Downtown

15

The theater was on Thirteenth Street off Seventh Avenue, a ninety-nine-seat house in what had once been the rectory of a Catholic church. The church was still functional, although the theater —according to Felix—barely scraped by. All of the street lamps on either side of the block had been smashed by vandals, and the only illumination at one-forty in the morning was a floodlight bathing the facade of the church and causing it to look like a sanctuary for Quasimodo. A hand-lettered sign affixed to a stone buttress on the northwest side of the church advised that the Cornerstone Players could be found in the direction of the pointing arrow at the bottom of the sign.

“They’re rehearsing a medieval play,” Felix said, “an allegory of sorts.”

Michael thought it odd that a group of players would be rehearsing at this hour of the morning. Then again, he did not know anything at all about allegories. Perhaps an allegory had to be rehearsed in the empty hours of the night.

“They were supposed to open just before Christmas,” Felix said, “but the director’s wife ran off with another woman, and they had to bring in a replacement. They’ll be lucky if they make it before the end of the year. Even with all these crash rehearsals.”

He was leading them familiarly up the lighted alleyway on the side of the church, feeling very chipper now that Michael had stopped banging him against the wall and had released his grip on the parka. On the way downtown in the open convertible, he’d told them he was really looking forward to killing Judy Jordan. Michael doubted he would actually kill her, even though he sounded simultaneously serious and cheerfully optimistic about the prospect. Apparently, an audition with Arthur Crandall was an important thing. Working in an Arthur Crandall film, even if the movie didn’t make any money, could help an actor’s career enormously. Which was why Felix was so incensed that Judy hadn’t told him the detective role was an audition.

Michael assured Felix it had been nothing of the sort, but Felix thought he was just mollifying him, Judy Jordan being a good friend of his and all, who’d even thrown a surprise birthday party for him. Michael was thinking that in his own way Felix was crazier than any of the people he’d met in the past few days. But Felix was an actor; perhaps he was only acting crazy.

There was an arched doorway near the rear of the church, which Felix explained was the entrance to the theater, but he walked right past it and around to the back of the church, where a metal door was set in a smaller arch. A sign advised that this was the stage door and asked all visitors to announce themselves. Felix pressed a button under a speaker. A woman’s voice said, “Yes?”

“Felix Hooper,” he said.

“Minute,” the woman said.

There was a buzz. Felix grasped the doorknob, twisted it, and led them into a space that looked like a one-room schoolhouse, with students’ desks and a teacher’s desk and a piano in one corner, and an American flag in another corner. A dark-haired woman wearing a wide, flower-patterned skirt over a black leotard and tights came into the room, carrying a clipboard.

“Hi, Felix,” she said.

“Hi. Is Judy here?”

“Onstage,” she said.

Michael noticed that she was barefoot.

“I’m Anne Summers, the stage manager,” she said.

“I’m Connie Kee, the chauffeur,” Connie said.

Michael did not introduce himself because he was still wanted for murder, albeit the murder of a dope dealer fence.

“You look familiar,” Anne said.

“Everybody tells me that,” Michael said.

“Okay to go in?” Felix asked.

“Sure.”

“‘Cause I want to kill Judy,” Felix said, and smiled.

“So does Kenny,” Anne said, and turned to Michael. “Kenny Stein, the director,” she explained.

Michael figured that in the theater, everyone had a title. He wondered if he was supposed to recognize Kenny Stein’s name. Anne was looking at him expectantly.

“Gee,” Michael said.

“You’d better sit way in the back,” she said to Felix. “Kenny likes a lot of space around him. Are you sure I don’t know you?” she asked Michael.

“Positive,” Michael said, and followed Felix across the room to a doorframe hung with a black curtain. Felix pushed the curtain aside, whispered, “Stay close behind me,” and stepped through the doorframe. Connie went out after him. Anne was watching Michael. He smiled at her. She smiled back.

There was darkness beyond the curtain.

And a man’s voice.

