بخش 03 - فصل 17

17 When he’s dressed, she walks down the hall with him and treats him to a lingering kiss at the elevator. “I still can’t believe last night happened,” he tells her. “Oh, it did. And if you play your cards right, it might happen again.” She searches his face with those blue eyes of

hers. “But no promises or longterm commitments, okay? We take it as it comes. A day at a time.” “At my age, I take everything that way.” The elevator doors open. He steps in. “Stay in touch, cowboy.” “I will.” The elevator doors start to close. He stops them

with his hand. “And remember to BOLO, cowgirl.” She nods solemnly, but he doesn’t miss the twinkle in her eye. “Janey will BOLO her ass off.” “Keep your cell phone handy, and it might be wise to program nine-one-one on your speed dial.” He drops his hand. She blows him a kiss. The doors

roll shut before he can blow one back. His car is where he left it, but the meter must have run out before the free parking kicked in, because there’s a ticket stuck under the windshield wiper. He opens the glove compartment, stuffs the ticket inside, and fishes out his phone. He’s good at giving Janey advice that he doesn’t

take himself–since he pulled the pin, he’s always forgetting the damned Nokia, which is pretty prehistoric, as cell phones go. These days hardly anyone calls him anyway, but this morning he has three messages, all from Jerome. Numbers two and three–one at nine-forty last night, the other at ten-forty-five–are impatient inquiries about

where he is and why he doesn’t call. They are in Jerome’s normal voice. The original message, left at six-thirty yesterday evening, begins in his exuberant Tyrone Feelgood Delight voice. “Massah Hodges, where you at? Ah needs to jaw to y’all!” Then he becomes Jerome again. “I think I know how he

did it. How he stole the car. Call me.” Hodges checks his watch and decides Jerome probably won’t be up quite yet, not on Saturday morning. He decides to drive over there, with a stop at his house first to pick up his notes. He turns on the radio, gets Bob Seger singing “Old Time Rock and Roll,” and

bellows along: take those old records off the shelf.