HOW FAR IT COULD GO
by Lawrence Block

She picked him out right away, the minute she walked into the restaurant. It was no great trick. There were only two men seated alone, and one was an elderly gentleman who already had a plate of food in front of him.
The other was thirty-five or forty, with a full head of dark hair and a strong jawline. He might have been an actor, she thought. An actor you'd cast as a thug. He was reading a book, though, which didn't entirely fit the picture.
Maybe it wasn't him, she thought. Maybe the weather had delayed him.
She checked her coat, then told the headwaiter she was meeting a Mr. Cutler. "Right this way," he said, and for an instant she fancied that he was going to show her to the elderly gentleman's table, but of course he led her over to the other man, who closed his book at her approach and got to his feet.
"Billy Cutler," he said. "And you're Dorothy Morgan. And you could probably use a drink. What would you like?"
"I don't know," she said. "What are you having?"
"Well," he said, touching his stemmed glass, "night like this, minute I sat down I ordered a martini, straight up and dry as a bone. And I'm about ready for another."
"Martinis are in, aren't they?"
"Far as I'm concerned, they were never out."
"I'll have one," she said.
While they waited for the drinks they talked about the weather. "It's treacherous out there," he said. "The main roads, the Jersey Turnpike and the Garden State, they get these chain collisions where fifty or a hundred cars slam into each other. Used to be a lawyer's dream before no-fault came in. I hope you didn't drive."
"No, I took the PATH train," she said, "and then a cab."
"Much better off."
"Well, I've been to Hoboken before," she said. "In fact, we looked at houses here about a year and a half ago."
"You bought anything then, you'd be way ahead now," he said. "Prices are through the roof."
"We decided to stay in Manhattan." And then we decided to go our separate ways, she thought but didn't say. And thank God we didn't buy a house, or he'd be trying to steal it from me.
"I drove," he said, "and the fog's terrible, no question, but I took my time and I didn't have any trouble. Matter of fact, I couldn't remember if we said seven or seven-thirty, so I made sure I was here by seven."
"Then I kept you waiting," she said. "I wrote down seven-thirty, but—"
"I figured it was probably seven-thirty," he said. "I also figured I'd rather do the waiting myself than keep you waiting. Anyway—" he tapped the book "—I had a book to read, and I ordered a drink, and what more does a man need? Ah, here's Joe with our drinks."
Her martini, straight up and bone dry, was crisp and cold and just what she needed. She took a sip and said as much.
"Well, there's nothing like a martini," he said, "and they make a good one here. Matter of fact, it's a good restaurant altogether. They serve a good steak, a strip sirloin."
"Also coming back in style," she said. "Along with the martini." He looked at her. He said, "So? You want to be right up with the latest trends? Should I order us a couple of steaks?" 
"Oh, I don't think so," she said. "I really shouldn't stay that long." 
"Whatever you say."
"I just thought we'd have a drink and—" 
"And handle what we have to handle." 
"That's right."
"Sure," he said. "That'll be fine."
Except it was hard to find a way into the topic that had brought her to Hoboken, to this restaurant, to this man's table. They both knew why she was here, but that didn't relieve her of the need to broach the subject. Looking for a way in, she went back to the weather, the fog. Even if the weather had been good, she told him, she would have come by train and taxi. Because she didn't have a car.
He said, "No car? Didn't Tommy say you had a weekend place up near him? You can't go back and forth on the bus."
"It's his car," she said.
"His car. Oh, the fella's."
"Howard Bellamy's," she said. Why not say his name? "His car, his weekend place in the country. His loft on Greene Street, as far as that goes." He nodded, his expression thoughtful. "But you're not still living there," he said.
"No, of course not. And I don't have any of my stuff at the house in the country. And I gave back my set of car keys. All my keys, the car and both houses. I kept my old apartment on West Tenth Street all this time. I didn't even sublet it because I figured I might need it in a hurry. And I was right, wasn't I?"
"What's your beef with him exactly, if you don't mind me asking?' "My beef," she said. "I never had one, far as I was concerned. We lived together three years, and the first two weren't too bad. Trust me, it was never Romeo and Juliet, but it was all right. And then the third year was bad, and it was time to bail out."
She reached for her drink and found the glass empty. Odd—she didn't remember finishing it. She looked across the table at him and he was waiting patiently, nothing showing in his dark eyes.
After a moment she said, "He says I owe him ten thousand dollars."
"Ten large."
"He says."
"Do you?"
She shook her head. "But he's got a piece of paper," she said. "A note I signed."
"For ten thousand dollars."
