The Switch Read online

  Richard: He’s always upstairs. I think he’s screwing her, but when I go up there they aren’t doing it.

  Ordell: Richard, tonight . . . I want you to take the lady home.

  Richard: I think he screws her real fast and doesn’t take his pants off or anything.

  Ordell: Richard! (pause) You have to listen to me, man, very very carefully. You listening?

  Richard: Yeah, I’m listening.

  Ordell: Since we all through, I want you and Louis to take the lady home tonight.

  Richard: Tonight take her?

  Ordell: Tonight when it’s dark. Tell Louis to get a car like he did and put her in the trunk. You follow in your car, Richard, case he has a flat tire or something. You understand? See, my van’s at the airport, Richard. But you don’t want to use it anyway. Always, Louis say, steal a car. It’s a rule.

  Richard: He gets a car and I follow him in my Hornet.

  Ordell: In the black Hornet. Tell Louis, take her in the house, lock her in a closet and cut the phone wires so he’ll have time to get way away from there—you understand?—and she can’t call anybody. But then, Richard?

  Richard: What?

  Ordell: This next part you got to do without Louis knowing about it. You got to when he’s gone, Louis’s gone, you go back to her house . . . go in . . . find out where he put her so you don’t have to look all over for her, you understand?

  Richard: Yeah, find out where he put her.

  Ordell: Then, Richard . . . you have to kill her.

  Richard: (pause) I do?

  Ordell: You have to, Richard, on account of she knows who you are. She told me. She said she recognize your voice and saw your pants. She know you the one came to her house. That’s what the Jew lady told me, Richard. She said you ain’t getting away with this, cause I know who that fat son of a bitch rent-a-cop is and I’m gonna see him put in jail.

  Richard: You know I wondered about that. There was something she said—

  Ordell: We don’t have no choice, Richard. I don’t want to see you, any of us go to jail. Man, it’ll kill you, worse than kill you in there with all those perverts, man, taking all kinds of trips on you. Richard . . . you got to kill the Jew lady. There ain’t no other way.

  Richard: Well—(long pause) What should I use?

  Ordell: You the expert, Richard. (pause) But, Richard, listen to me. Don’t . . . tell . . . Louis. He’ll chicken on you, Richard, and mess you up.

  Richard: I think the Python, the mag. It’s my favorite. (pause) You know something?

  Ordell: What, man?

  Richard: I knew she was a Jew. I could tell.

  17

  * * *

  NEATNESS COUNTS. Of all the rules of magazine contests Mickey had entered when she was young, that was the one she remembered. She had taken it upon herself to be neat and clean long before she learned about virgins and holy purity from the I.H.M. Sisters. When she was a little girl, her mother had told her, she used to change clothes three and four times a day. She would come downstairs wearing a good dress to go out to play and her mother would march her back up to her room.

  The blue shirt and white slacks didn’t look that bad, for four days. She was pretty sure she didn’t smell. They had let her take a shower yesterday and the day before. But there was no deodorant in the bathroom, obviously. The fat policeman didn’t seem to know what it was. He hadn’t forgotten to bring it, this was his house—he had said it to the nice one outside the bathroom door, arguing, “It’s my house, ain’t it?”—though she couldn’t associate the fat policeman with this room. It was more like her grandmother’s. And then her mother was mixed up in her mind with the fat policeman.

  What would her mother think if she knew? Her father—she had never realized it before—her father looked like a TV dad in his cardigan sweater with the full sleeves, his pipe, his gray hair—thin but still wavy—his comfortable manner. Her dad would look at the fat policeman and say, “Hi, chief, how are you?” She would say, “Dad, he kidnapped me.” And her mother would say, “Oh, now, you’re imagining things. You can see he’s a policeman.” And her father would wait on the sidelines with his pipe while she and her mother discussed it. Both her mother and dad would accept the policeman, and his authority, at face value. She could not imagine them questioning anything—other than the Democratic Party and trade unions—or discussing or arguing with each other about anything . . . important.

  What was important?

