by Mark Harris
“I’m on my supper hour,” said Brown.
“I know that when he comes back he’ll be pleased to see you,” said Officer Phelps, who in his mind’s privacy had several times today taken this man’s “wife” Luella into his arms and covered her with affectionate kisses. “How is your wife if I may ask?”
“Why do you call him Congressman?” Brown asked. “He’s not elected yet.”
“Just following orders,” said Phelps. “How is Mrs. Brown?”
“Mrs. Krannick is very well,” said Brown.
“Last night you stunned me,” said Officer Phelps. “I’m still recovering.”
“I didn’t know you didn’t know,” said Brown. “When we have trouble we think everybody knows.”
“All day long I’ve been thinking of Junie,” said Officer Phelps. Over Brown’s shoulder the young officer saw James Berberick. His chest bore two McGinley buttons, but a little satirically, one upon each breast, like nipples. Officer Phelps placed a folding chair beside Brown, urging him to sit, be comfortable.
“I can’t wait,” said Brown. “I haven’t time. I’m on my supper hour.”
“No word from the astronauts yet,” said Officer Phelps. “They’re past due. I believe they must be dead.”
“Cronkite won’t face it,” said Brown. “They’re dead.”
Officer Phelps brought a second chair and sat beside Brown, not facing the television squarely, however, keeping one eye on the headquarters (telephone especially), and upon James Berberick, too. “To go from the sublime to the ridiculous,” said Officer Phelps, “I’m wondering if your neighbors found their dog yet.”
“He was found,” said Brown.
“I’m delighted,” the young policeman said. “Did he just wander home by himself, I suppose?”
“No, I found him,” said Brown.
How modestly he put it! Officer Phelps admired modesty. Then, of course, if it was Mr. Brown who found the dog it couldn’t have been Mr. Brown who made the barking telephone calls. Officer Phelps was pleased to follow that line of thought. He spoke confidentially to Brown, sitting close. “I’m not going to pretend I’m grieving over those three fellows,” he said. “You’ll get no crocodile tears out of me. I don’t understand all this attention they’re getting. What about plumbers or bricklayers or coal-miners or anybody else that risk their lives or die? These fellows knew what they were getting into when they got into it.”
“They volunteered,” said Brown. “Junie didn’t even volunteer. He had no choice. He was taken. He was murdered by . . .”
“Murdered?”
“By Congressman McGinley,” said Brown, “since that’s what you’re all calling him. You heard what he said to me last night. I thought it was extremely obscene. Didn’t you? Is this the kind of man that’s supposed to represent me in Congress?”
“It’s hard to go on in the face of things,” said Officer Phelps.
“There’s no justice,” said Brown.
“There may be justice in Heaven,” said Officer Phelps, observing the candidate McGinley pass on foot before the headquarters, having left by the rear door to have his “throat sprayed,” as he said — his euphemism, as we observed last night.
Now, briefly, for a few seconds. Officer Phelps held these three men within his vision, Brown beside him, McGinley passing on foot, and James Berberick standing, leaning, his back to the wall, his attention divided between the television and his line of sight to McGinley passing by.
“Don’t give me that Heaven stuff,” Brown said fiercely, seizing Officer Phelps by the arms. “There’s no Heaven and there’s no justice. Everybody knows that now.” The power of his rage was in his hands. He released the officer’s arms as abruptly as he had seized them. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“Forget it,” said Officer Phelps. “You’re overwrought. You have a right to be mad.” Brown’s angry face had occupied the officer’s attention fully, and when Phelps’s attention returned to the general area of the headquarters he saw that James Berberick had disappeared — launched himself from the wall, passed through the door to the street, and passed from sight, too. “You should reread that letter your wife received,” said Phelps. “I read it several times today. ‘In your grief you are not alone. Be comforted, and be free of vengeful thoughts.’“
“All very easy to say,” said Brown. “You’ll return the letter.”
