The Big Bounce (jr-1) by Elmore Leonard

Author:Elmore Leonard [Leonard, Elmore]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: det_crime

10

“IT’S A GOOD DEAL,” Mr. Majestyk said. “Thirty bucks a week she comes in every day but Sunday. Sunday I like to cook a steak outside on the grill, nice sirloin, this guy at the IGA cuts it about two and a half inches thick.”

Mr. Majestyk sliced off a piece of kielbasa and dipped it in chili sauce. He pushed the fork into his sauerkraut and heaped it over the sausage with his knife. Chewing, he took a piece of bread and buttered the whole slice. Still chewing, he said, “She bakes it herself. At home, bakes two, three times a week and brings it in fresh. I mean fresh.”

“It’s all right,” Ryan said.

“She keeps the place clean. Vacuums twice a week.”

Ryan was eating fast. He had missed breakfast again and he was hungry. The idea had been to get up early and drive over to Ritchie’s hunting lodge and look it over, before anybody was around. But he’d overslept and missed breakfast. He’d have to drive out there after work, but he was too hungry to think about that now. “She can cook,” Ryan said.

“I wouldn’t let her if she couldn’t,” Mr. Majestyk said.

“You got something going with her?”

“With Donna?” Mr. Majestyk glanced toward the doorway into the living room. “Christ, what do you think, I’m hard up or something?”

“She’s old, but she’s not too bad looking,” Ryan said. “I mean, better than nothing.”

“You’re young, you got it on the brain.”

“Well, it’s natural, isn’t it?”

“Natural doesn’t mean you got to think about it all the time.”

“Is that right? What do you think about?”

“I got plenty of things,” Mr. Majestyk said. “For example, should I stay up here year-round? I mean, what’s in Detroit? I might as well live here. I mentioned keeping the place open for hunting season?”

“You said something about it.”

“Well, I got another idea. A hunting lodge.”

“Like Ritchie’s?”

“Naw, that’s a farmhouse he fixed up. You know what an A-frame is?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Like a Swiss-looking place-a steep roof almost comes down to the ground? For people who ski. They’re building them all over up north. Prefab.”

“I’ve seen pictures.”

“Take two of them,” Mr. Majestyk said. “Big ones, each sleeps about ten with the loft upstairs, and join them together with a central heating system.”

“You already got the cabins,” Ryan said.

“I’d have to put in new heating units. It gets twenty below, them little units in there would quit. No, I don’t mean here. There’s some property I know a guy wants to sell-off by itself, woods, a lake. You know the road there it goes through the migrant camp and up past Ritchie’s lodge?”

“Yeah?”

“Go past it about a half a mile, you see a sign, ROGERS, turn left and follow the road up the hill through the woods.”

“Out away from everything.”

“Right. Build the A-frames there, get twenty hunters, twenty-five bucks a day each-three full meals, all the mix and ice and everything included for twenty-five bucks a day.”

“That’d be all right.”

“In the heart of deer country. But you see with the lake you got the bird hunters too.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.