Mike Nelson's Death Rat!

by Michael J. Nelson

  “You allow events to influence you too much, Mr. Bromstad. Evenness is the key. We Danish have long understood that. In fact, there is an oft-cited Danish proverb, Ingen ko på isen, which means “No cow on the ice.” He shook his head meaningfully.

  “‘No cow on the ice’?”

  “Ja. Ingen ko på isen,” Stig repeated.

  The men looked at each other. “Perhaps you hadn’t noticed that I was waiting for you to explain that,” said Bromstad.

  “It means that there is no problem. If one of our cows was out on the ice, that would be something to worry about. As it is, our cows are safe on land. No problems. Do not become agitated until your cows are out on the ice.”

  “That’s what you Danish people worry about, is it? Cows out on the ice? That’s the ultimate tragedy for you?”

  “Within the internal logic of that one saying, yes. I don’t think you can generalize all Danes through the lens of that one proverb, however. If that were the case, I would judge all Americans by any number of sayings. Take, for instance, ‘Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle’ or, more comparably, ‘Why buy the cow when you are able to enjoy the milk for free?’ I certainly could judge Americans by those, but I have taken care not to, and—”

  “All right, all right. Lay off. I think we should go into town, check out that bar. Maybe poke one of the locals and see if he howls.”

  “I’ll get my shoes.”

  In the car Bromstad mulled over Stig’s adage. “Let me tell you something: I got plenty of cows on the ice, you square-headed simpleton Dane! They think it’s their pasture right now. The ice is cracking, and there are hooves poking through into the water.”

  “Oh, I don’t think it’s all that—Um, please, watch the road, Gus Bromstad. You nearly hit a rabbit.”

  “Good,” said Bromstad. They angle-parked in front of the Taconite Saloon, and as they climbed out of Bromstad’s Acura, Stig advised, “Mr. Bromstad, you are agitated. Why don’t you let me cast about to see what I can find out. In your state you might rile them.”

  “Oh, I shall rile, my friend. Let the riling begin,” said Bromstad, a hard look in his eyes.

  “Have it your way.”

  They pushed open the door and entered a fairly lively saloon. The pinball machine, pool table, and video games all were occupied, and the sound of Molly Hatchet from the jukebox only added to the mood of rowdy festivity. Stig and Gus helped themselves to the last remaining vacant stools at the bar. Stig, recognizing the barkeep as Ralph Wrobleski, tilted his head and mouthed the words, “It’s him,” to Bromstad.

  “What’s your problem?” said Bromstad, looking down at the front of his sweater and then wiping his mouth. “What? What?”

  “Nnnn,” said Stig out of the side of his mouth as Ralph approached and leaned his mass toward them.

  “Hey,” he said suspiciously.

  “Hello, stout fellow,” said Stig, who was still learning the language. “May I have some vodka on the rocks, and my friend will have . . . ?”

  “Same.”

  Ralph withdrew with a backward glance toward the pair, and Stig leaned in to Bromstad. “That’s the one from the photo, the one with the head,” he said, making a gesture with his hand that was supposed to represent an asymmetrical skull.

  Gus, however, was not at his best and could not pick up Stig’s gist. “The one with the head? Have you gone mad, you fish-creaming freak?”

  Ralph returned before Stig could clarify. Stig broke off and asked Ralph in honeyed tones, “So why, may I be so bold as to ask, is it this busy?”

  “Revival,” said Ralph impatiently.

  “Oh, the King Leo–sponsored event at the mine, is it?”

  “Yeah. He’s going ’round the clock now. People take their breaks here, I guess.”

  “I see, thank you. I wonder if I might—”

  “So listen, buddy, just what the heck is this flimflam about the rat anyway? I happen to know it’s not true, and I’ve got the goods—” Bromstad began, but he was interrupted when Ralph pulled him halfway over the bar by the front of his sweater, taking dozens of Bromstad’s chest hairs out in the process.

  “IT’S TRUE, YOU GOT IT, PAL?” bellowed Ralph as he shook Bromstad like a can of paint. “I will not be answering any more questions about that. That rat was real, okay? As real as you or me.”

  Bromstad, who had first sounded off with a high-pitched shriek at the shock of being manhandled by this publican, now made gruff vocalizations each time the air was forced out of his chest.

