11/22/63 полностью

Lee and Robert glanced at each other.

“Might as well go in and have a look around,” Lee said.

“This a good place on a fam’ly street,” Snakeskin Boots said. “Y’all want to watch out for that first porch step, though, it needs a smidge of carpenterin. I got s’many of these places, and people is s’hard on them. That last bunch, law.”

Watch it, asshole, I thought. That’s Ivy’s people you’re talking about.

They went inside. I lost the voices, then got them again — faintly — when Snakeskin Boots ran up the front room window. It was the one Ivy had said the neighbors across the way could see into, and she was a hundred percent correct on that score.

Lee asked what his prospective landlord intended to do about the holes in the walls. There was no indignation in the query, no sarcasm, but no subservience, either, in spite of the sir appended to every sentence. It was a respectful yet flat mode of address he had probably learned in the Marines. Colorless was the best word for him. He had the face and voice of a man who was good at sliding through the cracks. In public, at least. It was Marina who saw his other face and heard his other voice.

Snakeskin Boots made vague promises, and absolutely guaranteed a new mattress for the big bedroom, on account of how “that last bunch had gone and stole” the one that had been in there. He reiterated that if Lee didn’t want the place someone else would (as if it hadn’t been standing vacant all year), then invited the brothers to inspect the bedrooms. I wondered how they would enjoy Rosette’s artistic efforts.

I lost their voices, then got them again as they toured the kitchen area. I was happy to see them pass the Leaning Lamp of Pisa without a glance.

“—basement?” Robert asked.

“No basement!” Snakeskin Boots replied, booming it, as if the lack of a basement were an advantage. Apparently he thought it was. “Neighborhood like this, all they do is ship water. And the damp, law!” Here I lost the vocal track again as he opened the rear door to show them the backyard. Which was not a yard at all but an empty field.

Five minutes later they were out front again. This time it was Robert, the elder brother, who tried to dicker. He had no more success than Lee had.

“Will you give us a minute?” Robert asked.

Snakeskin Boots looked at his clunky chromed-up watch, and allowed as how he could do that. “But I got a ’pointment over on Church Street, so you fellas need to hurry on n make up your minds.”

Robert and Lee walked to the rear of Robert’s Bel Air, and although they pitched their voices low to keep Snakeskin Boots from hearing, when I tilted the bowl in their direction, I got most of it. Robert was in favor of looking at some more places. Lee said he wanted this one. It would do fine for a start.

“Lee, it’s a hole,” Robert said. “It’s throwin your…” Money away, probably.

Lee said something I couldn’t make out. Robert sighed and raised his hands in surrender. They went back to Snakeskin Boots, who gave Lee’s hand a brief pump and praised the wisdom of his choice. He launched into the Landlord Scripture: first month, last month, damage deposit. Robert stepped in then, saying there would be no damage deposit until the walls were fixed and the new mattress was installed.

“New mattress, sure,” Snakeskin Boots said. “And I’ll see that step fixed so the little woman don’t turn her ankle. But if’n I fix them walls right off, I’d have to boost the rent by five a month.”

I knew from Al’s notes that Lee was going to take the place, and still I expected him to walk away from this outrage. Instead, he took a limp wallet out of his back pocket and removed a thin sheaf of bills. He counted most of them into his new landlord’s outstretched hand while Robert walked back to his car, shaking his head in disgust. His eyes turned briefly to my house across the street, then passed on, disinterested.

Snakeskin Boots flogged Lee’s hand again, then jumped into his Chrysler and drove off fast, leaving a scrunch of dust behind.

One of the jump-rope girls came barreling up on a rusty scooter. “You movin into Rosette’s house, mister?” she asked Robert.

“No, he is,” Robert said, and cocked a thumb at his brother.

She pushed her scooter to Lee and asked the man who was going to blow off the right side of Jack Kennedy’s head if he had any kids.

“I’ve got a little girl,” Lee said. He put his hands on his knees so he could get down to her level.

“She purty?”

“Not as pretty as you, nor as big.”

“Can she jump rope?”

“Honey, she can’t even walk yet.” Can’t came out cain’t.

“Well bullpucky on her.” She scooted away in the direction of Winscott Road.

The two brothers turned toward the house. This muffled them a little, but when I cranked the volume, I could still make out most of what they were saying.

“This… pig in a poke,” Robert told him. “When Marina sees it, she’ll be on you like flies on a dog-turd.”