Chapter 15
On Sunday morning, he left early with Zoe and drove her up to her father’s house and then headed over to see Quimpy. The plan was that he would call her later. Zoe had said that his fire should earn him a day off, but Ron didn’t want a day off. He was yearning to be Mr. Tuck on Monday morning.
Quimpy opened his door smiling and bobbing his head. “I just finished making this guacamole and shrimp thing and we got chips and some great exotic buds to smoke.”
“Games start yet?” said Ron, not sure who was playing or what time it was.
“Just about,” said Quimpy.
Then Ron told him about the fire and what he wanted to accomplish with Zoe. He left out the feeling of the flames on his face and concentrated on the things that he had lost. Quimpy was comfortable in that territory. The living room was a jumble of street furniture and dusty antique tables and stacks of magazines and books. Ron saw that in one corner Quimpy was replaying the Fischer-Spasky matches on a board that was set up with a book about the championship. Ron looked at it but didn’t touch anything. In another corner was another desk set up with stuff on the Kennedy assassination. Quimpy had been in contact with this newspaper guy from Dallas and there were his newsletters and their exchanged letters along with a yellow legal pad of notes and books that had been written about what had gone on. Six Seconds in Dallas, next to Whitewash and Rush to Judgment and a strange book called the Rich and the Super-Rich were lying in these piles.
Quimpy noticed Ron looking and said. “Lamar Hunt, now
there’s an evil mother-fucker. Texas oil money and connected in unbelievable ways.”
Ron nodded. He didn’t know who Quimpy was talking about. The one thing that he did know was that if Quimpy thought that it was important that it probably was. It was Quimpy who had been Ron’s early mentor, before there was a Lashly and before he became Mr. Tuck. It was Quimpy who had realized that Ron was smart enough to grasp things and began to show him the music of Lightin’ Hopkins and Phil Ochs and the talking albums of Mark Twain made by Hal Holbrook.
Now Ron flopped down into a bean bag chair as Quimpy opened a small jelly jar, one of the 30 small jelly jars that he had had sealed from the best pot that they had smoked over the last few years. Ron admired Quimpy’s ability to collect and preserve things, even if wherever he lived did seem to have a musky dusty smell that spread across everything.
Midway through the first game, Quimpy stroking his beard said, “I know a studio apartment that might be available right now. It’s in Bloomfield and the guy isn’t staying there anymore. He left his wife and then got cold feet and went back to her. Everything that you need might be right there, if you can cover the monthly nut.”