  To get some clean clothes, go home, look at the house . . . call to see how Bo was— She stopped and thought: You’re as bad as they are. Stay in your own little world—

  She thought, If you get out of this, what will you do? What will you say to Frank?

  Come on, you walk in the house and he’s standing there. What will you say? . . . Hi? She heard a pretend little-Mickey voice say, “Oh, hi . . . No, I’m fine. How’re you?” And never discuss it beyond that point ever again. Hide at the club and get back into the routine. “No, I haven’t been away really. I was—” Where?

  There were two quick raps on the door, the sound of the key in the lock. Mickey turned off the bed lamp and sat down in the rocker. The nice one came in from the hallway light with the dinner tray. She had heard the fat policeman this morning, but not the other one, the black one, since the day before yesterday.

  “What time is it?”

  “About one,” Louis said. He placed the tray on the bed.

  “I don’t think I can eat any more noodles.”

  “Ham and cabbage today,” Louis said.

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “And cream-style corn.”

  “Oh, that’s different,” Mickey said, “cream-style corn. Do you people read? I’d love something to read.”

  “You’re going home,” Louis said.

  Mickey sat up, her hands on the chair arms. “When?”

  “Later on.”

  “He paid you?”

  “We’re gonna drop you off after awhile.”

  Mickey sat back in the chair again, slowly. “I don’t believe you.”

  “So, don’t,” Louis said. He turned to go out.

  “Wait—Did my husband really pay you?”

  “Yeah, it’s done.”

  “All you asked for?”

  “I guess he must’ve.”

  “But you’re not sure?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.” He motioned to the tray. “Eat your dinner.”

  “What’re you going to do to me? Will you tell me?”

  “I already did. You’re going home.”

  “I won’t tell anybody,” Mickey said. “I promise I won’t go to the police.”

  “Well, it wouldn’t help your husband any,” Louis said. “I ‘magine you’ll have a few things to say to him but I’d keep in mind he’s paid a lot of money for you.”

  “Did you talk to him?”

  “Not personally, but it’s all done. I ‘magine you’ll have a few things to say to your friend, too. I’d like to hear what he’s telling people, how he got the cut in his head.”

  She was thinking, Could it actually be happening this way? Go home, pick up where she left off. It was what she had been thinking about just before. Walking in the house and seeing Frank, saying, Hi-I’m-fine-how’re-you—?

  She said again, “I don’t believe you. It doesn’t happen like this.”

  “What doesn’t?”

  “It doesn’t happen as if it never happened, for God sake. You can’t kidnap somebody and take a million dollars and that’s the end of it.”

  “It is if it works,” Louis said.

  “Do you have the money?”

  Louis hesitated. “I told you, yes.”

  “You’ve seen it?”

  “Look, take my word. You’re going home.”

  Her voice rose. “No!” Then was quiet again, though with an edge to it. “Something’s going on. It doesn’t happen this way. And you don’t know any more than I do. The other one went to Freeport, didn’t he?” />
  “I got to go downstairs,” Louis said.

  “He called you and said my husband gave him the money? It was that simple?”

  “I’ll be back for you,” Louis said.

  “To kill me?”

  He stopped, his hand on the door. “Take it easy, okay? I say you’re going home, you’re going home.”

  In the kitchen Louis said, “The one thing I don’t understand, why he didn’t ask to talk to me.”

  “He was in a phone booth,” Richard said.

  Louis waited, but that was all the explanation he was going to get. “What did he say exactly?”

  “I told you.”

  “I mean his exact words. Like if you were writing a police report.”

  “He said, it’s all set.”

  “All set, uh?” What did “all set” mean. It could mean anything. “You should’ve called me to the phone.”

  Richard tightened up. “He said I could tell you it was all set and take the woman home, and then about getting a car and putting her in the trunk, that part, that was all he said. He didn’t say anything else, goddarn-it!”

  “What’re you getting mad about?”

  “I ain’t mad,” Richard said. “I say something, it’s the truth.” With his face red, his mouth a tight line, looking as though he was going to punch somebody out.

