“And where is he?”
“He’s out, ma’am.”
“When do you expect him to return?”
“Can’t say. He comes and goes a lot. O-fficial business and all.”
Agnes is not the kind of woman who can be dissuaded by a weak-chinned man. “Very well,” she says, “I shall wait.” And she plants herself in a chair as if she has every intention of growing roots.
The hours pass. The deputy is not comfortable with the strange English woman in his workspace. He had thought she would grow tired and bored and leave. But she does not. With each passing moment, Agnes is more at home in her environment. First, she flips through a magazine. Then she gathers all of the magazines in the sitting area, removes the subscription cards, and piles them alphabetically by subject. Next, she organizes the furniture. Wherever she steps, order follows.
The Deputy protests, “Hey, look, now just look, you can’t — ”
Agnes counters, “But it is such a frightful mess.”
“But this is important po-lice business.”
“All the more reason that it should not be shoddy.”
Of course, Agnes knows exactly what she is doing. A little more time and she will have broken him completely. As she thinks this, she hears the rumble of heavy equipment. With her innate English instinct for tragedy, she knows Topper is about to ruin everything.
A blast of an air horn rattles the windows in the Hims Chapel Sheriff’s office. Agnes hears the grinding of gears and an unmistakable, high-pitched cackle. The dwarf is afoot!
“Whut in the hell is that?” asks the deputy as he reaches for his gun belt.
Agnes does not answer. She drops a stack of files and bustles out the door as fast as her proper old feet will carry her.
Outside she sees a flatbed truck with a bulldozer on it accelerating hard towards the north end of town. As the truck roars past her, Topper throws her a little wave. He appears to be standing high above the wheel, on a naked woman’s lap.
“Oh my God,” says Agnes. She is certain that she has just seen the first Harbinger of the Apocalypse.
At the far end of main street, Topper flattens a few parking meters and a defenseless shrub. Squeezed onto the bench seat next to Topper are the Sheriff and a man named Clarence Johnson. The Sheriff is laughing so hard Topper can’t even hear the engine. Hims Chapel is a very small, and very dull, place. This evening is already the third best time the Sheriff has ever had. And, just like the stripper that Topper is using to work the pedals for him, this night is frighteningly young.
After taking out the parking meters Topper overcorrects, hops a curb, mangles a stop sign and then manages to wrestle the rig back onto to the road.
“Whattya call this thing?” asks Topper.
“Suicide Knob,” answers Clarence. He should know, it’s his truck.
“I LIKE IT!” cries Topper.
From the reasonable end of town, Agnes watches the truck disappear. Coins from the parking meters rain down on the pavement, spinning and shimmering to a rest. As the sound of the truck fades into the distance Agnes asks the night, “How did this happen?”
The night does not answer. But in small towns, boredom is always to blame.
So it was that Topper, Clarence Johnson, and Sheriff Cooper wound up drinking together in a small sad strip club off Alabama State highway 109. They bought each other lap dances, talked the coarse language of men, and generally enjoyed themselves.
After he was pretty sure the Sheriff was drunk enough to tell the truth, Topper asked, “So whattya know about this Rielly woman?” Despite intoxication, Topper was still very much on the job.
“She owns most of the county. But I never did like her though. Rich. And not just rich, thinks she’s better than everybody else. Looks down on people,” slurred Sheriff Cooper.
“I hate people who look down on me,” said Topper. They all laughed. “Except for her,” Topper says, pointing at one of the women, “she can look down on me anytime.”
“You a’right boy, you all right,” said Sheriff Cooper. “I like a fella knows how to enjoy himself.” Glasses of brown liquor clinked together and dived down throats.
“It’s just a shame you’re only half a man,” said Clarence, needling Topper out of pure boredom.
“Half a man? Sheriff, you need to arrest this man. He’s got bullshit pouring out of his mouth. Can’t be sanitary.” The men roared with laughter.
“No, no, I like you and everything little man, but it’s not like you can do an honest days work,” said Clarence.
