Lowboy by John Wray Read Free Book Online Page B

fries.
       
    “That’s right, little boss! Intimidate the money. Don’t just put it in your pocket like a fool.”
    Lowboy raised his head slowly. The woman who’d spoken was straightbacked and enormous and stood with her feet wide apart, like a boxer or a circus acrobat. She could have been any race in the world, from Sikh to Sudanese to Cherokee. She could even have been white. She wore plastic shopping bags inside her sneakers and frowned at him as though he was hard to see.
    “It’s counterfeit,” said Lowboy. “It’s not right.”
    “Counterfeit,” said the woman. “Is that so.” She pinched her chin between two yellowed knuckles. “What if I was to pick it up any-ways, and put it into my portmanteau?”
    “In your what?”
    “‘Portmanteau,’” the woman said, lowering her voice, “is a word from the French. Meaning wallet.”
    “I know that,” said Lowboy. He thought for a moment. “You could do that,” he said finally. “That might work.”
       
    “Might it now,” said the woman. She inspected the money closely, turning it clockwise with her foot, then sighed and shuffled off behind the columns. Time went by. Lowboy leaned forward and touchedhis middle finger to the bill. A current shot up from his palm to his shoulder, locking his jawbone and making his teeth knock together. He pulled back and the feeling stopped at once.
    “I thought you said that bill was counterfeit , little boss,” the woman hissed, stepping out from behind the nearest column. She held a small blue suitcase tightly in both hands, the way a baby clutches at a blanket. Her hands were too small for the rest of her. She moved her body modestly, taking tiny bashful steps, considering every move before she made it. Her dark eyes never wavered from the bill.
    “How much does a twenty buy these days?” Lowboy said, making room beside him on the bench.
    “Don’t you know about money?”
    He shook his head. “I’ve been away.”
    The suitcase jangled as she set it down, as though it were filled with champagne flutes or Christmas lights, or possibly empty bottles of perfume. They sat for a while with the suitcase between them, watching people come and go across the tracks. An express train came and went, and for an instant Lowboy worried about the money, but the money stayed exactly where it was. It didn’t even flutter. Finally the woman cleared her throat and nodded and smoothed her eyebrows down with her two thumbs.
    “$20,” she said, “don’t buy too much of nothing, on the floor.”
    Lowboy grinned at her and shrugged his shoulders. “What’s your name?”
    “Heather,” said the woman. She drew herself up smartly. “Heather Covington.”
    “Heather Covington,” he repeated. He looked the woman over. She was adjusting the plastic lining of her shoes.
    “You don’t look like a Heather,” he said.
    She gave him a wink, as though he’d played into her hands, then opened her suitcase and brought out a battered blue passport.
    “What’s this for?” said Lowboy.
    “Introductions.”

    He took the passport and flipped through it. Except for a faint yellow stamp from Fort Erie, Canada, all of its pages were blank. The issue date was 4/2007. “Heather Dakota Covington,” he read out. “Hair Auburn. Eyes Green. Weight eighty-seven pounds.” He paused. “Born Vienna, Virginia, 11/13/1998.”
    She smiled sweetly at that, still averting her eyes, then tucked the passport back inside her coat. He looked at her closely. The smile sat tightly on her face, sliding sideways a little, as though it was hard work to keep it there. She turned toward him expectantly, pointing at her mouth, and for a moment he thought she was doing some sort of impression. Then he recognized the smile. It belonged to the girl in the passport.
       
    A train came in across the tracks, a downtown express, full of people staring dully into space. “November thirteenth,” Lowboy said finally, for the sake of being friendly.