Numbers Don't Lie

by Terry Bisson

  I raced home to tell Wu what I had found.

  * * *

  Everybody should have a friend like Wilson Wu, just to keep them guessing. Wu worked his way through high school as a pastry chef, then dropped out to form a rock band, then won a scholarship to Princeton (I think) for math (I think), then dropped out to get a job as an engineer, then made it halfway through medical school at night before becoming a lawyer, which is where I met him. He passed his bar exam on the first try. Somewhere along the line he decided he was gay, then decided he wasn’t (I don’t know what his wife thought of all this); he has been both democrat and republican, Catholic and Protestant, pro and anti gun-control. He can’t decide if he’s Chinese or American, or both. The only constant thing in his life is the Volvo. Wu has never owned another kind of car. He kept a 1984 240DL station wagon for the wife and kids. He kept the P1800, which I had helped him tow from Pennsylvania, where he had bought it at a yard sale for $500 (a whole other story), in my garage. I didn’t charge him rent. It was a red 1961 sports coupe with a B18. The engine and transmission were good (well, fair) but the interior had been gutted. Wu had found seats but hadn’t yet put them in. He was waiting for the knobs and trim and door panels, the little stuff that is hardest to find, especially for a P1800. He had been looking for two years.

  Wu lived on my block in Brooklyn, which was strictly a coincidence since I knew him from Legal Aid, where we had both worked before going into private practice. I found him in his kitchen, helping his wife make a wedding cake. She’s a caterer. “What are you doing in the morning?” I asked, but I didn’t wait for him to tell me. I have never been good at surprises (which is why I had no success as a criminal lawyer). “Your long travail is over,” I said. “I found an 1800. A P1800. With an interior.”

  “Handles?”

  “Handles.”

  “Panels?”

  “Panels.”

  “Knobs?” Wu had stopped stirring. I had his attention.

  * * *

  “I hear you got your brakes fixed,” Wu said the next day as we were on our way to Howard Beach in my car. “Or perhaps I should say, ‘I don’t hear.’ ”

  “I found the parts yesterday and put them on this morning,” I told him. I told him the story of how I found the Hole. I told him about the junkyard of Volvos. I told him about stumbling across the dark blue P1800. By then, we were past the end of Atlantic Avenue, near Howard Beach. I turned off onto Conduit and tried to retrace my turns of the day before, but with no luck. Nothing looked familiar.

  Wu started to look skeptical; or maybe I should say, he started to look even more skeptical. “Maybe it was all a dream,” he said, either taunting me or comforting himself, or both.

  “I don’t see P1800s in junkyards, even in dreams,” I said. But in spite of my best efforts to find the Hole, I was going in circles. Finally, I gave up and went to Boulevard Imports. The place was almost empty. I didn’t recognize the counterman. His shirt said he was a Sal.

  “Vinnie’s off,” he said. “It’s Saturday.”

  “Then maybe you can help me. I’m trying to find a place called Frankie’s. In the Hole.”

  People sometimes use the expression “blank look” loosely. Sal’s was the genuine article.

  “A Volvo junkyard?” I said. “A pony or so?”

  Blank got even blanker. Wu had come in behind me, and I didn’t have to turn around to know he was looking skeptical.

  “I don’t know about any Volvos, but did somebody mention a pony?” a voice said from in the back. An old man came forward. He must have been doing the books, since he was wearing a tie. “My Pop used to keep a pony in the Hole. We sold it when horseshoes got scarce during the War.”

  “Jeez, Vinnie, what war was this?” Sal asked. (So I had found another Vinnie!)

  “How many have there been?” the old Vinnie asked. He turned to me. “Now, listen up, kid.” (I couldn’t help smiling; usually only judges call me ‘kid,’ and only in chambers.) “I can only tell you once, and I’m not sure I’ll get it right.”

  The old Vinnie’s instructions were completely different from the ones I had gotten from the Vinnie the day before. They involved a turn into an abandoned gas station on the Belt Parkway, a used car lot on Conduit, a McDonald’s with a dumpster in the back, plus other flourishes that I have forgotten.

