Stephen Brust: The Gypsy

I hope you don't mind

If I rest inside your door

Please forgive the snowy footprints

I'm tracking on your floor.

"RED LIGHTS AND NEON"

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There is something about the sound of the tambourine.The zils rattle or ring in the same tones and pitches as the kettles in which you heat the water or stew the meat, and the calfskin head that is as old as Nagypapa will predict the rain by saying dum or the dryness by saying doooooom. When the tambourine is played well, the feet move on wings of their own, and the heart leaps with them, while the lips, distant observers above, cannot help but smile a little, no matter how somber the mood. This is why the dance and the laughter are one, and whoever says different is either deluded or in the service of You Know Who.And You Know Who has many servants.Some are weak, some are strong. Some need guidance day by day; others, well, others can work their evil on their own, and bring more souls into the sway. For example, there is the Fair Lady, Luci, who-

No. We will not dwell on that now, there is plenty of time later. Now, we are remembering the tambourine, which is as perfect a match for the fiddle as the onion is for the bacon, and the memory of the ear and the tongue is forever, which is as it should be. These things stay with a person, no matter how many years have passed, or what paths he has trod. Once those sounds are in his blood, he can never forget-

Never forget-

Umm…

Somewhere, perhaps half a mile to his left, a siren divided the evening into sections. Why do they call them sirens, he wondered. What sort of sailor would be attracted to them? The question was rhetorical and ironic. He wasn't worried. He had no reason to think the siren was for him, so he continued to stroll down Saint Thomas, which seemed to be the street where appliance stores gathered, with a few grocers and liquor stores interleaved between them like the thick cloth that keeps the pottery from breaking against itself when-

Umm…

He had been a sailor once-twice? Something like that. He remembered rope burns on his hands; endless buckets of fish soup; toothless, fair-haired men with food in their beards shouting to him in Dutch;salt water in his mouth; the sick-sweet smell of rum;earplugs so the batteries wouldn't deafen him; scraping sounds of a too-small tool against an ugly green metal hull; salt water in his mouth. He almost remembered meeting a small shark once, but this could have been a dream. He'd never met a siren, in any case.

It was coming closer. He almost ducked into a storefront from some urge to flee, but there was really no reason to think they were looking for him. He kept walking.

A wooden door opened almost in his face and a burly figure in a red plaid jacket walked away from him. He noticed the jacket and thought. Is it cold, then?He could see his breath, and there was a light coating of snow on the sidewalk, so it must be. He looked at his own clothing and saw only a very thinly woven cotton shirt, pale yellow with a few blue threads for embroidery. He wore baggy blue pants of the same material, and high doeskin boots. These should not be enough to keep him warm. Perhaps he ought to go inside. A sign above the door said ST. THOMAS BAR, which meant it was a public house. The door had opened before him, which could as easily be a Sign as it could be a Trap or nothing at all, and the siren, which ought not to have anything to do with him, was getting closer. He opened the door and stepped inside, entering another alien world, which is what any new place is, after all, isn't it?

Cigarette smoke, an anemic blue, hung over a pool table, entwined with a neon BUDWEISER sign, and crept over to a long bar where a fat man in an apron was talking with a smiling patron. The fat man's features were not unpleasant, and his nose had been broken at least twice; the patron hunched his shoulders as if the world had been too much for him for along time, and he had a large scar down the side of his neck-a knife scar.

The fat man noticed him and said, "What'll it be?"

"I… that is, brandy."

"How d'you want it?"

"How-?"

"You all right, buddy?"

"I think so."

"Want me to call someone?"

"No. Just let me sit down."

"Sure. Sit down. Maybe you shouldn't have anything right now."

"Maybe you're right."

"You driving?"

"What?"

"You got car keys?"

"Car… keys? I don't think so."

"Good. Just sit there for a while and I'll call you a cab. You got any money?"

"Well, I-I don't know." He put his hands in his pockets and began removing things; An oddly formed lump of heavy grey metal, the key to room fourteen of some hotel somewhere, an empty bottle for sixtyfive milligram pills of Darvon, a nickel and three pennies, He stared at this collection, wondering if it had any significance. The pill bottle; he remembered something about that-he had just been trying to get more pills, when-what happened? He shook his head, frustrated.

The fat man said, "Shit. Never mind, now. What's your name?"

"Ummm, Chuck-Charles, I think."

"Yeah, you look like a Charles. Okay, just sit tight. No one here will hurt you. You'll feel better in awhile. I'm Tony, by the way."

"Thank you. Tony. Do not write the letter."

"What?"

"Do not write the letter. It will bounce three times and bite three times and leaving you kissing dust."

"Is that a poem or something?"

"It is for you."

"What letter are you talking about?"

"I don't know."

The man with the scar looked up. "He some kind of nut. Tony?"

"Hell if I know."

"Did you write a letter?"

The bartender paused, glanced at Charles, then back at the patron. He cleared his throat. "I just told you about my daughter."

"The dyke?"

"Shut the fuck up."

"Hey, you said it first."

The bartender stared at a soapy glass in his hand."I was gonna write and tell her not to bother coming home for winter break, but…"

"This guy gives me the creeps. Tony."

"So go to the other end of the bar. He ain't bugging nobody."

"I guess not."

But Charles, after replacing his possessions in his pocket, decided he should be the one to move to the other end of the bar, as a result of which he spotted the policemen before they spotted him. His throat tightened. They can't be looking for me. They can't be looking for me. Can they? One was very young and made Charles think of the phrase, "One hand grabs for the reins while one foot runs for the ditch." Who had said that, and in what language? The other policeman was like an old wolf-leader, whose eyes miss nothing even if they appear closed.

Charles turned away, hoping to be missed in the blue fog, but he felt the old policeman's eyes seize the back of his neck. This was pursuit, and pursuit led to capture, and capture led to-

No, there was no time for that, now, either.

The room was heavy with tobacco smoke; it could become heavier, he knew that. He could hide himself in it, although there would be a price to pay.

He did what was necessary, vaguely aware that he was losing something as he did.

There was a back way, and he found it, and he was gone. His headache returned, bringing with it the memory that it had been an almost constant companion for a long time. He felt pursuit, and it frightened him, but at least now he knew it was not an irrational fear which had gripped him since-

–Since-

Blind man's night is music to the deaf, and everyone has two paths, not one, whence comes tragedy and comedy, forsooth and damn straight, son.