Yes.
Yes mam.
How do you spell Wyrick?
Sanderson, the driver said.
Which way would that be?
Chigurh didnt answer. He backed out of the truck and stood looking over the bajada in the moonlight. Dead quiet. The man in the Bronco had not been dead three days or anything like it. He pulled the pistol from the waistband of his trousers and turned around to where the two men were standing and shot them once each through the head in rapid succession and put the gun back in his belt. The second man had actually half turned to look at the first as he fell. Chigurh stepped between them and bent and pulled away the shoulder-strap from the second man and swung up the nine millimeter Glock hed been carrying and walked back out to the vehicle and got in and started it and backed around and drove up out of the caldera and back toward the highway.
I dont need it.
What am I supposed to tell Mama?
Driving out 90 toward the turnoff at Dryden he came across a hawk dead in the road. He saw the feathers move in the wind. He pulled over and got out and walked back and squatted on his bootheels and looked at it. He raised one wing and let it fall again. Cold yellow eye dead to the blue vault above them.
Whats a wadcutter?
Can you get anything on it?
Yessir.
He pried the aluminum inspection plate off of the rivets inside the door and put it in his pocket and came back and got in and put the screwdriver back in the glovebox. Who cut the tires? he said.
Point bein you dont know what all youre stoppin when you do stop somebody. You take out on the highway. You walk up to a car and you dont know what youre liable to find. I set there in that cruiser for a long time. The motor had died but the lights was still on.
Its a target round. You got the keys?
I didnt know that.
What do I want with that?
I dont envy you that. I surely dont.
You all dont be makin light of the dead thataway, Bell said.
Can I go back there and look?
With anything.
I hear you.
Chigurh poured more cashews into his palm. I could come back then, he said.
Youre free white and twenty-one so I reckon you can do whatever you want.
If thats the way you want to put it.
You done seen it.
Let me put somethin on it.
What do we have on the perpetrator?
I robbed the bank at Fort Stockton.
Yessir. I do too.
The proprietor took a while to answer. This was my wifes fathers place, he said.
Chigurh unfolded a dollar onto the counter. The man rang it up and stacked the change before him the way a dealer places chips. Chigurh hadnt taken his eyes from him. The man looked away. He coughed. Chigurh opened the plastic package of cashews with his teeth and doled a third part of them into his palm and stood eating.
They rolled out across the desert in the dark.
Chigurh poured the last of the cashews into his palm and wadded the little bag and placed it on the counter. He stood oddly erect, chewing.
Well, we need to catch him first.
No. Lets go.
Will there be anything else?
He sat listening. He lowered his feet to the floor and sat up.
Chigurh picked his change up off the counter. And what business is it of yours where Im from, friendo?
Four.
Call it?
Sir?
He and Wendell pulled onto the paved shoulder in front of the unit and parked and got out. Torbert got out and was standing by the door of his car. The sheriff nodded. He walked along the edge of the roadway studying the tire tracks. You seen this, I reckon, he said.
Its in the truck. You want it?
Chigurh nodded. Lets go, he said.
We dont know.
Is that his truck?
Under the bed.
No. I appreciate it. I need to go.
The radio squawked. He picked up the receiver and pushed the button and put his feet up on the desk. Bell, he said.
Get the keys and look in the turtle. Thats all right. Im right here.
I said how much are these.
You stand to win everything, Chigurh said. Everything.
I got a feelin he aint.
Well. Maybe you do.
I said whats the most you ever saw lost on a coin toss.
