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| It's only in retrospect, that it begins to look like some semblance of a plan. |
Louis Shalako
It took him a while to catch on. At first, the low
black car parked across the street from his building meant exactly nothing. He
was just shifting his briefcase to the other hand, digging for his keys, when
the window cranked down and an old, familiar voice accosted him from the
driver’s side.
“Hey, old man. I see you finally got yourself a good
haircut—” Alphonse.
“Fuck! This must be my lucky day.”
Alphonse was waving him over, and he crossed to the
other side and got in so they could talk.
“Hey. I hear you finally did it—” Having reached his
sixty-fifth birthday, Alphonse had finally taken his retirement.
“Yeah. So, ah, Gilles.”
“And you ended up with the fucking car, too. How in
the hell did you manage that one?”
“Let me buy you a couple of drinks down the street,
and I’ll tell you all about it.”
“All right.” Gilles lifted the briefcase over and into
the back seat.
The pair got out, and Alphonse locked it as carefully
as ever.
Their little bistro was just a few doors down, it was
a warm afternoon, and there were tables on the street where they could at least
keep an eye on things, as Alphonse put it.
Grabbing a table, a waiter headed on over, pencil and
pad at the ready…
“Beer?”
“Beer.”
“So.”
“So.”
“Okay. So, I don’t know if I mentioned it, but some
bright boy was questioning some of the expenses for the old unit. One-oh-five. They don’t even call it a car, Gilles.”
Maintenon grinned faintly as their waiter came back,
with a small pitcher, glasses, and a big bowl of free popcorn.
“Yeah, some bright young fellow in the accounting
department. The vehicle is five years old or greater—and they do get a lot of
kilometres, with lots of different people, idiots mostly, driving the living
shit out of them. How could this one be any different? That’s how they think up
there. And, considering a few items, such as a brand-new motor, right out of
the crate. A new clutch, a rebuilt transmission…new battery, new starter, new
generator. New tires, new brakes, fucking brand-new wiper blades. Oil and
filter changes every three months. Half the vehicles in the force are lucky to
get that once a year, it’s like no one can find the time…” It never occurred to
anyone, anyone at all, that good old Alphonse absolutely loved that fucking car. “When a bearing went, we got it fixed. When
the fuel pump went, we got it fixed…right.”
Over the five years, the thing had been rebuilt from
top to bottom, and Alphonse had the log book to prove it.
Maintenon, sipping foam off the top of his mug, nodded
along. It was hard not to laugh, sometimes.
“And it’s like they figured no car has costs like
that. There must be something wrong with it, it must be what the Yanks call a real lemon, Gilles…” He shook his head.
“Yeah, the kid says—this vehicle must be some kind of an outlier. That’s how they talk up there, Gilles.”
He trailed off, tasting his own beer and taking his
own sweet time with it.
“Okay. So, what happened—”
“So, I says to this kid, well, how much is it worth if
we sent it to the scrappers? And he says, we’d be lucky to get two or three hundred
francs for it. The taxi companies love old cop cars, they’re built like tanks
in some ways. They have the biggest engines, the heavy-duty brakes and
suspension. In the end, they sell them off by the lot, people literally bid on
them five or ten at a time. Old cop cars are dirt cheap at auction, Gilles. And
I said, well, okay. I’ll give you that much for it, and maybe a little more
besides. Just to ram it home, I made them pay for the safety check and the new
plates and such.”
 |
| Ye olde Hispano-Suiza. |
“Ha.”
“…and damned if they didn’t take it. Anyhow, that was
about the time the wife and I were thinking…well, you know. About what we might
want to do next. And I just said fuck it, Gilles. Not everyone gets a retirement, and you never really
know just how long you got.”
“That’s very true, anyhow. Here’s to you, Alphonse.
Retirement—what are you going to do,
anyways?”
Alphonse snorted, then uttered a long, deep sigh.
“Huh. Painting the fucking dining room, for
starters—ah, what the hell. I guess I can take it.” After that, he had a funny
feeling they were getting new rugs and probably a couch. “When winter comes,
we’re thinking of heading down to the Cรดte d’Azur.”
“Heh-heh-heh.”
“Seriously, Gilles. After all those years, at some
point, I have to wonder if I will ever be able to sleep in…like any normal
human being.” At five a.m., there weren’t too many places to go, in his
observation. “Sooner or later, Gilles, we’ll be driving each other nuts.”
Gilles sat there, grinning. He raised his glass.
“Here’s to the wife, who must be a very patient
woman.” She’d waited long enough, and so had Alphonse.
“Ah—ha.” Ha.
And of course, Gilles thought of Ann, gone for so many
years now, and things got pretty quiet between them. One might as well top up
those beer glasses…
For his part, Alphonse lit up another one of his
innumerable cigarettes, and studied him for a while.
“It’s funny. I never would have occurred to me. It’s
only in retrospect, that it starts to look like some kind of a plan.”
“What does?”
“…the car, dumb-ass.”
Ah, yes, the car.
As for the plan, Gilles wouldn’t put it past him.
And good for him, too—
It’s not like he hadn’t earned it.
END
Previous Episodes.
Louis has books and stories on Draft2Digital.
See his free audiobook, Dead Reckoning, Inspector Gilles Maintenon Mystery #11 on Google Play.
Here are his works on ArtPal.
Thank you for reading.
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