“Let’s take it from Judy’s entrance again.”

And then a voice Michael remembered well.

“Kenny, could you please refer to me as the Queen?”

Judy Jordan speaking. The woman who’d called herself Helen Parrish on Christmas Eve. Wishing to be called the Queen on Boxing Day.

“Because if I’m going to stay in character …”

“Yes, yes,” the man said patiently.

“… and you keep referring to me as Judy …”

“Which, by the way, is your name.”

“Not in this play,” Judy said. “In this play, I am the Queen, and I wish you’d refer to me as that.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” the man said. “Can we take it from the Queen’s entrance, please?”

“Thank you,” Judy said.

Michael was following Felix and Connie up the side aisle of the small theater, turning his head every now and then for a glimpse of the lighted stage, where Judy Jordan was standing with three men. Michael stumbled, caught his balance, and then concentrated entirely on following Felix, who was now at the last row in the theater, moving into the seats there.

“What’s the problem?”

The man’s voice again. Kenny Stein, the director.

“Some problem, Your Majesty?”

“Did you want this from the top of the act, or from my entrance?” Judy asked.

“I said from your entrance, didn’t I?”

“That’s so close to the top, I thought …”

“From your entrance, please.”

Seated now, Michael turned his full attention to the stage. The set seemed to be an ultramodern apartment in Manhattan, judging from the skyline beyond the open French doors leading onto a terrace. But the people in the set—Judy and the three men—were dressed in medieval costumes. Judy was wearing a crown and an ankle-length, scoop-necked gown. One of the men was wearing a black helmet that completely covered his head and his face. Another of the men was holding what looked like a real sword in his right hand. The third man, younger than the other two, was wearing leggings wrapped with leather thongs, and a funny hat with a feather in it; he looked like a peasant.

“They’re rehearsing in the set for a play that’s already in performance,” Felix whispered, leaning over Connie, who was sitting between them.

“It’s only two A.M.,” Kenny said patiently, “just take all the time you need.”

“We just want to make sure we’ve got the right place,” the man with the sword said.

“The right place is Judy’s entrance,” Kenny said.

“From my line?”

“Yes, your line would be fine.”

“`The White Knight? At your service, fair maiden?`”

“Yes, that is your line,” Kenny said. “Can we do it now, please?”

“Thank you,” the man with the sword said.

“Judy, are you ready?”

“Please don’t call me Judy,” she said.

“Well, I’m not supposed to know you’re the Queen yet. You haven’t come in yet.”

“Yes, please do come in,” Kenny said. “Just say your line, Hal, and Judy will come in.”

“The play is called Stalemate,” Felix explained.

On the stage, the man with the sword said, “The White Knight. At your service, fair maiden.”

“I’m not a maiden,” Judy said. “I’m a queen.”

The White Knight knelt at once. “Your Majesty,” he said. “Forgive me.” Judy turned to the man who looked like a peasant. “Who are you?” she asked.

“I am the White Knight’s squire,” he said, “a mere pawn. Your Majesty.”

“And this poor creature?” she asked, indicating the man in the black helmet.

“A helpless servant of the Queen, Your Majesty, tell him to put up his sword!”

“Release him,” Judy said.

“He’s a dangerous man, Your Majesty.”

“Release him, I say.”

The White Knight and his squire immediately let go of the man wearing the black helmet.

“Take off your helmet,” Judy said. “I want to see your face.”

“No,” the man in the helmet said.

“I’m a queen!” Judy said. “Do as I say!”

“You’re not my queen, lady,” the man in the helmet said, and immediately turned to look out into the theater. “Kenny,” he said, “I don’t get this, I really don’t. A minute ago, I’m calling her `Your Majesty,` and now I’m telling her she’s not my queen.”

“That’s because this is the first time you can really see her,” Kenny said patiently.

“Why can’t I see her before this?”

