I got him into the living room—he lost his other scuff on the way because his feet were dragging—and got him on the rollaway.
“Jesus Christ, Howard, what was that? What did you shoo—”
“Pantry,” he said. “Top shelf. Behind those bottles of Wesson Oil. Whiskey. This much.” He held his thumb and forefinger a smidge apart. They were trembling. I had thought he was pale before, but now, with those red spots fading from his cheeks, he looked like a dead man with living eyes.
I went into the pantry and found the bottle of Jameson’s where he said it would be. Tall as I am, I had to stand on tiptoe to reach it. The bottle was dusty and almost full. Even as wrought-up as I was—scared, almost panicked—the smell when I uncapped it brought back vile memories of my father lolling on the couch in a semi-stupor or hung over the toilet, retching. Whiskey doesn’t smell the same as gin… yet it does. All alcohol smells the same to me, of sadness and loss.
I poured a small knock in a juice glass. Mr. Bowditch tossed it down and coughed, but some of the color came back into his cheeks. He unbuckled the gaudy gunbelt. “Get this fucking thing off me.”
I pulled the holster and the belt slithered free, Mr. Bowditch giving a muttered fuck when the buckle must have scraped the small of his back.
“What do I do with it?”
“Put it under the bed.”
“Where did you get the belt?” I had certainly never seen it.
“At the gettin’ place. Just do it, but before you do, reload it.”
There were bullet loops on the belt between the conchos. I rolled the big gun’s cylinder, filled the two empty chambers, holstered the gun, and put it back under the bed. I felt like I was dreaming awake.
“What was it? What was in there?”
“I’ll tell you,” he said, “but not today. Nothing to worry about. Take this.” He gave me his keyring. “Put it on that shelf there. Give me two of those Oxys and then I’m going to sleep.”
I got him the pills. I didn’t like him taking high-tension dope after high-tension whiskey, but it had only been a small knock.
“Don’t go in there,” he said. “You may in time, but for now don’t even think of it.”
“Is it where the gold comes from?”
“That’s complicated, as they say on the afternoon soap operas. I can’t talk about it now, Charlie, and you must not talk about it to anybody. Anybody. The consequences… I can’t even imagine. Promise me.”
“I promise.”
“Good. Now go away and let an old man sleep.”
2
Radar was usually happy to go down the hill with me, but that Saturday she wouldn’t leave Mr. Bowditch’s side. I went down solo and fixed myself a deviled ham sandwich on Wonder Bread—the snack of champions. My dad left a note saying he was going to a nine AM AA meeting and bowling with Lindy and a couple of his other sober friends afterward. I was glad. I would have kept my promise to Mr. Bowditch no matter what—the consequences, I can’t even imagine, he’d said—but I’m pretty sure Dad would have seen something on my face anyway. He was a hell of a lot more sensitive to things like that now that he was sober. Usually that’s a good thing. That day it wouldn’t have been.
When I got back to Number 1, Mr. Bowditch was still asleep. He looked a little better, but his breathing had a raspy quality. It was the way he’d sounded when I found him halfway up the porch steps with his leg broken. I didn’t like it.
By evening the rasp was gone. I made popcorn, shaking it up old-school on the Hotpoint stove. We ate it while watching Hud on my laptop. It was Mr. Bowditch’s pick, I’d never heard of it, but it was pretty good. I didn’t even mind that it wasn’t in color. At one point Mr. Bowditch asked me to freeze the picture while the camera was close-up on Paul Newman. “Was he the handsomest man that ever lived, Charlie? What do you think?”
I said he could be right.
I stayed Saturday night. On Sunday, Mr. Bowditch seemed better still, so I went fishing with my dad off the South Elgin Dam. We didn’t catch anything, but it was nice to be with him in the mellow September sunshine.
“You’re awful quiet, Charlie,” he said on the way back. “Anything on your mind?”
“Just the old dog,” I said. This was mostly—but not entirely—a lie.
“Bring her down this afternoon,” Dad said, and I tried, but Radar still wouldn’t leave Mr. Bowditch.
“Go sleep in your own bed tonight,” Mr. Bowditch said. “Me ’n the old girl will be fine.”