Dead men

A man walked into my house without knocking. He began to measure the walls with a measuring tape. He'd make a measurement then make a note of his findings on a legal pad. He hummed "Hotel California" as he worked. He was short and pot-bellied and walked with his feet splayed out like a duck.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

He dropped his tape measure. He turned and looked at me, mouth open, face turning slack and white. He made the sign of the cross and took a step backward. "You're supposed to be dead," he said.

"No one told me," I said.

He sat down heavily on the sofa. "They said you'd been killed. You fell asleep out on the Interstate, rolled your car. They said the house was empty. Your wife is selling it, but she's got to have it fixed it up a little. You know, to bring it up to code."

My house was empty except for an old worn-out sofa and the kitchen stuff that Janet didn't want. I went into the kitchen and came back with two beers. I gave one to him. He held the bottle up and looked at it against the light. "A dead man has just given me a beer," he said.

"You sure you're in the right house?" I said.

He took a slip of paper out of his shirt pocket. "Six four one, McNutt. That's what they said."

"I think you wanted six four three. I was about to make myself a ham sandwich," I said. "You had your lunch yet?"

The wreck hadn't been bad enough to kill anyone, but then it doesn't take much. Drowsy, then a deer in the headlights, oversteering to miss it, an icy spot, a slide into the median. All this at low speed, the car still usable. Walt Ragdale, who lived next door, left a wife and four kids. No insurance, a load of debt. The house was all Geri Ragdale had. And it wasn't worth much. Maybe twenty, twenty-five. In California it would go for a hundred and fifty. But there's no work here anymore since the mines closed and the smelter moved its business to Mexico and other places where you can get people to defy death working from a catwalk over molten copper for two dollars a day.

I brought the sandwiches out. "It's the guy next door you want, Walt Ragdale," I said. "He drove his Ford off the road this side of Bozeman Hill."

I was glad to have company. I'd been more or less alone since Janet took off for California with our son, Bill, and most of the furniture. I'd made a mess of things, no question about it.

"Son of a gun," the guy said. "They told me the wrong address. Said nobody's home. Just go in and take the measurements."

He had a wad of bread and ham in his jaw. His eyes watered from the hot Chinese mustard I liked to use. He gulped down some cold beer. "You looking for a job by any chance?" he said.

I wasn't, but I should have been. I hadn't worked in two months. The flower shop had fired me, and that was okay since the pay sucked. The bereaved don't tip and most of the flowers were sent to them.

Money's scarce in this town. People don't spend what they have on the frills. Before the flower shop I worked on the Arco smelter for union wages. The town thrived back then. You could make a living picking up loose coins outside the bars. We had more bars than churches and more churches than grocery stores. I made good money. Even so I drank and sulked and took it out on Janet and sometimes little Bill. "What's wrong with you?" she said more than once, sobbing. I didn't have a clue. Still don't. "Me," I said. "I'm what's wrong with me." I meant it as a wise crack, not a confession. It was both, I guess.

I never hit her, but I might as well have, if words can bruise. They can do worse than bruise. They can kill off the spirit. They can put you through hell and leave you there. Janet was only saving herself and little Bill. I tried to make it up, but I'd crossed the point of no return.

"What kind of job?" I said.

"This job. Doing shit like this for Lakin Real Estate. Checking foundations, insulation, wiring, measuring square footage, looking for dry rot. Shit-work basically, but they pay fifty cents over minimum wage."

"Why give it up?"

"I'm going fishing. Up in Alaska. Salmon. My cousin Fermin Duran has his own boat. He lost a crew member-washed overboard in a storm. I can make a pile of money in season, then travel in the off. I need to see things. Like Mexico, or Sweden. My wife's a Swede on her father's side." He made a comical face. "Yah, shore, you betcha by golly!" he said. One beer and he was drunk. He got up and hiked his pants and sat down again. He was more fat than muscle and didn't seem too bright. I couldn't see him waddling across the deck of a fishing boat, tossing up and down on the high seas.

"You're not afraid of getting washed overboard in a storm?" I said. "Water's pretty cold up there. A man would die of hypothermia in a few minutes."