“Because she’s standing in the dark. This is when she moves toward the fire. On `I’m a queen,` she moves toward the fire. And you can see her face in the firelight, and that’s when you say `You’re not my queen, lady.`”

“Then whose queen is she?” the man in the helmet asked.

“That’s not the point, Jason. The point is …”

“You know, I think Judy’s right, you shouldn’t call us by our real names when we’re supposed to be other people.”

“It would be clumsy to call you `Black Knight,`” Kenny said.

“Then call me `Sire,`” the Black Knight said.

“Me, too,” the White Knight said.

“And what would you like to be called, Jimmy?”

“I’m the Pawn,” the young man in the peasant outfit said, looking stunned.

“Yes, that’s what the playwright has chosen to call you, the Pawn, that is part of the metaphor. The chess metaphor. But shall I call you `Pawn` when I address you?”

“Yes, that would be fine, Kenny,” the young man said.

“Very well, then. Sire, would you please take it from your denial line?”

“Me?” the White Knight asked.

“No, the other sire, please.”

“My what line?” the Black Knight asked.

“The line where you deny the Queen. If you please.”

“Oh.”

“Thank you,” Kenny said.

Michael wondered if allegory and metaphor were one and the same thing. Whichever, it was certainly a very confusing play, at least the part of it they were rehearsing. At one point, he thought he was beginning to catch on to the idea that the Black Knight represented black men everywhere, but then the play swerved off in another direction and he figured he was wrong. Puzzled, he began to lose interest, until—

“I can still remember the day Arthur died,” the Black Knight said.

“Oh, yes, of course,” the Queen said, “the whole world remembers.”

“I’d been in the woods with a friend of mine,” the Black Knight said. “It was a bright, clear November day, the forest was alive with sound, we walked on crackling leaves, and breathed needles into our lungs. And when we came out of the forest, there was a beggar woman sitting by the side of the road, wringing her hands and weeping, and we said to her, `Why do you weep, old woman?` and she answered, `Arthur is dead.` And we didn’t believe her. Arthur could not be dead. But as we walked further along the road, we came upon more and more people, all of them saying, `Arthur is dead,` until at last there was a multitude of people, all of them weeping and saying the same words, `Arthur is dead, Arthur is dead,` and then we believed it. And the sun went out, and a wind rose up, and there was no longer the sound of life in this land of ours, there was only the sound of muffled drums.”

He’s talking about John F. Kennedy, Michael thought.

The Queen shuddered and said, “You’re a very morbid person.”

“He was a good king,” the Black Knight said.

“Yes, but we’ve all got to go sometime, you know.”

“Things would be different if he were still alive,” the Black Knight said. “He had a vision, that man, you could see it flashing in his eyes, you just knew he had a dream clenched tight in those hands of his. And when a man can dream that strong, it makes you want to join him, it makes you want to move right in and say, `Yes, Daddy, take me where you’re going, I’m with you, Daddy, let’s yell it out together.` There was no bullshit about that man. I loved him.”

Now he’s talking about Martin Luther King, Jr., Michael thought.

“You talk too much,” the Queen said, “and not about the right things. Also, I don’t like profanity. And if you want to know something, I’m beginning to find you enormously boring and a trifle sinister.”

This is Alice in Wonderland, Michael thought.

“Besides, I don’t trust masked men,” the Queen said. “Nobody does.”

Everything in this city is Alice in Wonderland, Michael thought.

“This isn’t a mask!” the Black Knight shouted.

“Then what is it?”

“My head is inside this black cage,” the Black Knight shouted. “My brain is in here, I think in here, I feel in here, it is not a goddamn mask!”

“You’re frightening me,” the Queen said. “Look, the fire’s going out.”

“The fire went out the day Arthur died,” the Black Knight whispered.

“Very good,” Kenny said, “very nice indeed. Let’s take a ten-minute break, and then I want to do the dragon scene, the H-bomb scene.”

“Oh, God, is that it?” the White Knight said.

“Sire?”

