Michael Christie - The Beggar's Garden

“Oingo bingo bango!” someone called from behind him. Saul thought it was his voices again until Drew came gamely jogging to the front like this was The Price Is Right. Then every face in the room ripened and turned from Drew to Saul like a field of pasty, deranged weather vanes, and it was fitting because, after all that had happened today, Saul felt he deserved the attention, he should be the contestant whose card Luis was now checking. Saul felt an itchy vibration in his chest and throat and found he was already in the act of describing luxuriously the day’s events: the prophetic Columbo episode; Jacob’s capture; the discovery of the apartment; his sobering realizations with respect to Ada Plinth and Kraepevic; and this new conclusion that Luis was not an Assassin at all but an ally, who was strangely not following through with what he promised. Then Saul saw his own fingers prying open the ball-tumbler. He just wanted to see if ball number I-25 was in there, while someone was repeating his name and a bunch of other words of minimal importance, until he heard amidst the din of voices the former Assassin say, “Drew didn’t win, he only had three numbers, we have to keep playing.”

Saul sat back down.

He watched Luis pull another ball. Saul didn’t have to look to know it was I-25.

To: Marty S.

Czar of Mentals

The Province of Greeting Cards

From: Saul Plinth, Master of Columbo and Fine Dining

Lots cooking way out here at Riverboat Hospital Marty the most specifically is this Assassin I detected has turned out to be a bingo emancipator a co-conspirator a guardian angel of some kind a real magnificent associate if you can locate my meaning. It’s also come clear that my derangement may in truth be a PSYCHIC SHAM constructed with the help of Darko Kraepevic by yours truly to scare the bejesus out of himself for psychological reasons unknown (keep you posted on said reasons).

In fact I suspect my entire caged life so far has been something of one great Columbo episode of which we are only now reaching the electrifying conclusion. My bumbling veneer is SHED and I grow more and more powerful by the microsecond. Did I tell you already Martin? I found a little nook to call my own. Yes Martin big changes are on the way don’t send authorities they arent needed. Before I go here are the charges I’m laying against you and your stooge Kraepevic:

In the care of the Riverboat Gulag, Saul Columbo-Plinth, The Desperate Grammophone, The Triumphant Detective, The King of Remnants has been the victim of: Glass assault, contempt of courtroom, note-scribbling, phantom-limb amputation, mail fraud, skimming of the books, mail terrorism, social security fraud, cyber-stalking, unreasonable bingo dabbery, medication management, puzzle piece apprehension, building code violations, copyright infringement, mind mapping, mind mastication, injury to wildlife, non-smoking, various war crimes, petty scheduling, land piracy, grave-robbing, tax fraud, price-gouging, hunting without a license and fratricide.

May I in closing tell you to fess up on your own GUILT surrender your position and do the only honourable thing by throwing yourself upon your silver sword.

With Fierce Sincereness,

King Saul Plinth-Columbo,

Eminent Fingerpainter, Majestic Vestibule

A gorgeous wash of time had passed when Kraepevic called him into his office.

“Saul, there is an old story my abnormal-psych professor once told of a schizophrenic patient who was hooked up to a lie detector and asked by his psychiatrist if he was Napoleon. And to this, the patient replied, ‘No,’ and the detector said he was lying.”

“So,” King Saul said.

“What exactly do you mean by ‘So'?”

“What if he was?” “Lying?”

“No,” King Saul said.

Kraepevic exhaled deeply and theatrically in the self-important manner of all doctors and lurched forward in his chair. “Saul, I just don’t want to find the condensed Art of War written on your walls again.”

King Saul neither feared nor loved the doctor. He pitied him. Kraepevic had dedicated his life to convincing the meek that they were to blame for their misery, that their brains lacked a chemistry they would never manufacture. The old Slavic fool had filled his own head with so much nonsense he was certainly too dull to grasp the majestic plan Saul and Luis had incubated in secret for the past few weeks.

“I never was dangerous, Darko,” King Saul said, a regal timbre riding in his voice. “Not until now.”

“Okay. May I ask why you are wearing that bathrobe and that pair of pyjama bottoms wrapped around your head?”

“You might want to consult the literature,” King Saul said, gesturing to the red, blocky DSM-IV parked on the doctor’s walnut-tinged shelf, a sort of Sears catalogue of ways the human being could malfunction. Saul vowed to burn it the day of the Electrifying Conclusion.

“Saul, I didn’t want to do this, and I don’t enjoy it, but I’m going to have to revoke your passes for the time being, as well as temporarily upping your dosages while you present yourself this way.”

The doctor thought keeping Saul from his apartment and upping his dosages could stop it. But the apartment had only been a prop. He’d been back and found that the TV and stereo were fake, the taps didn’t work and there was no electricity, but the remembrance of Ada had opened his eyes. He’d seen the selfishness of ignoring the plight of the other patients. The maligned, the ruined, the shot to shit, the perennially confused, the monstrous slack-jawed head-bangers, the unfit for community, the grotesque drooling legions with blown fuses in their eyes, they were his subjects. King Saul saw them for what they were: a people ripe with an untapped greatness. And if he, their Sovereign, didn’t care for them, who would?

King Saul sculpted some sounds into words Kraepevic wanted to hear and exited the office, acting the role of the freshly strapped schoolboy. They would have to speed preparations. Outside he saw Kim sullenly navigating the hall. Saul had described the Electrifying Conclusion to her on Pizza Night earlier that week and she’d seemed, at first, a touch concerned before growing duly inspired when he assured her the staff would be unharmed. They would surrender or they would be humanely executed with med overdoses, and this had impressed her so much she’d gone to bed.

“Feel like checkers, Saul?” she said, glancing with apparent awe at his Intuitional Headwrap. He considered describing to her how the Wrap amplified his thinking, but doing so would force him to use upside-down words so he was silent. He’d so far avoided inflicting the infinite wattage of his brain on Kim and those sixty-four squares, fearing that a defeat as crushing as he’d administer could be ruinous to her already fragile mental constitution.

“I’m sure you’d be victorious, Kim,” King Saul said, “but it is I alone who can provide the leadership that those broadcasters pine for nightly on their evening news.”

“Okay, Saul,” she said, carrying on, and Saul was fortified by her enthusiasm.

He found Luis in the bathroom across from the laundry, sprinkling a pink powder that smelled like bubble gum chewed by the fetid jaws of the devil himself.

“Got you on cleanup, have they?”

“Georgina had an accident,” said Luis.

“Your talents are wasted here, friend.”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” he said. “It’s just smelly. Somebody has to do it. Hey, I’m done here. Why don’t you come talk to me while I do lunchtime meds?”