“Oh, yes. Yes. I’m not going to sell television. Something like this should be given away, like schooling.”
The sounds of a hundred necks rubbing against a hundred collars as people turned to their neighbors to check if they’d heard correctly. “But if you’re not selling it—”
“It should be in the public domain. I’m asking for your help, so corporations can split the cost of development. It will be a boon—” he hesitated.
The room found its voice then, a discontented rumble that seemed to build to laughter. James could hear the words charity case echoing around.
“Clearer and clearer,” Ledocq said into James’s ear. James nodded. An idealist with a device that he believed could end war? One that he wouldn’t sell, but would only give away? Reason enough to kill him. However, ten rows ahead, the Spider, who was also an idealist, and intelligent, had mentally unloaded the bullets from his revolver. He began to look with awful eyes for his contact, with whom he wished to have a violent quarrel.
“People will settle their differences around a conference table instead of—” And then Philo heard gasps. He turned around and saw the television screen, where the first image he’d prepared, the horse, was frozen. He hadn’t been able to get a moving image since the evening with Pem, the gadget was still that finicky, but still, a horse that didn’t move was at least something. He hadn’t finished his sentence, but no one asked him to continue.
He wondered if that was because they all were ready to leave, but as he surveyed the crowd, he began to feel something prickly and wonderful happening to his skin. Horripilation. The mood had shifted, just like that, to sheer awe.
But was that enough to get funding? Was the beauty of television such that it could make capitalists want to help the public and the poor? He looked at the audience, row after row of dark shapes bathed in a blue light. They were a group of kin in a cave around something that glowed warm while, outside, the storm beat down like kettledrums. He remembered Pem saying she was so happy she wanted to stop time, and how he’d foolishly given her all the reasons you couldn’t do that. Now he knew what she meant.
Two seconds, three seconds.
He had a good gag prepared precisely for the type of man who’d asked when they would see money in all this. It was a slide with a picture of a dollar bill.
“Pem,” he said. He decided to introduce her, “Pem is Mrs. Farnsworth. Pem, would you change the image, please?”
Five seconds, six.
Off came the horse. The screen went white.
“Philo, is this—” she said, then “Oh!”
He turned, feeling annoyed that he might miss the audience’s reaction to the next slide. He saw an arc, a jagged blue arc of electricity over the anode finger, that wasn’t supposed to happen, and a flash so bright it turned everything in Philo’s view black and white. Pem contorted, her hair on end. Then spots before his eyes. A heavy thump, like a flour sack hitting the floor. His eyes smarted. It had gone as fast as the flash of a photographer’s lightbulb, and it left a similar smell of ignited resins. His television apparatus was on fire.
“Pem?”
And now everything went so slowly he wondered if he were dreaming. Shouts. His eyes dazzled, he felt around the floor in perfect blackness for his wife.
“Pem?”
That awful smell of things burning, he looked on the tabletop to confirm it was only his invention, then back to the floor, the lights went on. People rushed up to help him.
“Put out the fire,” someone yelled, and someone else was reaching for the pitcher of water. Philo was crouched over Pem, patting her hand. She was looking at him through singed eyebrows, before he realized he had to turn and scream, “No!”
But it was too late. Whoever it was meant well, pouring the water on the flames, but since they were fed by potassium and sodium, what had been a small sizzle of wires and rubber roared into a conflagration that consumed every scrap of metal, every hand-wound coil, and forced people to leap backward as others, thinking quickly, used the cotton sheets to bat at the showers of sparks. A faint popping sound, then the collapse of broken glass as the vacuum tube went out. Impossible to build, and now it was gone.
More things happened to him in those early minutes—people fetching help, a blanket covering Pem, anonymous trouser legs surrounding him, awkward stares, whispers. He hardly noticed. Instead, one image was forever etched into his memory: the flash, with Pem in agony. He had wanted time to stop, and there it was.
In all, Philo’s television had been demonstrated for eight seconds, and burned for thirty.
He huddled by his fallen wife.