“Is the dragon supposed to be the H-bomb?”

“Yes, Sire, that is the metaphor,” Kenny said.

“I’m glad to know that. Because, actually, I was wondering why I was so afraid of a little dragon. I’m supposed to be an experienced knight, but I’m afraid of a little dragon. It didn’t make sense to me. Now that you tell me it’s the H-bomb …”

“That’s the metaphor, yes.”

“Well, that’s an enormous relief, I can tell you. Did you know it was the H-bomb, Jason?”

“Oh, sure,” the Black Knight said, and both men walked off the stage. The Pawn, looking somewhat bewildered, followed them. “Ten minutes, please,” Kenny called after them, and left the theater through the curtained doorway that led to the one-room schoolhouse.

Judy Jordan sat alone on the stage. Sat on a wooden plank stretched across several stacked cinder blocks. Head bent, studying her script.

Looking blonde and beautiful and serene and quite regal.

“I want her first,” Felix said, and stood up.

“No,” Michael said.

He said it quite softly.

Almost whispered it, in fact.

There was no reason for Felix to have obeyed him.

But he sat down at once.

Michael walked up the aisle to the front of the theater. He climbed the steps onto the stage. Judy was absorbed in the script, probably trying to dope out all its inherent metaphors and allegories. He walked directly to her.

“I’m looking for a good criminal lawyer,” he said.

Her head jerked up.

“Because I’ve been accused of murder,” he said.

She started to rise.

He put his hands on her shoulders and slammed her back down onto the makeshift plank and cinder-block seat, which was undoubtedly a metaphor for a medieval bench.

“Remember me?” he said.

“Yes,” she said. “Hello.”

She was playing a woman in a movie about the French Resistance. She was really a Nazi spy and he was the wounded American soldier who had fallen in love with her and been betrayed by her. It was now his painful duty to turn her over to the authorities. He had come to take her away. She still loved him. She was looking up at him wistfully, her blue eyes wide.

“How have you been?” she asked.

“Comme ci comme ça,” he said, in the French he had learned in Vietnam. “Et tu?”

“Not very good,” she said. “I saw it on television.”

“Oh. And what did you see, Miss Parrish?”

“My name is Judy Jordan,” she said.

“I know.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “That’s not what I thought would happen.”

“What did you think would happen?”

“Charlie said he was playing a joke on a friend of his.”

“By Charlie …”

“Charlie Nichols.”

“You call your father by his first name, do you?”

“My father?”

“Yes, Charlie. You call your father `Charlie?`”

“No, I call my father `Frank.`”

Michael looked at her.

“Isn’t it true that you call Charlie `Daddy`?” he asked.

“No, I call Charlie `Charlie.`”

“Look, Miss Jordan, I happen to know that Charlie Nichols is your goddamn father. So please don’t …”

“No, Frank Giordano is my goddamn father, which is where I got the name Jordan, from Giordano, and I really don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“I am talking about a photograph of you and Charlie Nichols …”

“Oh.”

“Yes, oh, inscribed `To My Dear Daddy, With Love,` and signed Judy Jordan, who is you, Miss Jordan, Miss Parrish, Miss Giordano, whoever the hell you are!”

Nodding, Judy said what sounded exactly like, “I remember Mama.”

“Good,” Michael said at once. “Who is she?”

“Who?” Judy said. “I Remember Mama is a play. I was Christine in a revival. Charlie was Papa.”

“What?”

“Yes. In the play. My father.”

“In a play?”

“Yes. I Remember Mama. And at the end of the run, I signed a photograph …”

“To My Dear Daddy …”

“Yes, With Love.”

“Referring to …”

“Yes, the characters in the play. Also, it was an inside joke, in that Charlie and I were sleeping together at the time.”

“I see.”

“Yes. Charlie was my first lover.”

“I see.”

“Yes. I was seventeen. I was a virgin at the time.”

“So he wasn’t your father.”

“No, that would have been incest. Also, my own father would have shot him dead if he’d found out.”