"Right."
"Like he loaned you the money."
"Right." She toyed with her empty glass. "But he didn't. Oh, he's got the paper I signed, and he's got a canceled check made out to me and deposited to my account. But it wasn't a loan. He gave me the money and I used it to pay for a cruise the two of us took."
"Where? The Caribbean?"
"The Far East. We flew into Singapore and cruised down to Bah."
"That sounds pretty exotic."
"I guess it was," she said. "This was while things were still good between us, or as good as they ever were."
"This paper you signed," he prompted.
"Something with taxes. So he could write it off, don't ask me how. Look, all the time we lived together I paid my own way. We split expenses right down the middle. The cruise was something else, it was on him. If he wanted me to sign a piece of paper so the government would pick up part of the tab—"
"Why not?"
"Exactly. And now he says it's a debt, and I should pay it, and I got a letter from his lawyer. Can you believe it? A letter from a lawyer?'
"He's not going to sue you."
"Who knows? That's what the lawyer letter says he's going to do."
He frowned. "He goes into court and you start testifying about a tax dodge—"
"But how can I, if I was a party to it?"
"Still, the idea of him suing you after you were living with him. Usually it's the other way around, isn't it? They got a word for it."
"Palimony."
"That's it, palimony. You're not trying for any, are you?"
"Are you kidding? I said I paid my own way."
"That's right, you said that."
"I paid my own way before I met him, the son of a bitch, and I paid my own way while I was with him, and I'll go on paying my own way now that I'm rid of him. The last time I took money from a man was when my Uncle Ralph lent me bus fare to New York when I was eighteen years old. He didn't call it a loan, and he sure as hell didn't give me a piece of paper to sign, but I paid him back all the same. I saved up the money and sent him a money order. I didn't even have a bank account. I got a money order at the post office and sent it to him."
"That's when you came here? When you were eighteen?" 
"Fresh out of high school," she said. "And I've been on my own ever since, and paying my own way. I would have paid my own way to Singapore, as far as that goes, but that wasn't the deal. It was supposed to be a present. And he wants me to pay my way and his way, he wants the whole ten thousand plus interest, and—" 
"He's looking to charge you interest?"
"Well, the note I signed. Ten thousand dollars plus interest at the rate of eight percent per annum."
"Interest," he said.
"He's pissed off," she said, "that I wanted to end the relationship. That's what this is about." 
"I figured."
"And what I figured," she said, "is if a couple of the right sort of people had a talk with him, maybe he would change his mind." 
"And that's what brings you here."
She nodded, toying with her empty glass. He pointed to the glass, raised his eyebrows questioningly. She nodded again, and he raised a hand and caught the waiter's eye and signaled for another round.
They were silent until the drinks came. Then he said, "A couple of boys could talk to him." 
"That would be great. What would it cost me?" 
"Five hundred dollars would do it." 
"Well, that sounds good to me."
"The thing is, when you say talk, it'll have to be more than talk. You want to make an impression, situation like this, the implication is either he goes along with it or something physical is going to happen. Now, if you want to give that impression, you have to get physical at the beginning." 
"So he knows you mean it?" 
"So he's scared," he said. "Because otherwise what he gets is angry. Not right away, two tough-looking guys push him against a wall and tell him what he's gotta do. That makes him a little scared right away, but then they don't get physical and he goes home, and he starts to think about it, and he gets angry."
"I can see how that might happen."
"But if he gets knocked around a little the first time, enough so he's gonna feel it for the next four, five days, he's too scared to get angry. That's what you want."
"Okay."
He sipped his drink, looked at her over the brim. His eyes were appraising her, assessing her. "There's things I need to know about the guy."
"Like?"
"Like what kind of shape is he in?'
"He could stand to lose twenty pounds, but other than that he's okay."
"No heart condition, nothing like that?'
"No."
"He work out?'
"He belongs to a gym," she said, "and he went four times a week for the first month after he joined, and now if he goes twice a month it's a lot."
"Like everybody," he said. "That's how the gyms stay in business. If all their paid-up members showed up, you couldn't get in the door."
"You work out," she said.
"Well, yeah," he said. "Weights, mostly, a few times a week. I got in the habit. I won't tell you where I got in the habit."
"And I won't ask," she said, "but I could probably guess."
"You probably could," he said, grinning. He looked like a little boy for an instant, and then the grin faded and he was back to business.
"Martial arts," he said. "He ever get into any of that?'
"No."
"You're sure? Not lately, but maybe before the two of you started keeping company?'
