The Plant. Part 35

At last he got the door of a Port-a-Potty open. We muscled our burden inside and propped it up between the gray plastic urinal and the toilet seat. The place still held the vague smell of urine and the ghost of old farts. In one high corner was a cobweb with the corpse of an ancient fly dangling from it. On the wall, by moonlight, I read two scrawlings."For XCELLENT BLOJOB BE HERE 10 PM SHOW HARD I SWALLOW," read one. The other, infinitely more disturbing, said: "I WILL DO IT AGAIN & AGAIN & AGAIN. UNTIL I AM CAUGHT."

Suddenly I wanted to be miles from that place.

"Come on," I said to Bill. "Please, man. Come on."

"Just one more second."

He went back to the truck and got the bag with the General's final effects in it-buckle, pacemaker, osteopathic pins. He raised the lid on the toilet, then shook his head.

"Collection bin's gone. It'll just fall on the ground."

"You don't have the d.a.m.n briefcase, either," I said.

"We can't leave that here," Bill said. "Something in it might identify

him."

"h.e.l.l, his fingerprints will identify him, if anyone finds him in there." "Maybe. But we don't know what's in the case, do we? Best we drop

it in the Hudson on our way back. Safer."

That made sense. "Give me the bag," I said, but before he could I s.n.a.t.c.hed the Smiler's bag from him. I jogged to the edge of the drop-off and threw it as far out as I could. I watched it turn over and over in the moonlight. I even imagined I could hear the pins which had held the old warrior's bones together rattling. Then it was gone.

I jogged back to Bill, who had re-latched the Port-a-Potty door. For a wonder, it was one of the less battered ones. It would keep the secret we needed it to keep.

"It's all going to work, isn't it?" Bill asked.

I nodded. Had no doubts then and no doubts now. We are being protected. All we need to do us to take reasonable precautions ourselves. And take care of our new friend, as well.

The moon sank back into the clouds. Bill's eyes glittered in the sudden gloom like the eyes of an animal. Which is, of course, what we were. Two junkyard dogs, one with a white hide and one with a brown hide, skulking in the trash. A couple of junkyard dogs who had successfully buried their bones.

I had a moment of clarity then. A moment of sanity. I'm a Cornell graduate, aspiring novelist, fledgling editor (I can do the job to which Roger Wade has promoted me, of that I have no doubt). Bill Gelb is a graduate of William and Mary, a Red Cross blood-donor, a reader to the blind once a week at The Lighthouse. Yet we had just deposited the body of a murdered man in an acknowledged mafia graveyard. The General stabbed him, but are we not all accessories, in some measure?

Perhaps only John Kenton escapes blame on that score. He did tell me to throw the ivy away, after all. I even have the memo somewhere.

"We're mad," I whispered to Bill.

His whisper back was soft and deadly. "I don't give a s.h.i.t."

We looked at each other for a moment, not speaking. Then the moon came out again, and we both dropped our eyes.

"Come on," he said. "Let's get the h.e.l.l out of here."

And so we did. Back to Route 27, then back to the turnpike, then back to the George Washington Bridge. No one was behind us at that hour, and Carlos Detweiller's case with the combination lock on it sailed away into the drink. No problems; smooth sailing. Sat.u.r.day night and we didn't even see a cop. And all the way, that song went running through my head: Gee it's good to be back home again.

From John Kenton's diary April 5, 1981 1:30 A.M.

Riddley just called. Mission accomplished. The General is gone, and now the Mad Florist and his attache case are gone, as well.

Or maybe he's not.

I just leafed back through these pages to the conversation Roger and I had with Tina Barfield, and what I read there, while not completely accurate, is hardly encouraging. She said we'd be reading Carlos's obituary; what she neglected to tell me (probably because she didn't know) was that I'd be writing it myself. She also told us to go on behaving as if Carlos were alive even after we knew he was dead. Because, she said, he'll be back.

As a tulpa.

Even now I don't know exactly what that is, but I tell you this with absolute certainty, utter conviction, and complete clarity of mind: the six of us haven't gone through all of this to be stopped by anyone living, let alone