Finally, her lips moved. “Philo,” she said silently. He nodded. He held her hand. And he sat like that, legs folded under himself, returning the feeble squeezes she gave with her hand, barely even blinking himself, until the ambulance came.
CHAPTER 24
Hollis, O’Brien, and Stutz were singing a different kind of harmony now, all of them yelling frantically, jumping and waving at the boat that was settling into the berth, regardless of their screaming, as if it belonged there. Samuelson, however, stood back—Carter was either going to drown or be crushed to death—he couldn’t decide whether it mattered which way he went. The tuna boat, as it approached, slowed, and two mates jumped off its sides, ropes in hand.
“Back off!” O’Brien yelled.
“You back off, chum!” returned one of the fishermen.
As the boat continued to ease inward, the crate bounced off its bow and then rolled along its side, corners catching as it spun lazily toward the starboard side.
“There’s a man in the crate!” Stutz yelled.
“Eh, piss off,” said a sailor.
The agents gathered together, Hollis carrying crowbars in his arms, all of them watching helplessly as the crate was scraped between the concrete pilings and the tuna boat’s hull. It was like a pair of jaws coming down on a peanut shell. The crate burst, sending up splinters and beads of water.
“No!” Stutz yelled.
“Did he get out?” O’Brien craned his neck.
Samuelson shook his head, curiously pleased, watching air bubbles and movement where the crate had been, then he said, “He’s right there,” and pointed, heart thumping, to something drifting up to the surface.
It was the mail sack, a hump of air making it float like a dead jellyfish. Samuelson couldn’t tell if Carter were still in it, and if so, if he were alive. The boat’s crew had unloaded their haul, using the port side, so the agents were unmolested as they gathered around the sack.
Hollis had the idea of poking it with a crowbar, but the dock was a good ten feet above the water’s surface. There was a rope ladder, though.
“Go check,” Samuelson directed.
The rain continued, and Hollis looked at the sack, the rope ladder, and his still-dry group leader, for just long enough to appear sullen. He stepped off the side of the dock, found the upper rungs of the ladder, and began to descend toward the white canvas. He had the crowbar tucked under his belt.
The three men remaining on the dock crouched carefully, as the planks felt dangerous and wobbly. In addition to the deliberately missing slats, some were broken or ready to yield; when Oakland successfully collected port fees, they never wasted money on upkeep.
Hollis went down to the end of the ladder. The sack was too far away to touch. He pulled the crowbar from his belt.
Above, Samuelson yelled, “What do you see, Hollis?”
“I don’t see anything down here. I’m going to see if I can get it.”
“Hollis?” The three men were all crowded together, shoulder to shoulder, trying to see over the edge of the dock. A gust of wind made Samuelson’s hand clench around the shaft of his umbrella.
“Hollis, where are you?” O’Brien sounded annoyed.
“Hey, get off,” Stutz said faintly, further complaint dying on his lips as he realized none of his companions had touched him. His gaze traveled from the edge of t
he dock to his shoe, where he saw unlikely movement: a hand between the dock slats. “Hey!” He leapt backward, constricted by something, and in a blind panic leaped again, landing on his tailbone and bowling over O’Brien, whom he hadn’t touched.
He saw fat water droplets gathering on the links that cuffed his right leg to O’Brien’s left.
“Sam!” he yelled, pointing. O’Brien was struggling upright and Stutz, too, hurried to his feet. Stutz pointed at the cuffs in a panic, “I saw a hand! I saw a hand!”
And, indeed, Carter was just below them, clinging to the dock’s rotting underside, on the kneebrace where the wooden joints came together. His clothes were ruined with mud and bay dreck. He had kicked out the underside of the crate seconds before it was crushed, and, propelled past a point where he could count the ways in which he hurt, he moved primally now, feeling the anger he had never in his life followed as far as he could.