"He never said anything," she said, "and he would. It's the kind of thing he'd brag about."
"Does he carry?'
"Carry?'
"A gun."
"God, no."
"You know this for a fact?"
"He doesn't even own a gun." 
"Same question. Do you know this for a fact?" 
She considered it. "Well, how would you know something like that for a fact? I mean, you could know for a fact that a person did own a gun, but how would you know that he didn't? I can say this much— I lived with him for three years and there was never anything I saw or heard that gave me the slightest reason to think he might own a gun. Until you asked the question just now it never entered my mind, and my guess is it never entered his mind, either." 
"You'd be surprised how many people own guns," he said. "I probably would."
"Sometimes it feels like half the country walks around strapped. There's more carrying than there are carry permits. A guy doesn't have a permit, he's likely to keep it to himself that he's carrying, or that he even owns a gun in the first place." 
"I'm pretty sure he doesn't own a gun, let alone carry one." 
"And you're probably right," he said, "but the thing is, you never know. What you got to prepare for is he might have a gun, and he might be. carrying it." She nodded, uncertain.
"Here's what I've got to ask you," he said. "What you got to ask yourself, and come up with an answer. How far are you prepared for this to go?"
"I'm not sure what you mean."
"We already said it's gonna be physical. Manhandling him, and a couple of shots he'll feel for the better part of a week. Work the rib cage, say." 
"All right."
"Well," he said, "that's great, if that's how it goes. But you got to recognize it could go farther." 
"What do you mean?"
He made a tent of his fingertips. "I mean you can't necessarily decide where it stops. I don't know if you ever heard the expression, but it's like, uh, having relations with a gorilla. You don't stop when you decide. You stop when the gorilla decides."
"I never heard that before," she said. "It's cute, and I sort of get the point, or maybe I don't. Is Howard Bellamy the gorilla?" 
"He's not the gorilla. The violence is the gorilla." 
"Oh."
"You start something, you don't know where it goes. Does he fight back? If he does, then it goes a little farther than you planned. Does he keep coming back for more? As long as he keeps coming backfor it, you got to keep dishing it out. You got no choice."
"I see."
"Plus there's the human factor. The boys themselves, they don't have an emotional stake. So you figure they're cool and professional about it."
"That's what I figured."
"But it's only true up to a point," he went on, "because they're human, you know? So they start out angry with the guy, they tell themselves how he's a lowlife piece of garbage, so it's easier for them to shove him around. Part of it's an act but part of it's not, and say he mouths off, or he fights back and gets in a good lick. Now they're really angry, and maybe they do more damage than they intended to."
She thought about it. "I can see how that could happen," she said.
"So it could go farther than anybody had in mind. He could wind up in the hospital."
"You mean, like broken bones?"
"Or worse. Like a ruptured spleen, which I've known of cases. Or as far as that goes, there's people who've died from a bareknuckle punch in the stomach."
"I saw a movie where that happened."
"Well, I saw a movie where a guy spreads his arms and flies, but dying from a punch in the stomach, they didn't just make that up for the movies. It can happen."
"Now you've got me thinking," she said.
"Well, it's something you got to think about. Because you have to be prepared for this to go all the way, and by all the way I mean all the way. It probably won't, ninety-five times out of a hundred it won't."
"But it could."
"Right. It could."
"Jesus," she said. "He's a son of a bitch, but I don't want him dead. I want to be done with the son of a bitch. I don't want him on my conscience for the rest of my life."
"That's what I figured."
"But I don't want to pay him ten thousand dollars, either, the son of a bitch. This is getting complicated, isn't it?"
"Let me excuse myself for a minute," he said, rising. "And you think about it, and then we'll talk some more."
While he was away from the table she reached for his book and turned it so she could read the title. She looked at the author's photo, read a few lines of the flap copy, then put it as he had left it. She sipped her drink—she was nursing this one, making it last—and looked out the window. Cars rolled by, their headlights slightly eerie in the dense fog. When he returned she said, "Well, I thought about it."
"And?'
"I think you just talked yourself out of five hundred dollars."
"That's what I figured."
"Because I certainly don't want him dead, and I don't even want him in the hospital. I have to admit I like the idea of him being scared, really scared bad. And hurt a little. But that's just because I'm angry."
"Anybody'd be angry."
"But when I get past the anger," she said, "all I really want is for him to forget this crap about ten thousand dollars. For Christ's sake, that's all the money I've got in the world. I don't want to give it to him."
