Part 28 (1/2)

”And you?” he asked Ames.

”Methodist till I die,” said Ames. ”And I don't care what color you make the good Lord out of pieces of gla.s.s. He is what he is.”

”I've got to get to the cemetery,” Wilkens said.

Wilkens touched my shoulder and Ames's as he pa.s.sed us and left the church, closing the doors behind him. I hadn't told him that what I planned to do was illegal. I didn't think he'd want to know. I wondered what he thought someone should do when the law and G.o.d didn't agree.

Ames and I stood alone in the church.

”Methodist pie,” he said, looking around the room. ”Think I'll go to church Sunday.”

I drove Ames back to the Texas Bar and Grill and told him what I wanted him to do.

”What I need is someone who knows how to get into a house, a big house with walls and a couple of men inside who have guns.”

I didn't have to tell Ames which house.

He said he would see what he could do, told me to take care of myself, and got out of the car. When he opened the door, I smelled grilling beef and onions. I was hungry.

I went into the Texas, had the grande bowl of Ed's Authentic Juarez Chili with crackers and a beer, felt a little better, and went back into the daylight after Ames, who had joined me for both the chili and beer, said, ”Sure you don't want me to stay with you?”

”I'll be fine,” I said.

”Watch your track and your back and don't go back home till we get this taken care of.”

”I won't,” I said. ”I'll be back in a few hours.”

Mickey's Collectibles was about half a mile south of Clark on Macintosh in a mall of five stores. One of the stores sold plumbing supplies ”wholesale to the public.” A second store dealt in Sperdoni Herbal Products, which, according to the signs in the window, ”strengthened the immune system” and provided good carbohydrates instead of evil ones.

Mickey's was in the middle. On the other side of him was a store for rent and the last store was the Welcome Auto Insurance Agency.

There were five cars parked in front of the shops. One was directly in front of Mickey's. I pulled in, got out, and paused to look at Mickey's window.

It was cluttered but neat. Star Wars figures, cups and gla.s.ses with pictures of Tweety, Minnie Mouse, the Cisco Kid and Pancho, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, and John Wayne were lined up neatly next to each other. Comic books were neatly overlapped like an open hand of cards, just enough so you could make out enough of the covers to know what they were: Famous Funnies, Daredevil, Submariner, Sad Sack, Justice League of America.

I went in. Shelves on both sides filled with cereal boxes, X-Men figures, tin lunch boxes, and a whole shelf of Betty Boop items-Betty Boop at a piano with her dog on top, Betty Boop sitting on a c.o.ke machine, a fully gowned Betty Boop in a black-and-white dress with a white corsage inside a box marked ”Collectable Fas.h.i.+on Doll.”

A chunky man in his late twenties or early thirties sat on a stool behind the gla.s.s counter. His hair needed combing. He wore a blue T-s.h.i.+rt with the Superman insignia in the middle.

”Can I help you?” he asked. ”Looking for anything special?”

”Nice place,” I said.

He gave a tiny shake of his head.

”Nice place, maybe. Bad location. I don't have the money to advertise and I'm not downtown on Main Street or in some big mall where I'd get walk-in trade. And I'm not near a school where kids could drop in.”

”Why not move?” I asked.

A shrug this time.

”Can't afford to,” he said. ”Can't stay. Can't move. I've got a few good customers, but not enough and I don't have the cash to buy much at the flea markets. Vicious circle.”

”Cycle,” I corrected. ”Vicious cycle.”

”Yeah,” he said. ”You interested in early television? I've got a Howdy Doody puppet in perfect shape, in the box, 1950. I'd let it go for two hundred.”

”I'm not a Howdy Doody guy,” I said. ”You Michael Donophin?”

”Mickey,” he said warily. ”Legal name is Mickey.”

I took the folded papers out of my pocket and handed them to him. He took them without a word and placed them on the counter next to a tiny figure of Emmett Kelly sitting on a white ball with a gold star.

”Used to have a lot of circus stuff,” he said, ignoring the papers I had served. ”Still have some. Mostly got it from old circus performers who still live around here. My big day was just about a year ago when a lady, no more than this big...”

He put his hand out about three feet above the floor to show me how small she had been.

”This lady, real old,” he said, brightening just a bit at the memory, ”bought all the circus stuff I had. Everything. Three thousand dollars even, no bargaining. Asked her if she'd been in the circus. Said she had but she didn't want to talk about it. I put everything in boxes real careful and got it in her car. Never heard from her again.”

”Why the papers?”

”Foreclosure,” he said. ”I'm fighting it. I'm gonna lose. The Donophins always lose. The Donophins always come back. Don't know anyone who might want to buy me out fast and cheap do you?”

”No,” I said.

”That's okay. I guess I shouldn't fight it. I guess I should just pack everything up, put it in my father's garage, and get a job at Winn-Dixie. That's where my father works.”

There was a large round bowl of a.s.sorted b.u.t.tons, mostly political, on the counter. I touched a red, white, and blue one with a young Teddy Kennedy's photograph on it with the words ”Kennedy for President” in black letters.

”You might try the Internet,” I said. ”Get a Web site. Sell out of your father's garage. There's even something called eBay.”

”Maybe,” Mickey said with no great interest. ”I like talking to people. It's not just the selling. It's the talking about, you know?”

”Yes.”

”Say, you like old music? I mean like really old? I've got old seventy-eights, some of them one-sided, good condition, even got an old Victrola I could let go cheap. Works fine. I've got Paul Whiteman, Eddie Condon, Bing Crosby, Tony Martin, Sophie Tucker. Couple of hundred maybe. Want to take a look?”

”I'm trying to get away from the past,” I said.

”And I'm trying to keep it alive,” he said, looking around his shop. ”You know all this stuff is important to people. The way I see it there're two different histories. There's the one we learn in school, the Magna Carta, the Crusades, the Civil War, George Was.h.i.+ngton, you know?”

”I know,” I said.

”I was never good at that stuff. But there's another history, more important,” Mickey said, excited now. ”There's the history of each of our own lives, filled with little stuff that stays with us, you know? Like watching Leave It to Beaver with your older brother. Remember when the Beaver got stuck in that giant coffee cup?”

I did remember, but I didn't have to tell Mickey. He didn't really need an answer.

”That's our lives. That's Nostalgia with a big *N,'” he said. ”Comic books, movies, television, Mickey Mantle, Frankie Avalon, mom baking fish every Friday night, and my Uncle Walt always coming over for it wearing a tie.”

”Nostalgia,” I said.