He’d never punched anyone in his life. His hands were too valuable for that. But now he wanted to hit them all, hit them hard. He expected them to run, which they did, but their panic was so complete they wasted several seconds choosing a direction, and Carter saw the chain above him flashing within reach. If he grabbed it, he could cuff it to one of the iron rings sticking out from the dock itself. With them held still, he would beat them senseless using whatever was handy.
He grabbed the chain and jumped off his shelf so his full weight brought the links down with him, like a conductor signaling a freight train’s full stop; above him his plan went awry immediately, for Stutz and O’Brien crashed against each other, and then the plank beneath them gave way and they fell through the dock.
Carter let out a gargling sound as the chain flew from his hands, and he fell backward into the water again and disappeared almost without leaving a ripple. The men who were cuffed together had the misfortune of falling several feet apart, among broken lumber and nails, on either side of a cross-beam that was unusually sturdy, and so their bodies no longer fell down but swung inward in an arc terminating when the backs of their skulls collided.
Samuelson walked backward two steps from the huge gash where his men had been pulled through. Walking backward was a terrible idea, as the magician could drop him, so he turned around and walked into the rain, toward the truck. He was alone. Hollis? Under the pier somewhere. The wind had kicked up, so he brought his umbrella down. This obscured his vision, which seemed like another bad idea, so he brought it back up again, behind him, and kept walking stubbornly over the gaps between planks. He expected hands to come out, or Carter to leap over the side, or to come up behind him, so as he walked he made full 360-degree twirls.
The umbrella was holding him back. He dropped it and ran, batting his pockets for the truck keys. He was just steps away from where Hollis had parked it. Missing Hollis. Who had the keys.
So he reached for his holster at the same time that he saw something drop behind the truck, landing with a clatter. Crowbar. His fingers made it to the leather strap buttoned over his pistol butt. Then he was tapped on the shoulder. He turned, drawing his gun, and something huge flared in his face. His umbrella, unfolding, made him stumble and, more quickly than Samuelson’s eye could follow, the umbrella retracted, showing off Carter, who ran the hook end down his gun arm like scraping ice off a window. The gun dropped to the dock, clattered across a plank, then into the bay. Samuelson looked up as the umbrella handle swung into his face.
Metallic sounds in his ears as he was clouted. He noticed Carter’s bare feet were still cuffed so he swung a fist to make him step back or duck or go off-balance. But Carter stepped inward, under his arm, and then he was behind him, where he quickly peeled Samuelson’s jacket down off the shoulders, pinning his arms, and ripped open his vest so the buttons popped off. He knotted the vest over the now-reversed jacket before the last button had bounced into the water. A makeshift straitjacket. Samuelson couldn’t move his arms. He fell over.
From the horizontal position, Samuelson’s world became more disappointing by the minute. First, Carter took a single step so that his feet were on opposite sides of his neck, bringing the ankle chain flush to his trachea. Samuelson twisted helplessly, seeing out of the corner of his eye a flashing movement—Hollis, now on the dock. He was saved!
Hollis crouched by the edge of the dock, seemingly torn between impulses. Carter watched him impassively, shifting his weight to better choke his victim.
“Yes?” he finally asked.
Hollis looked at Carter. He looked at Samuelson. He ran. He ran to the truck, and as Samuelson began to pass out, his penultimate sight was the bread truck stripping gears to get away.
The final sight was Carter bending over to his wayward watch pocket, then straightening. “What have we here?” he asked, holding the ivory skull between his finger tips. Then Samuelson blacked out.
. . .
“Agent Samuelson.”
The rain was steady and warm; on a more chipper sort of day, it would be wonderful to walk in. But Samuelson wasn’t able to go anywhere. He was reclining on a pile of rubber tires through which heavy ropes were wound. His arms, which he couldn’t quite see, were secured to something behind his head. He could move his legs a little, but when he did so, they made clanking noises. Somewhere, muffled, echoing, he heard someone shouting. Stutz?