  Big dumb fuckhead Nazi gunfighter to handle, to keep calm, keep him busy making his fucking noodles. Louis said, trying to sound like Ordell, “Hey, it’s cool, Richard. Nothing to be upset about, man. I believe you. I just want to make sure I understand it. You know what I mean?”

  “He said it was all set, he had the money.”

  “Ah,” Louis said. “I must’ve missed that part. He did get the money. Good. See, I was wondering about that.” You dumb fuckhead. “So, what I want to do now, I want to use your car for a little while. Line up some transportation for tonight.”

  “How long you want to use it?”

  “Half hour maybe. That okay?”

  Richard guessed it was, but took his time giving Louis his keys. Then told Louis when he came back, he was to back the Hornet in the driveway like he found it. Richard liked it headed out at the street, ready.

  Louis almost told him to stay away from the lady: they didn’t want to get her mad and upset now that it was over. But he thought better of it and kept his mouth shut. He’d hurry instead.

  In fact, Louis decided, once he was out on Woodward Avenue in the Hornet, he might be able to get back in about five minutes.

  His original plan was to go north into Ferndale and Royal Oak; but then he got the restaurant idea and couldn’t think of a good one north, with valet service, within ten miles. There was a good one about a mile and a half south though, the Paradiso. He could walk there from Richard’s house, later on when it was dark. Go in the parking lot, spot a car in the back row, describe it to the parking guy and hand him a buck. It was a lot easier than crossing wires. And he wouldn’t have to go scouting around and leave Richard alone with the lady.

  What he’d do, check the distance to the restaurant on the odometer to make sure it wasn’t farther than he thought or had burned down or anything. If it was still there, he should be back in about five minutes easy.

  Try it again. You walk in the house—Mickey pictured it, opening the door, seeing the familiar black-and-white tile. You go into the kitchen. There’s a sound from the den. Frank comes out. He sees you, stops. His hands come up. He says . . .

  Quietly—no, gravely, his hands at his sides. “How are you?” And you say, “I’m fine, thank you.” Very coolly, looking him right in the eye. “And how was Freeport?” And Frank says . . . “Not bad. I shot a seventy-two at Lucaya yesterday. The greens were slow, otherwise—”

  “Do you want something to eat? I haven’t been to the store this week, but we must have something.” She goes to the refrigerator.

  Her mother was there, somewhere, saying, “Oh, Margaret, don’t be silly. Frank wouldn’t do that. Frank’s a wonderful husband and father.” While her dad, holding his pipe, watched. “No, mom, really. Things are not as nice as they seem. Nothing is.” But why bother? It would require too much of an effort to tell her mother, to tell her friends at the club. And for what? Assuming they would let her go. She would sit and wait and see and if they did she couldn’t tell anyway. Frank would go to jail.

  Try that.

  “Keep your mouth shut, Frank. You say one more word about your golf game, I’ll turn you in.”

  It was getting better.

  Richard entered his mother’s room without the monster mask on, without knocking and telling the woman to turn out the light first. He walked in, looked at her sitting in the rocker and then at the tray of food on the bed. Sure as hell just what he thought, she hadn’t touched it.

  He said, “You didn’t eat your ham.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “I forgot you’re not allowed to eat it.”

  He lifted the tray and took it over to the dresser, Mickey giving him a funny look. “Why aren’t I allowed to eat it?”

  “Your religion, if you want to call it that. I call it something else.”

  She wondered if it was worth asking him what he was talking about . . . and why he’d left the light on and wasn’t wearing the rubber Frankenstein face she had seen once through the uncovered eye of her mask. She watched him come around to the near side of the bed—in his policeman pants and a white T-shirt, hands on his hips, the armpits stained gray—and tried not to breathe.

  “He tell you, Louis, you’re going home?”

  Louis. “Yes, he did.” The nice one was Louis.

  “I’m gonna miss you around here.”

  “I’ll miss you too,” Mickey said. “I’ve had a lovely time.” The wrong thing to say, making fun of him. Seeing his nose tighten, seeing Richard’s hard-eyed look-right-through-’em look.

