Terraplane (19 page)

"All right, break it up-"

"Move along," said the other, pushing aside two white-haired
elderlies. "Break it up."

"Look at 'em," said the speaker, descending from his ladder.
"We want free speech in this country like the white man has-"

"Get back to Russia," cried the larger of the two guardians,
rushing up, clubbing the man pavementways; before he kissed the
street his crowd was gone. Wanda lowered her head; turned and
moved on.

"What's ongoing?" I asked, following.

"One of those speechifyers," she said. "Most of 'em hang out
over on Lenox. They don't like 'em comin' over here too much and
they never like 'em when they start talking about cops. But ever'
word he said's true."

"He bore no Russian look," I said. Wanda laughed.

"Babes in the woods, all of you."

A few hundred meters more and we reached our evident destination, a small candy store with dirt-blackened windows. Eyeing upand then downstreet, she entered; a bell attached to the door tinkled as we crossed over. The windows were dew clean in comparison to the shop's inside. Beneath a long smudged glass counter
lay Kerr's butterscotch and Oh Henry! bars, their gray paper crinkling around their grisly cores. Several yellowed papers stacked
near bore previous month's dates. Countered behind was a sullen
young boy, an oversize cloth cap shading most of his head, a
toothpick wiggling at mouthcorner.

"They're in?" she asked. The brat nodded without looking,
thumbing rearward towards an all-concealing drape. "Better be."
Slipping behind the curtain, we faced a smooth wall broken by a
single metal door. She knocked three separate knocks. Someone
sized us through the door's spyhole before unlocking; the watchman showed, a slender man of cafe-au-lait tint, wearing a dress
vest and trousers cut for look rather than ease. Lowering his pistol,
he smiled, gleaming incisored diamond's glint.

"Hi-de-ho, big woman." He sounded theatrically trained.
"Come right in. "

"Put away that cannon," she said, entering. Within showed an
unwindowed office holding no furniture save for filing cabinets, a
massive wooden desk and a tall coatrack. 'Iwo of those antique
phones were desktopped. Hanging above the desk was a framed
photo of Teddy Roosevelt; Cedric, I noted, wore similar nosepinching glasses. Cornered was what, in these days as since discovered, was called a Victrola; on its spinner black wax played Verdi's
screams, and I wondered at my musicinate's taste. Atop Cedric's
silk shirt lay a broad green-and-purple tic, noosed tight round his
slender neck. Hanging on the coatrack was a dark pearl-buttoned
jacket and a sky gray derby; dried vomit speckled both.

"Miss Wanda," he said, "I'm just a wreck this morning. Up all
night taking care of Rockefeller back there-" Downhall, rearward, I heard stumbling'' sound, as occurs after a long bout.

"Dump him in a bag and drop him in the river. Cedric, I didn't
come here to get an earful-"

"He and one of his floozies got into a row last night, don't want
to know what happened but his knuckles were all skinned upanyway, they must have been drunk. I know he was. Came home,
ripped all his clothes off like he was Josephine Baker and went to the bathroom. I hear this thud like a horse keeled over in the heat
and I go in and he's passed out between the john and the wall. I
greased him all over with Dixie Peach and then took hold and
pulled-"

"I don't want to hear about your love life," she said. "Where's
this passport Norman was talking about? I got things to do,
Cedric-"

"Oh. We'll just gossip when Miss Wanda wants to, I suppose.
All right," he said, trotting deskways like a new-groomed pony.
"This is our man in need?" He measured me plain; I felt X-rayed.
"A military man, I hear. He's staying with you?"

"Quit flittin', Cedric, and get with it."

"Put curdled milk in the coffee this morning?" he asked, arming
me with quick hand. "When she gets too big for her britches"-he
winked-"shouldn't be long, you just come up here and stay with
us as long as you like."

"You've what's wanted?" I asked, preferring not to commit.

"Never heard any complaints." Unlocking his desk drawer, he
took out a thin green booklet. "Here you go, you Venezuelan
firecracker. Brought a snapshot? Won't work otherwise." Passport
handed over, he toreaway my photo without looking it over;
swabbed its rear with mucilage brush and thumbed it pageways into
the booklet. After flapping it a few times, he decided it had dried.
"Sign as I've got you listed. Gave you a new monicker, you'll see."

My readjusted natality was August 7, 1892; my alias was-

"Anselmo Peron y Caracas Valentino?"

"Sounds so south-of-the-border, doesn't it?" he said. "I can
almost see the cactus. Sign there, muchacho. A high yellow like
you won't have no trouble passing."