They wouldnt have it no other way. And youd better not lose, neither. You dont see that so much no more, but maybe you see worse. I had a man pull a gun on me one time and it happened that I grabbed it just as he went to fire and the plunger on the hammer went right through the fleshy part of my thumb. You can see the mark of it there. But that man had ever intention of killin me. A few years ago and it wasnt that many neither I was goin out one of these little two lane blacktop roads of a night and I come up on a pickup truck that they was two old boys settin in the bed of it. They kindly blinked in the lights and I backed off some but the truck had Coahuila plates on it and I thought, well, I need to stop these old boys and take a look. So I hit the lights and whenever I done that I seen the slider window in the back of the cab open and here come somebody passin a shotgun out the window to the old boy settin in the bed of the truck. Ill tell you right now I hit them brakes with both feet. It skidded the unit sideways to where the lights was goin out into the brush but the last thing I seen in the bed of the truck was the old boy puttin that shotgun to his shoulder. I hit the seat and I just had hit it when here come the windshield all over me in them little bitty pieces they break up into. I still had one foot on the brake and I could feel the cruiser slidin down into the bar ditch and I thought it was goin to roll but it didnt. It filled the car just full of dirt. The old boy he opened up on me twice more and shot all the glass out of one side of the cruiser and by then Id come to a stop and I laid there in the seat, had my pistol out, and I heard that pickup leave out and I raised up and fired several shots at the taillights but they was long gone.
Is there somethin wrong?
When they came to Mosss truck Chigurh leaned forward to study it.
I got the same feelin. Let me call you this evenin.
What happened to your leg?
He stood looking in at the dead man slumped across the console of the Bronco. He shone the light into the cargo space behind the seats.
If you aint goin to believe me whatd you ask me for? You need to get on back there and get your stuff together. We got about four hours till daylight.
And then they set out together travelin around the country killin people. I forget how many they did kill. Now what are the chances of a thing like that! Them two had never laid eyes on one another. There cant be that many of em. I dont think. Well, we dont know. Here the other day they was a woman put her baby in a trash compactor. Who would think of such a thing? My wife wont read the papers no more. Shes probably right. She generally is.
You got any more toast?
Wendell nodded. Yessir, he said. Youre right. I might be one myself some day.
I dont know. Will there?
You want me to go out there with you?
Torbert nodded. You and the sheriff goin to come down and get me off of death row?
Coin toss.
I DONT KNOW if law enforcement work is more dangerous now than what it used to be or not. I know when I first took office youd have a fistfight somewheres and youd go to break it up and theyd offer to fight you. And sometimes you had to accommodate em.
I think Im goin to quit, Ed Tom.
Now. We close now.
He stood there looking out across the desert. So quiet. Low hum of wind in the wires.
He might have a family someplace.
Wheres your truck at?
Whats in that satchel you brought in?
Yessir.
When he came out of the shower he was wearing a pair of shorts and when he sat at the little formica table in the kitchen the first thing she said was Whats that on the back of your arm?
Well whatever you are.
You all gettin any rain up your way? the proprietor said.
You are gettin on a bus and goin to Odessa.
He looked haggard. He looked at Bell and he looked at the ground. He shook his head and looked away. I used to play mumbledypeg here when I was a boy. Right here.
Have you talked to him? the driver said.
The man took the coin. I got to close now, he said.
He ducked under the tape and went up the steps. Lamar looked up when he tapped at the door. Come in, Ed Tom, he said. Come in. We got hell to pay here.
I dont know. Folks dont generally bet on a coin toss. Its usually more like just to settle somethin.
I seen you was from Dallas.
I need to take a shower. Fix me somethin to eat. My stomach thinks my throats been cut.
He watched Lamar cross the lawn and climb the steps to his office. I hope you dont quit, he said. I think were goin to need all of you we can get.
Torbert opened the trunk and they stood looking at the body. The front of the mans shirt was covered with blood, partly dried. His whole face was bloody. Bell leaned and reached into the trunk and took something from the mans shirtpocket and unfolded it. It was a bloodstained receipt for gas from a service station in Junction Texas. Well, he said. This was the end of the road for Bill Wyrick.
She buttered the fresh toast and put it on the plate and sat in the chair opposite. I like to eat breakfast of a night, he said. Takes me back to my bachelor days.
The Ramchargers windows were tinted so dark they looked black. Chigurh opened the door and got out. A man got out on the passenger side of the Dodge and folded the seat forward and climbed into the rear. Chigurh walked around the vehicle and got in and shut the door. Lets go, he said.
Anything can be an instrument, Chigurh said. Small things. Things you wouldnt even notice. They pass from hand to hand. People dont pay attention. And then one day theres an accounting. And after that nothing is the same. Well, you say. Its just a coin.
I dont know.
Now is not a time. What time do you close.
You didnt mean nothing by it.
What time do you go to bed.