“Here,” said Officer Phelps, “or I’ll carry it to her myself.”
“I’m all right,” said Brown, taking the letter from Officer Phelps, receiving his own message of consolation. The letter to “My Very Dear Mrs. Luella Krannick” might as well have been written to “My Very Dear Brown.” Another good deed accomplished! His rage had passed from his hands when he seized Officer Phelps. Now he was free, his work done, his rage complete, having passed outward from himself and flowed gently away, distributed, bequeathed, conferred upon Phelps, upon Luella. Vibrations emanate and become suggestions. Upon Lala. Upon James Berberick. Our circle has no end. We are all connected. Farewell, Brown, we won’t see you again.
James Berberick in his pea-green BMW 1600 passed from standing to motion, gliding past the mailbox at Larkin & McAllister, past the public library, toward Van Ness, across Van Ness, to Franklin, and turning north. He travels fastest who travels alone. He makes all decisions free of dispute. He does what he damn pleases. Betrayed, sent to war, made brutal, he’d do what he damn pleased henceforth. He had not eaten dinner. He had drunk two cups of tea with Lala Ferne at mid-afternoon, but he was empty now. Later he would dine well.
A slight odor arose from his body, and he expected that it would increase. That was natural. Stress produced odor. He was prepared for odor, as he was prepared for everything else. Be prepared. We Are A Girl Scout Family. Those little chicks were quite all right. Their very white teeth recommended themselves to him. Later he would bathe and dine well and indulge himself a fine cologne. Lately he had formed an interest in Mister L and bought four ounces but not yet used it. It rode on the seat beside him. According to his radio the polls had closed.
What was Brown doing there talking with the pig? Brown too was a pig. What were the two pigs up to? He could tell pigs when he saw them, he felt. It was a plot against him. It was a trap. All three were pigs on Eagle Street. Then Lala and Iris were in on it, too, and they probably weren’t mother and daughter, either. Well, that Lala went a long way in the interest of her job, too, didn’t she? She gave it everything, that’s for sure. Clever how they lured him there! Pigs mingle with pigs. Birds of a feather fuck together.
No, she was no pig, she was a natural masseuse, and they were going to make a great deal of money together. He was convinced of that. According to his radio the astronauts were dead, or at any rate presumed dead, there’d be three days of national mourning up ahead. But when James Berberick had been missing nobody planned any days of national mourning. Nobody had even known he was missing. When he realized that he was lost he realized, too, that nobody cared, nobody was searching for him, he was a company statistic, he was on his own, now and forever. He had been cool and very methodical and kept up his concentration, kept his wits about him, lived with his hunger, and remembered everything he had ever learned or heard or been taught that could have been helpful to him, and by following that procedure he found his way back, shooting as he came, and when he walked back into camp they hadn’t even noticed he’d been gone.
So much for days of national mourning, flags at half-mast. Lala’s flag was extra-large. What would be wrong with a patriotic massage parlor, Jim & Lala, Old Glory Massage, turning onto Fulton now and following Fulton beside the park (the very route of Brown and Phelps last night), tasting hard-boiled eggs, for when he was a boy his mother had always taken hard-boiled eggs to the park. He could go for a hard-boiled egg right now. Well, later. At Old Glory Massage they’d have linens red, white, and blue, fifty stars on the cei
ling, the music of bugles, and photographs of Betsy Ross. Shower curtains could be flags. Salute while bathing. With his surplus earnings he intended to try out his motel scheme, too, all rooms bugged with TV closed-circuit cameras, which would certainly be more of an attraction to the proprietor and a few selected friends than watching the sky for three jokers lost on their way back from the moon.
He laughed on Fulton Street, tasting hard-boiled eggs. He wished he had just half an egg at this moment to ease his gut, although it was well to be hungry, too; his precision was excellent when he was hungry, he concentrated well, and he was most methodical. When he had been lost at war in Asia he had been hungry for several days. Yet his mind had never been sharper. His hearing had been particularly acute. Listen for the fencegate, he thought.
