The Company Man

by Robert Jackson Bennett

  Hayes stared in shock and then withdrew, ashamed to have witnessed such a private moment. He walked back to the car, his face burning red, and sat without moving.

  There was always more, he thought. Always more to everyone. For all the moments and feelings he could pluck out of the air there were thousands more hidden closer to the heart that would never be known to any other creature except their owner, and when they passed on from this world those secrets would fade as though they had never been here at all.

  Which they may never have been, he thought. Which they may never have been.

  Time passed. Maybe an hour. Then Garvey came out, phonograph under his arm again, tie fixed and hat straight. He stored the machine in the back and came and sat in the driver’s seat again. “You ready?” he asked.

  Hayes cleared his throat. “You don’t have to.”

  “Huh?”

  “You don’t have to do this. Today, at least.”

  “Why not?” asked Garvey.

  “You just don’t. Drop me off somewhere in the city.”

  “Where?”

  “Anywhere.”

  Garvey shrugged and drove back into town. The green-gray countryside melted by until it became smooth cement walls once more. Garvey steered the car to a rattling stop outside an old theater, where he pulled in under the marquee. Then Hayes got out and turned around and said, “You should go see Samantha.”

  “Why?”

  “It’d clean you up, I think. I’m just saying. And she needs to see someone besides me, too. She’s probably going mad.”

  Garvey cocked an eyebrow at him. “All right. Come by later and I’ll have that address for you.”

  “I said you didn’t have to do it today.”

  “Well, I’m doing it anyway. You don’t have a choice.”

  “If you’re sure. Thanks, Garv,” said Hayes. He gave him the address and saluted and walked away, weaving through the crowd with his shoulders hunched and his hands in his pockets.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Hayes had not intended to get drunk. He remembered that now, just a few hours after he’d left Garvey behind and gone roving through the streets, trying to purge that stolen image of Garvey’s children from his mind. He knew his actions often had casualties, and it was cowardly to want to ignore them, but it was no longer a question of want as much as need. After the sun had set and the temperature dropped he’d fled into an open pub to huddle next to the barside fireplace, sniffling and cursing, and he’d told the barman that he wanted one beer, and then a chaser of whisky, and no more. But then the gentleman had mentioned one or two specials, and Hayes had listened.

  Now it was night and he was stumbling through the alleys of the Shanties. “McNaughton,” he muttered to himself. “Mc-fucking-Naughton. Always McNaughton.” He turned to peer at the Nail, far away, lit up by spotlights along the base. Where had the bastard come from, he wondered. Had Kulahee dreamed of it, sitting in his little hut? Had he sketched it out on parchment, and then forgotten about it? Or had it always been here, waiting to be carved out of everything else around it?

  He hiccupped. Then he looked around and realized he was quite lost.

  They said that when Evesden was first founded the Shanties had been no more than log cabins cobbled together with hides stretched over them, built right in the woods. Hayes could believe it. The place had the planning and the hospitality of a shabby campground, or perhaps he was just drunk. As the population of Evesden had erupted, the tenements had swelled up between the leaning homes like enormous mushrooms, dark and stinking, and they’d remained that way for the future. Massive, darkly lit buildings with strings of smaller, rambling homes clutched between their ranks.

  He looked at one tenement and realized he recognized it. It was Skiller’s, smoke still oozing from the rooftop cracks. Perhaps he’d led himself here without realizing. It seemed like a ruin from some recent war left standing. He reached out and touched it to make sure it was real.

  He stumbled around to the side of the building, to a little alley. It swelled and narrowed as the wall of the adjacent building warped. He walked along it and tried to imagine people living here. Tried to match this world with the one in Newton where Samantha had once slept peacefully, or peacefully enough.

  Hayes stopped halfway down the alley. He heard someone just ahead, padding through the darkness. There was a snuffle, as though they were crying. Hayes stepped forward and the alley took a hard right down to the debris-filled gutter of the next building. No one was there. He looked back and around and saw no one in the little spaces between the buildings.