Michael wondered if her own father had now belatedly if messily shot Charlie dead. He also wondered if Judy even knew that Charlie was dead. He decided not to mention it. From seeing a lot of cop movies, he knew that this was an old cop trick. You did not mention that someone was dead. You waited for the suspect to trap himself by mentioning that the last time he’d seen So-and-So alive was Thursday, and then you yelled, “Ah-ha, how did you know he was dead?”

“I am really sorry,” Judy said. “When I saw on television that they’d accused you of murdering Arthur Crandall …”

“Oh, you saw that, did you?”

“Oh, yes. I was shocked!”

“But I didn’t murder Crandall, you know.”

“Well, of course you didn’t.”

“In fact, I didn’t murder anyone.”

“Well, I’m not too sure about that.”

“You can take my word for it. And please don’t change the subject. The reason the police think I killed Rainey …”

“Who?”

“… is that you and Felix Hooper stole my goddamn identification and …”

“Yes, but that was for a joke.”

“What joke? What do you mean?”

“The joke Charlie was going to play on his friend.”

“What friend?”

“He didn’t say.”

“What did he say?”

“He said he needed someone’s identification to play a joke on a friend of his. He said it wouldn’t really be stealing …”

“Oh, it wouldn’t, huh?”

“In that he would return the stuff to its rightful owner the moment he was through with it.”

“And just how did he plan to do that?”

“He said he would mail it all back.”

“And you believed him, huh?”

“Not entirely. But a thousand dollars is a lot of money.”

“What do you mean?”

“Charlie paid each of us a thousand for the job.”

“You and Felix.”

“Yes.”

Which accounted for two thousand dollars of the check Crandall had cashed on Friday. But where had the other seven thousand gone?

“I was the one who picked Felix for the part,” Judy said. “He was very good, didn’t you think?”

“Yes, excellent,” Michael said.

“Yes, he’s a very good actor. I still owe him the thousand, but Charlie hasn’t paid me yet.”

Nor is he likely to, Michael thought.

“So as I understand this,” he said, “you were supposed to steal my identification …”

“Well, borrow it, yes. And your money, too.”

“Why the money? If all you needed was my …”

“In case you went to the police. So it wouldn’t look as if we’d been after your I.D. Actually, it was the best improv Felix and I ever did together.”

“The best what?”

“Improvisation. Picking up a stranger in a bar, and then …”

“You mean I was chosen at random?”

“Well, not entirely. Charlie gave me the nod.”

“What nod?”

“To go ahead.”

“Go ahead?”

“Yes. He was sitting at the bar, listening to everything we said …”

“Yes, I know that.”

“And he gave me the okay, just this little nod, you know—do you remember when I looked down the bar?”

“No.”

“Well, I did. To get his okay. The nod.”

“To get his permission, you mean, to steal my goddamn …”

“Well, it was only for a joke, you know.”

“A murder was committed!”

“Well, I’m sorry about that, but Felix and I had nothing to do with it.”

“Where does Crandall fit in?” he asked.

“I have no idea, but he’s a very good director and I’m glad it wasn’t him you killed.”

“I didn’t kill anyone, goddamn it!”

“I don’t like profanity,” she said at once. “And if you want to know something, I’m beginning to find you enormously boring and a trifle sinister. If the police made a mistake, you should go to them and correct it, instead of breaking the concentration of someone who’s trying to master a very complex role.”

“That was very good,” he said sincerely. “You sounded absolutely royal.”

“Do you really think so?” she asked.

“Positively majestic. Better than Bette Davis in Elizabeth and Essex …”

“Honestly?”

“Even better than Hepburn in The Lion in Winter.”

“Oh dear,” she said.

“But would you happen to know a bar called Benny’s?”

“No. I’m not being too forceful, am I? Maybe I should temper the steel with a touch of lace.”