Well I aint so dont go to slobberin.
When I know what it is that Im telling him.
Generally around dark. At dark.
Mrs Downie I havent seen that many dead cats in trees. I think hell come down directly if youll just leave him be. You call me back in a little bit, you hear?
No.
Yessir.
Whats the most you ever saw lost on a coin toss?
Wheres it at?
No.
When he pulled into the filling stationat Sheffield it was almost dark. A long red twilight with doves crossing the highway heading south toward some ranch tanks. He got change from the proprietor and made a phone call and filled the tank and went back in and paid.
Under the bed in the back room.
Yes.
You married into it.
You seem to have a lot of questions, the proprietor said. For somebody that dont want to say where it is theyre from.
Coin toss?
We lived in Temple Texas for many years. Raised a family there. In Temple. We come out here about four years ago.
Thats correct.
All right. Keep your lights on. Ill be there in fifty minutes. And Torbert? Shut the trunk.
Thats all right. He dont. This here was just dumb luck.
Well why would you be comin back? Well be closed.
He listened. He nodded.
He followed a southrunning fence, the Ford wallowing over the bad ground. The fence was just an old remnant, three wires strung on mesquite posts. In a mile or so he came out on a gravel plain where a Dodge Ramcharger was parked facing toward him. He pulled slowly alongside it and shut down the engine.
The white marks at the side of the road when he found them looked like surveyors marks but there were no numbers, just the chevrons. He marked the mileage on the odometer and drove another mile and slowed and turned off the highway. He shut off the lights and left the motor running and got out and walked down and opened the gate and came back. He drove across the bars of the cattleguard and got out and closed the gate again and stood there listening. Then he got in the car and drove out down the rutted track.
That boy was married.
Whats happened, Sheriff?
The driver shut the door. Yeah, he said. I can do that.
Fill out the report same as any report.
Its broke out in a rash.
Twenty-three year old. Clean cut boy. Straight as a die. Now I got to go out to his house fore his wife hears it on the damn radio.
Yessir.
Heres whats goin on, Carla Jean. You need to get your stuff packed and be ready to roll out of here come daylight. Whatever you leave you aint goin to see it again so if you want it dont leave it. Theres a bus leaves out of here at seven-fifteen in the mornin. I want you to go to Odessa and wait there till I can call you.
Well. Id say around nine-thirty. Somewhere around nine-thirty.
Youve already asked me that.
When do you aim to tell him? the driver said.
Where do you want me to put it?
Well lets take a look.
He dont know whats happened?
Nothing?
I hope that son of a bitch is in California.
All right.
He sipped his coffee and set about salting his eggs.
You aint kiddin, are you?
Yeah, I think theres some buckshot salve in the cabinet if we aint out. Will you go on and quit aggravatin me? Im tryin to eat.
I didnt put nothin up.
And you want me to get on a bus and go to Odessa.
Well be closed then.
Call Miss Rosa over yonder. She aint got nothin to do.
Yessir. Sheriff?
Look in the jockeybox there.
Sir?
These are some ripe petunias, one of the men said.
Chigurh uncovered the coin. He turned his arm slightly for the man to see. Well done, he said.
Well we will.
Is that what youre asking me? Is there something wrong with anything?
Will there be somethin else? the man said.
Well then I reckon thats whats in it.
Youre a lyin sack of you know what.
If we cant get you out well get in there with you.
Yessir.
Mrs Downie I believe hell come down directly. Why dont you call me back here in a little bit. Yes mam.
I dont know what it is I stand to win.
Its nineteen fifty-eight. Its been traveling twenty-two years to get here. And now its here. And Im here. And Ive got my hand over it. And its either heads or tails. And you have to say. Call it.
Yes you did. Youve been putting it up your whole life. You just didnt know it. You know what the date is on this coin?
Theyre in the unit.
Just call it.
You dont spell it. We dont know what his name is.
Yessir. I know what you mean.
Yessir.
Dont put it in your pocket. You wont know which one it is.
Well I need to know what it is were callin here.
I just have this feelin were looking at somethin we really aint never even seen before.
Let me see that thing on your arm.
How much are these?
