Rust and Bone

by Craig Davidson

  Jess emitted a low sarcastic whistle.

  “His most impressive feat, the one that I’ve been practicing, is making oneself invisible to the naked eye.”

  “Come on, Herbert.”

  “I’m serious. It’s no trick, just a purely mental skill. A basic matter of will. Lagahoo trained for years and was eventually able to maintain invisibility for hours at a stretch. The whole undertaking drove him crazier than a bedbug.”

  “Did you ever consider he was crazy to begin with?”

  Jess listened with mounting disbelief as Herbert described how, for the past six months, he’d passed each day in a room of his house, sitting in a cross-legged yoga position on the bare floorboards, teaching himself to become invisible.

  “… first, you must block all outside distractions. The basic human sensations of sight, sound, smell, touch—block them out. One must feel nothing in order to experience everything. Focus the mind. Set aside all material thoughts. Concentrate. See nothing— no, see white. Perfect, unending whiteness. Center yourself upon it.”

  He nodded to himself. “Yes, it’s possible. I’m living proof.” He added, “Totally self-taught!”

  “If you’re doing this by yourself, how can you tell you’ve become invisible?”

  Herbert sighed the way a teacher might when faced with a particularly dim-witted student. “I just know, Jess. I can feel it. A disconnection, I guess you’d call it.”

  “All I can say is, if some guy walked into the station raving about aged swamis and invisibility, I’d ring up the men with butterfly nets.”

  “Shut up.”

  “Off to the loony bin he’d go. For his own good.”

  “Think I’m nuts, do you? Pull in.” Herbert jabbed his finger at an approaching convenience store. “I’ll goddamn well show you.”

  Jess eased off the highway into the lot of Gibson’s Groceteria, parking beneath a sign reading: Utility Turkey—59¢/lb. Herbert shrugged off his jacket and rolled his shirt sleeves to the elbow. “Shut the engine off and be quiet,” he said, unbuttoning the shirt to his navel. “This takes incredible concentration.”

  Jess made a motion as though zippering her lips shut.

  “All right.” Herbert rolled his neck and popped his knuckles. “Now, then. Watch.”

  He closed his eyes. Soon his body was trembling, fingers twitching through a series of paroxysms as though tuning in stations on a finicky radio. His eyelids quivered like a man deep in REM sleep. His lips moved silently, a string of unintelligible syllables. Jess was reminded of a 911 call she’d answered a few years ago, some burnout who’d smuggled a narcotic toad back from Borneo; his girlfriend reported he’d been licking the poor creature’s backside all night. Jess found the guy sprawled on the kitchen floor in his boxers. The toad’s head poked from under the fridge, appraising its molester with bugged-out eyes. The guy’s body shook faintly, as though undergoing mild electroshock therapy. Herbert’s body was shaking much the same way.

  This went on for five minutes. At no time did he disappear.

  “Can you still see me?”

  “Afraid so.”

  “Damn!” His eyes snapped open. “Nothing? Didn’t my skin turn opaque?”

  “Maybe a little smoky,” she lied.

  “Hah—I told you!” Watching Herbert smile was like watching a match head burst into flame. “Just needs more practice.”

  Jess pulled back onto the highway. The highway hooked sharply westward coming through Sudbury. They drove directly into the sun, which, sinking gently into the hills, threw long embers over the landscape. Here or there they passed a motel or trading post or bait shop, but otherwise the land unfolded in great sweeps of pine and maple and poplar. Herbert rummaged through his suitcase and slotted a CD into the player. “Edith Piaf,” he said. “The Little Sparrow. One of Dad’s favorites.” Jess listened to French lyrics sung in a gravelly contralto, trying hard not to hate Piaf just because her father liked her. It was nearly five o’clock by the time they hit Sault Ste. Marie.

  THE SLEIGHTON MENTAL CARE FACILITY was situated on the city’s western outskirts, surrounded by a dense forest unclaimed by the logging corporations. The grounds were dotted with tall deciduous trees from which all but the most stubborn leaves had fallen. A wrought-iron fence, rusty bars tipped with ornate points, enclosed the buildings. Jess parked in the visitors’ lot.

  “Cozy,” said Herbert.