“No, I think you’ve got exactly the proper balance, really. On Christmas Eve, Crandall went to Benny’s to meet a man sent there by someone named Mama. Would you happen to know who Mama is?”

“Well, of course.”

“You do?”

“Mady Christians, am I right?”

“Who?” he said.

“That was in the original 1944 production, of course. When we did it fifteen years ago, a woman named …”

“Yes, but this Mama is an illegal alien. Would you know anyone …?”

“Oh,” she said. “That Mama.”

He held his breath.

“Charlie’s crack dealer,” she said. “I’ve never met her, but he talks about her all the time.”

“Do you know where she lives?” Michael asked.

Only her last name was on the mailbox.

Rodriguez.

The match Michael was holding went out.

The hallway was very dark again.

“Somebody peed in here,” Connie said.

Michael was thinking it would be very dangerous to ring Mama’s bell and then go up there to see her. He wondered if they should go up the fire escape again. Apartment 2C. Was what it said under the name Rodriguez on the mailbox.

Michael rang the bell for apartment 3B.

There was no answering buzz.

He tried 4D.

No answer.

“Is this an abandoned building?” he asked

Connie.

“Not that I noticed,” she said. “Why don’t you just kick the door in?”

He did not want to hurt the sole of his foot again by trying to kick in yet another door. And he didn’t want to throw his shoulder against the door, either, because his arm still hurt from getting shot and then hurling himself at Alice. He wondered if there were any medics here in this almost abandoned building.

What’s the matter, honey? Andrew asked.

Cute little baby girl, eight months old, not a day older. Crying her eyes out. Sitting the way the Orientals did. Squatting really. Legs folded under her, feet turned back. Bawling. Birds twittering in the jungle. The village not six hundred yards behind them. Friendlies. Charlie had left three days ago, the old man had told Mendelsohnn. Took all the rice, moved out. Had to be miles and miles away by now. The baby crying.

Come to Papa, sweetie.

Andrew reached for her.

Michael kicked out at the doorjamb, just above the lock. The door sprang open, surprising him, catching him off balance. He stumbled forward, following the opening door into a small ground-floor rectangle directly in front of a flight of steps. Connie was immediately behind him. “2C,” he said.

She nodded.

They began climbing the steps.

Four apartments on the second floor.

2A, B, C, and D. They stopped outside the door to 2C. He put his ear to the wood, listened the way Connie had told him cops did. He couldn’t hear a thing. He took the .22 out of the right-hand pocket of the bomber jacket. He wondered if he would need both pistols. Suppose Mama Rodriguez was sleeping inside there with a .357 Magnum under her pillow? In Vietnam, you slept—when you slept, if you slept—with your rifle in your hands. But sometimes …

Andrew’s rifle was slung.

His arms extended to the baby.

Come on, darlin’.

The baby blinking at him.

It had stopped raining.

A fan of sunlight touched the baby like a religious miracle.

“I don’t hear anything in there,” Michael said.

Birds twittering in the jungle. The leaves still wet. Water dripping onto the jungle floor. The baby had stopped crying. Fat tear-stained cheeks. Looking at Andrew wide-eyed as his hands closed on either side of her body, fingers widespread, lifting her, lifting her—

Michael was suddenly covered with sweat. Terrified again.

Terrified the way he’d been that day in Vietnam when Andrew picked up the baby. Afraid of what might be beyond that door. Afraid to enter the apartment beyond that door. Because beyond that door was the unknown. Mama. A woman named Mama who had ordered him murdered. Fat Mama Rodriguez inside there. Waiting and deadly. Like the baby.

Here we go, darlin’, Andrew said. The baby in Andrew’s widespread hands, coming up off the jungle mat, the birds going suddenly still as—

Michael did not want to know what was behind this closed door.

