Last Call (Last Call 1)

"If a person's mother was the moon," the young man said earnestly, "he could find her by where she—where she—"

Ozzie shook his head sharply at Mavranos, who lowered his hands.

"Where she left her—her face! Or the raven's face, the eye of the raven!" The young man put the bowl down and wiped his own face with his sleeve. "Queen of Hearts," he said, more quietly, "and the Jack going to find her." He dragged up a chair from an empty table nearby and sat down. Keeping his right hand under his jacket, with his left he dug a box of blue Bicycle brand playing cards out of his pocket and tossed it onto the table. "We gonna play?"

A waitress inside had been staring out the window at their unsavory visitor; but Ozzie smiled at her and waved, and she seemed satisfied.

Ozzie was facing their visitor again, frowning at him, obviously trying to figure out how this madman might fit into the structure they were dealing with and how it would affect things if they were to play with him.

"What … stakes?" asked Ozzie.

"M&M's," the young man said, "against your sugars." He pointed at the bowl he'd snatched up earlier and then pulled two packs of regular M&M's out of his pocket. "Candy. And sugar, too. It's bad for your teeth if you let it." He swatted ineffectually at one of the circling flies. "And flies like it," he added. "The word for 'fly' is mosca in Spain." He chuckled and shook his head.

"Uh," said Ozzie, "do you know where the moon … 'left her face'?"

"My name's Dondi Snayheever. Yeah, I got some—some maps, in the car. It's very difficult to say, as you would say, maps in the car."

Ozzie nodded. "Let's play for a map or two. We'll fade 'em with cash."

"Letters and lockets and lesson plans, you can't do otherthing but keep them, because they—they—they're the leadages candlewise to the father and mother." He looked hard at Ozzie. "You can't see any of my maps, sir."

"What's the game?" asked Crane cautiously. "That we're going to play here."

Snayheever blinked at him in evident surprise. "Go Fish."

"Of course," said Ozzie. The old man met Crane's eyes and made a sort of over there twitch with one white eyebrow.

You want me to go find his car and steal a map or two, thought Crane. Okay. But if I've got to do it, I'm by God going to award myself a prize. That's my ruling.

"I bet the engine's cooled enough for me to pop the cap off the radiator," Crane said, getting to his feet. "I'll go check." He looked at Mavranos. "Keys?"

"Keys?" echoed Snayheever. "Your radiator is inside the car?"

Mavranos had pulled out his key ring and tossed it to Crane. "Locking hood," Mavranos said easily. "Where we come from they'll steal your battery soon as blow their nose."

"Where do you come from?" Snayheever asked.

"Oz," said Ozzie testily, his voice sounding very old and reedy. "Shall we cut for the deal?"

Crane got up and walked out to the asphalt, and as he rounded the bushes toward where the cars were parked, he heard Snayheever say, "No, for this I've got to deal."

He's probably a cheat, Crane thought with a weary grin. We'll wind up with no sugar cubes at all.

Crane wondered how he was supposed to recognize Snayheever's car … until he walked past Mavrano's Suburban and saw the weird little vehicle parked on the other side of it.

It looked like a 1950s English version of a Volkswagen—it had the same bulbous fenders and arching roof—but the body flared out into a slight skirt around the sides. It was impossible to guess the little vehicle's original color; it seemed to have been dipped in oil decades ago and been driven relentlessly on remote desert roads ever since.

Crane walked forward, feeling as though he were pushing against the hot air and leaving it curling in slow turbulence behind him, like the wake of a ship.

He read the rusty emblem on the front of the car's hood: Morris.

Crane peered in through the dusty passenger-side window. The car was a mess: The upholstery was all split, stacks of newspapers filled the back seat, and the glove compartment had no door.

A number of ragged-edged folded maps protruded from the open compartment. The passenger door was not locked; Crane opened it, leaned in and pried free a couple of maps from the center of the pile, and then closed the door and walked over to the Suburban, fumbling with Mavranos's keys.

He got into the truck and stared at Mavrano's ice chest.

"Go fish," he whispered, and then slowly reached out and lifted a can of Coors from the cold water. One won't hurt, he thought. This desert air will dry me out like a dead rat in no time.

He popped the tab. The beer foamed up but didn't run over the rim of the can.

He looked behind him, but there was no one else in the truck.

Tired of alertness, he drained the beer in one long, gulping series of swallows. It stung his throat and brought tears to his eyes, and he could feel his tense muscles relaxing.