by Julius Fast
He began to jog along, dodging around people in the crowded street. He didn't dare look behind. He realized how conspicuous the jogging must be, and he slowed down to a walk. How much about him could they signal to each other? Not all of them knew what he looked like. Could they send mental pictures, or descriptions? What was the range of their telepathy anyway?
Someone caught at his arm, and he dodged aside in sudden panic. But it was a man, a panhandler. "Please. Yuh got the price of a cuppa coffee?"
"No, no—I'm in a hurry." He ducked past and hurried his pace. As always, when he refused a panhandler, he had a quick stab of guilt. What would it have cost to give him a few coins? And it might have brought him luck—Christ, he needed luck now! He actually hesitated, half turning back, and then shook his head. Was he out of his mind? The light at the corner was just changing to red and he raced across, beating the oncoming cars by inches. The subway steps were ahead of him and a group of school children were surging up leaving no room to get by.
He shoved and pushed his way down till he reached the change booth, and then he fumbled in his pocket for change. He seemed to have nothing but pennies, and finally he shoved a dollar bill at the woman in the booth.
"How many?"
What were they, 20 cents each? It had been so long since he had ridden the subway. "Let me have five?"
"Only two to a customer."
"Okay, two." He took the tokens and change. Was she deliberately trying to delay him? He looked at her face, waiting for her to raise her eyes from the newspaper she was reading inside the booth. When she looked up, she frowned out of annoyed, black eyes. "Well?"
"Nothing." He turned to the turnstiles and pushed through, then hurried to the downtown platform. It was almost empty while a train on the other side was discharging a wild, shouting mob of children. Christ, how many school children were there?
He paced down the platform nervously. Where was the damned train? There was only one old man on the platform, busily poking through the trash container, sorting out the scattered pages of the discarded afternoon papers.
If the train would only come now he'd be rid of them. Damn it, where was it? He paced down the platform to the far end where a post offered some concealment. Maybe they'd miss him if they looked down the platform. Maybe he could get on the train without their knowing it.
A slow rumbling filled the subway and down the platform the lights of an oncoming train swelled and filled the tunnel. "Hurry, hurry!" he whispered.
Then, as it thundered to a stop and the doors opened, he looked back. Two women were running to catch it, one waving an umbrella, the other carrying a shopping bag.
They couldn't be connected with the grey-eyed ones. They didn't even look up the platform but dashed for the doors. He stepped into the train just before the doors closed, pushing past the crowd that blocked the doorway. The two women had already boarded the train at the far end of the platform. No, they were no part of the chase.
He let out his breath in a sigh of relief. He had outwitted them all right, there was no way they could get to him now. He'd get out at the next station and take a cab crosstown. Or would he? A cab. He shook his head, remembering the redheaded Alice Marks. No. He'd stay on down to Times Square and shuttle across to the East Side. It was quicker and safer.
But at Times Square he decided that the wisest thing was to call Jack first. Then if anything happened to him he'd at least have warned him. He fumbled in his pockets for coins and dialed the number. It rang twice, and then a beep and a voice, obviously recorded, cut in. "The number you have dialed is not a working number. I am sorry. Please check your directory or call the operator for assistance. Thank you..."
He hung up and bit his lip. Had he dialed wrong in his hurry? He tried it again carefully, and again heard, "The number you have dialed..."
He hung up slowly, feeling the cold fear touch his back. They had managed this somehow, anticipating his move, every move. What were they? How had they done it?
He looked around at the hurrying press of people. Any one of the women rushing past him could belong to them, old, young, Negro, white ... Was there any guarantee he had eluded them? Couldn't they always alert one of their own kind, broadcast his description, whip up a net to trap and hold him anywhere in the city?
This was ridiculous. He had eluded them. This was nothing but a foolish panic. He joined the crowd moving to the shuttle and pushed in. There was no possible way of tracing him in this mob.
He moved into the car and caught one of the hanging straps as the shuttle lurched away from Times Square towards Grand Central. He almost fell on top of an elderly woman reading the afternoon paper. She pulled it back with a show of annoyance and he mumbled an inarticulate apology.
As the train reached Grand Central he turned to join the shoving crowd leaving the shuttle. But he looked back just before he left the car and he saw her lower the paper and look up at him, a little old lady, white-haired and delicate, with the palest grey eyes, knowing eyes, washed of all color and emotion. She just sat there staring at him as the crowd pushed around him and then moved him with it off the train.
That was the worst part of it. She hadn't gotten to her feet. She hadn't rushed after him. She had just watched with that unbelievable calm. There was no need to move, she seemed to say. She could signal ahead of him, warn whoever was on the platform that he was coming, describe every detail about him.
Oh, God! He pulled free of the crowd and raced down the platform, colliding with the oncoming people carelessly. There was an arcade, and then an exit, and he tore through it and up a flight of marble steps, to find himself in the center of Grand Central terminal. Again he jostled through the crowd, running for the street before he realized what he was doing and slowed down. But so many others were running here, to catch trains, to make cabs. Would he stand out that much? And what difference did it make, he thought defeatedly. They had followed him this far—how could he shake them?
