Page 147 of Roadrunner

Alex

Now

Riley mentioned it.

Casually.

“Club’s getting together Saturday,” he said. “Nothing formal. Come by around noon.”

I looked at him. “Nothing formal.”

“Just a Saturday.”

“Riley.”

“Noon,” he said. “Bring Arthur.”

He changed the subject.

I let him.

Arthur knew something.

I was certain of it by Friday evening. He had the quality of containment he got when he was holding information he’d been asked to hold. Cooperative but slightly luminous with it.

Like a window with a light behind it.

“What do you know?” I asked at dinner.

“About what?”

“Arthur.”

He ate his dinner. “Nothing,” he said. Pleasantly. Unconvincingly.

Martina was doing something at the counter with her back to us.

Her shoulders were doing the thing they did when she was trying not to laugh.

“You too?” I asked.

“I’m making rice.”

I looked at the two of them.

I let it go.

Saturday arrived bright and immediate.

Arthur was dressed before I came downstairs. He was in the kitchen eating cereal with the barely contained energy of a boy who had somewhere to be and had known it since Thursday.

We drove to the clubhouse at noon.

The parking lot was full.

Every bike the club owned was there. I noted that as I pulled in. All of them. Lined up along the front of the building with the precision of men who took the positioning of their motorcycles seriously.

The club was outside.