  Then he heard it again. A child’s sob, but now it was from far behind him. He swiveled around drunkenly to look, but again there was nothing.

  “Hello?” he said.

  The crying stopped abruptly, but not like the crier had just stopped. It was as if the noise itself had been cut off, like the halting of a record. Then Hayes heard it again down an alley to the right, much more agitated, some little child wailing. Hayes staggered down the gap and peered into the darkness. There was nothing.

  “Is anyone there?” he called.

  The crying did not stop this time, but he still could not see. It was as though it floated away from him. Then he heard it again, this time behind him, but the first voice did not stop. He heard a third voice, this time to his left, and all of them sobbed together, a child’s chorus weeping all at once in a circle around him.

  Hayes reeled around, listening to the many voices. Then it struck him. A keening sense of such sorrow and grief that it brought him to his knees, sadness almost beyond human naming. Ancient tears. Wordless and timeless. He choked and fell to all fours as it filled him.

  Then came the sound, a shrieking like metals being ground into one another with unimaginable force. Hayes screamed and lifted his watering eyes and looked down the alley to see a shadow on the wall, a human shadow, but it was blurred at every edge and it moved so fast it was little more than a smear. It was there and it was real, he could tell, and yet when he looked to see what was casting the shadow he could see nothing at all.

  The shrieking stopped, leaving a ringing in his ears. Hayes took a breath and started clapping his hands together and was relieved when he found he could hear it. He checked his ears and felt no blood. Then he crawled up and sat on his knees and stared at the empty alley before him.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Garvey went to the safe house at eight, not sure if she would be there. He knocked and there was no answer, so he tried the door and found it unlocked.

  She was asleep on the bed. He walked in carefully, moving as softly as he could. Her thumb was just inches from her mouth, as if she were just a few years out of infancy. He smiled and stroked her head and said, “Hey.”

  Samantha awoke, blinking. “Donald?”

  “Yeah. It’s me.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  He shrugged, unable to stop smiling.

  “How long have I been here?” she asked.

  “Long enough,” he said. Then he stood and held his hand out to her. She took it and stood up.

  He took her to the winter carnival, which was always open this time of year down out at Discovery Bay. They ate floss candy and watched the clowns before finally getting a ride on the Ferris wheel. The clanking architecture lifted them up into the cool night sky, the lights of the nearby buildings dipping below them. Then they looked across the waters and saw it. Glowing starlight-bright like crystal or ice. A city formed from dreams, drifting in the night like some mythical iceberg. It seemed as though such a place could not be made or populated by men, and both were struck silent for some time.

  “Sometimes I think this city has a voice,” Samantha said.

  “Do you?” Garvey said, smiling slightly.

  “Yes. Out there.” She pointed across the waters.

  “What’s it saying?”

  “That there’s always tomorrow. And there always will be.”

  Wh
en they were done they returned to the parking lot and looked back at the carnival. Samantha turned to look at the bridge and the city towering behind it.

  “Home,” she said, and Garvey nodded.

  They drove to his apartment just before midnight. Then as they crossed the little courtyard Samantha pointed to the trees at the center.

  “Someone’s there,” she said. They both stopped and looked, and saw a hunched figure leaning against one of the trunks. A large wooden box was sitting on the ground before him. “Are people still watching your apartment?”

  “No,” Garvey said. “Hayes checked. And if that guy’s a shadow he’s doing a terrible job of it…”

  Garvey walked to the figure carefully. It did not move. Then he got in front of it, squatted, and said, “Shit. It’s Hayes. He’s passed out.”

  Samantha drew close and coughed. “Lord. It’s like he slept in a distillery.”

  “I thought he was doing better. What’s that?” Garvey asked, nodding at the box.

  She opened it slightly. “It’s the files. The Tazz ones, and the ones from Savron Hill. I suppose it’s his present for you.”