But he had been so sure, so confident. How had they done it? The two women at the last moment in the subway? Was there nowhere they couldn't track him down? Or was there a safe place? Was that part of their plan, to convince him that he couldn't escape. Was that why the little old lady had sat so quietly?
He took off his hat and wiped his head with his handkerchief. It was covered with sweat and his hands were trembling. God, I'm a mess. He forced himself to stop. Take it easy. Relax. Think. Can they follow me everywhere? Use your brains. Think. Think!
There must be a weakness, there had to be, and standing there, drawing in deep breaths, he suddenly realized what it was. They were women, all women, and he was a man.
Across the room he saw a men's room sign, and he suddenly remembered one drunken evening with a crowd of friends catching a train for Westchester. Where was it, Mamaroneck? It was about ten years ago. One of them had gone to the men's room with him and they had come out a different exit, so completely different they were both confused and wandered about for fifteen minutes before they found the crowd.
Now which men's room was it? Which entrance? He bit his lip. This one? No. There was one on a mid-level, between the upper and lower terminal, and it exited on the upper level as well. He glanced around the huge room and slowly memory came back. There, by the right, near the exit. He put his hat back on and walked to the exit carefully. No panic now.
The men's room entrance was past a liquor shop and opposite a bank of telephones. Half the phone booths were filled. Was one of the women in them grey-eyed? He walked through the exit and down a half flight of steps. This was one place they couldn't follow him, one place he could be secure in.
He had an overwhelming urge to urinate and he stepped up to one of the urinals to relieve himself. There was a man on either side, and he looked at their faces quickly. What guarantee did he have that they were really men? He finished and walked away. It was almost funny when you thought of it. No, he was safe here. He was sure of that.
He washed calmly and then
hurried up the long flight of steps to the other exit. It led to a small waiting room and then out to the street. Did they know that? Unless you were a man, how could you possibly know the men's room had two exits? No. They must still be waiting at the other exit.
Outside there was a line of cabs and he caught the first one, a male driver he noticed thankfully, gave Jack's address and then sank back in exhaustion. He had done it. He had shaken them. They weren't, after all, infallible.
He had a vision of them waiting patiently outside the men's room, one joining the other, young women, old women, the whole army who had trailed him, waiting and studying each man as he left. He smiled at the picture, almost laughed out loud in sudden exhilaration.
At Jack's he paid the cab and hurried inside, taking the steps two at a time. He rang the bell and waited, then rang it again, and finally, in growing panic, put his finger on it and kept it there.
Andy, the super, came out with a mop and pail and recognized him. "You looking for Mr. Freeman?"
"Did you see him, Andy?"
Andy nodded at the street. "Just went out, about ten minutes ago."
"Alone?"
"Nooo—with a real cute dish." Andy grinned wickedly. "You single guys!"
As Clifford turned away and went down the steps slowly, he asked, "Should I tell him you called?"
"No. Don't bother, Andy." He stared hopelessly up and down the street as he remembered what the redheaded driver had said. "Just for an hour."
What a prize damned fool he had been. They had wanted an hour and he had given it to them, playing hide-and-seek all over the city while they had just the time they needed to get Jack away. It was funny when you thought about it, and as frightening as hell.
Chapter Fourteen
Sleep, for jack, was at first an endless, roaring vortex into which he slipped helplessly, a dark and deafening whirlpool that rose to a crescendo of tortured sound and then abruptly faded away to leave him floating on the oily waters of a sea bounded by a brazen bowl of sky. He floated belly up and struggled helplessly to open his eyes, but even with eyes closed he could see himself, disembowelled, swollen and baking under the heat that poured down from above.
He struggled to move, to pull his trailing entrails back with his paralyzed hands, to stem the slow ebb of blood that stained the water. And then, cutting lazy ripples in the surface scum, he saw the fins converging towards him, the shark pack summoned to the feast. He screamed but no sound came from his parched lips. Again and again he forced the soundless screams from his throat, and then he was fighting his way out of sleep, moaning and whimpering as he came awake.
He lay in a bath of sweat, too weak, too sick to get out of bed, and slowly he sank back into a dreamless, sodden sleep. He slept heavily and motionless long into the day. He woke just before Clifford's call, and he lay in bed, breathing harshly, staring around the room with frightened eyes, fighting to calm his racing heart.
The room was familiar, and yet so strange. But the strangeness lay in himself, not in the room. How empty it was, how devoid of all feeling! He felt a revulsion at the white walls, bone white, bleached of all meaning, as empty as a skeleton. No pictures, no drapes—a ghost of a room. And yet for so long he had lived here and accepted the emptiness.
He began to breathe more easily, and he wiped the sweat from his forehead. He wondered for a moment if it had all been a dream, a nightmare from which he was only now waking. He reached down to touch his chest, his body, and he shuddered. No. It was real, horribly real.