Behind this door was something unspeakably horrible, something that went beyond fright to reach into the darkest corners of the unconscious, the baby going off in a hundred flying fragments, her arms and legs spinning away on the air, eyeballs bursting, bone fragments, tissue, blood spattering onto Andrew as the bomb exploded. A moment too late, Long Foot yelled, “She’s wired!” and a surprised look crossed Andrew’s face as the metal shards ripped through his body and blood spurted out of his chest. A piece of the dead baby was still in Andrew’s hands. The hands holding what had been the baby’s rib cage. But the hands were no longer attached to Andrew’s arms. The hands were on the trail some twelve feet away from him. And the stumps where his wrists ended were spurting blood. And a hundred smoking wounds in his jacket were spurting blood.

“Oh, dear God,” Michael said, and dropped to his knees beside Andrew, and the RTO said,

“Barnes, they’re …” and the jungle erupted with noise and confusion. They were flanked by Charlie left and right. Charlie had wired the baby, had stolen a baby from the village and wired it, and left it just off the trail for the dumb Americans to find, Come on, darlin’, here we go, and the baby exploding was the signal to spring the trap, Andrew hoisting her off the jungle mat and tripping the wire.

And in that instant, the true horror of the war struck home. The true senseless horror of it, they had wired a baby. And recognizing the horror, they had wired a baby, Michael was suddenly terrified. Running through the jungle with Andrew in his arms, and the Cong assuring him in their sing-song pidgin English that they did not want to hurt him, and the baby’s gristle and blood on Andrew’s face, and Andrew’s own blood bubbling up onto his lips, oh dear God his hands were gone, they had wired a baby, Michael knew only blind panic. Suddenly there was no logic and no sense there was only a wired baby exploding between the hands of a good dear friend and the friend was dying the friend’s blood was pumping out of his body in weaker spurts the friend was oh God dear God dear Andrew please, and he began crying. In terror and in sorrow. A sorrow he had never before known. A sorrow for Andrew and himself and for every American here in this place where he did not wish to be or choose to be and a sorrow, too, for a people that would use a baby that way because no cause on earth was worth doing something as terrible as that but behind him Charlie kept saying it was okay Yank no need to worry Yank nobody’s gonna hurt you Yank.

Andrew was already dead for half an hour when Michael found the medical chopper.

He would not let them take the body out of his arms.

He kept holding the handless body close, rocking it.

“Come on, man,” the black medic said.

“Get a grip.”

Michael turned to him and snarled at him.

Like a dog.

Lips skinned back over his teeth.

Growling deep in his throat.

The medic backed off.

A colonel came over to him later.

“Let’s go, soldier,” he said, “we’ve got work to do.”

“Fuck you, sir,” Michael said.

And growled at him, too.

Click.

A sound to his right. He whirled, terrified. The door to apartment 2B was opening. A girl the color of cinnamon toast was standing in the doorway. She was wearing only a half-slip. Nothing else. Naked from the waist up. She stared blankly into the hall.

“You lookin’ for Mama?” she asked.

“Yes,” Connie said.

“Try the club,” the girl said.

Michael felt a tremendous rush of relief.

Mama was at the club.

She was not behind this closed door. She would not have to be faced just yet.

He put the pistol back into his pocket.

“What club?” he asked.

He did not want to know.

He hoped the girl would not tell him.

Stoned out of her mind, she would not be able to remember the name of the club. No older than sixteen, stoned beyond remembrance. He had seen that same glazed look in Vietnam.

Young Americans going into battle stoned. To face the faceless enemy and the nameless horror in the jungle. For Michael, here and now, inexplicably here in this hallway in downtown Manhattan, the horror was an unseen, unknown woman named Mama, and he did not wish to face that horror again. Because this time it would destroy him. This time, the horror would explode in his hands, and he would run weeping all the way to Boston, his stumps spurting blood, only to learn that his Mama had given away even his best blue jacket. No cause, he thought. No cause on earth.

“Oz,” the girl said.

“All the way downtown,” Connie said. “Over near the river.”

No cause, Michael kept thinking.

“Are you all right?” she asked him.

“Yes,” he said, “I’m fine.”