sweaty fat guy comes up,” the first woman said. “Sat next to him and you could tell they knew each other. But I can’t say they liked each other. It was like they had to talk to one another but neither one of them wanted to be there. Like what they really wanted to be was arguing, but there was too many people around.”
“I understand,” Maggie said. “What did this fat guy look like?”
“A loser,” the first woman offered.
“Like a really bad car salesman,” her friend explained. “One who hasn’t sold a car in, like, twenty years. Fat. Sweating. Losing his hair. Bad suit.”
“He had red hair,” the first woman offered.
“No, he didn’t. I have red hair,” her friend said, running her hands through it to prove it. It was nice hair, too. She took good care of it. “That guy had brown hair. What was left of it.”
“Okay, he had reddish brown hair,” the first one decided. “And he stunk of bad aftershave and way too much of it. Like we couldn’t smell the booze underneath it?”
Danny. Danny had been there, too.
“What happened next?”
“They were arguing,” the second woman explained. “Me and Tammy tried to get closer. You know. We were bored. There’s this new girl,” she explained, then stopped to make a face. “She was in line earlier to talk to you. Every time she climbs up on the bar, you’d think Miss America had arrived and decided to tear off her clothes and do lap dances. The men go wild and we’re invisible.”
“Yeah,” the first one agreed angrily. “And they throw all of our money at her. Because, let me tell you, we bring in steady paychecks, which is more than I can say for most of the men in this place.”
“And then?” Maggie asked firmly, leading them back to the point.
“They were sitting at the end of the bar, near the front door,” the first one explained. “I figured it was because the young guy had claustrophobia. You know, he didn’t like little spaces on account of just getting out of the joint.”
“That’s probably true,” the second woman said in admiration. “I didn’t get that far in thinking about it.”
“And?” Maggie asked less patiently.
The first woman was ready: “All of a sudden, someone shoves Tony into the two of them. I mean, he just comes flying out of the crowd and slams into them, and they topple over on Charley, and some girl he’s trying to pick up, and drinks are spilling everywhere, and Charley and Tony come up swinging, and before you know it, everyone has pushed out the front door and they’re rolling around in the parking lot, and the whole place empties out and you can’t see a thing, but people are hitting the dirt right and left and fists are flying.”
“Yeah,” the second woman added. “It was way better than the dancing.”
“How did he get cut?” Maggie asked, gesturing toward Bobby Daniels.
Both women shrugged. “That’s kind of the weird part,” the first woman said. “I mean, we were looking and we didn’t see nobody pull a knife. So whoever it was had to be quick. Now, I did see maybe a chain or two, but these guys got records. Most of ’em got two strikes against ’em. They’re not going to pull their weapons unless it’s serious.”
“Are Charley and Tony waiting to talk to me?” Maggie asked, nodding toward the two men standing on either side of Bobby Daniels.
“Tony is,” the second woman said. “Charley split with the girl he was hitting on as soon as Roger came out swinging a bat and broke up the fight.”
“Yeah,” the first woman agreed. “Charley’s a lover, not a fighter.”
Maggie suppressed a smile. “Okay.” she said. “Thanks, you guys. I appreciate how observant you are.”
“Yeah?” the first woman said eagerly. She looked at her friend. “Maybe you and me ought to be cops?” They were still laughing as they stumbled back inside, anxious to start drinking on someone else’s tab for a change.
None of these people had bothered Maggie. She was able to see beyond their rough exteriors and bad teeth and lack of money to the human beings beneath. She was able to find some sort of point in common with them, somehow, and they could feel it, and that was why they talked so easily to her. What a woman. I marveled at what I felt coming from her. She was calm and organized inside. She knew this was a distance game and