Court smiled a little. “What do you say we make it four hundred a month?”
Despite the fact that he was being offered one hundred fifty dollars more per month than he’d originally been asking, Mayberry frowned. “Son, I can’t allow no criminals in here.”
“Not a criminal, Mr. Mayberry. Just a guy who’s hoping to avoid some red tape.”
“Well, that’s a problem, because I’m by the book. I guess this place isn’t for you.”
Court turned his head back and forth, scanning the small room. “You’re right. By the book is best.”
“That’s what I say.”
“Cool. Can I take a quick look at the back door?”
“The what?”
“The back door?”
“Uh . . . just the one door.”
“Huh,” Court said. “I could have sworn building codes say private apartments have to have two exits in case of fire. I could be wrong, though. How ’bout while you are running that background check on me, I check with the city to make sure you’ve complied with all the building and zoning laws. That way we both know what we’re getting into here.”
The African American man glared at the white man for a long moment.
Court smiled. “Like you said. By the book.”
Bernice reached out and took her husband by the arm, giving it an anxious squeeze. Slowly the corners of Arthur Mayberry’s mouth rose, and he smiled a wide, toothy grin. “All right, then. You gonna have it your way, and I’m gonna have me five hundred dollars a month, plus two fifty security deposit.”
Court calculated he’d have to burn this tiny room to cinders to do two hundred and fifty dollars’ worth of damage. But with a little smile he reached for his wallet. “A hard bargain, sir, but I like your style.”
Bernice spoke up for the first time, and apparently none of the new mutual respect between the two men had rubbed off on her. “I’ll tell you right now, young man, we’re not gonna stand for no parties.”
Court had never thrown a party in his life, but still he wondered how much of a party one might actually throw in a ten-by-ten basement with a metal water pipe running across at forehead height. “I’ll be gone a lot. I guarantee I’ll be the quietest tenant you’ve ever had.”
“And no drugs,” the woman added.
“Absolutely not.”
—
Jeff Duncan” handed Arthur Mayberry $1,250 and took a key, and when Arthur asked the younger man when he would actually move in, Jeff replied he’d been up all night so he’d go right to bed, and then bring some things over from his hotel that evening.
Arthur and Bernice left him in his new apartment and headed back to the front of the house. As soon as the storm door shut Bernice said one word. “Drugs.”
“You’re probably right,” replied Arthur. Plaintively he added, “But what was I gonna do? First and last month’s rent ain’t nothing to turn your nose up to. And all that bonus money.”
Bernice made a clicking sound with her tongue and said it again. “Drugs.”
Arthur sighed. He knew he’d be hearing this a lot over the next two months.
—
Court wedged one of the metal chairs under the door and then he took a shower, his first in days. He took the .380 pistol into the stall with him, leaving it in the soap niche. There was no soap or shampoo, so all he really did was rinse off, and there were no towels so he did little more than drip-dry, although he patted himself down with the thin comforter from the bed. He put his clothes back on, even his shoes, and then he pulled a pillow and a wool blanket off the bed and threw them in the long narrow closet behind the door to the outside. He rolled the damp comforter around the remaining two pillows and he put them under the bed sheet in the center of the bed, making an approximate man-sized shape under the sheets.
He turned off the lights in the room, walked over to the blanket and the pillow in the closet, and lay down, drawing his pistol from his pocket and putting it on the linoleum floor to the right of his body.
He thought about the locks on the doors and the wedged chair. This wasn’t exactly a high-security facility, but he was dead tired and he could barely think. Anyone who kicked open the door would see the bed, and Court hoped they would assume someone was sleeping there. They would open fire on this target first, giving Court a little warning. They wouldn’t see Court here in the closet until they stepped a few feet into the room and looked to their left, at which point Court would shoot them dead.
That was the plan, anyway. Court wondered if he’d even wake up at the sound of a shattering storm door. And of course, most attackers came in pairs, or in long lines of jocked-up operators, and his little .380 peashooter wouldn’t do much more than kill the point man and maybe one of his buddies.