A shambler emerged from hall's dark; his form, once muscular,
raced towards fat. Lee the Blood showed in less than magnificence,
wearing knee-length undershorts dabbed with red hearts; a sleeveless under was tucked under shortsband.

"Wanda," he said, rubbing his face as if to transform its shape.
"What're you doing here?"

"Collecting on tramp's debts," said Cedric. "Miss Wanda, you just tell Doc that if he ever wants a big favor all he has to do is get
Lee to bring in all his girls for an exam"-he paused, eyeing Lee
with blood-"and then plug the bitches up."

"Easy, Cedric," she said. Lee leaned nearer, reached around her
waist as if looking for a handle with which to hold himself upright,
patted one casabalike buttock.

"My fine dinner's not gonna ride with the master?" he asked,
sounding yet drunk. `Ain't comin' in on that tab?"

"Keep your hand offa my ass," she said, pushing free. "Jiveass
pimp. Think I want to look at your ugly face first thing when you
haul yourself outta bed?"

"You have," he said, grinning. "Got killer fizz out back. Come
send me."

"Shit. Send your dead ass to the pen. Go feel up somebody
wants feelin' up. Come on, Luther, let's go." Lee shrugged,
grinned again, bumped back into the hall. Cedric clasped my
shoulder as I trailed, his frustration all but smoking.

"Drop in anytime," he said, unsmiling. "Soldier boy."

Once we'd restreeted I looked at Wanda, her face bright with
anger; this time, at least, I knew we hadn't been the cause.

"You're connected as well?" I asked.

"Did some work for him, long time ago," she said, disposing of
the subject as she would a used tissue. "Anyhow, that passport
ought to keep you out of most trouble."

"The name's senseless," I said. "My residence is typed in as
Bogota. That's Colombia-"

"Who']] know?" she asked. "Colombians?"

Jacketing the pass, I bumped hand into the tracker; decided to
recheck Skuratov's lack of movement. Covering it with jacket and
hand, I flicked it open as Wanda stopped to buy a paper from a
newsstand fitted below an el stair; the ascent's three-flight rise was
roofed with metal shingling, upheld by delicate iron posts showing
rust, needing paint. The moving light showed plain on trackerscreen.

"How's to downtown fastest?" She pointed upward, seemingly
unsurprised by my outburst. "He's moving. On rubber, must be-"

"Just hold on a minute," she said, grabbing my arm, whispering
earways. "Don't let people see that damn thing. What're you
talking about?"

"He's enrouted," I said. "We've got to see where he settles."
Judging the tracker, he'd entered lower Manhattan; no chance he
was ambulatory alone.

"That thing shows where he's going, right?"

"Someone's taking him. What if he's being airported or inac-
cessibled? He's got our only ticket and I've got to trail-"

"Mean you want to go downtown?" she sighed, knowing my
answer.

"It's essentialled," I said. "If he was footing, no, but at this
speed-"

"Well," she said, "sending you down by yourself be like having a
baby crawl through a snake pit. Don't suppose we got time to run
home first-"

"No," I said. "It'll be a follow only. Safety's assured."

"Let's go then. But look, I'm not going to chase some asshole I
don't even know back and forth 'cross town all day long. Once you
get used to things you can do your own running." Reaching into
her purse she extracted a coin, handed it over; the nickel bore a
bison and an Indian, each finely sculpted. "Slide it in the turnstile
slot when we go through."

The station at ascent's summit outwardly resembled an overworn
Swiss chalet bearing muddy orange gables and tilting cupolas; RIDE
ON THE OPEN-AIR ELEVATED was stenciled along its side. The
place's innards showed as a museum's period room, its fixtures and
look antique even for that day. A uniformed clerk kept watch over
all from within a black-brown cubicle, guarded from those without
by a window barred with brass rails. Friction of many feet gave the
floorboards rolling rises and valleys. A cast-iron stove's sooty pipes
shot upward, through the pressed-metal ceiling; round its black pot
and stubbed legs, buckets of sand grouped as if for storytime. Blue
glass windows inking the light daubed azure wash over all. Passing
through the light metal turnstiles, we heaved open the high doors
leading to the platform. Forty blocks down tracks vanished in
perspective's depths. Cantilevered above, on track's left, were addi tional tracks; expressline, undoubted, unreachable from where we
stood. Wanda spread her paper's wings; I eyed Skuratov's progress,
Eighth Avenue's roar ringing unabated through my ears. He was on
Canal bearing east. To lose him before finding him would make
hash of hope's semblance; I swore he wouldn't get far from our grip.