  “Yeah, ‘ugh, ugh, ugh’ better be the only thing you say, pal,” Ralph encouraged. “I am not going back there, you hear me? I refuse to listen to any more hoo-ha about amniotic fogs and tomorrow jellies, you got that?” he asked of Bromstad, and then, without really giving him a fair chance to answer, dropped him on the floor. “I’m doing my mission work. I’m spreading the word. This is my going forth,” he hollered in a rather unorthodox method of proselytizing. “All right, who’s thirsty?” Ralph said to his stunned clientele.

  “He just roughed up Gus Bromstad,” said a tourist with a pool cue as Stig scraped his partner off the floor.

  WHAT DID YOU say to tick that guy off?” Bromstad asked from a reclining position on his couch at the Bugling Moose, sipping an aquavit that Stig held to his lips.

  “Perhaps I just have that effect on people.”

  “Well, tone it down a bit, will you?” he asked, sipping some more. “That guy’s not going to give us much, I’m going to guess. So what next?”

  “Perhaps I am going to sound like a broken record, but the day is coming to a close, and I think we should sauna.”

  “Sauna?”

  “Yes. Things always seem better after a sauna. They are almost magical that way.”

  “I have to ask, what part of speech is sauna? You seem to use it as a noun and a verb?”

  “I am taking liberties with Danish speech as I speak it in English. Sauna is the place, the hot room, saunoa is the action of enjoying it. I use them interchangeably in English. Many Danes do this in America. Please forgive the liberty.”

  “Forgiven.”

  “So. Sauna?”

  “Yes. But it must involve the water of life.”

  “And so it will,” promised Stig.

  Soon they were ensconced in their favorite location at the Bugling Moose, the humid, superheated cedar room that stood alone among the cabins.

  “So the nudity? It’s so horrible. Why?” asked Bromstad once the löyly was thick in the air.

  “It is a custom. Finnish, to be certain, but we have adopted it, as have the Swedes. What can I say, except that it is like your custom of eating turkey at Thanksgiving or of going to brunch on Mother’s Day?”

  Bromstad considered this. “Well. I suppose once you’ve seen so many naked men, nothing can ever, ever match it in terms of shock and horror and pure mental trauma. So as far as inuring one to tragedy, perhaps it serves a purpose,” he allowed. “I’m going to shake hands with a millionaire,” Bromstad declared, and stood to leave.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “I’ll return shortly,” he clarified, slipping on his sandals.

  “Oh. Oh, of course,” said Stig, getting the gist.

  Bromstad wandered out into the brisk moonlight and immediately regretted his decision not to wrap himself with a towel, given the night’s average low temperature of fifty-nine degrees.

  “Whew,” he said, recognizing the distinct danger of shrinkage. He looked up at the moon and, noticing how it undulated, discovered that he was tipsy. He stood for some time in the wood, allowing his eyes to adjust to the darkness, and when they did, he saw to his surprise that a female rear end was protruding from the side of Cabin 5. He crept up to investigate. Staying a discreet distance away, concealed for the most part by a thick tamarack, he could make out the words of the voices inside.

  “Um, getting back to my question, whom didn’t you want to see you just now?” said a male voice.

&nb
sp; “Gus Bromstad,” came the answer, and in an instant Bromstad knew all. He listened for just a moment more and then ran to his cabin at the top speed that his sandals and nudity would allow, fetched their two pistols from Stig’s leather travel bag, and ran back to the sauna.

  “It’s go time!” he announced to Stig, who was leaned against a wall, dozing. Bromstad pitched him his towel. “Put this on for a change.”

  “Huh?”

  “And take this. We gotta go!” he said, throwing a Beretta into his lap.

  Stig, awoken effectively by the cold metal, secured his towel, slipped on his sandals, and followed Bromstad without question.

  CHAPTER 24

  Gus Bromstad!” exclaimed Ponty.

  “Pontius Feeb,” said Bromstad.

  “And you are . . . ?” Ponty asked, looking at Stig.

  “I’d rather not say.”

  “I understand. Well, pleased to meet you anyway,” said Ponty.

  “Likewise,” said Stig politely.

  “I’m sorry, Ponty. I started to tell you,” said Sandi.

  “That Gus Bromstad would appear in just a towel? Sandi, I like and respect you a great deal, but you should have tried harder. This is a nightmare.”