  Suffice it to say that, twenty minutes later, after bouncing down a steep bank, Wu and I found ourselves cruising the wide mud streets of the Hole, looking for Frankie’s. I could tell by Wu’s silence that he was impressed. The Hole is pretty impressive if you are not expecting it, and who’s expecting it? There was the non-vertical crane, the subway car (with smoke coming from its makeshift chimney), and the horse grazing in a lot between two shanties. I wondered if it was a descendant of the old Vinnie’s father’s pony. I couldn’t tell if it was shod or not.

  The fat lady was still on the phone. The kids must have heard us coming, because they were standing in front of the card table waving hand-lettered signs: MOON ROCKS THIS WAY! and MOON ROCKS R US! When he saw them, Wu put his hand on my arm and said, “Pull over, Irv,”—his first words since we had descended into the Hole.

  I pulled over and he got out. He fingered a couple of ashy-looking lumps, and handed the kids a dollar. They giggled and said they had no change.

  Wu told them to keep it.

  “I hope you don’t behave like that at Frankie’s,” I said, when he got back into the car.

  “Like what?”

  “You’re supposed to bargain, Wu. People expect it. Even kids. What do you want with phony moon rocks anyway?”

  “Supporting free enterprise,” he said. “Plus, I worked on Apollo and I handled some real moon rocks once. They looked just like these.” He sniffed them. “Smelled just like these.” He tossed them out the window into the shallow water as we motored through a puddle.

  * * *

  As impressive as the Hole can be (first time), there is nothing more impressive than a junkyard of all Volvos. I couldn’t wait to see Wu’s face when he saw it. I wasn’t disappointed. I heard him gasp as we slipped through the gate. He looked around, then looked at me and grinned. “Astonishing,” he said. Even the inscrutable, skeptical Wu.

  “Told you,” I said. (I could hardly wait till he saw the 1800!)

  The old man was at the end of the driveway, working on a diesel this time. Another customer, this one white, looked on and kibitzed. The old man seemed to sell entertainment as much as expertise. They were trying to get water out of the injectors.

  “I understand you have an 1800,” Wu said. “They’re hard to find.”

  I winced. Wu was no businessman. The old man straightened up, and looked us over. There’s nothing like a six-foot Chinaman to get your attention, and Wu is six-two.

  “P1800,” the old man said. “Hard to find is hardly the word for it. I’d call it your rare luxury item. But I guess it won’t cost you too much to have a look.” He reached around the diesel’s windshield and honked the horn. Two shorts and a long.

  The oversized head with the oversized eyes appeared at the far end of the yard, by the fence.

  “Two lawyers coming back,” the old man called out. Then he said to me: “It’s easier to head straight back along the garage till you get to where Frankie is working. Then head to your right, and you’ll find the P1800.”

  * * *

  Frankie was still working on the endless pile (not a stack) of tires by the fence. Each one went through the low door of the shed with a pop.

  I nodded, and Frankie nodded back. I turned right and edged between the cars toward the P1800, assuming Wu was right behind me. When I saw it, I was relieved—it had not been a dream after all! I expected an appreciative whistle (at the very least), but when I turned, I saw that I had lost Wu.

  He was still back by the garage, looking through a stack (not a pile) of wheels against the wall.

  “Hey, Wu!” I said, standing on the bumper of the P1800. “You can get whee
ls anywhere. Check out the interior on this baby!” Then, afraid I had sounded too enthusiastic, I added: “It’s rough but it might almost do.”

  Wu didn’t even bother to answer me. He pulled two wheels from the stack. They weren’t exactly wheels, at least not the kind you mount tires on. They were more like wire mesh tires, with metal chevrons where the tread should have been.

  Wu set them upright, side by side. He slapped one and gray dust flew. He slapped the other. “Where’d you get these?” he asked.

  Frankie stopped working and lit a cigarette. “Off a dune buggy,” he said.

  By this time, I had joined them. “A Volvo dune buggy?”

  “Not a Volvo,” Frankie said. “An electric job. Can’t sell you the wheels separately. They’re a set.”

  “What about the dune buggy?” Wu asked. “Can I have a look at it?”

  Frankie’s eyes narrowed. “It’s on the property. Hey, are you some kind of environment man or something?”

