Chapter 4

Randy had wanted to get over and see Danny Evachevski at Spearfish Lake Appliance earlier in the day, but there were some things from the office that he needed to take with him. Predictably, once he got into the office, it was just one thing after another, so the afternoon was getting pretty well shot by the time Randy finally got away from Clark Construction, carrying a clipboard with several notes on it.

Rather than just head over to the appliance store, Randy wanted to swing by Danny's new building first to have a word with Rod about a couple things. What with everything, it had been a couple days since Randy had been by the site, but even as he pulled his pickup into the parking lot, he could see that Rod and the steel crew had been making good progress in spite of the rainy, crappy weather. That was good, because they were rushing to have the building at least closed in before deer hunting season opened in a little over two weeks. Randy knew when that happened progress would slow to a crawl, because most of the crew would disappear off into the woods for a period from one day to up to the full season. He didn't particularly like it, because deer hunting always raised hell with jobs that they were rushing to finish up before hard winter set in, but the hunting was traditional and there was no way Randy dared to get on anyone's case about it, like it or not.

At a glance, though, it appeared that they'd meet their goal of having the building closed in and the important exterior work done before the hunting season lead flew. That would allow the crew to do the interior work at leisure while it was too cold to work efficiently outside. Although in recent years, Clark Construction had been doing more and more work in the winter, in the deep snow country around Spearfish Lake there was a limit to what could be done in the depths of winter.

The building was pretty much a standard steel building, although the exterior would have a higher level of finish since it was primarily going to be used for a retail business. In recent years, the price of steel had been steadily dropping while lumber prices kept going up and up, so there was a price issue involved. That and the fact that the steel building structure could be put up more quickly than a balloon frame wood building, the result was that the Clark Construction steel building crew stayed busier than most others.

This building hadn't even been conceived back in the spring when Randy and his grandfather were trying to set up the schedule for the year. It probably wouldn't have been started until spring if the steel crew hadn't been ahead of schedule on some other jobs for the year. The building was set to mostly be the new Spearfish Lake Furniture and Appliance store, although there were a couple other things that were going to go into it as well. The only thing about it that was in the least bit out of the ordinary was that one end of the building was going to be heavily soundproofed so Jennifer and Blake could use it as an office and a recording studio.

Though the building was primarily intended to be the home of the new furniture store and the studio, it was being built for a company named JPD Holdings. Randy figured it was at least partly a tax dodge for Jennifer and her brother in law, Phil Wine, but Danny Evachevski was officially the President and go-to guy. It had to pretty well represent Jennifer and Phil's money, since Randy knew Danny had been through a nasty divorce the year before and had arrived home in Spearfish Lake after a number of years' absence with barely two nickels to rub together.

Randy had known Danny back in growing up days, since they lived only a few houses apart from each other. Danny was several years older, and Randy hadn't known him well in those days. Back the previous winter, they'd renewed acquaintances a little, when Danny was still shaking off the divorce and seemed a little bit at loose ends. Danny had gotten over it; he'd been working hard for his dad, Gil, at the appliance store, and if that weren't enough he'd held down a fulltime job as a railroad brakeman for Josh over the summer. On top of that, Danny was now living with his new girlfriend, Debbie Elkstalker, who was a full-blooded Shakahatche from the Three Pines reservation off to the northwest of Spearfish Lake. While Randy still didn't know Danny well, the new Danny was a far cry from the morose, lonely, and distracted soul Randy had met last winter.

It didn't take long to take care of the real business that Randy had with Rod, so he hopped back in his pickup and drove the few blocks to the old Spearfish Lake Appliance store. It was a storefront in an older brick building that could have been in better shape. It would be unfair to say the place seemed empty these days, but it was less jam-packed with large appliances than Randy had been used to seeing. Danny was trying to sell the stock down so there'd be less to be moved to the new building in a few months.

Business first; there were some issues with the wiring plan that needed to be settled. The building was being designed and built on the fly, rather than with lots of planning ahead of time, so naturally there were going to be some issues like that – it went with the territory on a quick build job like that. For the most part, the questions had obvious answers, and all Danny had to do was sign off on them, so that step didn't take long. They batted some conversation back and forth about the building for a while, but that well soon ran dry, too. Finally, Danny asked, "So, can I help you with any appliances today?" It was almost a joke; Randy's house was less than two years old, and had mostly been fitted out with high-end appliances that could be expected to last for a while, and Danny knew it about as well as Randy did.

