A Singular Man Part 24

Smith stepping back. Naturally. This growling person advancing, putting forth a hand to grab Smith's tailoring and tie held with such a small neat knot. Walked out of a Dynamo house so hushed and still Checked my watch on the big clock of the Treasury Building. They keep close track of time. My half day rest from letters, phone calls, and the keester harrowing communications by hand. Smell weakness and they close in all at once. Muscles across the stomach in fine fencing trim to take the first blows there before they get lower and lower. Fisticuffs from an utter stranger. Always run into trouble taking a local train. Pee on the live rail you oaf. Electric will jump up the liquid arc and snuff you out. If it's death you're looking for.

Stranger's clenched fist pulling George Smith's face close to his own. For a gaping contrast of cla.s.s. Smith's left hand with briefcase raised. Right paw tightened hard in its white silken glove. A flash in the air. Smith's fist landing with a thud on this stranger's jaw. Little pearls of teeth shooting out bouncing bonelike in the puddle. A deflating sigh. Stranger spinning slowly to the platform. Brief splash in the puddle. And rolling head first from the platform into the tracks. Now tingling with the thundering of a train.

Two feet thumping over the turnstile. Shirtsleeved man from the change booth. A citizen covering his eyes and peeking through his fingers at the prospective slaughter. Some hands over mouths and a long high pitched scream. Race of more feet. The nose of the black swaying train. Towards the bleeding unconscious figure stretched on the gleaming rail. George Smith lips tight compressed. Brain tabulating all bank accounts, canes, bra.s.s pigs and umbrellas. The moments on Miss Tomson, crying out against the nape of her neck. Soft skin of her shoulder. Her hand up over my mouth as I screamed. Hush, O George, it's all right. Yesh. Long fingers pressing in on my back. It's all right. Hold you in this terrible terror. Sleep there gently on my shoulder safely from all harm. out against the nape of her neck. Soft skin of her shoulder. Her hand up over my mouth as I screamed. Hush, O George, it's all right. Yesh. Long fingers pressing in on my back. It's all right. Hold you in this terrible terror. Sleep there gently on my shoulder safely from all harm.

Crowd on the edge of the station platform. Train squealing and screeching. Yards ticking off. Hold my breath one year for each. Staring through the backs of all the heads. Silence. Voice shouting get back, get back. An elbow nudging Smith.

"What happened, suicide, someone jump. They should stop it. Work hard all day and somebody blocks the tracks when you want to go home. And ruin your appet.i.te."

Smith's lips stiff and dry. Cold tight band of fear around the throat. Human being prostrate in the tracks under a train. A trip up river. To the great pile of rock I saw from the Prep school boat ride. Walk a last mile down the rattling corridor. To the electrodes. Juice must hurt just a little in that terrible instant. Answer the phone Sally, please. Don't leave me any longer with the sound of sirens above in the street. And this manslaughter. Lying down there.

A dark sleeve of uniform. A chocolate colored face. Looking down into George Smith's own.

"Are you a witness mister."

"O dear G.o.d."

"Look relax."

"How dead is he."

"He's all right. Train missed him."

"G.o.d."

"O.K. whos awit."

Hands dragging the body up on the platform. Blood running down over an eye and out the corners of the stranger's mouth, as he wipes a wrist across his face, lips mumbling and stares dumbly at the relieved George Smith.

"O.K. I got hit in the tracks. Maybe I started it. Took me by surprise. I could beat him in a fair fight. Look at him with them white gloves. I can beat him."

Chocolate policemen stepping in. Firemen arriving. With buckets of sand and little squirting pumps to clean the tracks. Policeman with the stranger and Smith by the arm, nodding back arriving reinforcements. Trains stopped over the whole wide city. Rumours spreading. A guy jumped holding his nose, blessed himself first. Party of police with Smith and stranger climbing up the chewing gum covered steps between the white b.a.l.l.s of gla.s.s and past a man standing with a sandwich sign. Who was arrested on the spot because it said a large rude word.

Smith all stony and silent with his little briefcase in the police station. The entrance, flanked by green b.a.l.l.s of gla.s.s. Gla.s.s swing doors. Rap of typewriters down long narrow corridors. Little group standing before a desk giving particulars to the sergeant. Doctor examining the victim sitting with a handkerchief up to his face. Chocolate policeman patting Smith quietly on the back.

"Don't worry mister, he started it. I got addresses of the witnesses."