“Honest day’s work!” cried Topper. “I’m a friggin lawyer. If I did an honest days work, I’d be out of a job.” Topper pointed to the sheriff, “And so would he!” More laughter.
Topper indicated a half-naked women walking by. “Finally, they bring out the good looking ones.” The other men grunted their agreement. The women had not changed at all. The liquor had just worked its sacred and profane magic.
Clarence still wouldn’t let it go. “Yeah, you’d have to be a lawyer. Me? I made my way by driving a truck. Then I bought a truck. Then I bought another truck and got somebody to drive the first one. I’m a self-made man.”
“Not me,” said the sheriff as he stared at pair of giant breasts, “My uncle got me this job.”
Clarence pointed at Topper. His finger floated and bobbed in time with the slow waltz of alcohol sieving through his liver. “But you, little man, you couldn’t drive a truck. No way.” He held his hand out over the floor, “You must be at least this tall to ride this ride.”
The Sheriff laughed a little too loud.
“Whattya mean I can’t drive a truck?” Topper said, suddenly very serious.
“No way. No how.”
“You mean like one of those trucks you’ve got out front? I can’t drive one of those trucks? Is that what you mean?”
“That’s what I mean.”
“You gonna put some money behind that, or are you all talk?” Topper asked.
This got the Sheriff’s attention. “Boys, boys, I’m afraid I can’t let you gamble in this county, unless I’m in on it. I got 500 says the dwarf can’t drive.”
“I got five thousand says the dwarf can’t drive. If anybody will cover it,” said Clarence, thinking that he was calling Topper’s bluff.
Topper smiled and pulled a gigantic roll of bills out of his pocket. “I’ll cover all the action.”
“There ain’t no way in hell,” said Clarence.
“Ah, bullshit. I’ll drive your Tonka truck, all I need is a good pair of legs,” Topper said, slapping the nearest stripper on the thigh. He peeled off a couple hundred and said, “C’mon Darlin’, now I’m going to sit on your lap for a while.”
Chapter Nineteen
Excelsior Fights the Hurricane
This time it’s a hurricane. Whatever, thinks Excelsior. He is still pissed at that snotty waiter from that French restaurant. He’s ready to uncork on just about anybody or anything. It’s odd though, in 70 years they’ve never asked him to fight a hurricane.
Excelsior isn’t sure he can pull it off. But so what? If he fails, maybe they’ll stop calling him all the time. And then a black thought — what if he messes up on purpose? Just drops the ball? Would it be over? Could he take a night off? Love a woman? Have a family? Would they take the pager back? Maybe throwing the game is the smart thing to do. Because if he stops this hurricane, will they call him for every hurricane? But deep inside, he knows he can’t throw the game.
Nobody understands. Nobody appreciates his situation. All those crazy bastards with gadgets and powers coming out of the woodwork. And he has to stop them. He doesn’t know how his powers work, not really. And he certainly doesn’t how some freaky alien ray gun works. And what about chemical warfare? His skin might be impenetrable but what about his lungs? The whole thing is risky. Excelsior meant higher, not indestructible. Not necessarily. And when he gets hit, or shot or bombed, it hurts. Excelsior is a good deal more nervous than mo
st people know.
Last year, he had been hit with a beam weapon and was unable to feel his leg for two months. And then, after the “incident” with Sinestro, he forgot all the words he knew that began with the letter ‘r’. He’s still not sure he has them all back yet. At least he no longer locks up when somebody asks him if he needs a receipt.
Coming across the panhandle, Excelsior slows a little. Daytona rushes past him on the left. Orlando on his right. He skims the ground at 150 feet. Less chance of getting messed up in air traffic down here. The worst he might do is rattle some windows. He decides he doesn’t care. A flick of a thought and he has broken the sound barrier. He can feel the air compress in a wedge in front of him. What is a mere mathematical consideration for students of aerodynamics is something he can actually feel with his fingertips. It’s good. He’s going to need to move a lot of air tonight.
Thinking it might be useful, he rips the top off a water tower in Hollywood, FL. But who knows? It’s not like there’s a playbook for this kind of thing. He grips the wedge of metal so tightly that steel seeps between his fingers. Then he sets his heroic jaw and accelerates.