Of course it was beautifully dark. He’d been foolish to worry about that. He’d asked Lala’s daughters what time darkness came tonight. That was quite a little family portrait with Christopher up there with his head in the steam, arriving at Twenty-Fifth Avenue and so intersecting with his recent past — the course he’d driven after lunch — and halting once more at the red light at the corner of Balboa where the beautiful black girl had sat combing her hair in the car beside his. Where had she gone? Why hadn’t she waited there for him? He’d have shown her a good time. He intended to be an Equal Opportunity employer. He proceeded, crossing Anza, turning into Geary, and parking his car in Narrow Alley.
His car was a hard starter. That much he’d leave to chance. He killed his motor. If it didn’t start again it didn’t, he’d chalk that up as a sign God didn’t want James Berberick to start that car at that moment, sitting listening to his radio, which was telling tonight of the dead astronauts and the local elections. Voters were saddened by the deaths of the astronauts — so said the radio.
Refer to map on page 258 showing Narrow Alley and adjacent thoroughfares. Observe James’s pea-green BMW parked and waiting this Tuesday evening. Observe the route of “Mr. and Mrs. Brown” walking arm in arm on Monday night.
Key
1. Mrs Krannick’s “Real-Estate Office.”
X. Scene of the collision.
2. Route of Brown’s walk with Luella (Monday night) to
3. Her parked car.
James hummed a little song to himself, stepping out of his car and examining with a flashlight his right front tire (that is to say, Lala Ferne’s right front tire) to be sure it hadn’t gone soft, and he unscrewed the cap of his bottle of Mister L and dabbed himself at forehead and temples, and on the wings of his collar. Splash Mister L generously over your face. In the morning. At lunchtime. Evening time. Correct always. And almost incorrect without. James too had plans for clever advertising — on calling cards, in the yellow pages, in various magazines, hotels, motels, barber shops, pool halls, beauty parlors.
McGinley came walking down the alley from Clement Street. This unsettled James, who for some reason had expected McGinley to come from Geary Street. His expectation wasn’t logical. It simply was. He tried his motor, and it started, and it was clear to him that God or his saints or Fate or whoever wished his BMW to start, just as God or Fate or whoever had caused him to turn in Market Street near Manasek’s, or as Fate rang him on the telephone under the name of Mrs. Lala Ferne. He turned his lights on and sat leaning with his chin on the palm of his hand, his elbow on the door, his head slightly averted, so that McGinley passing down the alley might receive the impression that the driver of that automobile was either thinking before driving off, or resting, or sobering, although McGinley was in fact preoccupied with other thoughts: he ignored James Berberick in his car.
McGinley thought for a moment that he might be in the wrong alley, opening Luella’s fencegate and walking through, climbing her wooden steps, ringing her bell, and receiving no answer. He lit a match, but no notice had been left on the door for him except the general messages McGinley for Congress and “Back Soon.” He tried the door, but it was locked. He rapped several times with his fist in a loud, heavy, hard, angry spirit or manner, swearing as he did so, and thinking for an instant that now that he was a Congressman, or certainly shortly to be, he’d crack down on such dirty businesses as these so-called massage parlors, and cause them to be outlawed in all fifty states, excluding however the District of Columbia, where he would live and enjoy them, for he was extremely angry to have been deprived of this moment toward which he had looked with such pleasure: campaigning done, polls closed, no useful action possible, this massage was to have been a serene indulgence before his return to his headquarters to receive the acclaim of his many friends. He turned from the door, kicking it, and yet resigned to the failure of this moment as he had learned to become resigned to failed moments during the course of his campaign: keeping his temper, keeping cool — don’t blow it, he often said to himself, for there was a great deal of money to be made as a Congressman in Washington, descending the wooden steps and letting himself through the fencegate into the alley. He walked toward Geary Street.
