about a hundred-and-eighty degree crankshaft. It’s simply a crank which is specially cast and then set up so that the cylinders in a V8 engine fire straight down the line, almost like two four-cylinder engines side by side.

Maybe I should introduce myself, the guy said.

I kept looking at the girl.

Sure.

Like I said, we have Rockland Motors. I’m Midge Dalton and the young lady is Ruth Talley.

Hello, Ruth.

She didn’t say a thing. She just smiled at me and looked superior.

Her father was a good midget man. Ever hear about him?

No.

He beat me plenty of times.

You look pretty big for the midgets, I said. I’d like to see you get into one.

He laughed.

Not any more, he said. I just sell the stuff. Not much to the midgets, although it’s coming back. Mostly stock cars and road stuff.

The girl was getting restless and she started walking around. Even under the coat she had plenty of movement, full and easy.

That job’ll cost you a buck, I said, trying not to watch her. And forty cents for the oil.

He didn’t seem to hear me.

You ever set up one of those cranks? he wanted to know.

Three or four.

When?

A couple in college and a couple after. Just for friends, nothing serious.

You an engineer?

That’s right.

He stared at the wall where the gaskets and fan belts hung in a tangle of spider webs.

Hell of a place for an engineer to be, he said. Funny for a guy with a good education to be found in a deadfall like this.

I won it. In a crap game.

You didn’t win much.

I shrugged.

You planning on staying here?

No, I said. Three weeks in this section and I’m ready to crawl up trees backwards. I’m shoving off any day.

You might be interested in a job?

I looked at the girl. She was leaning up against the car and her coat had come open again.

I might.

We could use some of those cranks. Midge Dalton walked over to the girl and his voice got excited. Jesus, we’d have a beauty, if we could advertise those hundred-and-eighty degree shafts! There’s nobody doing it, Ruth — nobody at all. Can you imagine how those stock car boys would go for something like that?

I can imagine, she said. She came toward me, walking slow and smiling. Only I don’t think he can do it. I don’t think he can do it at all.

Our eyes met and held.

She knew what I was thinking, all right, because I could see it in her face, in the way her eyes clouded over, getting darker.

Don’t make me laugh, she said.

She was up close and I could smell the damp rain in her hair and the woman perfume of her. I knew, somehow, that together we would be dynamite, shattering everything that we touched, but I couldn’t walk away from it now. She wasn’t like Kathy, or any of the others, and I had to find out what made her different.

Yeah, I said, turning to Dalton. I’d like a job making up cranks for you. I’d like it fine.

He seemed to go for that in a big rush and he started telling me about his business, how much gross he did, around four hundred thousand, and that he spent more than forty grand a year in advertising. I didn’t pay much attention to him. I kept watching the girl and trying to figure out how quick I could haul myself out of Litchfield.

You could start any time, Midge Dalton said. At a hundred a week.

Okay.

That seems pretty high, the girl said.

Not for turning out those cranks.

If he can do it, she said. He hasn’t done anything yet.

My eyes kept taking off her clothes and putting them back on. After a while I left them off.

I’ll do plenty, I told her.

She walked around the car, got in and slammed the door hard. I could see her looking out at me through the glass. After a while she yawned, closed her eyes and put her head back against the cushion. I got the impression that she didn’t think she was missing anything at all.

Don’t worry about her, the man told me. Ruth will see things my way.

Oh, sure, I said.

You know where we’re located?

No.

He told me they were in Shehawken, about thirty miles away, and that they occupied a building on one of the side streets.

If you take me up on my offer, he said, I wish you’d do it right away. It’s getting close to the racing season and we’ll have a chance to profit by it if we can get out some early advertising.

I knew what he was thinking. If I produced those cranks for him he could clean up a wad, not only from the cranks and the piston assemblies, but also from the other parts the stock boys would buy at the same time.

I’ll think it over, I said. I’ll let you know.

He looked disappointed.

I thought you sounded hot for it.

Well, sure, but I have to straighten myself out here first. I can’t burn the shack down or just walk off and leave it.

No, I suppose not.

The coffee smell was stronger and I thought I could hear Cleo in the tiny kitchen, moving around. I wondered what she’d say when I told her I was shoving off, but I didn’t worry about it. She didn’t mean anything to me. I’d only known her since I’d been back in the States. That part about the crap game had not been a gag, though it sounded enough like one. About three weeks before I’d come driving up the road, looking for the gas station I’d won in a crap session from Johnny Easton, on a construction job in Iceland. He hadn’t said anything about having a sister, or what the place was like, or much of that sort. He’d had an Icelandic girl qualified for motherhood and he’d needed kroner and he’d thrown the gas station into the pot. The next morning they washed the top of his head off the ceiling in the hut and sent the rest of him home in a box.

Look, I said. I’ll see what I can do and if things come off all right, I’ll drop in and we can talk it over.

I wish you would. I think we can help each other.

I looked at the girl