“Hugo?”

“Yeah, who’s this?”

“It’s Tim.”

“Tim who?”

“Tim who works for Josef. Lose the charade. You want an update or not?”

“You got Preacher?”

“We’re working on it.”

“Explain that.”

“We had him boxed, but he disappeared. I don’t know how he did it.”

“Preacher is onto you but he got away? Do you have any idea what you’re telling me?”

“It sounds like you overloaded on your Ex-Lax.”

“You listen, asshole-”

“No, you listen. The guy has got no wheels and no house to go back to. We’ll find him. In the meantime-”

“What do you mean, he has no house to-”

“There was a propane accident in his kitchen. Some vandals blew the tires off his car at about the same time. Everything is under control. Here’s the good news. You said you were looking for a broad.”

“No, I said Preacher was looking for a broad. He’s got an obsession about her. You said you shot out his tires? What the fuck do you think this is? Halloween?”

“Man, you just don’t listen, do you?”

“About what?”

“The broad and the soldier you’re looking for. She has chestnut hair and green eyes, looks like a fine piece of ass, sings Gomer Pyle spirituals to beer-drinking retards who don’t have a clue? If that sounds right, I know where you can find her.”

“You found Vikki Gaddis?”

“No, Michelle Obama. You got a pencil?”

“There’s one here somewhere. Hang on.”

“One day you guys have to explain to me how you got into the life.”

Inside the motel room, the women got up and dressed in the bathroom. The woman from the dollar store came out first, blotting her face with a towel, smoothing her hair out of her face. She was overweight and round-shouldered, her arms big like a farm girl’s; without makeup, her face was as stark as a pie plate. “Where’s the pizza?” she asked.

“The guy must have got lost,” one biker said.

The other biker wanted to use the bathroom, but the second woman had locked the door. “What are you doing in there?” he said, shaking the knob.

“Calling my son. Hold your water,” she said through the door.

“I love family values,” he said.

The second woman came out of the bathroom. Unlike her friend, her bone structure looked like it had been created from an Erector Set. Her face was triangular in shape, her skin bad, her eyes filled with a glint that seemed to teeter without cause on malevolence.

“Your kid okay?” one of the bikers said.

“You think I’d be here if he wasn’t?” she replied.

“Not everybody is such a good mother.”

The two women went out the door. A beaded sky-blue sequined purse hung on a string from the overweight woman’s shoulder. She looked back once, smiling as though to say good night.

Tim came back into the room and sat down in a chair by the window. He pulled off his metal-sheathed boots and cupped his hands on his thighs, staring at the floor. “We’ve got to clean this up.”

“You talk to Josef?”

“To this lamebrain Hugo. He says we spit in the tiger’s mouth.”

“A guy on crutches with no car or house? I think this guy is some kind of urban legend.”

“Maybe.”

“I’m hungry. You want me to call the pizza place again or go out?”

“What I want you to do is let me think a minute.”

“You should have got laid, Tim.”

Tim stared at the nicked furniture, the yellowed curtains on the windows, the bedclothes piled on the floor. On the chair by the television set was a gray vinyl handbag, the brass zipper pulled tight. “There’s something wrong,” he said.

“Yeah, we’re wandering around in a giant skillet. Is this whole state like this?”

“Who ordered the pizza?”

“The skinny broad.”

“What’d she say?”

“‘I want two sausage-and-mushroom pizzas.’”

“Pick up the receiver and hit redial.”

“I think you’re losing it, man.”

“Just do it.”

“This phone doesn’t have a redial.”

“Then get the number off the pizza menu on the desk and call it.”

“Okay, Tim. How about a little serenity here?”

Someone knocked on the door. The biker who had picked up the phone replaced the receiver in the cradle. He started toward the door.

“No!” Tim said, holding up his hand. He got up from his chair in his sock feet and clicked off the light. He pulled back the window curtain just far enough to see the walkway.

“Who is it?” the other biker asked him.

“I can’t tell,” Tim said. He removed the Glock from his overnight bag. “What do you want?” he said through the door.

“Pizza delivery,” a voice said.

“What took you so long?”

“There was an accident on the highway.”

“Set it on the walkway.”

“It’s in the warmer.”

“If you set it down, it won’t be in the warmer any longer, will it?”

“It’s thirty-two dollars.”

Tim put on the night chain and took out his wallet. He eased the door open, the chain links tightening against the brass slot. The delivery man was older than he expected, blade-faced, his nose sunburned, an orange-and-black cloth cap pulled low on his brow.

“How much did you say?”

“Thirty-two dollars even.”

“I’ve only got a hundred.”

“I have to go back to the car for change.”

Tim held on to the hundred and closed the door and waited. A moment later, the delivery man returned and knocked again. Tim cracked the door and handed the hundred-dollar bill to him. “Count the change out on the top of the box. Keep five for yourself.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“What’s your name?”

“Doug.”

“Who’s with you in your car, Doug?”

“My wife. When I get off, we’re going to visit her mother at the hospital.”

“You take your wife on deliveries so you can go to the hospital together?”

The delivery man began blinking uncertainly.

“I was just asking,” Tim said. He shut the door and waited. Then he went to the curtain and peeled it from the corner of the window and watched the pizza man turn his car around and drive back onto the highway. He opened the door and squatted down and lifted the two heavily laden cartons of pizza from the concrete. They were warm in his hand and smelled deliciously of sausage and onions and mushrooms and melted cheese. He watched the taillights of the delivery car disappear down the road, then closed the door and replaced the chain. “What are you guys looking at?” he said to his companions.

“Hey, you’re just being careful. Come on, let’s scarf.”

They ordered beer brought over from the nightclub, and for the next hour, they ate and drank and watched television and rolled joints out of Tim’s stash. Tim even became silently amused at his concern over the pizza man. He yawned and lay back on the bed, a pillow behind his head. Then he noticed again the vinyl handbag one of the women had left behind. It had fallen from the chair and was lodged behind the television stand. “Which one of the broads was carrying a gray purse?” he said.

“The bony one.”

“Check it out.”

But before the other biker could pick up the handbag, there was another knock on the door. “We need a turnstile here,” Tim said.

He got up from the bed and went to the window. This time he pulled the curtain all the way back so he could have a clear view of the walkway and door area. He went to the door and opened it on the chain. “You forgot your purse?” he said.

“I left it here or in the club. It’s not at the club, so it must be here,” the woman said. “Everything is in it.”

“Hang on.” He shut the door, his hand floating up to release the chain.

“Don’t let her in, man. If women can have a hard-on, this one has got a hard-on. I’ll get her purse,” one of the other bikers said.

Tim slipped the night chain from its slot.

“Tim, wait.”

“What?” Tim said, twisting the doorknob.

“There ain’t a wallet in the purse. Just lipstick and tampons and used Kleenex and hairpins.”

Tim turned around and looked back at his friend, the door seeming to swing open of its own accord. The woman who had knocked was hurrying across the parking lot toward a waiting automobile. In her place stood a man Tim had never seen. The man was wearing a suit and a white shirt without a tie, and his hair was greased and combed straight back, his body trim, his shoes shined. He looked like a man who was trying to hold on to the ways of an earlier generation. His weight was propped up by a walking cane that he held stiffly with his left hand. In his right hand, snugged against his side, was a Thompson machine gun.