James Berberick once more was unsettled. McGinley, having entered at Clement Street, ought to have left that way. James, having entered at Geary Street, had turned to face Geary again, preferring to confront McGinley. But McGinley was leaving now toward Geary, and James was behind him. He had not wanted it that way.
Why Geary? James never knew. Nobody ever knew. Why toward Geary instead of toward Clement? He had parked his car on Clement. Perhaps he had suffered some momentary lapse of memory, some confusion of direction. Perhaps he intended to make a telephone call. But there were many telephones on Clement. James came upon McGinley from behind therefore, calling as he came, “Mr. Chairman of the Draft Board,” which McGinley may or may not have heard. He never turned his head. He never indicated in any way, by any sign or motion, that the car behind him alarmed him. No doubt he was “lost in thought,” as people say — perhaps he had in mind another massage parlor. He assumed that the car behind him would pass him by, but in this he was mistaken, and the driver again called to him, “Luella asked me to do this,” touching him gently behind his knees, striking him down, and he fell forward without sound or speech, broken at the middle.
Eleven
Luella in her “real-estate office” sat waiting for Officer Phelps. Here he came. No it wasn’t. Many men passed along Geary Boulevard, sometimes stopping to examine the photographs in her window showing houses presumably for sale, although, as a matter of fact, none was for sale as far as she knew: they were only pictures in the window, as a real-estate office ought to have. Once in a while, to pass the time, she rearranged them — here he came. No, wrong again. Now and then she sold a house, though she didn’t try, or perhaps because she didn’t try: somebody begged her to place the photograph of their house in her window, and somebody else fell in love with the photograph. It was gravy. She had the touch for selling houses when she cared to, but she didn’t push, she didn’t press. She didn’t need it, after all. She didn’t fret, she didn’t worry, she didn’t hurry. Go slow, she thought. She took her time. She would take years if necessary to revenge herself for the death of her son.
Here he is, she thought, and along he came on foot, entering her office, inquiring after her health.
“I’m not very well,” she said.
“I can understand that,” said Officer Phelps, sitting on the second chair, where he had sat last night, and wondering once more how much business she could possibly do with only two chairs. “I gave your letter back to your husband.”
“Where did you see him?” she asked.
“At McGinley headquarters,” he said. “I read it several times today. It comforted me greatly. It really did. ‘In your grief you are not alone. Be comforted, and be free of vengeful thoughts.’“
“That’s it,” she said.
“It eased my mind,” he said.
“You didn’t know until yesterday?” she asked. “You hadn’t heard?”
“Un
til last night,” he said, “when Junie’s father told me.”
“Last night I was off my rocker,” Luella said.
“Junie’s step-father I suppose I should say,” said Officer Phelps.
“Not even step-father,” Luella said.
“Then Mr. Brown I suppose I should say.”
“Say anything you want,” Luella said. “Say ‘Mr. and Mrs. Brown’ if you want. God notices our marriage.”
“That’s official enough for me,” the young officer said. “I can’t tell you how constantly Junie’s been in my thinking all day.”
“His father murdered him,” Luella said.
“His real father,” said Phelps. “His natural father.”
“His real natural unnatural father,” Luella said. “Stanley Krannick.”
“When he’s in town you get all upset,” said Officer Phelps, speaking as a policeman. “I’m beginning to get the whole picture. Does he threaten or intimidate you? That’s what we’re for, you know, to protect citizens from threats and intimidation.”
“I should think so,” she said. “He killed my son. That’s why I get all upset. Don’t you think that’s something upsetting?”
He did not reply. He had no words to suit such a moment, and he said instead, “I’m just wondering how the real-estate business is these days.”
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“Because I don’t have the feeling you’re fully engaged. It doesn’t look to me like an awful lot of activity goes on here, and I don’t hear the telephones ringing and all that. Are you a notary public? I notice there’s nothing in your trash basket except that one rubber band that Mr. Brown threw in last night. That’s not much trash for a busy office.”