The Ape Man's Brother by Joe R. Lansdale Read Free Book Online Page A

concerned, but we were determined to not let some asshole with a camera ruin our life, and like I said, we were cowards. We drove outside of New York and into the country. There was a nice place there where we could have a picnic. We parked the Packard and rolled our blanket on the ground, set out our picnic basket stuffed with very fine foods, a thermos of good wine, as well as a thermos of Italian coffee. We had paper plates and cups, and we ate and laughed and kissed, trying to make our worries go away, but the truth is they hung over us like a rain cloud even though the sky was clear and beautiful. After awhile we lay back on the blanket, in each other’s arms, digested and looked at the sky. I rose up on one elbow to pry off the thermos lid to the coffee, and that’s when I saw him.
    The Big Guy. He was a pretty good distance away, on a hill covered by trees. In the tallest tree, mostly hidden by leaves, he sat in the fork of a limb and watched us.
    I knew then that Red had not only had the camera put in my hotel room, but that most likely shots from that camera had been put in an envelope and somehow slipped to The Big Guy, just as we feared.
    The Big Guy knew I saw him. He dropped from the tree, light as a bird, disappeared behind the hill. I expected he would come rushing down that hill to destroy us at any moment, and I didn’t intent to put up a fight, not even to protect her.
    The Woman had seen him as well. She had tears in her eyes.
    We waited.
    He didn’t come rushing down after us.
    I heard a car start up behind the trees and race away.
    I could tell by the sound of the engine that it was his Buick, the one he hardly drove and really shouldn’t drive at all. The Big Guy could do many things, but he never really learned to drive too well. He was always being pulled out of ditches and having to pay other drivers for banging up their cars. But he had been smart enough to ease up behind that hill silently, get out and climb that tree. Now he didn’t care. About anything was my guess.
    You want to know what hurt me the most right then? That he didn’t even have the courtesy to kill us.

[13]
     

A fter that, it was over with me and The Woman.
    I decided what I had to do was confront The Big Guy, lay it all out and hope he didn’t yank off my leg and beat me to death with it. I desperately wanted to make amends. But he wasn’t in his room. I couldn’t find him. I walked all over the city, took taxies and trains to his favorite haunts, but nothing. I must have gone through every bar in New York City that next week, but I couldn’t find him. The Woman had gone back to their room to wait for him, to hope for the best. But he hardly ever went there. Up until the other day he didn’t seem too concerned about where she was, or even where he was. But I could imagine him seeing those photos, my hairy ass on top of her, doing the deed. It made me sick to my stomach.
    I didn’t really want to see her again, but I went to her and told her that I had searched everywhere, and had pretty much given up.
    “Any ideas?” I said.
    “The hospitals,” she said.
    “Beg pardon?” I said.
    “He may have been injured. You know how he drove. He may be in the hospital.”
    Well, that got me to a phone right away. I started checking around, and sure enough, we found him. Downtown, right near the hotel, in a hospital room. Two broken legs, a broken arm, smashed ribs, and a concussion. He’d been there all week, under an assumed name. He hadn’t done that, a doctor had, knowing there was so much publicity afoot concerning the film of him and the lion. It was a damn noble thing to do, I thought, though later I found out he sold his story to one of the cheap-ass rags, and for not that much money, I might add.
    When I finally saw the police report a couple days later, it was revealed that he had driven down a hill on his way back into the city at top speed. A motorist behind him said, “He just yanked the wheel to the left,