  Garvey’s eyes gleamed briefly. Then he nodded, jaw set, and grabbed Hayes by the arm and pulled him to his feet. A long stream of drool gathered at Hayes’s lower lip and then broke and spattered onto the cement. He muttered something and then said, “Good evening.”

  “Goddamn it, Hayes,” Garvey said. He fought to gather all of Hayes’s errant arms and legs.

  “Did you all have a nice evening?” Hayes asked, slurred.

  “Shut up,” Garvey said.

  “Yes,” said Samantha.

  “Oh,” said Hayes. “That’s good.”

  “Take that, will you?” said Garvey to Samantha, nodding again at the box.

  They brought him inside the apartment and sat him on the sofa. Hayes sprawled across the beaten cushions, then opened his eyes and seemed to focus a little. He moved his limbs around like they were all new additions and managed to force himself into a sitting position. Then he blinked hard and said, “Thought I’d come by and get that address from you, Garvey-o.”

  “Yeah,” Garvey said. “Yeah, I fucking figured.” He poured a glass of water and said, “Here. Drink up.”

  “Much obliged.” Hayes held it with the knuckles of both hands, like an old woman with arthritis. He sipped it and smacked his lips. “I look forward to it. Look forward to doing you right.”

  “What have you been doing, Mr. Hayes?” asked Samantha. “You look sick again. I haven’t seen you in such a state since our first day together.”

  “I’m fine,” he said. But then he looked away, transfixed by some invisible presence, and whispered, “No. No, I’m not. I saw it again tonight.”

  “Saw what?” asked Samantha.

  “The thing. The ghost. The one we saw.”

  “You did?” said Samantha. She and Garvey moved closer to him, propping him up to shake some sense out of him. “Where?”

  “Out by… by Skiller’s tenement. Same place, sort of. In a little alley behind. No one died, though. No more deaths. I looked, and checked.”

  “But what did you see?” she asked.

  “Nothing. A shadow, twitching. And there was a voice. I heard it. It cried, I think.”

  “Cried?” said Garvey. He sounded skeptical.

  “Yes. Cried. Many voices, crying all along the little dark alley. And I wondered… I wondered what they had said before about it being a ghost. I mean, it’s the second time we’ve spotted it by Skiller’s tenement and all.”

  “God,” Garvey said. “How loaded are you?”

  “I don’t know. Loaded enough. Do you believe me?”

  “Are you sleeping here?” Garvey asked, impatient.

  “Here? Where, on your couch?”

  “That would be the idea.”

  “I wouldn’t want to intrude.”

  “You’ve already intruded.”

  Hayes felt the couch springs, then took a pillow in his arms and squeezed it to his chest and rocked forward. “All right,” he said.

  “Fine, then. I’ll get some blankets,” said Garvey, and he went back into his bedroom.

  Hayes groaned and lay back, pillow still clutched to his body. “You believe me, don’t you, Sam?” he asked softly.

  “I’m trying,” she said.

  “I did see it. It cried. And I felt it. You know, with…” He pointed to his head.

  “I understand.”

  Hayes thought for a moment, his ivory brow crinkling. “I think it’s very sad.”

  “Sad?”

  “Yes. Very sad. I’m not sure why, though.” He sniffed, and then smiled fondly at her. “You know, I knew a girl like you once.”

  Samantha turned to him, slightly uncomfortable. “Yes?”

  “Yes. I was very young then. A boy. It was a long time ago.”

  “What happened to her?”

  Hayes paused. “She died.”

  “From what?”

  His eyes closed a little. “A bastard.”

  “I’m very sorry to hear that,” she said slowly.

  Hayes stared into the corner of the room. His eyes were wide and empty, no doubt seeing faces that he wished he could forget. “She was with child when she died,” he said. “We were going to have a baby together. Can you believe that?”

  Samantha nearly shook her head, but stilled herself and stayed quiet.