  “Oh, this is too perfect,” said Bromstad, narrowing his eyes at Ponty.

  “It is?” asked Ponty incredulously.

  “Let’s drive, sweethearts,” commanded a new and purposeful Bromstad, gesturing with his pistol.

  The gunmen checked the immediate area before leading them out through darkness to their parked cars.

  “What are you going to do with us?” Ponty asked. “Also I need to ask—and this is very important—does your being nearly naked figure into the plan at all?”

  “Oh, please, no. It would kill me if you thought that,” said Stig. “We were simply taking a sauna when the call to action came. I am sorry.”

  “Shut up,” Bromstad commanded. “We’re going to take a little drive.”

  “Can we please not take the Saturn?” Sandi asked. “It’s not mine. It’s my neighbor Lindy’s, and he will go nuts.”

  “Oh, no. We’re taking this little beauty,” Bromstad said, tapping the side of the Tempo with his Beretta.

  “Careful, please. I’m trying to preserve what little resale value it has,” Ponty pled.

  “You drive, Pontius Feeb,” said Bromstad, his voice fuzzy with drink.

  The foursome loaded into the Tempo, Bromstad selecting the seat behind Pontius so he could more effectively threaten him with his firearm.

  “All settled in up there, Mr. Wedgie?” asked Bromstad, who was warming to his role as a naked ruffian.

  Ponty was formulating a plan. “Oh, sure, just let me give you some legroom back there.” Hoping to knock the gun from Bromstad’s hand and crush his lap, Ponty pulled the seat lever and thrust his legs backward with all the force available to him. Nothing happened. The Tempo’s seat froze without moving an inch.

  “How you doing on that legroom there?” Bromstad asked.

  Ponty sighed. “Seat’s broken. Sorry. You’ll have to make do.”

  “Drive on,” said Bromstad. “The mine.”

  Ponty drove, grinding the gears several times out of nervousness. He could smell Bromstad’s alcohol breath and hear the Beretta brushing against the side of his headrest. Once on the road, he snuck a look over at Sandi.

  “Sorry,” he said softly.

  Sandi shrugged and offered him a weak smile.

  “You okay on heat back there?” Ponty asked.

  “I could use a little, I must confess,” said Stig.

  “It’ll just take a bit for the engine to warm.”

  They drove for several minutes in silence through the dark night. A dim light in the sky glowed brighter as they approached Gerry Iverson’s property. There were more cars in the makeshift lot than Ponty had yet seen.

  “Oh, my, look at all the cars! Looks like King Leo’s got himself a nice little revival business going here,” said Stig as Ponty maneuvered through the somewhat illogical parking scheme.

  “We’ll see if we can’t throw a little cold reality on that,” said Bromstad. “Okay, park it, Feeb.”

  “This is pretty far away. Do you want me to try to find something closer?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Just don’t do anything funny.”

  “I think this guy’s leaving,” Ponty said, and he followed a young man wearing big madras shorts. “Oh, no. He’s just getting a jacket from the car.”

  “Oh, there’s a spot,” said Stig.

  “Think I can squeeze in there?” asked Ponty.

  “It will be tight,” Stig agreed.

  “Well, let’s try and see if you can get out on your side.”

  “Look!” yelled Bromstad. “Just stop the car here! It doesn’t matter!”

  “Okay, okay. Just don’t kill me,” Ponty requested, stopping the car in the middle of a traffic lane. As they unloaded, Ponty looked at the Tempo’s placement and shook his head. “Someone’s going to key it.”

  “Get moving,” said Bromstad, and he poked Ponty.

  Gus and Stig walked their prisoners as near as they could to the stage area, but further progress was prohibited by the crush of people, all watching raptly as Jack gave a reading from his book, Death Rat. King Leo looked on.

  “‘All throughout that dark, cold night,’” Jack read, his voice pleasant and sonorous, “‘Lynch huddled in the wetness, shivering and afraid, not knowing if at any moment the hot muzzle of the rat would be upon him. Doom spread over him like a cloak.’”

  “Lousy spread over your prose like a cloak,” Bromstad said to Ponty, and then he fired his pistol into the air. “All right, make a hole, people!” he shouted to the crowd.

  There were some screams and exclamations, and the crowd parted dutifully.