They parked some distance from the trucks and walked down to look at them. Chigurh stood there a long time. It was cold out on the barrial and he had no jacket but he didnt seem to notice. The other two men stood waiting. He had a flashlight in his hand and he turned it on and walked among the trucks and looked at the bodies. The two men followed at a small distance.
When he walked in she got up off the couch and ran and put her arms around his neck. I thought you was dead, she said.
Cab full of glass and dirt. I got out and kindly shook myself off and got back in and just set there. Just kindly collectin my thoughts. Windshield wipers hangin in on the dashboard. I turned off the lights and I just set there. You take somebody that will actually throw down on a law enforcement officer and open fire, you have got some very serious people. I never saw that truck again. Nobody else did neither. Or not them plates noways. Maybe I should of took out after it. Or tried to. I dont know. I drove back to Sanderson and pulled in at the cafe and Ill tell you they come from all over to see that cruiser. It was shot just full of holes. Looked like the Bonnie and Clyde car. I didnt have a mark on me. Not even from all that glass. I was criticized for that too. Parkin there like I done. They said I was showin out. Well, maybe I was. But I needed that cup of coffee too, Ill tell you.
White male, late thirties, medium build.
It was a big redtail. He picked it up by one wingtip and carried it to the bar ditch and laid it in the grass. They would hunt the blacktop, sitting on the high powerpoles and watching the highway in both directions for miles. Any small thing that might venture to cross. Closing on their prey against the sun. Shadowless. Lost in the concentration of the hunter. He wouldnt have the trucks running over it.
No.
Well lets not be leavin keys in the units.
For what?
Why dont you fix me some bacon and eggs while I take a shower.
Chigurh studied the dead man. He jostled him with his flashlight.
Gone the way of all flesh. Nothins forever.
Chigurh took a twenty-five cent piece from his pocket and flipped it spinning into the bluish glare of the fluorescent lights overhead. He caught it and slapped it onto the back of his forearm just above the bloody wrappings. Call it, he said.
I told you what was in that satchel.
Well I need to close now.
Me? No. I aint kiddin a bit. Are we out of preserves?
Let me see that cut on your head. What happened to you? Wheres your truck at?
When he pulled up in front of the sheriffs office in Sonora the first thing he saw was the yellow tape stretched across the parking lot. A small courthouse crowd. He got out and crossed the street.
Whats the biggest thing you ever saw settled?
HE CROSSED THE Pecos River just north of Sheffield Texas and took route 349 south.
What time do you close?
You live in that house behind the store?
I guess that passes for manners in your cracker view of things.
He drummed his fingers on the desk.
What is goin on, Llewelyn?
It wasnt us.
Yes I do.
Well, its just a coin. Yes. Thats true. Is it?
Originally.
She sat back in the chair and watched him. You want me to go to Odessa, she said.
Sir?
High bloodweeds along the road. Wiregrass and sacahuista. Beyond in the stone arroyos the tracks of dragons. The raw rock mountains shadowed in the late sun and to the east the shimmering abscissa of the desert plains under a sky where raincurtains hung dark as soot all along the quadrant. That god lives in silence who has scoured the following land with salt and ash. He walked back to the cruiser and got in and pulled away.
Thats all right.
I aint twenty-one.
Wheres the box? he said.
What would you like to hear?
Yessir.
Whose dog? Chigurh said.
Not a bleep.
Theys two more pieces comin. What is that, Llewelyn?
Well, try standin in the door and hollerin: Mama, Im home.
Call it.
Sixty-nine cents.
With what?
Ill see you in two days time.
For instance. Nothing special there. What could that be an instrument of? You see the problem. To separate the act from the thing. As if the parts of some moment in history might be interchangeable with the parts of some other moment. How could that be?
Dont put it in your pocket.
Yes you do. Take it.
The man looked at Chigurhs eyes for the first time. Blue as lapis. At once glistening and totally opaque. Like wet stones. You need to call it, Chigurh said. I cant call it for you. It wouldnt be fair. It wouldnt even be right. Just call it.
You got anything to go on?
Sir?
I read the papers ever mornin. Mostly I suppose just to try and figure out what might be headed this way. Not that Ive done all that good a job at headin it off. It keeps gettin harder. Here a while back they was two boys run into one another and one of em was from California and one from Florida. And they met somewheres or other in between.