  “The very opposite,” said Wu. “I’m a lawyer. I just happen to dig dune buggies. Can I have a look at it? Good ones are hard to find.”

  I winced.

  “I’ll have to ask Unc,” Frankie said.

  “Wu,” I said, as soon as Frankie had left to find his uncle, “there’s something you need to know about junkyard men. If something is hard to find, you don’t have to tell them. And what’s this dune buggy business, anyway? I thought you wanted interior trim for your P1800.”

  “Forget the P1800, Irv,” Wu said. “It’s yours. I’m giving it to you.”

  “You’re what?”

  Wu slapped the wire mesh wheel again and sniffed the cloud of dust. “Do you realize what this is, Irv?”

  “Some sort of wire wheel. So what?”

  “I worked at Boeing in 1970,” Wu said. “I helped build this baby, Irv. It’s off the LRV.”

  “The LR what?”

  Before Wu could answer, Frankie was back. “Well, you can look at it,” Frankie said. “But you got to hold your breath. It’s in the cave and there’s no air in there.”

  “The cave?” I said. They both ignored me.

  “You can see it from the door, but I’m not going back in there,” said Frankie. “Unc won’t let me. Have you got a jacket? It’s cold.”

  “I’ll be okay,” Wu said.

  “Suit yourself.” Frankie tossed Wu a pair of plastic welding goggles. “Wear these. And remember, hold your breath.”

  It was clear at this point where the cave was. Frankie was pointing toward the low door into the shed, where he rolled the tires. Wu put on the goggles and ducked his head; as he went through the doorway he made that same weird pop the tires made.

  I stood there with Frankie in the sunlight, holding the two wire mesh wheels, feeling like a fool.

  There was another pop and Wu backed out through the shower curtain. When he turned around, he looked like he had seen a ghost. I don’t know how else to describe it. Plus, he was shivering like crazy.

  “Told you it was cold!” said Frankie. “And it’s weird. There’s no air in there, for one thing. If you want the dune buggy, you’ll have to get it out of there yourself.”

  Wu gradually stopped shivering. As he did, a huge grin spread across his face. “It’s weird, all right,” he said. “Let me show my partner. Loan me some extra goggles.”

  “I’ll take your word for it,” I said.

  “Irv, come on! Put these goggles on.”

  “No way!” I said. But I put them on. You always did what Wu said, sooner or later; he was that kind of guy.

  “Don’t hold your breath in. Let it all out, and then hold it. Come on. Follow me.”

  I breathed out and ducked down just in time; Wu grabbed my hand and pulled me through the shed door behind him. If I made a pop I didn’t hear it. We were standing in the door of a cave—but looking out, not in. The inside was another outside!

  It was like the beach, all gray sand (or dust) but with no water. I could see stars but it wasn’t dark. The dust was greenish gray, like a courthouse hallway (a color familiar to lawyers).

  My ears were killing me. And it was cold!

  We were at the top of a long, smooth slope, like a dune, which was littered with tires. At the bottom was a silver dune buggy with no front wheels, sitting nose down in the gray dust.

  Wu pointed at it. He was grinning like a maniac. I had seen enough. Pulling my hand free, I stepped back through the shower curtain and gasped for air. This time I heard a pop as I went through.

  The warm air felt great. My ears gradually quit ringing. Frankie was sitting on his tire pile, smoking a cigarette. “Where’s your buddy? He can’t stay in there.”

  Just then, Wu backed out through the curtain with a loud pop. “I’ll take it,” he said, as soon as he had filled his lungs with air. “I’ll take it!”

  I winced. Twice.

  “I’ll have to ask Unc,” said Frankie.

  * * *

  “Wu,” I said, as soon as Frankie had left to find his uncle, “let me tell you something about junkyard men. You can’t say ‘I’ll take it, I’ll take it’ around them. You have to say, ‘Maybe it might do, or . . .’ ”

  “Irving!” Wu cut me off. His eyes were wild. (He hardly ever called me Irving.) He took both my hands in his, as if we were bride and groom, and began to walk me in a circle. His fingers were freezing. “Irving, do you know, do you realize, where we just were?”

