Gene Wolfe - Free Live Free

“This place sure don’t smell good,” Williams said under his breath.

“It’s just the cat box, Bill.”

Sergeant Proudy glanced up. “You got the ax.”

“Yeah,” Williams said slowly. “Right.”

“Chop the door yet?”

“What you mean? I just got back. Dispatcher say somebody try to bust in here, and here I am.”

“That was me that called,” the old woman in the rocker said. “I hung up when I saw it was the police. No use crying wolf when the fire’s out.”

Williams asked Sergeant Proudy, “What happened, anyhow?”

“Fred dropped his light and we got the wrong house. I knew something was the matter as soon as that door went flying open. The Free place has doors like a fort.”

Evans added, “We were pretty cold, so when Mrs. Baker here asked us in it sounded good. Then the Sarge got to playin’ with her cat.”

“Puff,” Mrs. Baker explained.

Sergeant Proudy said, “I happen to like cats. Some people do, ain’t that right? It’s no crime.”

Williams shook his head. “‘Course not. Me, I’d rather have a dog, but it’s just what a man’s taste run to. I believe, though, they’re ’bout ready with that big machine outside.”

The little guy who had slipped in behind Williams said, “They’ve had some kind of breakdown—I think they said something about a cylinder head.” He had taken off his trenchcoat and battered felt hat. Perhaps everyone there except Mrs. Baker herself thought he belonged in the house.

“We ought to get them out anyways,” Williams said. “Get it done.”

“Yeah.”

Puff had changed tactics. She was clapping both gray paws now.

“If you ain’t going to go, I believe I’ll just go out and set in me and Evans’s cruiser. Something might come over the radio.”

Sergeant Proudy stood up. “You trying to smart off, Bill?”

“Not me. I just meant what I said. Not a thing else.”

The little guy glanced at Mrs. Baker. “Maybe you’d like some coffee before you go out. I know I would.”

“I don’t have any,” Mrs. Baker told him. “Just tea for two and cooco. How about some cooco? It always goes so nice on a cold day.”

“Yes’m, I’d like some,” Williams said. “I got mighty cold walking all the way down to that fire station.”

“We were out in it as much as you were, ain’t that right?”

“I never said you wasn’t, Sarge. I never said you went and set in the cruiser or anything like that. I know you must have got cold too. Probably that’s why Fred dropped his flash. A man’s fingers gets cold and he start dropping things. Why I just ’bout dropped this ax a couple times on my way back.”

Sergeant Proudy looked at Williams dangerously.

Mrs. Baker murmured, “I’ll Polly put the kettle on,” and bustled off. The little guy offered helpfully, “If you’re really worried about that radio, I’ll go listen a while. I’m not cold. I’ll come in and tell you if anything comes over it.”

“There’s a man out there with blue glasses on that’s probably listening now,” Williams said.

The doorbell rang, and the little guy opened the door to see who it was. The snow had slackened again, but enough had fallen to form a minute glacier at the bottom of the door. The man on Mrs. Baker’s stoop wore sunglasses, a coconut-fiber hat, a colorful sports shirt, and shorts. His face looked sunburned. “Could you let me inside?” he asked the little guy.

“I might. You another insurance salesman?”

“No.” The man in the sports shirt raised one hand solemnly. It was shaking. “I swear to you on my mother’s grave, on my honor and everything I hold dear, that I am not selling insurance.”

“I’d let an insurance salesman in,” the little guy said. “I just wondered if you were one. There’s quite a few out there.” He stood aside and let the man in the sports shirt across the threshold.

“Thank God. I’m freezing.”

“You look it.”

“I always have a couple gin slings before I go out on calls—we’ve got them free in the office—but by God, I don’t think they help a bit.”

“I may come up to your office sometime.”

“We’d love to have you. I mean that.” The man in the sports shirt reached into its pocket and took out a card. “Any time. Let me know.” The card read:

Sim Sheppard

“SUNSHINE ESTATES”

The little guy said, “I think you’re looking for Sergeant Proudy, am I right? I’m not him, I’m Jim Stubb. Proudy’s the one with the kitten. Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

Barnes tapped Stubb on the shoulder. “What is it?” he asked. Like Stubb, he stood in the snow, his coat collar turned up against the wind.

“You don’t know, huh?”

Barnes pursed his lips. “Salesmen?”

“Yeah. There must be a hundred of the bastards. Insurance. Stocks and bonds. Florida real estate.”

“I called them. I said I was Proudy and told them to meet me here.”

“I thought it was something like that. You’re a clever devil, Ozzie.”

“Madame Serpentina wanted me to do something, and I had to think and think before I came up with this. I don’t believe it will stop them. Not really.”

“It’s sure as hell slowing them down.”

The three policemen were fighting their way through the mob. It might have been a riot.

“I think we should go up and stand in front of the door,” Barnes said. “It may be the last thing we can do.”

“Watch your step. Candy threw some water out of her window a while back, and it froze.”

“I should have thought of that,” Barnes said. There was no rail on the stoop, and the two roomers clung to each other to keep from falling.

“Anyway, she did,” Stubb told him. “Candy’s a straight-forward girl. Hey, look at that!”

Down the street, a van with an elaborate antenna on its roof loomed through the falling snow.

“Channel Two News,” Stubb said. He took off his glasses and wiped them on his sleeve.

Barnes glanced at him admiringly. “You call them?”

“If I called them, they wouldn’t come. But I called a hell of a lot of politicians, and I figured somebody would tip them. There’s always somebody in politics who wants to make a little time with the media.”

Williams flourished the fire ax over his head. Beside it, Evans’s nightstick rose and fell. One of the salesmen yelled. A siren howled in the distance.

“More police,” Barnes said.

Stubb nodded. “I was afraid of that.”

“Think we ought to lock arms?”

“We’re not young enough, but sure. No nukes! Save the whales! Free’s an endangered species!”

They locked arms. Stubb used his free hand to take off his glasses and slip them into a pocket in his trenchcoat.

Evans was thrusting with his nightstick now, using its blunt end to punch the bellies of the salesmen. Williams and Proudy broke free and mounted the stoop, Williams still brandishing the ax. “Get out the way!” he ordered the two roomers.

The yellow machine’s operator revved its engine.

“Not us,” Stubb told Williams. A rusty, bulbless porch light thrust forward from the bricks. Stubb was just able to grasp its bracket to steady himself.

The salesmen surged after Sergeant Proudy. Beyond them, a little class of varicolored children and a gaggle of old people watched with interest, wiping their noses on their sleeves. The camera crew had taken in everything at a glance and was already shooting as a reporter advanced with a microphone. Down the street, a black-and-white police car skidded around the corner.

“It’s you,” Sergeant Proudy said to Barnes. “Where’s Free?”

“Yes, it’s me,” Barnes told him.