November Road. Lou Berney

in and out. With each step he took, Guidry’s heart thudded a little slower, a little slower, a little slower. He needed a drink and a steak and a girl. And he needed to move his bowels all of a sudden, to beat the goddamn band.

      He was alive. He was all right.

      At the filling station on La Porte, the pump jockey squinted at Guidry. “Where’s your car at, mister?”

      “About a mile up the road, headed due west at forty miles an hour, my wife behind the wheel,” Guidry said. “I hope you’re not married, friend. It’s a carnival ride.”

      “I ain’t married,” the pump jockey said. “Wouldn’t mind to be, though.”

      “Stand up straight.”

      “What?”

      “If you want to have luck with the ladies,” Guidry said. He was in a generous mood. “Head up, shoulders back. Carry yourself with confidence. Give the lady your full attention. You have a phone I can use?”

      A pay phone on the side of the building. Guidry used his first dime to call a cab. He used his second dime to call Seraphine.

      “No problems,” he said.

      “But of course not, mon cher.”

      “All right, then.”

      “You’ll spend the night at the Rice?” she said.

      “Uncle Carlos better cover my tab.”

      “He will. Enjoy.”

      Back inside, Guidry caught the pump jockey practicing his posture in the reflection off the front glass. Head up, shoulders back. Maybe he’d get the hang of it. Guidry asked about the men’s room, and the pump jockey sent him outside again, to the back of the building this time.

      WHITES ONLY. Guidry entered the single stall and sat down and with great relief released the acid churn he’d been carrying around in his belly for the past twenty-four hours. On the cinder-block wall next to the toilet, someone had used the tip of a knife to scratch a few words.

      HERE I SIT ALL BROKEN HEARTED

      TRIED TO

      That was it. Inspiration had flagged or the poet had finished his business.

      When Guidry came out of the men’s room, his cab had arrived. It dropped him at the Rice, and he headed straight to the Capital Club. A few promising Texas bluebonnets were scattered about, but first things first. Guidry sat at the bar and ordered a double Macallan neat, another double Macallan neat, a rib eye with creamed spinach.

      One of the bartenders, blond hair so pale it was almost white, sidled over and asked out of the corner of his mouth if Guidry wanted to buy some grass. Don’t mind if I do. Seraphine had instructed him to enjoy his evening, had she not? The bartender told Guidry to meet him in ten minutes, the alley behind the hotel.

      Guidry had lifted the last sip of Macallan to his lips. You’ll spend the night at the Rice? That’s what Seraphine had asked him on the phone. Why would she need to ask that? She’d booked his hotel room and knew that his return flight departed tomorrow morning. Why would she need to ask that, and why had Guidry not wondered about it until now?

      “I’m a dumb-ass,” he said.

      The bartender watched him. “What?”

      “I left my wallet upstairs.” Guidry gave him a wink. “See you in five minutes.”

      He left the bar and crossed the hotel lobby, past the elevators and out through the revolving door. The bellhop in the porte cochere said he’d whistle up a cab for Guidry, it’d only take a minute. Guidry didn’t have a minute. He walked to the end of the block, turned the corner, and started running.