  “A baby girl, maybe,” he said. “I would have liked a baby girl. With fat baby hands and fat baby feet. I don’t know what I would have named her. Gloria, or Susan, or something. And I don’t know if she or he or it would have been like… like me. But I often wonder about it. About how it could have been. Two children, raising a child. I’d have never left, never seen the world. Just me, and the wife, and the little one. Fucking momma and poppa. What a crazy thought. Fuck me. Who knows how things could have been.”

  “Is that why you do this?” she asked.

  “Do what?”

  “Follow people. Try to set things to right.”

  “I don’t set things to right. Not ever. Usually I just make them worse.” He squinted at her. “You’re sure you want to come tomorrow?”

  She smiled a little. “Yes. I miss my job.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. I miss running around with you.”

  “I never ran.”

  “No.” She laughed. “That’s true. You didn’t.”

  Garvey returned with the blankets. “Here you go,” he said, and handed them over. “Do not vomit in the middle of the night. Do you understand me? If you do, I’m not cleaning it up.”

  “I understand perfectly,” Hayes said, and he took the pillow and stuffed it behind his head. Then he spread the blankets out across his legs. “Where’s my address?”

  Garvey took an envelope from his back pocket and handed it to Hayes, who snatched it greedily. “It took a lot of weight to pull that, you know,” said Garvey. “Your friend is a hard man to find. He was barely recorded at all.”

  “Yes. He wouldn’t be.” Hayes opened the envelope and peered at it owlishly. “Good. Now. You can all stay here watching me if you want. But I do intend to sleep. Very hard and very soon, so…” He waved toward the back bedroom. “Go away.”

  “Jesus,” Garvey said.

  Hayes rolled over and stuffed his face in the corner of the sofa. He lay there perfectly still until they could only assume he was asleep. What an odd little family we have, Samantha thought to herself. Two jobless parents taking care of a wayward son. She almost laughed.

  “What?” said Garvey. But she shook her head and led him away.

  Garvey and Samantha sat in his darkened bedroom, the box of files set on the mattress between them like a needy child. Garvey opened the lid slightly, peeking in through the crack at the papers within, then put it back and looked away.

  “It’s all there?” he asked.

  “It looks like it, yes,” said Samantha.

  “Je
sus. Jesus Christ.”

  “It’s enough to hang Brightly,” she said. “And Tazz. Probably more.”

  “But there’s nothing on the murders?”

  “Not on the murders, no. Hayes is just guessing there. But Mr. Hayes is terribly good at guessing.”

  “Yeah. Yes, he is.” Garvey placed a hand on the box again and took a breath. “I’m afraid,” he said.

  “I know. I am, too.”

  “You know, I lied to you.”

  “What? When?”

  “When I was talking about my gun. I told you I forgot it all the time. But that’s not true. It’s just heavy. It’s got this heaviness to it. When I put it on, it just drags me down. I hate it, so I leave it behind. But this…” He tapped the cover of the box. “This is heavier than anything. It hurts just to have this near me.”

  “Are you going to do it? Go to Collins with this?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. Well, no. I just have to. People have gotten killed over Tazz. And it was all nothing. Someone needs to tell people about that.” He blinked slowly in the darkness. In the alabaster light from the lamps outside he looked bloodless. “I suppose it’ll have to be me.”

  “And then what will happen?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe that’ll be the chink in the armor. The chance to wipe all this shit from our backs and stand up clean. Or maybe not. Maybe it’ll just be papers, to be burned and forgotten.”

  He opened the box and began taking out the files, carefully looking over each of the notations she had made. It somehow pleased her to see his methodical approach, carefully raising each sheet to catch the lamplight from outside, then squinting to read it, then laying it back down. She could see the librarian in him then, handling these little papers as though they were desperately important and fragile, and yet she could also see something of a priest in him as well, doing his daily rituals for some unspoken higher power, and hoping that with each repeated action he could enforce a structure on the world around him.

  After a while he noticed her looking at him. “What?” he said.

  “Come here,” she said.