  Jess sat behind the wheel listening to the engine cool. She’d last seen her father as an eleven-year-old girl. Now she was a thirty-six-year-old woman with house and husband and twenty-five years of unshared history. She thought about that night at the Pythian lodge, how her father hadn’t held her gaze for even a moment; he’d simply stepped inside the tea chest, tipped his hat, and vanished. She wondered if it had been premeditated, or if he’d found himself on the other side of the curtain when the notion popped abruptly into his head: walk through the kitchen door out into the alley, turn the corner onto the street, keep walking. A snap decision. Two children, a mortgage, all responsibility—poof. Gone. Like magic.

  “We’ve got to do this, Jess.”

  “Says who? Nobody’s codified these things, written a guidebook.”

  “Do I have to hogtie you, drag you in there?”

  The facade of the hospital’s central building was pitted and water stained, chunks of mortar crumbling from the Catherine-wheel window frames. The receptionist’s unsmiling face was framed in a small porthole set in the middle of a pebbled-glass window. The only means of communication was through a perforated metal disk, same as at a theater box office.

  “How may I help you?” the receptionist’s voice rattled.

  Jess leaned close to the metal disk. “There was a magic show here a few days ago. We …”

  “Ward Eight, fourth floor. Elevators down the hall to your right.”

  The entrance to Ward Eight: a steel door painted with a faded rainbow; rabbits, chipmunks, and other forest creatures frolicked beneath the colorful arch. The window glass inlaid with chicken-wire.

  An orderly sat behind the charge desk reading Archie’s Digest. The man filled out his white uniform to the last stitch, fabric straining under its hopeless burden. The skin of his face appeared to float upon his features, not quite secure, like the membrane forming on cold soup. His name tag read LEE.

  “We’re here about the magician,” Jess told him.

  Without looking up from the comic, he angled his wrist so Jess could see the digital readout on his watch. “Visiting hours end at five.”

  “We aren’t here to visit any—”

  “’Tis past five, m’dear.”

  Jess reached for her badge, which she still carried. With her suspended it carried no weight, but the orderly didn’t know that. She flipped the top half over his comic and let it hang.

  “What do you want with the magician, officer?”

  “We have reason to suspect he was involved in a robbery,” Herbert said. “The man is a known hoodlum. We have eyewitness reports, and certain … corroborating evidences.”

  “I don’t see how that could be,” said Lee.

  “Look, we just want to ask some questions,” Jess said.

  “Well, then, guess I’ll go rustle up your magic man.”

  The orderly came around the desk and waddled into the ward, walking with the listing gait of a once-skinny man whose body has ballooned to ungovernable proportions. Herbert shot his sister a distressed look. Was their father a patient? Mercurial, recalcitrant, heedless of social responsibility—dear god, he fit the profile! Maybe they’d picked him up years ago, wandering the streets in filthy rags, destitute and mentally unglued. Perhaps he’d been here for decades and every few months the doctors reduced his medication so he could dress up and perform a show for his fellow looners. Herbert couldn’t handle the sight of his father in a ratty housecoat and fuzzy slippers, shambling about like a zombie.

  “Do my eyes deceive me?”

  They turned to see
a man coming out of a glassed-in office behind the charge desk. Mocha-skinned and trim, sporting a pencil-thin mustache of a style cultivated by ’70s-era adult film performers, sleek body nearly lost within a billowing lab coat. “It is! ” he exclaimed, skidding to a stop beside Herbert. “Mr. Mallory, can I just say how honored I am—imagine, the great magician in our ward!”

  Herbert inched behind his sister, ignoring the man’s proffered hand.

  “Is there a problem?” The man spoke with a delicate Indian accent. “Have I upset you?”

  “He’s fine.” Jess shook the man’s hand. “Just, after the accident …”

  “Oh my, yes!” A shake of the head. “Terrible accident. Terrible, terrible. I watched on television.” He took a step back, embarrassed by his proximity. “Dr. Venky Iyer.”

  “Jessica Heinz.”

  “A thousand apologies, doctor.” Herbert bowed. “I mistook you for one of the inmates.”

  “Ha!” Dr. Iyer cackled. “Cannot be too careful. Now, what brings you fine people here?”