"Should you contact Doc?" I asked.

"No phone up here," she said. "I'll call once we get where we're
going, wherever that is."

Her paper was the Journal-American; knowing but a single city
daily in my normal life, the multitude here struck me as recklessly
superfluous. Studying seeable pages as she held it before her,
noting an entry believed pertinent, I grasped a corner of the sheet
to attempt to read.

"Want to see it?" she said, releasing the rag's front unit. Its lead
concerned Landon and Edward, whose names unfamiliared; upon
a quick scan, realized that the President and King of England were
meant. More essential to our own moment was an astronomic
note, filling lower corner right.

METEOR BELIEVED LANDED IN JERSEY MARSHES

No Martians Reported This Time

No details there inhered; as well, no word of search and seizure,
though such seemed certain under circumstance. This tale, obviously, was nothing but a coverfable. How was Skuratov? While
green evidenced life, it didn't guarantee consciousness-yet if his
mind ranged free as ever, would he not send for us, rather than
await our own search to turn him? If he developed a new cadre of
minions here with which to work his ploys before we accessed him,
there could be no telling the things he might manage to loose
down upon us.

"Here's the train," she said, looking north. It's slim bulk widened
as it neared, and soon enough its six olive-drab cars clanked to a
stop before us. I approached the nearest steps; noticed pale startled
faces peering through the carwindov s.

"Where you think you're going?" she asked, fastening my arm with vicious hold, dragging me rearward. "Come on. Down to the
baggage car. "

"There were seats aplenty there-"

"It's the law," she said as we shoved in. The rear cars teemed with
mob; we slicked past, butted through those standing, found places
to toe our feet. The jungle-wet air bore the scent of a million
unwashed; tiny fans bolted above us, ceiling-attached, lay still
within their grilles. None but black faces glistened around us, all
drenched by noon's humid sponge. As we rolled ahead half the
standees lurched; none had room enough to fall.

"Why aren't the front cars availabled?" I asked, my face shoved
almost into hers.

"They aren't," she said, clutching a nooselike loop hanging
from the ceiling. "Things must be mighty different in your day,
Mister Major General."

"Multichanged, yes," I said.

"Give anything to know how it is we turn into you," she said. I
had no idea whether they would or not, and so said nothing.
Through an entanglement of arms I looked towards the window,
taking in views down passed streets, quick shots of Harlem's roofs
and spires and steeples. At 110th the line curved as on a roller
coaster, sweeping west at seven-story height. Across the park's June
green bower, midtown showed by daylight, six kilometers away, its
towers' pastels grayed and blurry in the shimmering air. Full
though the sky must have been with particulate and poison, there
was so much more of it to see, and all heaven seen seemed
newmade, creation's dust yet sparkling its vaults.

"Ninety-sixth!" At each stop the conductor shouted station
name. "Ninety sixth and Columbus Avenue. Watch y'step gettin'
off-

I rejudged the tracker's tale. "Whoever's with him stopped," I
said.

"Where is he, then?" she asked, fanning herself with her paper as
the crowd slipped away. After we pulled away from Ninety-sixth the
car had nearly emptied; we took space on the varnished-rattan
seats. Pressing appropriate buttons I blew the grid.

"Centre Street north of Canal," I said. "Near Grand. Chinatown. "

"That's not Chinatown," she said. "That's Little Italy. That's
where we're going?"

"Unless new movement shows," I said. "It's reachable from
here?"

"We can get off first stop above Canal and walk across," she said.
"I forget the name but I know it when I hear it. Just be damn sure
we're not down there longer than we have to be. "

As we rattled down Columbus it became Ninth, and then Hudson. Tenements became lofts became pinnacles, became tenements again, dipping and rising where in my time stood nothing
but glass spire and small-balcony condo. As I sat squashed between
Wanda and a sleeping man, newsprint edging from betwixt his
shoe and sole, I felt sudden wrack, filled with isolation's rage: never
had I felt so inconsolably alone. I'd sustained parents' loss, seen
battlemates liquefied in midconversation; felt loneliness's breath
cool my neck during advance solos in distant lands; scratched away
at the unscarred wound left when, without warning or evident
reason, my wife vanished one late afternoon. Only the latter pained
as much, yet here, surrounded by strangers whose actions never
showed plain, in a city disorienting by its vague similarities, in a
world whose soul was of alien stuff, the worse worsened. Not even
Alice could comfort here.