The sound of the wind whipping past the edges of the metal is an angry, ceaseless ripping. He loves the sound. He is mighty. A god set to do battle with the elements. He gives it more speed. Below and behind him the windows of a strip mall shatter as he passes
As Miami Beach disappears beneath him, he tries to remember which way hurricanes spin. Clockwise? Counter? Does it matter? He decides to head directly into the wind and batter the storm into submission. Should he start from the bottom or the top? He decides it is best to cut it off at the knees like a quarterback you want to cripple. Get angry. Get tough. Time to end this thing’s career.
Even as he amps himself up, he feels the air get colder and thicker. It takes a greater effort to maintain his speed. The sky and the sea become the same shade of grey. Visibility drops to zero. And then he hears the howl. As if the world is dying. The storm sounds hungry, eager to teach him a lesson about power.
It is 500 miles wide, 400,000 times bigger than a man. It is nothing more than a heartless, unpredictable, inevitable and remorseless set of natural coincidences. But to Excelsior it seems the storm has an evil will of its own. Excelsior is dwarfed, humbled by the wall of wind and water before him. And inside the costume, inside his bowels, he knows fear.
He puts it from his mind. Isn’t he a hero? Heroes don’t feel fear. Or don’t have time to feel fear, flying that fast. There is nothing to do but fly the pattern. Get it done. He banks to the right and gives it all he is worth. In spite of the rain and the wind, the metal grows hot in his hands. He grips it tighter and loves the pain.
The sky explodes with moisture, as if the sea has been ripped from the ocean floor. He chokes on the air. Yet still he flies faster and faster in tighter and tighter spirals. He yells at the top of his lungs. His hands grip through the metal in several places. Of course he is more than human. But even he has limits. And reaching beyond the limits is a test of will, rather than power.
Around and around and around and around. Until finally the wind drops. He slows and catches a glimpse of the stars. He has broken the storm.
But this time, the laws of physics cannot be denied. Even as Excelsior stops circling, the fluid in the center of his skull keeps spinning at a frightening rate. Dizziness overcomes him. The horizon spins. The now flat ocean exchanges places with the sky again and again as he fights to make progress towards land.
He hits the beach like an artillery shell. Sand explodes outward. In the bottom of a crater, he vomits seawater. Exhausted, he collapses into his own vomit. Is this victory? He doesn’t care. All he wants to do is lie here for a moment.
Curious faces peer over the lip of the crater. There are a thousand questions they could ask, “Are you okay? Do you need anything? Can we help?” But when a small boy speaks from the crowd, he asks the question on everyone’s mind.
“Did you save us?”
Excelsior nods as he wipes a strand of spittle from his chin. “Yeah kid. Today, I did.”
Excelsior stands up. He doesn’t want them to see him like this. But as soon as he’s up, his legs give out. Only his ability to fly prevents him from collapsing onto the sand again. He throws the boy what he hopes is a jaunty salute, and heads up into the sky.
He flies East with all the speed he can manage. What he needs now is the sun. The light of the sun, which will somehow regenerate his powers. He had once joked with Gus that they should test his blood for chlorophyl. A good joke because there is no needle that will pierce his skin.
As he crosses the coast of Africa, he really begins to feel it. This time, he might not make it back to the light. Might have to lay himself out along the plain and wait for sunrise. But just as he gives up hope, he sees the first glimmer of dawn. At the speed he’s going it takes only seconds for him to be engulfed in the light. He feels the power roar back into him. He doesn’t know how. He doesn’t know why. But in the light of a new day, he is somehow made whole again. What does he care of how and why? He stopped the hurricane. It’s a pure win.
Chapter Twenty
Marauding Through The Night
“Faster you dolt! Faster!” screams Agnes as if the British Empire were losing India all over again. The deputy doesn’t need much encouragement to pour the gas to his rattly old patrol car. The flashing lights, the blaring sirens and the roar of the wheels against the road are really the only perks his job offers. Sometimes he drives far out into the county at night and pretends to be chasing someone. Just to relieve the boredom of it all.