Smith yessing his head. Flashes of fear over the knees. Silent eyes everywhere. Full of death. Under lids in the chilled air on this hot afternoon in all the squat funeral parlours dotted here and there on the avenues. Let me go to my little bench in the park. To tea. Back to all the sad memories of my shy big Miss Tomson. Hand under her thatch of hair. On her smooth egg of skull. Miss Tomson's knees bent were round just like the world.

Outside sky grows grey. Leaves of a little tree through bars in a courtyard turning over. Lights flashing. Rain pouring down with sudden white hail. Cooling moist breeze blowing in off off the street. Police changing shift. Taking off caps and wiping their brows. The rancid stranger, a boiler watcher in a hospital. Had to talk to his lawyer. Three of his teeth in an envelope. Said he knew how to fall. His father taught him as a kid to be a champion diver. Chocolate policeman said why don't you shut up buddy before you get another bust in the face. the street. Police changing shift. Taking off caps and wiping their brows. The rancid stranger, a boiler watcher in a hospital. Had to talk to his lawyer. Three of his teeth in an envelope. Said he knew how to fall. His father taught him as a kid to be a champion diver. Chocolate policeman said why don't you shut up buddy before you get another bust in the face.

Outside the hailstones are melting in white ribbons along the gutter. Police station's barren windows and faint lights against a sky of mountainous black cloud. Smith with his little briefcase slowly stepping down to the sidewalk. The boiler watcher quickly following behind. Putting a hand to Smith's back and talking to Smith's cold eyes.

"What about my suit, it's all blood and dirty and I'm going to have to have a plate. Yeah, I need new teeth. What's a matter aren't you talking. I could of pressed charges. Hey, I'm going to sue you. Sure they said I can sue you, see my lawyer. I already got pains in the head. Doctor said it was too early to tell the damage. Wait till I get the specialists at the hospital. Hey, come back. I can sue. Don't worry I got your address."

Smith walking to Golden Avenue. Stop to look at a ship safely sitting dry in a window. With tiny funnels, lifeboats, and first cla.s.s cabins on the promenade deck. Sail from one sh.o.r.e to reach another. Across the days till they're all behind. If winter could come charging down this street. Drive all the heat away. Make the people go crouching in the buildings. And leave me to vamoose on a silver sea. With all my money stacked and packed. Guilty hearts lurk in the giant marble merchant halls. Sally you would have been proud how all the eyes of the other successful people on the station took a deep sad interest in me. Prior to the fisticuffs. Those on the hopeful way up in life turned their heads to look as I pa.s.sed. Think of me. Watch the way I wave down this taxi. Light on my feet and could go into old age like swans down and float up to heaven. That place Bonniface enquired after when he appeared according to Miss Martin at the information desk at the airport near Pomfret Manor, asking if there was an afterlife and was referred to the meteorological office. They may yet get me in this steamy street. All perforated with paper bullets. Come to my funeral as you promised. Keep what you want of me. A little coffin for it, all of its own.

Bury it In Your window Box.

A poppy Will grow.

15.

GEORGE Smith in a rented pair of blue tinted eyegla.s.ses, crossing by the fish market and moving down Owl Street past the wide steps of the Treasury Building towards Dynamo House. The middle of the month of August. Reaching out across the weeks to sink clutching fingers into this harmless Wednesday. Smith in a rented pair of blue tinted eyegla.s.ses, crossing by the fish market and moving down Owl Street past the wide steps of the Treasury Building towards Dynamo House. The middle of the month of August. Reaching out across the weeks to sink clutching fingers into this harmless Wednesday.

Starting at seven o'clock this morning to walk from Merry Mansions. To watch the city awake. Sanitation trucks sprinkling the street. Along the river, breakfast being served in the vast grey hospital. Nights now at their lonely worst. Matilda, an angel fluttering over redemption meetings, home late. While I stand lurking in the train stations, bus terminals. Fly firmly zipped up. Hoping to see some unbelievable golden sign of Miss Tomson's head.

Down in the early morning streets messengers trotting in and out of doors. This instant I feel good. Ships moving out to sea on the high tides. Barges carrying western trains headed north across the narrow waters. Bridges and highways humming with tires. Smell of coffee across this downtown.

Smith stopping, looking up. Obstructing him in his forward motion, a face coming out of prepsterhood. Quickly steering a detour into the gutter. Nearly getting cut down with machines, and leaping back from the honking horns. Too late, too weak and vulnerable to turn and run this crazy time in my personal history. A smooth jawed figure. Grey natty topcoat, cream shirt and fat striped tie. And eyes that turned on their glow.

"I know you, hey aren't you George Smith. Not so fast like you were at the building site, that time."

"Beep."

"Ha you're George Smith all right."

"Beep."