  “You hosted a magic show a few days ago …”

  “Very nice, very nice,” Dr. Iyer said. “It certainly brightened everyone’s day.”

  Jess glanced around, thinking the ward could use some brightening. The dayroom was covered in olive-green tile, strips of padded foam tacked to the walls at hip level. The light filtering through the leaded glass windows was muted by thick mesh screens.

  “So,” Dr. Iyer arched his brows, “will Mr. Mallory be performing?”

  He seemed to have mistaken Jess for Herbert’s agent. “I’m sorry, no.” She showed her badge. “We’re looking for information on the man who performed …”

  “Here’s your magician.”

  The orderly gripped a scrawny fellow by the elbow. The man had thick curly red hair and lips so thin they resembled soda crackers stacked one atop the other. A gourdlike head perched atop a spindled neck like an apple balanced on a breadstick. Standing beside him was a shockingly large woman of about sixty. With blotches of mascara smudging her face and a shock of frizzy black hair, she resembled a chimneysweep after a dogged day’s work.

  “This is the magician …?” Jess managed.

  “Who, Oogie?” Dr. Iyer chuckled. “Certainly not.”

  “Well, he’s been practicing tricks all day,” said Lee. “I figured …”

  Dr. Iyer shook his head. “The officer’s looking for the man Oogie’s been imitating lately.”

  “I’ve been off the past week,” Lee said defensively.

  “I’m the man you’re after,” the scrawny man piped up in a voice shrill as a piccolo. “I got magic like you never seen!”

  “Cool your jets,” Lee warned.

  Oogie grasped Jess’s hand and kissed it grandly. “Yes, milady, your eyes do not deceive you. It is I, Oogie Dellanthorpe.” His tone suggested the name passed over people’s lips with great frequency. “Or, as my legions of fans know me, the Mysterious Oogie.”

  “Delusional, but quite harmless,” said Dr. Iyer. “A fascinating case.”

  “I’ve been hiding out with my able-bodied assistant, Rhonda McMurphy.” Oogie nodded to his female companion. “The pressures of fame, you know. But don’t worry, I’ll soon be thrilling audiences again. I can leave anytime I want.”

  “That’s not at all true,” Dr. Iyer whispered to Jess.

  Oogie’s eyes fell upon Herbert. “Is it—could it be?”

  Herbert performed a polite bow. “Guilty as charged.”

  “Dr. Iyer, about the other magician …?”

  “Of course, officer. I have his address on file.”

  Dr. Iyer ushered Jess into his office and closed the door, leaving Herbert to fend off Oogie alone. The office was small and cluttered, shelves stacked with outdated medical texts. In the corner, a little heater popped and cracked as its parts grew warmer and expanded.

  “An interesting man,” Dr. Iyer said, speaking of her father. “Comes in every year around Halloween. Mr. Dellanthorpe was so enthralled he’s taken on a whole new persona.”

  Dr. Iyer handed over a slip of paper with an address in Thessalon, a town two hours east. “I don’t even know the fellow’s name. He insists on using his stage name—the Inimitable Cartouche.”

  By the time they exited the office, Oogie’s arm was draped chummily over Herbert’s shoulder. “You’re a fine fellow,” he said. “I like the cut of your jib.”

  Jess pulled at her brother, making for the exit. “Well, thanks for everything.”

  “No!” Oogie was reluctant to relinquish Herbert’s neck. “I’m … I’m putting on a magic show. Yes, it’s true: the Mysterious Oogie will perform tonight.”

  “You’d really be helping us,” Dr. Iyer whispered. “Otherwise he’ll grouch all night.”

  They agreed to stay. Lee guided Jess and Herbert to a sofa. Their presence prompted a great deal of curiosity; patients wandered out of their rooms, gravitating to the dayroom.

  Oogie reappeared with a turquoise bedsheet pinned to the shoulders of his housecoat and a bristol-board top hat on his head at a breezy angle. Rhonda wore a sequined top and hoop skirt.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Oogie said. “Tonight I will dazzle you with illusions guaranteed to leave you questioning your sanity!”

  “Ho ho ho, now, now, Mr. Dellanthorpe,” Dr. Iyer said in a singsong voice. “Let us choose our words a little …” he brought his index finger and thumb together, as though squeezing the juice from an invisible grape, “… more prudently, shall we?”