To his left, sitting on a weathered bollard that looked like a mushroom cap, was Carter. His face was cut, and rainwater streamed from the black hair plastered to his head, down his torn shirt, past his trousers, which had gaping holes in them. His legs were crossed so that one bare ankle touched the opposite knee. Somehow, he managed to keep a cigarette going in the rain.
“What are you doing?” Samuelson heard himself ask.
“I’m having the time of my life.” He French-inhaled smoke and blew rings in between raindrops. “Look over your head. Ah, my mistake—you can’t. Listen, then. Your arms are manacled to a bollard just like the one I’m sitting on.” He paused. Then, using his cigarette to get Samuelson’s attention, he directed him to look just beyond his wingtips. There was an incredible tangle of chains and ropes, and at the edge of the dock were three anchors: two Danforths, the other a close-stowing model made for larger vessels. Samuelson recognized them from his childhood, when he’d crewed on his father’s boat.
Cocking his head to listen to vague shouts—O’Brien this time—Carter addressed Samuelson. “Your friends are trapped under the dock, by the way. I had an extra pair of cuffs, and I took some mooring swivels from that ferry boat, and—listen, do you know three-card monte? It’s also called ‘find the lady.’”
Samuelson, bewildered, made no motions at all.
“You have three blind cards, and one of them is the right one. It’s a sucker’s game. Anyway, one of those anchors is secured to the pair of cuffs that’s around your ankles. The other two are not. Are you following me?”
“I’m not telling you anything. The Service has a code—”
“That’s fine,” Carter interrupted. “I understand codes.” It was impossible to read his blue eyes. They seemed as quiet as Sunday streets. “I’m going to drop each of these anchors one by one off the dock. I don’t know what’s going to happen when the one attached to you goes over. If you weren’t also manacled to the dock, you’d simply be pulled under and drown, but since you are manacled to the dock—”
“I told you, I’m not telling you anything.”
“Either the anchor will rip your hipbones and shoulders out of their sockets, or you’ll actually be torn in half.” He took another drag on his cigarette. “I actually have seen a man torn in half before, in India. They used elephants. So,” he patted Samuelson’s shoulder and asked, conversationally, “which anchor do you pick first?”
In the distance, O’Brien was bellowing for help.
“I’m a Secret Service agent,” Samuelson said. “You can’t get away with this.”
“How about the Danforth that’s on the left?” Carter stood and stretched his legs. He
yawned widely and ambled to the edge of the dock. Samuelson watched him, but also watched to his left and his right. There was a ferry boat. Someone would see, eventually. And if there were three anchors, of course Carter would knock the first two off the dock before choosing the one actually connected to his legs. There would be time for someone to see them. Samuelson knew this, and clung to it.
Carter’s palms were both on the Danforth. He looked over his shoulder at Samuelson. “By the way, I didn’t want to cheat. So I mixed all those chains and ropes quite a bit, and I have no idea which one of these is connected to you.”
“What?”
“Allez-oop!” he cried, and sent the Danforth over the side, thirty feet of wide-gauge chain snaking with it.
Samuelson made an inarticulate cry as something snapped against his legs, but it was just the end of the chain passing him by on its way into the bay.
Carter looked over the edge. “That was very interesting. Would you like to play again?”
“We were only told to detain you! That’s all I know!”
Carter squatted next to Samuelson. “Along with the keys to the cuffs, and your identification and so forth, you had notes in your pocket. Detain me at such and such a time. Keep me off the field forever, which isn’t so very cryptic. You also had twelve dollars in your wallet. Which anchor shall I throw over next?”
“I don’t!” It sounded like a full sentence to Samuelson; he’d meant it as such, but he realized it made little sense. “What do you want?”
“Honestly, what I want is to throw the remaining anchors over the side and see what happens. Why did you put me in the bay, you round-heeled ham-and-egger?”
“You’re a magician.”
“I’m a magician,” he replied blankly.
“I figured it served you right.”
“You figured . . .” he hesitated. “You really thought that?”
“I figured you’d either get out or you wouldn’t, and it would serve you right.”
“For what?” He looked disarmed, and newly hurt.
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