  “No one make a move, or the mayor and the history author get it!” Bromstad instructed.

  “I told you we were being followed, Jack!” Ponty yelled up to the stage.

  “Shut up,” said Bromstad.

  They moved through the crowd, and as they did, there were many exclamations of “That’s Gus Bromstad” or “Hey, it’s the Dogwood guy!” They came to the foot of and then mounted the stage, a move that particularly upset the crowd when performed by the two men wearing only towels.

  “Oooohhhh,” the people with the best views groaned as Stig and Bromstad swung their legs up onto the stage.

  King Leo tried to manage the situation. “Now, men, whatever your beef is, you know it cannot be settled with violence, but only through the intercession of the Dee-vine and Cosmic Nature Force that—”

  “Shut up!” said Bromstad, leveling the Beretta at King Leo’s exposed belly button. Bromstad stepped up to the microphone. “I have a strong feeling that church will be breaking up for the night right after you all hear this reading from St. Ponty. Ponty? Why don’t you go ahead and tell them what you were telling the mayor here? And I want the real story, not your little fiction of a confession, got it?”

  Ponty nodded, stepped slowly up to the microphone, scanned the crowd for a moment, and said, “Ahem.” He was going to continue when he noticed just how many television camera crews were taping the event. He turned back. “Gus, I—”

  “Go ahead and tell ’em, lover boy.” Even in such a stressful moment, Ponty had time to wonder why Bromstad had called him “lover boy.”

  Ponty turned back. “Ahem,” he repeated. “I, um . . . should probably introduce myself. My name is Pontius Feeb. Some of you may know me as Earl. Earl Topperson, but that’s just a clever pseudonym. As you can see, I don’t have my mustache, and Earl did have one.” There was some murmuring from the assembled crowd.

  “Shut your mouths!” ordered Bromstad. He leveled his pistol toward the crowd. “You in back—stay where you are. Go on, Feeb,” he urged Ponty.

  “Yes, thank you, Gus. I’m actually Pontius Feeb, and I am the history author, that, um . . . Mr. Bromstad was threatening to shoot just a
moment ago.” He saw recognition on the faces of some people near the stage, so he continued. “Right. So thank you for not making a move. Anyway, last summer, I wrote a pretty silly little book that I hoped would be a nice summer read, you know, something to throw into the beach bag or take on a plane. Nothing too serious or deep. Anyway, I couldn’t sell it, so I asked Jack Ryback there—hi, Jack—to pretend he wrote it. As you can see, Jack is better-looking than I am by a long chalk. Not a judgment, you understand, just an observation. So Jack did sell it, but by mistake he sold it as a piece of nonfiction and . . . well, here we are. You see, that book was Death Rat,” Ponty said miserably.

  The crowd emitted a collective gasp. Jack pushed past Ponty and said sloppily into the microphone, “No, no! Don’t worry, everyone. Just a little joke. It’s all part of the show here. Well, show? Heck—revival. It’s all meant to increase your faith in the Funka-, you know, Lovely—” Jack turned to notice a weapon near his ear. “Ah! Mr. Bromstad. You have something to add?”

  “The truth, Ryback,” he said, pressing the gun into Jack’s ear.

  “Oh, Mr. Bromstad, please don’t shoot me there. Okay, okay. Ponty was right, everyone. Sorry.”

  Ponty took over again. “That’s right. There is no Holey Rat. Never was. Rats don’t get to be six feet, you see. Capybaras, as I wrote in the book, get big, sure, but they are a different kind of animal, and their growing seasons are much longer than here in Minnesota so . . . Well, anyway, the town of Holey backed me up on the story because . . . well, I paid them. Who can blame them, right?” he quickly added. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to get this out of control. Or rather I guess I did mean for it to get like this, because I could have stopped it and I didn’t. It’s all my fault. I betrayed the reading public.” He turned to King Leo, who was staring at him wide-eyed. “I’m sorry, King Leo. No rat. No dee-vine help from anything. Lynch was just a citizen of Holey, nothing special. Never did battle with any rodent, that I know of. I am sorry. And, Jack, I’m sorry I got you into this thing.”

  “Oh, please. It’s been fun,” Jack said, and then he looked at Bromstad’s gun. “Tonight could still turn sour on us, but . . .”