Jonathan Lethem - Gun, with Occasional Music

“I’ll see what I can do,” she said.

I thought about it. I’d come a long way on Angwine’s fourteen hundred dollars. “That’s not good enough,” I said. “I need more.”

She looked me dead in the eye. This time it was me who didn’t blink.

“Okay,” she said. “Tomorrow. You’ve got my word.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me,” she said. “Thank your lucky fucking stars. Take your stuff and get out of here.” She opened her drawer and gave Surface his card and his pad back, and then she gave me my card and put my gun out on top of her desk I reached for it, but her hand was still over it, and she looked at me and I looked at her and I think possibly I saw the faintest hint of a smile cross her face. The moment passed, and she let me pick up the gun and put it back in the pocket of my coat.

She leaned on the button of her intercom and spoke to the muscle waiting outside her office. “Get them out of here,” she said. “Put them on the street.”

They took it literally, bless their hearts.

THE PARKING METER OUTSIDE THE WHITE WALNUT REST Home played me a couple of bars of Hawaiian bottleneck guitar when I dropped in the quarter, but I didn’t stick around to hear out the tune. It had been a long drive up into the hills and my head didn’t feel so good. My bloodstream wouldn’t quit asking and I was running out of ways of saying no. Cold turkey was a merry-go-round I couldn’t get off, and instead of a wooden horse I was riding a porcupine.

I went inside. The place was nice and quiet, all rosewood antiques and bunches of flowers. I found the office. The woman at the desk seemed frightened by my presence, but I don’t know whether it was my red eyes and pasty complexion or the fact of who I was asking to see. Both, probably.

They had him in a dayroom, a pretty one, with windows on three sides and a collection of wicker furniture for putting glasses of lemonade on. He was watching television, or maybe I should say they had him facing the television, because when I moved around his wheelchair and stood in his line of sight, he didn’t notice, though his eyes were open. Except for the deadness in what had once been exceptionally lively eyes, he looked pretty much the same. His beard was unkempt, but he still had a full head of hair. I waved the attendant out of the room and sat down in one of the armchairs.

We sat like that for a while, me watching motes of dust float through the sunlight, him supposedly watching the television. The only sound was the rasp of his breathing. Then 1 reached over and turned off the picture.

“Phoneblum,” I said.

He murmured like he was asleep.

I got out of my chair and took the collar of his robe in my hands. His eyes brightened considerably. “Wake up,” I said. He put his big clubby hands over mine and pushed me away.

I watched as he blinked away his stupor. His forehead wrinkled like a question mark as he looked me over.

“You’re an inquisitor,” he said. The voice rolled out of him like secondhand thunder, acquired cheap. It was a voice from the past, and I was impressed at the way he could still summon it up.

“That’s right,” I said.

“Very good.” He curled a finger and rubbed at his nose with the knuckle. “Do questions make you uncomfortable? I prefer to relax the conventional strictures.”

He was running on empty, but the old routines died hard. I had to tip my hat to him. It was a bluff, but his junk was better than most guys’ fastballs. In another setting, minus the television and the wheelchair and the layer of dust, I might have bought it, might have believed he was still in the saddle. But the bright hard intelligence behind his eyes was missing. He didn’t know who he was talking to.

“Questions are my bread and butter,” I said.

He didn’t remember the answer. He just nodded and said: “Good. What can I do for you?”

“I want to ask you about Celeste,” I said.

I watched him chew it over. He obviously knew the name. It seemed to lull him back a step towards dreamland.

“You remember Celeste?” I said.

“Why, yes,” he answered. He wasn’t looking at me anymore. “I remember Celeste. Of course.”

“I’ve been working on her murder,” I said.

His eyes shot back to mine. “That’s a long time ago,” he said.

“Couple of days, to me. I’ve still got her blood on my shoes.”

I said it casually, but I could see it was having an effect. His forehead lifted.

“Yes,” he said softly. “So do I.”

“You killed her,” I suggested.

“I don’t remember,” he said. “I killed a lot of people.”

“You loved hen”

He clouded up. I waited.

“I don’t remember,” he concluded. His face fell slack.

“Try harder,” I said. “This one was special. You loved her and you killed her.” I took hold of his robe again.

His eyes cleared and his jaw set. “I suppose I did,” he said. “The two sometimes go together.” He smiled through his beard. “Women are already split in two from the floor halfway up, you know. I just finished the job.”

, That did it. I’d been arguing with myself, but now he was making it easy. I let go of his robe and stepped back and took Barry’s gun out of my coat pocket. It played the creepy violin music as it came into my hand. I opened up the safety and leveled the muzzle at Phoneblum’s big chest. He made a good target.

I watched him struggle to focus on the gun. He had to cross his eyes to do it. His fingers tightened a little on the arms of his wheelchair, but his face showed no fear.

“Are you going to kill me?” he asked.

“I might,” I said. I wanted to. I didn’t know what was stopping me.

He squinted into my eyes. “Do I know you, sir?”

There was a long, rough minute while I tried to get myself to squeeze the trigger. The motes of dust in the air seemed to slow down and hover, glowing, in the space between the end of the gun and the beginning of Phoneblum’s giant chest. Eventually I saw that it wasn’t going to happen. I closed the safety and put the gun away.

“No,” I said, disgusted. “There was a mix-up. I’ve got the wrong guy.”

Phoneblum didn’t say anything. He didn’t even look relieved. I reached down and turned the television back on, straightened my coat, and went out into the hallway.

I passed through the lobby but I didn’t sign my name in the guest register. I wasn’t in the mood. I went out to the car and sat. It had enough fuel in it for one more trip, but I wasn’t sure I did. I thought about the little packet of make I’d thrown into the woods, and I thought about the makery. The vending machines didn’t seem so bad from this distance. I tried to tell myself the job was finished, that it was okay to let it go. I tried hard, and I got as far as starting the engine and pointing the car down the hill to the makery. But it wouldn’t take. The job wasn’t finished. I screwed the wheels around and drove across the ridge to the Fickle Muse.

I was early. I had to park in the lot and watch the sun set and wait for them to open the place. The sky looked like a bruise. When the guy showed up, I went inside and ordered a drink on the chance it might fool my nerves for half an hour. Beyond that I didn’t care. I didn’t recognize the bartender, but I didn’t have to. The face had changed but the type hadn’t.

He brought me the drink. “First customer of the night,” he said, as if it meant something.

“Guess so,” I said back.

When I got my change, I went to the corner and used the pay phone, then I finished my drink at the bar and went back out to the lot to wait. It didn’t take long. The kangaroo looked like he was alone, but I couldn’t tell for sure. He wasn’t riding a scooter anymore.