Kalooki Nights (61 page)

‘They being, according to Manny,’ she said, ‘the agents of Manny’s will. Which if you take the long view, they were. But terrorists, yes.’

‘So that was Manny’s gun?’

She didn’t quite understand what I meant. But yes, ‘Yes, he believed and still believes he pulled the trigger.’

Couldn’t quite own to turning on the tap, which he had done,
but wanted to have pulled the trigger, which he hadn’t. Explain that.

‘And you never heard from him?’

‘From Asher, no.’

‘No communication of any sort?’

‘No.’

‘Not a single, solitary line?’

‘No.’

‘We are an implacable people.’

She thought about that, pushing away a stray strand of grey hair from her eye. ‘Well, you’ve been an experience,’ she said.

‘Have you married again?’

She shook her head. Then she laughed, not as girlishly as she might have. ‘Unless you call being with Manny a marriage.’

I smiled back. I knew something about that.

I looked across the room to where he was still being held in conversation by Mick Kalooki. He was fluttering his hands, his lizard tongue licking at something or nothing in the air before him, his head still the shape of a small boy’s, his eyes dead. No, I could not call being with Manny a marriage. But then I had funny ideas about what constituted a marriage.

‘I am surprised,’ I said, ‘that you don’t curse us all for ruining your life.’

‘
My
life?’ She seemed astonished I should suggest such a thing. ‘My life’s just a life. It’s your lives that are ruined.’

a cognizant original release september 24 2010