  He pulled her up by the arms and threw her on the bed, moving in over her as she tried to twist free, as she strained, turning her head from the red face looking down at her, feeling his knee between her legs. He was telling her now he had been wanting to see something and he was gonna see it, goddarn-it, and he was gonna do whatever he wanted and she was gonna lie there and not move or holler or anything or he would kill her right now, right here on his mother’s bed, and not wait till after. Her eyes were closed. She was trying to get her breath and trying to remember what she was supposed to do that it said in books and on the women’s page. Fight him. Kick him in the balls. Or was it don’t fight him? Let it happen. She could not imagine letting it happen. She could not imagine that it would be possible for it to happen. He would tear her, injure her—

  He rose, pulling her to a sitting position on the side of the bed. “Take your clothes off or I’ll rip ‘em off you,” Richard said, and began unfastening the heavy, gold-plated Wells Fargo buckle on his belt.

  Mickey looked down unbuttoning her shirt, chin to chest, seeing the whiteness of her bra, still snowy white, and the tiny pink bow between the cups. Little Mickey sitting there. The real Mickey perched above watching, thinking, The pink bow is too much. Thinking, The poor girl. Seeing Frank come in naked from the bathroom with a towel over his arm. Seeing 6­4 Marshall Taylor stoop-shouldered naked, vaguely, Marshall there and gone. Thinking, What would Susan Brownmiller do? Thinking, Get it over with. She took her shirt off.

  “Now the bra-zeer,” Richard said.

  Her hands went behind her, unhooked the bra and pulled it off. My God, her nipples were sticking out.

  “Now your pants and your undies,” Richard said.

  He was standing with his uniform trousers around his ankles, showing his round, marble-white thighs, thumbs hooked in his Jockeys, ready to push them down. The Mickey up above said, you poor little thing. I’d take my chances and kick him in the balls.

  And was totally surprised when nice Mickey on the bed rolled back, came forward with momentum, eyes on Richard’s crotch, and with a grunt and all the force
she had drove her foot into the sagging pouch of his Jockeys.

  Unbelievable, Richard saying, “Unnnngh!” doubling over, holding his groin, little Mickey rolling off the bed, grabbing her shirt, doing it almost as a reflex action—the shirt and the bra with it—running through the door and down the stairs, almost down the stairs—

  Louis—she remembered his name—was near the bottom, already on the steps looking up at her.

  Louis said, “Jesus Christ.” Louis knew. One look at her, bare-chested, holding the shirt, Richard nowhere downstairs. He said, “Come on. Come on!” Reached up and tried to grab her arm as she held the shirt tightly against her. “Where is he?”

  “In the room.”

  They heard Richard then, from upstairs, screaming, “Come back’n this room! You hear me!”

  “Jesus Christ,” Louis said. “Come on.”

  She was into her shirt, holding it closed, ran out the front door and down to the walk, hearing Louis yell at her to get in the car, and turned and ran toward the driveway, cutting after him through the low hedge. The car was pointed toward the street. Inside, Louis fumbled with the keys. He got the right one into the ignition and started the car and she heard the fat one’s voice again. “Get back in here!”

  The car was moving. It shot down the driveway and Mickey held onto the seat and the door handle because the turn into the street would be abrupt, wrenching. But the car didn’t turn, it kept going—Louis pressing down on the accelerator—straight for the chainlink fence across the street, into a driveway toward closed double gates in the fence and a yellow sign that said FAIRGROUNDS PARKING USE GATE NO. 5.

  The blue-and-white Detroit Police cruiser rolled past Grayling Elementary School on Bauman—a woman’s voice crackling on the radio—reached the corner and came to a stop. After a pause the cruiser turned left onto State Fair.

  The Detroit patrolman, looking straight ahead through his windshield, saw the black car come out of the drive halfway up the block and knew he was about to hear tires scream through a turn and if the guy didn’t sideswipe some cars and pile up he’d be on him before he hit Woodward, nail him with the gumballs flashing blue and siren turned up to high yelp. Christ Almighty, but the car kept going. Smashed through the horse-trailer gate, smashed right through it, the cyclone swing-gates flying apart and the black car heading north through the empty fairgrounds. It looked good, it looked to be something different for a change.