Rupert Thomson - The Five Gates of Hell

He drove to a diner on V Street. A waitress flipped him a menu. ‘Coffee?’

He remembered her from six years ago, but she didn’t remember him. She didn’t even give him a second glance. The city was blind.

He looked out of the window. V Street. The wrong end of the alphabet. To the west lay downtown: hotels, banks, the crescent of white sand that was Moon Beach. East of here were the grit and cigarette-butt streets of Mangrove, and then Moon River, wider than a mile, its waters laced with oil and chemicals.

He knew these streets, knew every crack. He’d grown up watching cars cruise the promenade, skulls dangling from their mirrors, numberplates like 998 DIE and a bumper sticker to match: ROOM FOR ONE MORE. (He’d bought his first plate three blocks south of here: CREAM 8. He still had it now. In Moon Beach people understood it right away. Drive somewhere else, they thought you were in the dairy business.) Then, when he worked for the Paradise Corporation, he drove V Street almost every day. The city morgue was two blocks away, Central Avenue and X Street (X marks the spot, as Maxie Carlo used to say). The most respected coffin-maker had set up in a warehouse just round the corner. People who worked in the business were everywhere, and people who didn’t looked as if they did. Down on V Street even the bums wore dark suits. He wouldn’t have been surprised to see himself through the glass. He’d passed this way so many times, surely he must’ve left his echo on the street. After all, if ever there was a city of ghosts, this was it. No, he wouldn’t have been at all surprised to see himself walk by. He might even have waved.

‘You stay here any longer, sir,’ the waitress said, ‘I’ll have to charge you lunch.’

‘All right,’ he said, ‘I’ll have lunch.’

‘What can I get you?’

‘Spaghetti,’ he said. ‘With Meatball.’

He was going to eat the past.

After lunch he felt tired. He drove south to the ocean and parked on Pier 22. He leaned his head back, closed his eyes. The sun landed on the windshield in dusty yellow blocks. Hundreds of people were out strolling. Their footsteps jumbled up, made a curiously wooden sound. He could hear the car’s engine cooling, ticking, like a dog’s paws on the sidewalk.

A loose rumble and he saw a plane lift above the rooftops. The car shook. The ignition key chinked once. He blinked, stretched. His teeth felt numb and fat in his head. He slowly pulled himself upright, found his face in the mirror. His eyes were pinned wide open, they’d seen everything and it had been too much, Now who’s the astronaut? He had stomachache. The past obviously hadn’t agreed with him. He checked the clock. It was five. He’d been asleep for almost three hours. In another three it would be dark.

He drove into Mangrove South and stopped at the first bar he saw. Polystyrene skulls hung from the ceiling. The Day of the Dead ceremony was being broadcast on TV. There was a phone in the back. He called Mitch. No answer. He drank a beer, watched TV.

Half an hour later he called Mitch again. Still no answer. He tried Carol instead. Lady Dobson answered. Carol had moved out, she said. She gave him Carol’s new number. He called the new number and Carol was home. Well, kind of home anyway. She used his name, but it didn’t seem to mean anything to her. He imagined her surrounded by hundreds of special shoes. None of the shoes made pairs.

‘This weekend’s no good,’ she was saying. ‘Can you do Monday?’

Monday? Every day was so big at the moment, Monday seemed like someone else’s life.

‘Sure,’ he said. ‘OK.’

She gave him a time and place, but he was still thinking about Monday. He just couldn’t picture it.

At last she realised. ‘Are you OK, Jed? Where are you?’

But it was too late, he was already hanging up.

Back in his car, he began to drive. He was only one of thousands who’d arrived in the city during the last twenty-four hours, and people were beginning to mass in the streets, some in blue body-paint, some in skull masks, some in luminous skeleton suits. There was a man lying on the bottom of a glass tank that was filled with water. A placard above him read PLAY DEAD! ONLY $1.25!. As he passed Jed by he opened one eye and winked. It was the Day of the Dead all right. Part fairground, part nightmare. Jed took comfort in the thought that he could hide in all this chaos and hysteria, that he could wear the carnival like a disguise. There was no way he’d be able to stay downtown, though. He’d passed a few hotels, and it was the same story all over: SORRY WE’RE FULL. He’d have to resort to the perimeters. Newtown, Austin, Normandy. No SORRY WE’RE FULL signs out there. It didn’t matter how eager tourism was, it never quite reached that far.

Then, as he crossed the bridge for the third time that day, he saw lights on the west bank, high above the river. That row of grey houses. He had lived there once. With Vasco and his uncles. Last time he’d seen the uncles (though he’d never actually seen Reg, of course) was fifteen years ago. They’d been senile then. They could be dead by now. The house might be standing empty …

In five minutes he was pulling up outside. Though the sun had almost set, no lights showed in the windows. That didn’t prove anything, of course. The uncles had always been tight. He climbed the steps to the verandah. Two punctured flyscreens lay on the bleached wooden boards. He thought of afternoons spent here with Vasco. Tins of beer and talk of war. He looked back down the garden. From here you could see clear across the river to the Crumbles in the distance. He turned away from the memory, the view. He pushed on the front door and it swung open.

It was dark inside except for one thin bar of orange light that had found its way into the hall and now stood propped against the wall. Dust dropped slowly through the air, as if settling in water. He began to move towards the stairs then, noticing the door to the elevator, hesitated. He punched the button, thinking nothing would happen. There was a clunk from somewhere up above. A snap as metal gates slid shut. Through a glass panel he watched the thick black cables loop in the empty shaft as the car dropped down.

The gates slid apart. Jed opened the door and then let out a gasp. In the elevator was Mario, sitting in his wheelchair. His head had fallen sideways, so he appeared to be listening to his shoulder.

‘Mario?’

Jed took one step forwards. Large black flies rose from Mario’s eyes and lips.

When Jed could look again, it was the wheelchair he noticed. The leather upholstery had started to decay. In some places it had lost its lustre and worn thin. In other places it had torn. Underneath the leather Jed could see bright paper. He moved closer, trying not to breathe. He reached into a gash behind the dead man’s back. His hand closed round several hundred-dollar bills.

Listen. Hear that? Money.

Jed felt a queer, crooked smile appear on his face. Everybody used to think that Mario was senile. Everybody used to wonder what he’d done with all his millions.

Listen. Hear that?

Every time he moved he must’ve heard it. He’d been sitting on it. He’d been wheeling himself around in his own mobile bank.

Jed was still smiling when he parked outside the Lucky Strike Motel an hour later. He’d chosen the Lucky Strike because it was in Newtown. The bleak north-western edge of the city. Even so, he knew he was running a risk. Vultures had always favoured motels. Motels were low-life information banks. They were ideal places to hold meetings, do deals. Skull McGowan used to run a team of vultures out of the Ocean Bed Motel on Highway 12. One night, Jed decided. Then he’d move on. He hid his car in the darkest corner of the parking-lot, and checked in under the name Matt Leech.