"Maybe you don't have to."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't think it's about money," he said. "Not for him. It's about sticking it to you for dumping him, or whatever. So it's an emotional thing and it's easy for you to buy into it. But say it was a business thing. You're right and he's wrong, but it's more trouble than it's worth to fight it out. So you settle."
"Settle?'
"You always paid your own way," he said, "so it wouldn't be out of the question for you to pay half the cost of the cruise, would it?"
"No, but—"
"But it was supposed to be a present, from him to you. But forget that for the time being. You could pay half. Still, that's too much. What you do is you offer him two thousand dollars. I have a feeling he'll take it."
"God," she said. "I can't even talk to him. How am I going to offer him anything?"
"You'll have someone else make the offer."
'You mean, like a lawyer?'
"Then you owe the lawyer. No, I was thinking I could do it."
"Are you serious?'
"I wouldn't have said it if I wasn't. I think if I was to make the offer he'd accept it. I wouldn't be threatening him, but there's a way to do it so a guy feels threatened."
"He'd feel threatened, all right."
"I'll have your check with me, two thousand dollars, payable to him. My guess is he'll take it, and if he does you won't hear any more from him on the subject of the ten grand." 
"So I'm out of it for two thousand. And five hundred for you?"
"I wouldn't charge you anything."
"Why not?'
"All I'd be doing is having a conversation with a guy. I don't charge for conversations. I'm not a lawyer, I'm just a guy owns a couple of parking lots."
"And reads thick novels by young Indian writers."
"Oh, this? You read it?"
She shook her head.
"It's hard to keep the names straight," he said, "especially when you're not sure how to pronounce them in the first place. And it's like, if you ask this guy what time it is he tells you how to make a watch. Or maybe a sundial. But it's pretty interesting." 
"I never thought you'd be a reader."
"Billy Parking Lots," he said. "Guy who knows guys and can get things done. That's probably all Tommy said about me." 
"Just about."
"Maybe that's all I am. Reading, well, it's an edge I got on just about everybody I know. It opens other worlds. I don't live in those worlds, but I get to visit them."
"And you just got in the habit of reading? The way you got in the habit of working out?'
He laughed. "Yeah, but reading's something I've done since I was a kid. I didn't have to go away to get in that particular habit." 
"I was wondering about that."
"Anyway," he said, "it's hard to read there, harder than people think. It's noisy all the time."
"Really? I didn't realize. I always figured that's when I'd get to read War and Peace, when I got sent to prison. But if it's noisy, then the hell with it. I'm not going." 
"You're something else," he said. 
"Me?"
"Yeah, you. The way you look, of course, but beyond the looks. The only word I can think of is class, but it's a word that's mostly used by people that haven't got any themselves. Which is probably true enough."
"The hell with that," she said. "After the conversation we just had? Talking me out of doing something I could have regretted all my life, and figuring out how to get that son of a bitch off my back for two thousand dollars? I'd call that class."
"Well, you're seeing me at my best," he said.
"And you're seeing me at my worst," she said, "or close to it. Looking to hire a guy to beat up an ex-boyfriend. That's class, all right."
"That's not what I see. I see a woman who doesn't want to be pushed around. And if I can find a way that helps you get where you want to be, then I'm glad to do it. But when all's said and done, you're a lady and I'm a wiseguy."
"I don't know what you mean."
"Yes, you do."
"Yes, I guess I do."
He nodded. "Drink up," he said. "I'll run you back to the city."
"You don't have to do that. I can take the PATH train."
"I've got to go into the city anyway. It's not out of my way to take you wherever you're going."
"If you're sure."
"I'm sure," he said. "Or here's another idea. We both have to eat, and I told you they serve a good steak here. Let me buy you dinner, and then I'll run you home."
"Dinner," she said.
"A shrimp cocktail, a salad, a steak, a baked potato—"
"You're tempting me."
"So let yourself be tempted," he said. "It's just a meal."
She looked at him levelly. "No," she said. "It's more than that."
"It's more than that if you want it to be. Or it's just a meal, if that's what you want."
"But you can't know how far it might go," she said. "We're back to that again, aren't we? Like what you said about the gorilla, and you stop when the gorilla wants to stop."\
"I guess I'm the gorilla, huh?'
"You said the violence was the gorilla. Well, in this case it's not violence, but it's not either of us, either. It's what's going on between us, and it's already going on, isn't it?"
"You tell me."
She looked down at her hands, then up at him. "A person has to eat," she said.
"You said it."
"And it's still foggy outside."
"Like pea soup. And who knows? There's a good chance the fog'll lift by the time we've had our meal."
"I wouldn't be a bit surprised," she said. "I think it's lifting already."