  “Some sort of cave? Haven’t we played this game before?”

  “The Moon! Irving, that was the surface of the Moon you just saw!”

  “I admit it was weird,” I said. “But the Moon is a million miles away. And it’s up in the . . .”

  “Quarter of a million,” Wu said. “But I’ll explain later.”

  Frankie was back, with his uncle. “That dune buggy’s one of a kind,” the old man said. “I couldn’t take less than five hundred for it.”

  Wu said, “I’ll take it!”

  I winced.

  “But you’ve got to get it out of the cave yourself,” the old man said. “I don’t want Frankie going in there anymore. That’s why I told the kids, no more rocks.”

  “No problem,” Wu said. “Are you open tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow’s Sunday,” said the old man.

  “What about Monday?”

  * * *

  I followed Wu through the packed-together Volvos to the front gate. We were on the street before I realized he hadn’t even bothered to look at the 1800. “You’re the best thing that ever happened to those two,” I said. I was a little pissed off. More than a little.

  “There’s no doubt about it,” Wu said.

  “Damn right there’s no doubt about it!” I started my 145 and headed up the street, looking for an exit from the Hole. Any exit. “Five hundred dollars for a junk dune buggy?”

  “No doubt about it at all. That was either the Hadley Apennines, or Descartes, or Taurus Littrow,” Wu said. “I guess I could tell by looking at the serial numbers on the LRV.”

  “I never heard of a Hadley or a Descartes,” I said, “but I know Ford never made a dune buggy.” I found a dirt road that led up through a clump of trees. Through the branches I could see the full Moon, pale in the afternoon sky. “And there’s the Moon, right there in the sky, where it’s supposed to be.”

  “There’s apparently more than one way to get to the Moon, Irving. Which they are using as a dump for old tires. We saw it with our own eyes!”

  The dirt road gave out in a vacant lot on Conduit. I crossed a sidewalk, bounced down a curb, and edged into the traffic. Now that I was headed back toward Brooklyn, I could pay attention. “Wu,” I said. “Just because you worked for NAPA—”

  “NASA, Irv. And I didn’t work for them, I worked for Boeing.”

  “Whatever. Science is not my thing. But I know for a fact that the Moon is in the sky. We were in a hole in the ground, although it was weird, I admit.”

  “A hole with stars?” Wu said. “Wi
th no air? Get logical, Irv.” He found an envelope in my glove compartment and began scrawling on it with a pencil. “No, I suspected it when I saw those tires. They are from the Lunar Roving Vehicle, better known as the LRV or the lunar rover. Only three were built and all three were left on the Moon. Apollo 15, 16, and 17. Nineteen seventy-one. Nineteen seventy-two. Surely you remember.”

  “Sure,” I said. The third thing you learn in law school is never to admit you don’t remember something. “So how did this loonie rover get to Brooklyn?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Wu said. “I suspect we’re dealing with one of the rarest occurrences in the Universe. A neotopological metaeuclidean adjacency.”

  “A non-logical metaphysical what?”

  Wu handed me the envelope. It was covered with numbers:

  “That explains the whole thing,” Wu said. “A neotopological metaeuclidean adjacency. It’s quite rare. In fact, I think this may be the only one.”

  “You’re sure about this?”

  “I used to be a physicist.”

  “I thought it was an engineer.”

  “Before that. Look at the figures, Irv! Numbers don’t lie. That equation shows how space-time can be folded so that two parts are adjacent that are also, at the same time, separated by millions of miles. Or a quarter of a million, anyway.”

  “So we’re talking about a sort of back door to the Moon?”

  “Exactly.”

  * * *

  On Sundays I had visitation rights to the big-screen TV. I watched golf and stock car racing all afternoon with my wife, switching back and forth during commercials. We got along a lot better now that we weren’t speaking. Especially when she was holding the remote. On Monday morning, Wu arrived at the door at nine o’clock sharp, wearing coveralls and carrying a shopping bag and a toolbox.

  “How do you know I don’t have court today?” I asked.

  “Because I know you have only one case at present, your divorce, in which you are representing both parties in order to save money. Hi, Diane.”