Deciding that I had best stick strictly to business, I said, “Your gas pumps are older than I am. How do they work? I mean, how do I pay and everything? I want to pay cash.”
“It’s a mystery,” he said, “but we can solve it together. I’ll switch on pump number one from behind the counter. You go out there and turn the crank until the meter shows only zeros. Then fill up with however much you need and come back here to pay me what the meter says you owe.”
“It’s just that in Phoenix, you put your credit card or debit card right in the pump.”
“Phoenix,” he said, “is a place of great wonders.”
“Don’t some people pump the gas and then drive away without coming back in here to pay?”
“One such scofflaw did exactly that in 1996,” John Kennedy Ching said, “but we tracked him down to Cleveland, Ohio, and burned his house to the ground.”
I laughed and nodded. “All right, you’re pulling my leg.”
Stepping behind the counter to activate pump number one, he said, “You pulled mine first, Bart Simpson. But unless you have excellent insurance on your residence, you better return to pay me.”
“I know it sounds unlikely, but my name really is Bart Simpson. My cross to bear. Oh, and could I have the keys to the men’s and women’s lavatories?”
“You do not seem to be a young man who is in doubt about his gender,” Ching said as he passed the keys to me. “I hope I may meet the lady traveling with you. She must be very interesting.”
By that point, I should have known that it was going to be a day of Ching with more twists than the woven chains of dried red peppers that were for sale in his store.
Outside, where Winston had drunk a bowl of water and was busy peeing in the dead grass beyond the parking lot, I gave one key to Bridget and one to Sparky. “All right. I told Mr. Ching that my name is Bart Simpson, so be careful not to call me Quinn or anything.”
“Bart Simpson?” Sparky said, favoring me with a look of pained incredulity.
“It was the first thing that came to my mind.”
“There’s actually a Mr. Ching?” Bridget asked. “I assumed that must be some Native American word meaning the end of nowhere.”
“Mr. Ching thinks you must be very interesting.”
“Why would he think that?”
“I made quite an impression on him.”
Sparky snorted and gave me the key to the Explorer and headed toward the men’s room.
“One more thing,” I said. They turned to me. “He thinks we’ve been over in Winkelville looking at property to purchase.”
“There’s actually a Winkelville?” Bridget asked.
“It’s about four miles from here, two miles east of Sulphur Flats and three miles south of Vulture’s Roost.”
“If they ever want to build an Arizona Disneyland,” she said, “it won’t be in this part of the state.”
After telling Winston to sit and stay, I drove the Explorer to pump number one. I cranked the numbers from the previous sale off the meter, filled the tank, and parked again in front of the store.
In the men’s room, Sparky had finished his business and was studying his face in the mirror.
I said, “Handsome fella, huh?”
“How’d I ever get to be so old?”
“You didn’t die.”
“I’m working on it,” he said, stepping outside.
I at once regretted being flippant when I remembered Bridget’s prediction that not all of us would survive what might lie ahead.
A few minutes later, refreshed, I found my three companions waiting for me in the shade of the scalloped green awning near the entrance to the store. Snakes of heat were writhing up from the blacktop highway.
“We’re starving,” Sparky said, “and the sign on the roof says fresh sandwiches.”
“It also says that well-behaved dogs are welcome,” Bridget said. “I’m thinking they might sell dog stuff. We need a leash.”
Just then a grizzled character exited the store with a purchase in each hand—a box of shotgun shells and a fifth of bourbon. Wild tangles of white hair flared out from under his cowboy hat, and the length of his beard suggested that he might once have been a member of that old rock group, ZZ Top. He looked as if he’d had a part in every Western movie ever made. As he passed us, he glanced at me and said, “Tell Homer and Marge they done a nice job with you,” and proceeded to the faded-blue pickup truck with the I SHOOT TAILGATERS bumper sticker.