Confessions of a Tax Collector by Richard Yancey Page B

fact remained that Culpepper had chosen this as the first case and Culpepper never wasted an opportunity to signal his intentions.
    The day had not gone well for Allison. She had become flustered, tongue-tied, bound by minutiae. She clearly thought she should have performed better and would not stop beating herself up for it. The owner of the mortuary was a stooped octogenarian named Mr. Rose and he spoke with a soft, babyish lisp. He was pitiful. Allison was pitiful. The whole damned thing was pitiful. Culpepper was intensely interested—or at least he pretended to be—in the esoteric intricacies of embalming. He assumed the lead in this and the other two of Melissa’s cases we called on that first day. At the end of it, after we had returned to the office, I looked through the window and saw her hurrying to her car, head bowed, and I was shocked to realize that Allison was crying.
    Back in the office, Culpepper tossed a three-inch-thick case file before me and said, “Look this over. We’re calling on it tomorrow.” He added, “One of Melissa’s dogs.” A “dog” was an old case, either overworked or under-collected. Dogs were nearly impossible to close. “You’ll notice it flunks the thickness test.”
    “The thickness test?”
    “The thicker the case, the harder it is to close. The little sucker is choking on all the paper. You never want a case file over an inch thick. Under an inch, you’re a superstar. Over an inch, you’re a fucking loser.” It was clear from his tone what category he thought Melissa belonged to. “Look it over tonight.”
    My first homework assignment. I dutifully brought the file home and spent three hours poring through Melissa’s history and the dozens of forms, computer printouts, letters, and sticky-notes pasted throughout.
    At the beginning of the case, some two years before, Melissa’s handwriting was large and flowing, almost flowery. By the eighteenth-month anniversary of its assignment to her, her handwriting had deteriorated to an almost illegible scrawl, like some desperate lifer scribbling on the cell wall. The last entry was over two months old. She had written, “TP stll nt curr. Sts needs add. time to consol. debt & refin. DL in 2 wks to supply new CIS.” Most histories are written in this kind of shorthand. Translated, it read, “The taxpayer [is] still not current [with making tax deposits]. States needs additional time to consolidate debt and refinance. [Gave] deadline in two weeks to supply new Collection Information Statement.” The deadline came and went without Melissa securing the new information from Ms. Marsh. That, I supposed, was up to me, under the guiding hand and watchful eye of William Culpepper. I comforted myself that I would not be alone: at least Allison would be there and could be counted on to draw some of Culpepper’s fire.
    “Allison’s called in sick,” Culpepper informed me when I walked through the door the following morning. “It’s just you and me today. Grab your cases. You’re driving.”
    He lowered himself into my little car and shifted his bulk this way and that in the bucket seat, trying to get comfortable. That was not a possibility for someone his size in a Nissan Sentra. He looked around the confines of the interior, unable to disguise his distaste. Culpepper drove a Ford Probe, jet black, low to the ground and immaculately kept. My car was not immaculately kept. Old newspapers, plastic lids from convenience-store fountain drinks, yellow napkins from Wendy’s, gum wrappers, loose change, all littered the tiny backseat and floorboards. He shifted his feet, trying to clear a spot. I dropped the case files into the seat behind me, slid down into the driver’s seat, buckled my seat belt, placed my hands on the steering wheel, and waited for the entire universe to come undone and crash upon my head. The stories of Culpepper’s cruelty were legion; they were recounted in Phase One training with gleeful abandon, like