But this? This is different. This is a real chase. And it is exciting. At first he had resisted the strange woman’s urgings to chase down the truck. She had used all kinds of words he didn’t understand. Words like “Miscreant” and “Commonweal.” But when she said “Hot Pursuit” — well hell, wasn’t that his job?
“Tallyho!” Agnes cries. She slaps the Deputy on the shoulder and points through a stand of scrub pines. There, on the far side of a long flat curve, is the Semi with a bulldozer on the back. The patrol car strains to create acceleration.
Inside the truck, Clarence has passed out cradling a bottle of bourbon. The sheriff has devoted all his attention to the stripper. Topper doesn’t care. He has The Reilly Estate pulled up on the GPS and is making for it with as much speed as he can muster. Of course, this is complicated by the fact that he can’t put his foot on the floor and is relying on the stripper’s legs. Every few minutes he has to stomp on her knee to get her to return her foot to the pedal. This has been awkward, to say the least, but now the lunacy in the truck cab has settled into an orderly pattern. He kicks the stripper, the stripper moans, the sheriff thinks he’s doing well and the truck goes faster.
But it is an inherently unstable system. If you take away any one of its components this diabolical apparatus will collapse under the weight of its own absurdity. This does not concern Topper. He doesn’t like to think in terms of theory. All theory ever does for Topper is tell him what he can’t do. And Topper doesn’t like being told what to do.
Theory says that the bumblebee can’t fly. But the little bumblsbee says, “Screw it!” and flies anyway. And if the bumblebee can get away with it, then Topper figures he can too. If this is the way it has to be, then this is the way it has to be. Topper doesn’t care if he has to outdrink every redneck and shitkicker from here to the Mason Dixon Line. Edwin is in trouble, and Topper is going to come through for him.
Topper sees flashing blue lights in the truck’s side mirror. He yells in the Sheriff’s face, “It’s the cops. You told me you were the law!”
The shouting brings Clarence back around. He doesn’t immediately open his eyes, but instead reviews recent events. He remembers losing a bet. He remembers not liking it. He remembers drinking heavily. His sides hurt. Has he been in a fight? There had been laughter. Lots of laughter. Probably before losing the bet. He doesn’t like to lose. Why would
he laugh after losing? Something isn’t right here, but everything is so sloshy in his head, Clarence can’t begin to put these facts together. Until he hears the air horn.
And with the horn blast, a key fact drops into place. He’s in a truck. He hears a child yell, “Holy Shit and thar she blows! It’s Liberace’s outhouse!” But what kind of child would yell that?
Clarence opens his eyes. In front of them is a hill. At the bottom is a white plantation house covered with blurry — he rubs his eyes — frilly white bits. Focus doesn’t make the place look any better to Clarence.
“Yessir,” says the sheriff, “That’s the Widow Reilly's place. Most ridiculous goddamned thing in the county.”
Underneath the Sheriff’s smoky, crackling laugh, Clarence hears a woman giggle. What is going on here? He almost has it, but clearly he is missing some key piece of information. He leans forward slowly. Nothing catastrophic happens, so he decides to turn his head. And then he sees a dwarf in a suit. The dwarf’s tiny hands rest on the steering wheel and most of his body is cradled between a naked woman’s fake breasts.
Topper pulls on the air horn again and it all falls into place for Clarence. As he opens his mouth to speak, he is slammed backwards into the seat. The truck roars forward as Topper shrieks, “Muwahhhhhhh!” The horizon dips and bucks as the truck tears through the fields. Clearly something must be done. Can’t anyone see that?
“Double Clutch. Double Clutchhhhhh!” cries Topper over the sound of grinding metal.
As the house grows larger and larger in the truck’s front windshield, Clarence’s common sense finally breaks through. It has been surrounded and outnumbered for most of the evening, but it has not given up. Now clear of the haze of alcohol and hormones and stupidity, it has just enough energy left over to send Clarence one clear message: “It’s your truck.”
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