  “Use what sense the good Lord gave you,” said Lee, “… or I’ll brain you.”

  “We do not brain our patients, officer,” Dr. Iyer told Jess with a nervous smile. “We have a strict No Braining policy, in fact.”

  Oogie shuffled a deck of playing cards. He strode over to a shrunken-apple doll of a woman, fanned the deck.

  “Now, to remove any taint of duplicity—milady, have we ever met before?”

  “I’m Marla,” the old woman croaked. “Your room’s next door to mine. You keep me up all night with grunts of self-gratification.”

  “What I mean is, are we in cahoots?”

  “I wouldn’t be in cahoots with you for all the silks in Siam.”

  “Wonderful. Please select a card.”

  Marla reached for a card. Oogie pulled the deck away and angled it differently. Marla reached again. Oogie snatched the cards away, stuffed half into his pocket and offered the remaining deck. Marla reached … Oogie pulled away. Rhonda performed a series of pirouettes.

  “My formidable mental powers are useless!” Oogie was confused and dismayed. “This lady’s resistance is otherworldly. Tell me, aged crone, is there a metal plate in your skull?”

  Marla had nodded off.

  Herbert had been watching with mounting agitation. “Mind if I have a go?”

  “Yes, give it a whirl,” Dr. Iyer said.

  Oogie took a seat beside Jess, unruffled despite his failure. “I’m learning how to clog dance,” he told her. “Ordered special shoes from Scandinavia.”

  Herbert fanned Oogie’s cards and knelt beside Marla, who snuffled into foggy wakefulness. Herbert asked her to take a card and show it to everyone but him. After Marla had done so, Herbert shuffled the remaining cards and directed Marla to slot her card back into the deck.

  “When I tap the deck, your card rises to the top.” A light tap. “Remove the card, please.”

  Marla’s face lit up. “The four of clubs—will you look at that!”

  “Beginner’s luck,” Oogie huffed.

  For the next half-hour Herbert ran through a series of card illusions: the Haunted Deck, Cutting the Ace, the Teleporting Card, the French Drop. Those who’d hung back earlier drew near. Everyone leaned forward, heads tilted slightly upward, bodies inclined towards Herbert like iron filings under a faint yet persistent magnetic pull. Following each trick the room burst with astonished laughter or low oooohs, followed by the disbelieving question: “How did he do that?�
�� Jess watched her brother’s face change. Something peeled away from it, a layer so deeply ingrained she hadn’t noticed it until it was gone. The features relaxed, creases smoothing out, softening. She saw a trace of the boy she remembered.

  “I must seclude myself in preparation for my final feat,” he said. “I ask the lights be dimmed. Everyone must remain completely silent. Any disturbance will ruin my concentration.”

  “Herbert, are you sure—?”

  “Hush, doubting sister.”

  Herbert entered a room at the end of the ward. Following his departure the dayroom filled with excited whispers, like a cage full of birds. Lee tiptoed over to the dimmer knob and brought the light level down to a mellow dusk.

  After a few minutes Herbert cried, “Behold!” and everyone craned to see the fabulous magician striding down the hallway …

  … stark naked.

  Herbert believed the only sure way to render oneself invisible required the removal of one’s clothes. Though he could still see his body—the pasty skin and thatch of curly black chest hair, the teacup-shaped birthmark on his hip—Herbert was utterly certain nobody else could.

  “I am in your very midst,” he called out triumphantly, “and yet you cannot see me—ho ho ho! ”

  A palpable surge of discomfort passed through the group. Most people looked away, shocked and deeply embarrassed. This only solidified Herbert’s conviction.

  “Is this normal behavior?” Dr. Iyer asked Jess.

  Herbert strutted through the group. He flipped a lock of Rhonda’s hair. “What’s that—the wind? No, madam, it was I!”

  “Fellow’s equipped like a fox,” Marla said to no one in particular.

  Herbert stopped in front of a black man wearing a porkpie hat. “Tell me, friend,” he asked. “As I stand before you, what do you see?”

  “I see a damn fool! ”

  “Herbert,” Jess said gently. “We can see you.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “Everybody please point at my brother.”