Dead and Gone - Andrew Vachss [86]
“You’re right. But the one I was thinking of, it’d slip right by, you did it right.”
“So which one, man?” Gordo wanted to know.
“Picture this,” I told them. “A ’56 Packard Caribbean. The hardtop, not the convertible. Strip all the chrome, even that fat wide strip down the sides. Then you slam it all around—not put it in the weeds, just a nice drop. Give the top a subtle chop … maybe only a couple of inches. I see it with some old-style mag wheels, like American Racing used to put out. Paint it about twenty coats of the deepest, darkest purple-black—you know, that Chromallusion stuff that changes color depending on how you look at it.”
“I never seen one of those,” Gordo said.
“I did,” Flacco said. “It had those giant taillights, right? Cathedrals?”
“That’s the one.”
“The man’s nailed it, compadre,” Flacco told his partner. “That would be the biggest, bossest, most evil-looking ride on the whole coast. And those suckers had some serious cubes. Mucho room for anything you wanted to do with the rubber, too.”
“Problem is finding one,” I reminded him.
“Oh, they’ll be out there,” Flacco assured me. “This part of the country, people keep their old cars. There’s always Arizona, too—we got plenty people down there could keep a lookout for us. And you should have seen this one when I first got it. Just a rusted-out shell.”
“You went frame-off?”
“Sí!” he said, proudly. “Me and my man, here, we got about a million hours in it. Gordo’s the mechanic, I’m the bodyman.”
“Be harder for the Packard,” I said. “They make all kinds of NOS parts for Chevys, but …”
“Be more work, is all,” Gordo said, reaching over to high-five Flacco.
“It sounds very beautiful,” Gem said, her chest puffed out a bit, proud of me for some reason.
It was still dark when they dropped us off in front of the Delta terminal at PDX. The first-class line was empty. Check-in was nothing at all—the clerk glanced at my passport photo so quick I could have been Dennis Rodman for all he knew.
The first-class thing was all about keeping our options as open as possible. We were only taking carry-ons, and they cut you a bit more slack with the size of the bags up in the front of the plane. You get out faster, too, and that can count for something when you have to change planes. But most important was that we wouldn’t have any company right next to us—I could take the window seat and just lie in the shadow until it was time to make our move.
The corridor leading to the gates at PDX was like an indoor mall. Upscale shops, some brand-name, some “crafts,” even a fancy bookstore—Powell’s—a real one, not the usual magazine stand with a couple of paperback racks.
Gem failed to surprise me by suggesting that we had plenty of time to get something to eat. A bakery-and-coffee-shop was open, with little café-style tables standing outside. Inside, music was coming over the speakers. Kathy Young’s version of “A Thousand Stars.” The sound system must have been real sophisticated, because someone had the bass track isolated … and cranked up so high you could barely make out the lyrics. I know it’s hip to say the Rivileers’ version is the real thing, and Kathy’s was just a white-bread cover. But I think the girl really brings it, her own way.
I got a hot chocolate and a croissant. Gem got a tray-full of stuff. We sat outside all by ourselves, listening to the music. The Spaniels’ version of “Goodnite Sweetheart, Goodnite.” The Paradons doing “Diamonds and Pearls.” The Coasters on “Young Blood.”
“What do you call that?” Gem asked me, head cocked in the direction of the music. “Rock and roll?”
“No. It’s doo-wop. From the fifties, mostly. Where the voices were the instruments—a capella. The kind of stuff that sounds the same in the subway as it does in the studio. If you ever heard the Cardinals, or the Jacks, or the Passions, or—”
“And today it does not?” she interrupted.
“Today it’s all sixty-four-track,