"Well, yeah, maybe," Randy said offhandedly. "You have clearance prices on any hot tubs?" Spearfish Lake Appliances dealt in hot tubs, along with a lot of other things, and had for over thirty years.

"Hell," Danny snorted, "I have a clearance price on anything in here that's not nailed down and some stuff that is. Do you know what you're looking for?"

"Not really," Randy shook his head. "Nicole thinks it would be a good idea, and I don't know that I disagree. You know the side porch on the north side of the house, between the house and the garage? Something that'll fit in there without having to rip a wall out to get it in."

"Let's see," Danny said thoughtfully, recalling a couple times he'd been over to Randy's for dinner. "As I recall, you've got sliding glass doors on both sides, something like six-eight high, but they probably open up a good four feet or more. That about right?"

"Yeah, six foot eight doors, and they open a good five feet."

"Shouldn't be any major hassle then," Danny smiled. "You got 220 on the porch?"

"Yeah, and a water hookup. We'd planned on putting a tub in there sooner or later."

"No big deal, then. I've got a Wind Dancer 320 hot tub that we could roll right in there and hook up in a matter of minutes. It's the floor model in the back. It's not quite as sexy as a spa but a little more energy efficient. I could cut you a good price on it, just to give me a little floor space. Let's go back and take a look."

One look told Randy it looked like a classic redwood hot tub, deep and comfortable, but with a fiberglass interior and extra insulation. It would look good on the porch, and he didn't think there would be any problem getting it through the double doors if it could go in sideways. "Looks good, bearing in mind that I don't know jack shit about these things," he said after looking at it for a moment. "I'm in your hands on this, Danny."

"I think it'd work for you, and I'll cut you a damn good deal," Danny shrugged. "I'll deliver and set it up for you free, and give you and Nicole a lesson on the care and feeding of these things. And hell, I'm in your hands on the new building."

"OK," Randy nodded. "You want a check now, or on delivery?"

"Whatever works for you," Danny said. "I'll have to scare up a couple hands to help me with it. These things aren't that heavy empty, but they are bulky. I'll have to do the delivery myself after I close up, and I can't do it tonight, I've got class."

"Yeah, it could get a little tight on time for me, too," Randy nodded. "Tomorrow night probably won't work. It's Halloween and we'll have a pot load of kids at the door."

"Yeah, me too," Danny agreed. "Debbie and I will have to stay around home, too. How about Thursday?"

"That looks good to me. I can help you with the moving, probably Nicole, too."

"Well, I'd probably volunteer Debbie to help," Danny nodded. "As far as I know, things are clear for her."

Randy thought for a moment. "What do you say we make an evening out of it?" he said finally. "I'll get Nicole to do dinner, and we can sit around and shoot the shit or something. Maybe we could even try this thing out."

"It'll take three or four hours to bring the water up to temperature," Danny replied. "It'll hold the heat pretty good; it's just that it'll take it a while to get there. It just means we'd have to get an early start."

One of the things Randy enjoyed in the slow months of the winter, that helped him stay in shape and give him something to think about, were his workouts with the martial arts group that met in an empty room above the old Spearfish Lake Appliance store. The group had been going on for years, sometimes more busy than others, clear back to before he had been in college, and would continue in the new building, where there was a special room set aside for the activity.

He'd learned a great deal from the more or less nameless group. Randy had needed those skills a couple times back in his college days, and he was considerably more skilled now. But really, it was recreation and exercise; those incidents were more or less self-defense, and Randy hoped there'd never be another one.

The sessions, usually on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, and sometimes on Saturdays, were a good way to work off frustration, and although Randy had seemed placid, he'd been counting the hours until this evening so he could do a little violent exercise. For that and one more reason, Randy was in a little better mood when he walked up the stairs next to Spearfish Lake Appliance and into the bare room, which only had mats strewn about. Several of the regulars were there already, along with a couple of students.

"Hey, Gil," Randy said to Danny's father, who was the leader of the group, as much as it had a leader. "Before we get started, I got a question to ask. You got any old keys?"

Spearfish Lake was small enough that it didn't have a regular locksmith, and Gil was about as close as they had. He could do some work with locks, made keys, and the like, mostly as one of many hobbies.

"Oh, I can probably dig around downstairs and find a few," he said. "What do you need old keys for?"

"I need more than a handful, I need a couple hundred, minimum," Randy said. "More would be better. It's for a little practical joke."