Hard Rain Falling - Don Carpenter [30]
On impulse, Jack went out into the hedge-rimmed garden in back of the house. There was a lawn, and the large black shadows of trees darkened the area to the rear of the garden. The sky above was clouded and tinted red from the lights of downtown. Faint noises came from the house; not loud enough, Jack felt, to be heard in the houses of the neighborhood, but light shone through amber window shades, and that could be seen—it was only in the front of the house and on the main floor that there were blackout drapes. Jack began to wonder if the neighbors would know the people were supposed to be on vacation. He did not know anything about how neighbors were supposed to be; he did not know that in upper middle-class neighborhoods such as this one, neighbors frequently did not know each other personally, did not even nod in greeting if they saw one another; he did not happen to know that the Weinfelds were Jews, and that there were no other Jews in this particular section of the neighborhood. So he began to be worried about what would happen if anyone saw the lights in the windows or heard a fragment of noise, a laugh, or a yell and decided to call the police.
He took a drink of whiskey and coughed. If the cops came, they would probably walk up to the front door and ring the bell. There were three or four cars parked out in front. The cops would notice these cars, and the boys they belonged to would be out of luck. But not Jack. When the cops came in, he would go out the back door. He looked at the hedge in the back. He could get over it easily; it was only about six feet high. He would have no trouble getting away. He relaxed.
But then, if he did get away (assuming the cops showed up at all), he would still be right back where he started: broke, locked out, etc. He felt a stirring of anger, not at society for failing to have provided him with money; not at himself for his refusal to work; but at the situation itself, for existing. Damn it! he thought. He took another drink of whiskey. There was nothing he could do about it now; so he might just as well get as drunk as he could, have fun, find a girl, and worry about later later.
“Hey,” said a voice out of the black. “Takin the air?”
“Who is it?”
“Billy.”
They approached each other. Billy, too, had a bottle, and they stood together for a few moments, drinking silently. Finally, Jack said, “What you doin out here? Takin the air yourself?”
“Yeah. This’s not much of a party, is it?”
“Well, you know.”
Later, when Jack had plenty of time to think about it, he wondered why he had not taken this golden opportunity to coldcock Billy Lancing and get his money. He had plenty of time to think about it, and he went over every possible motive in his mind. It wasn’t because he and Billy were friends, and even if they had been, Jack saw no reason not to do it; Billy had money, lots of it, and Jack needed money. And it was not because Billy was smaller and defenseless, even in a way trusted Jack not to take advantage of this accidentally private meeting; no such motive had ever stirred Jack in his life. And it certainly wasn’t because Jack didn’t think of it, or because he was afraid to, or because it seemed unethical to invite a person to a party and then rob him (that had been the original idea of inviting Billy). In fact, in all the time Jack had to think about it he was not able to come up with a logical, reasonable answer. They stood there in the garden and talked, and then they went back in the house. That was all that happened. It was inexplicable.
A great deal was going on inside the house. In the basement party room, three couples were dancing, and one lone boy was behind the bar trying out different exotic combinations of liquor. When Jack came in for another bottle, this boy was holding up something greenish in a milk-shake glass and grinning like a mad scientist. Jack took the glass from him