Thats it. Plates is gone.
Chigurh got out with the screwdriver and walked over to the truck and opened the door.
I didnt look to see if he had a billfold on him.
Wendell leaned and spat. Yessir, he said. Im ready. He looked at Torbert. You get stopped with that old boy in the turtle just tell em you dont know nothin about it. Tell em somebody must of put him in there while you was havin coffee.
In the blue light the mans face was beaded thinly with sweat. He licked his upper lip.
He picked the coin from his wrist and handed it across.
Heads then.
All right.
I dont have some way to put it. Thats the way it is.
No.
You said it was full of money.
You married into it.
See about closing.
How are we supposed to get down there in the mornin?
She got up and got the preserves out of the refrigerator and set them on the table and sat back down. He unscrewed the jar and ladled some onto his toast and spread it with his knife.
How would that change anything?
He studied the hole in the mans forehead. Looks like a .45. Clean. Almost like a wadcutter.
Pull up here. Have you got a screwdriver?
Take it. Its your lucky coin.
I said you dont know what youre talking about do you.
What have you done, Llewelyn?
I didnt mean nothin by it.
You all go on, said Lamar. Me and the sheriff here need to talk.
Lamar looked away. He wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve. Ill tell you right now. This son of a bitch will never see a day in court. Not if I catch him he wont.
He took off his hat and put it on the desk and sat with his eyes closed, pinching the bridge of his nose. Yes mam, he said. Yes mam.
Youre a bit deaf, arent you? I said what time do you go to bed.
How many eggs is this?
WHEN THEY PULLED up in front of the cafe it was one-twenty in the morning. There were only three people on the bus.
You aint makin any sense, mister.
No. I just said that to get you stirred up. Go on now.
I dont know, said Bell. I just got here.
These youngsters today I dont think would even know what that was. Ed Tom this is a damned lunatic.
BELL CLIMBED THE REAR steps of the courthouse and went down the hall to his office. He swiveled his chair around and sat and looked at the telephone. Go ahead, he said. Im here.
Im talkin about closin. Thats what Im talkin about.
Youve lived here all your life?
We dont. Give Wendell your keys fore you forget it.
Moss made his way forward. Hed seen the driver eyeing him in the mirror. Listen, he said. Do you think you could let me out down at the Desert Aire? I got a bad leg and I live down there but I got nobody to pick me up.
Not really.
I aint.
When he got to Dryden it was about eight oclock. He sat at the intersection in front of Condras Feed Store with the lights off and the motor running. Then he turned the lights on and pulled out on highway 90 headed east.
Well sir, I apologized. If you dont want to accept my apology I dont know what else I can do for you.
Did you get shot?
Yessir.
He hung the phone up and sat looking at it. Its money, he said. You have enough money you dont have to talk to people about cats in trees.
Chigurh stood slowly chewing. You dont know what youre talking about, do you?
Sir?
Bell shut the trunklid. He looked around. Passing trucks on the interstate were downshifting as they approached. Ive already talked to Lamar. Told him he can have his unit back in about three days. I called Austin and theyre lookin for you first thing in the mornin. I aint loadin him into one of our units and he damn sure dont need a helicopter. You take Lamars unit back to Sonora when you get done and call and me or Wendell one will come and get you. You got any money?
Well I need to see about closin.
The man turned away and put his fist to his mouth and coughed again. He looked at Chigurh and he looked away. He looked out the window at the front of the store. The gas pumps and the car sitting there. Chigurh ate another small handful of the cashews.
You aint goin to tell me, are you?
I was just passin the time of day.
The phone rang. He reached and picked it up. Sheriff Bell, he said.
They walked out on the courthouse lawn. Some of the men followed them.
Dont put it in your pocket.
You said that.
Wendell, you ready?
Chigurh cupped his hand and scooped his change from the counter into his palm and put the change in his pocket and turned and walked out the door. The proprietor watched him go. Watched him get into the car. The car started and pulled off from the gravel apron onto the highway south. The lights never did come on. He laid the coin on the counter and looked at it. He put both hands on the counter and just stood leaning there with his head bowed.
I appreciate it.
The truth.
