Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 46, No. 11, November 1982

J.J. DuBose turned to look at me, and smiled a crooked smile that even now makes me distinctly ill at ease just to recall it.

“Don’t know that,” he said. “But I kin tell you this: it’ll be someone with courage. Someone who kin show me he has guts, who’ll take anythin I kin hand im an come back fer more. You show me somebody who measures up t’that an I will write him a check that’s good at any bank in this dang state fer ten thousand dollars. An that is fer real.”

I don’t recall if he brought his fist crashing down on the table to round off his spiel with the proper punctuation mark, but it seems to me he did.

At this point the waiter returned to our table. Catching sight of our companion, the waiter smiled amiably and said, “I didn’t realize they were friends of yours, Mr. DuBose.” Then, turning to us: “Drinks are always on the house for a friend of Mr. DuBose’s.”

The Texan smiled again and said, “Y’see? Ah cain’t even give m’money away. Everwhere I go they tell me m’money’s no good. Shore is nice t’be liked.” To the waiter he said, “Gimme a stinger, Albert.”

The waiter smiled and nodded, and said, “How about it, boys? Another?”

“A double bourbon,” Landry said. I noticed he had consumed all of his while listening to our acquaintance. The waiter turned to me, but I shook my head and said, “No, I’m fine.”

As soon as the waiter had departed J.J. DuBose leaned across the table and, speaking directly to Landry now, said, “Ten thousand U.S. dollars shore buys a lotta bourbon.”

“What are we talking about?” Landry asked suddenly. “What does a person have to do to satisfy you? What kind of courage are you looking for? Someone to rob a bank — is that it?”

The Texan went into a laughing fit I thought would never stop. His broad shoulders shook with a rhythm so emphatic and well-coordinated it looked choreographed. During this fit I glanced over at Landry. His face never changed expression: he was staring intently at J.J. DuBose, and there was not an ounce of humor, or human warmth, on his features. The big man continued to laugh until his chuckles turned into a wracking cough that continued to convulse him until at length it subsided.

When J.J. DuBose was again able to speak he said, “Hail, I don’t want you robbin no bank. I got more money in m’safe at home than most banks in this state got in their vaults. Besides, that wouldn’t prove nothin other than what a fool y’were t’do such a damfool thing. Naw; t’earn the ten thousand I want y’t’do somethin not one man in ten thousand would have the nerve t’do.”

The waiter returned with the drinks. Nearly everyone beside our party had cleared out, I noticed, for the restaurant closed at midday; the hubbub of conversation heard earlier had been reduced to an ominous silence. I knew we would not be asked to leave: the waiter’s every movement, and the very intonation of his voice, showed he paid deference to J.J. DuBose.

“How bout it, boy?” DuBose finally asked. “Have y’got the stuff?”

Landry took a gulp of bourbon, then set the glass down on the table with a steady hand. “Try me,” he said.

The texan never took his eyes off him, as though afraid he might turn tail and run the second he was unwatched. “Albert,” he called. The waiter reappeared. Sensing him behind him, but not turning in his chair to look, DuBose said, “You know what to bring me. A cupful. And make sure it’s hot.”

The waiter nodded and said, “Yes sir, Mr. DuBose. Right away.” He turned and walked off toward the back of the restaurant and disappeared into the kitchen.

“This is just a little, I guess you’d call it a test, o’mine,” J.J. DuBose said. “I’ve tried it on people before, an, d’you know, not a one — not one — of em’s passed it.”

“I’ll pass it,” Landry said.

DuBose stared at him, and his eyes seemed to bore into Landry’s, as if plumbing his depths. “We’ll see,” he finally said.

Fully ten minutes passed in excruciating silence, during which I do not believe J.J. DuBose once took his eyes off Landry. I rose from my chair at one point simply to stretch, but did not say anything. The atmosphere was filled with the kind of tenseness that forbids speech. I had begun to feel queasy, as though it were I and not Landry who was being tested, and by the time the waiter appeared from the back it was such a relief to have someone break the stillness that I exhaled loudly.

“Just set it on the table there, Albert,” DuBose instructed. The waiter did as he was told. All the gaiety he had displayed earlier had left his features; he looked like a man with an unpleasant duty to perform. He placed the object he was carrying very carefully on the center of the table, exercising the greatest of care in standing it upright and taking very great care indeed not to spill it.

It was a beaker, filled nearly to the brim with a liquid of some kind, a vaguely metallic bluish-gray in color. I could not for the life of me identify it.