"What do you mean, beep for an old friend. We were prepsters together."

"Beep."

"Ha ha George. It is you. Greetings. No kidding. Well how are you. I read that nifty write up in the papers. I mean you're a somebody. I mean I'm not doing badly. I'm doing all right. Got myself a little old partnership. But I mean how are you, all right."

"Beep beep."

"Now wait a minute. George ha ha. I know this is a funny situation."

"Beep."

"But a joke's a joke. O.K."

"Beep beep."

"Now hold it. Let's not make a meeting like this in the middle of Owl Street with all the congestion, holding things up. I mean you're located here. What do you say."

"Beep."

"Gee George is there something wrong. Are they crowding you. This has kind of gone on too long to be comic. I can take a hint, if that's it. What are you saying this beep to me for. If you don't want to recognise me say so."

"Beep beep."

"What is it. Is this a method, something happened and you use this method. I mean they said in the papers you were building a mausoleum, that costs, I know. I mean are you nervous."

"Beep."

"It's a method."

"Beep."

"I see that's one beep. O now I remember. The rude noise you made to the reporters. O I'm catching on, a voice lapse. It's one beep, maybe, for yes."

"Beep."

"And two for no."

"Beep."

"I'm sorry, I didn't know anything about this George. Is it permanent."

"Beep."

"Gee that's tough, on your wife and kids. I heard you got married. Only guessing you got kids. To Shirl. What a girl. She'd never even give me a tumble. Remember the tea dances. Those white linen suits Shirl used to wear. She was beautiful."

"Beep."

"But I just didn't know you had this problem. I guess you're under specialists."

"Beep."

"New method like this must tax the mind. You must want to really say something once in awhile. Like an opinion."

"Beep beep."

"Is that right. If there's anything you need. I know you have money. But if you're bothered by a problem, spiritual, you know. Why you holding your hand to your ear. You're not deaf too."

"Beep."

"O, gee that's tough. You lip read."

"Beep."

"You remember Alice. You know I married her."

"Beep beep."

"She only mentioned you the other day. How Shirl followed you right across the ocean. The ocean. I'm saying the ocean. My Alice, yes, mentioned you. She mentioned you. This is a really rotten world. Real rotten. It's rotten. Guy's speech and hearing cut off in his prime. I said in your prime. It's a shame. But you can still see. I said see, you can still see. To lip read. From behind the blue gla.s.ses."

"Beep."

"Thank G.o.d for that. Can they do something for you. I said, help you. Can they help you."

"Beep beep."

"It makes you sick, doesn't it. A disgrace. I said it was a disgrace."

"Beep."

"Believe me I'm really sorry for what's happened to you. I mean that sincerely. I said, I'm sorry. Sincerely."

"Beep beep beep."

"That's three. I got it. For thanks."

"Beep."

"Only George, I'm sort of in a hurry. Like to hang on, talk over old times. Sure would like to hear what it was like serving in a foreign army. Must feel good to be a colonel. I said full colonel. Must feel good to be one. Get together won't we. I mean sometime, old sport, when you're all right again. You'll be all right. Thing is not to worry. I said don't worry. Looking at my watch. Got to be dead on time, somewhere. An appointment. I wish you all of G.o.d's luck that someday you may be well again. Hope your health comes back. I mean that."

"Beep beep beep."

"Sorry I got to rush. But if you can read my lips I'm saying the cure may be in prayer George. Pray. So long."

"Beep beep beep beep."

"Ha ha, goodbye. Goodbye."

Smith ducking into the inhuman stream. Entering Dynamo House. So many have wives and little ones. Like the lonely have themselves. I've just the strength to climb these stairs. Ugliness brings taunts and jeers from pa.s.sersby. Elegance invites a.s.sault from strangers. Old friendships promote beeps.

As a c.r.a.p Can lead To crutches.

16.

Miss Martin sitting at her desk in room 604. Looking up with apprehensive eyes. A tiny smile at the corner of her lips as Smith cleared his throat and said a forceful good morning. In the corner a canvas container stiffly against the wall. Four mornings it's rested there, and while Miss Martin was out purchasing wiener and crumb cake for lunch yesterday I sneaked to take a look and swallowed peering down a narrow bore barrel.

Seems for no reason at all I go beep. But the presence of a lethal instrument makes one tense at any sudden sound in the front office. Miss Martin's been making rapid visits to the water closet feeling sick. Once staying there two hours. Perhaps say a little word before she starts to read her newspaper.

"Miss Martin, the rifle."

"Yes."

"I note it has a hair trigger."

"Yes."

"I know we're a little informal here nowadays."