Stephen Brust - The Gypsy

Durand had been chewing on the cuticle beside his thumbnail all this time. Evidently this had helped him reach some sort of decision, because he now announced, "You're probably right. Probably there wasn't a knife. Maybe I got him mixed up with that other guy. Hey. I told Dispatch we were only taking ten or so. Gotta be getting back to the car. Step."

"Sure." He paid for their coffees and left the tip.Feeling guilty as hell, he walked put behind Durand. There were already too many people that he cared about, and he wasn't doing any of them any damn good. Why add Durand to the list?

He had a sense of crossing another line. The first had been not turning the knife in. The second had been giving it back to the Gypsy. And now he was holding out on his partner. Last month he'd have punched anyone who'd insinuated he could do such things. But now he was doing them, getting farther and farther out, and he couldn't really see how to get back to where he should be. It was like when Jennie had divorced him, when he'd had to go out and find his own place and start taking care of only himself. Come home to an empty place, just the sound of the toilet running because there'd been no one there all day to rattle the handle. "This is all wrong" he'd thought to himself every evening, eating alone, going to bed between cold sheets. This is wrong, this isn't what I signed up for. But he'd kept going, just the same way he kept going if he got off on the wrong freeway exit. Keep going and don't even slow down,because if you do the jerk behind you is going to smash into you and you're going to crash and burn.So just keep going. Look out the window and watch yourself get farther and farther away from where you're supposed to be.

"My turn to drive," he told Durand as they walked around the car. Driving was a hell of a lot easier than thinking.

We left the fires behind us

We followed a carriage track,

And I'll never see my brothers,

But perhaps they made it back.

"RAVEN, OWL, AND I"

When Daniel had first started working around University and Dale in St. Paul, many years ago, children had thought he was an ice-cream man because of the bell on his truck. They were disappointed when they found out he only sharpened knives, but he won them over. He told them jokes and made coins vanish and by now he was part of the neighborhood. They waved as he came by and he waved back, ringing his bell.

Dumpy Mrs. Holgrim came out of her lower duplex, wearing a dirty white apron like a uniform and holding out today's worthless pieces of cutlery along with one good French chef's knife that she'd been given as a present and didn't know the value of. He pulled the little truck up to the curb and put the parking brake on. He didn't turn off the engine because it had trouble warm-starting. By the time she had reached him, he had picked out the appropriate grade of stone and put some oil on it. She smiled her yellow teeth at him and handed up the knives. He put the first one, a cheap little vegetable knife, on the stone and began to work before he'd even greeted her. Then he said, "How are you today, Mrs. Holgrim?"

"I'm fine, Daniel. Robert's home with a cold, and I'm sure he'll give it to the girls, but there you are."

"Indeed, Mrs. Holgrim."

"How are you, Daniel?"

"Oh, I'm always fine." Mrs. Holgrim nodded, believing it because that was how she thought he always must be. Daniel said, "A poultice of garlic on his feet will cure the cold, Mrs. Holgrim."

"Really?" She looked skeptical. Daniel didn't press the issue. He returned the vegetable knife and started on an equally worthless paring knife. They made small talk for a while, then, as he began to work the steel of the chef's knife, her one good cutting utensil,he said, "You know, Mrs. Holgrim, if I may say so,if you were to learn to use a butcher's steel, you could keep this in fine shape without having it sharpened nearly so often."

Mrs. Holgrim's blue eyes, which were still very pretty, opened wide. "Really, Daniel?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Why haven't you told me this before?"

He returned the knife to her and accepted two dollars per knife plus a one-dollar tip. He wiped his hands on his shirt, the oil blending into the moss green. "Because, Mrs. Holgrim, then you wouldn't have needed me to sharpen your knives for you."

Her mouth dropped open, closed again. She seemed to think about getting angry, but finally said,"Then why are you telling me now?"

"Because I won't be here."

"Won't-where are you going?"

"I'm not sure. I won't know until the driver comes,but I think it's somewhere in the midwest. Ohio, I believe. Or Indiana."

"You don't know?"

"No, I only know that it is time to pick up my fiddle and find my brothers. Good afternoon, Mrs. Holgrim."

Daniel continued down the street, ringing his bell.

Scarf wound tight around my head

To keep hair from my eyes;

My knife would cut deeper

Then I could realize.

"RAVEN, OWL, AND I"

"… And the captain told me, 'My whole crew's a bunch of yo-yos.' Well, I didn't give it another thought until we were halfway back to the States and we hit an iceberg. The ship sank." Pause. "Sixty-five times." There was some scattered laughter as the large comedian shook his head sadly, and crossed the stage.

He stopped in front of a small, attractive woman at a front table. He puckered his lips obscenely for a moment, then said, "Hey, cutie, wanna go halfsies on a baby?" This got more laughs than the ship joke had.

The gypsy, who had forgotten his name, sat in back, wondering how he'd gotten there. He found little humor in the comic, J. J. McNair, yet he appreciated the skill of the storyteller. He admired the comedian's timing and ability to read the audience.How? Why did he know these things when he couldn't remember his own name? He remembered being called "Little One," but that wasn't right. And how had he gotten here? The last thing he could remember clearly was performing a ritual over his knife,to purify it. He knew it had worked, but why had it been necessary?

The comic was saying, "I'm a great lover, honey. I am. Really. I taught myself." A bit more laughter. "I bought a complete sex manual and I've been following it. I'm up to page eighty-three. It says, 'Get a partner.' " He raised his eyebrows lewdly while the audience laughed, more at the woman's obvious embarrassment than at the jokes.

McNair wasn't bad. It was not a sort of storytelling the observer was used to, yet it made him unaccountably homesick. Homesick for-

For-

A voice, that's all it was. A melodious, half-drunken voice that told stories with an ironic bite to them, for all their seriousness. Tales of fairies and heroes, and he, the "Little One," had listened eagerly and believed them. He remembered the champing of horses,the ringing of the bridle loops like the tinkling of the zils of the tambourine. He remembered the black horses, and a black coach.

Yes.

And he had learned from that voice. He had learned that if you make a promise, you must always carry it out, or else you might have to behead the cow with one horn who had always given you food when you were starving. Yes, you must always keep your promise.

What promise had he given, then? And who was he? Gypsy, that's what they called him. The name came back with a certain sense of relief. That wasn't his name, but it was one of them. There were other gypsies, he knew that, but he was the Gypsy. Yes.Now, if he could only remember the promise, and to whom it was made, and if he could only find his brothers. He needed them for-