He shut his eyes and clenched his jaws, fighting down an overwhelming desire to scream.
The phone rang and Clifford's voice was the reassurance he needed to clutch at sanity. Afterwards he got out of bed and put on a bathrobe. He plugged in the electric coffeepot and then lit a small cigar, coughing as he drew in a mouthful of smoke, frowning at the unfamiliar, harsh taste.
He stared, uncomprehendingly, at the cigar in his fingers, then stubbed it out thoughtfully and started for the bathroom to shave and shower. The buzzer interrupted him and he answered it, expecting Clifford. To his amazement Rhoda walked in.
"Rhoda!" He stared at her, bewildered and yet delighted. "How did you find me?"
She smiled. "Jack! It's so good to see you. How do you feel?"
"Is it really you? Let me look at you. My God, it's been so long, or it seems that way. How did you find out where I live?"
"From the phone book." She stood just inside the door. "Are you glad to see me?" That faint smile, tender, enigmatic, almost mocking.
"You know I am!" Unexpectedly his throat was full and tight. He took her coat and suddenly conscious of his bathrobe pulled the belt tight. "I've thought of you two so often. Is Steve all right? Did she get that mess with Stiener straightened out?"
"Oh, that." She dismissed it with a wave of her hand. "She quit and came to New York. She has a wonderful spot at the Albert Einstein Medical Center. Jack ... you've changed. Let me look at you. Your face..."
He stood facing her and tried to keep his voice light. "Changed for the better or worse?"
Softly she asked, "Has it been bad?"
It took him a moment to realize she meant the cancer. "That hasn't bothered me," he said in surprise. "Maybe Steve's DNA worked. Rhoda, so much has happened, so much I can't begin to explain. I have to talk this all over with someone, or I'll go out of my mind—if I haven't already. Where is Steve?"
"She's downstairs, circling the block in our car. It's a glorious day out, Jack. How would you like to take a ride up to Westchester?"
"Westchester?"
"South Salem. Steve and I have a house there. It's wonderful fall weather, just right for a day in the country, and we've all so much to talk about..."
He nodded slowly, staring at her. "I'd like that." A day in the country after the past frightening week! It sounded like heaven. He began to smile. She looked so lovely, more beautiful than he had remembered. Those fantastic eyes and that hair. "Rhoda!" Impulsively he reached out and took her hands. "I've missed you."
"And we've missed you." She freed one hand and touched his chest through the half-open robe. The touch of her fingers against his bare skin went through his body like a shock. Harshly, he asked, "We?"
"I've missed you ... so much." She bit her lip. "Jack, please put some clothes on."
He smiled and pulled her to him. She came easily, her lips lifting to his, her mouth sweet and fresh and unbearably soft. They clung together for almost a minute, then she pulled away reluctantly, her eyes glowing. "Steve's waiting, Jack."
"I have to shower." He remembered Clifford all at once. "Oh, damn, a friend of mine is coming up in a few minutes."
"We'll bring him along. It is a he?" When he nodded, she grinned. "An extra man is always welcome. You take your shower."
He showered leisurely, letting the scalding water wash over him, soaping and rinsing, again and again. So much brine and sea slime had dried on his skin. He didn't think he'd ever get it clean.
Finally, knowing Rhoda was waiting, he stepped out and towelled himself dry. Afterwards he inspected himself in the bathroom mirror. What he had seen in the train's lavatory was still unchanged. This body simply wasn't his—and yet it was. A birthmark on the side of his chest was unchanged, but his appendectomy scar was gone. He had a foreskin, but the shape, the size of his penis was the same. The color of his hair, the placement of body hair, it was all as it had been, and yet...
It was he as he might have been had he made a fetish of body care. It was a beautiful body, developed to the peak of physical perfection, and still it was his own. He dressed in the bathroom and came out to the fragrant odor of coffee and toast. From the kitchen Rhoda called out, "Your bread is stale, but I managed some toast from the center of the loaf. Poor Steve, I hope she hasn't given us up for lost. This is the most barren kitchen I've ever seen! Not even milk or butter."
"I take my coffee black. Anyway, I don't eat at home often." He struggled with the knot of his tie as he sipped t
he coffee. "My clothes are all falling off me. Any sign of Clifford?"
"I'm sorry, I forgot." Rhoda struck her forehead. "Your friend Clifford, he called while you were in the shower. Something about a sudden assignment. He said you'll understand and he'll see you tomorrow. Here, let me fix your tie."
She reknotted it, and having her that close he couldn't help but pull her into his arms again. "We'd better get started," she murmured reluctantly. "Steve will be ready to boil over. She has a low boiling point anyway."
Downstairs, he nodded to Andy and hesitated at the mailbox. "I haven't checked my mail in almost a week."
"Save it for tomorrow." She tugged at his arm and he followed her down the front steps. Steve had the car at the corner and they ducked inside, Jack in front and Rhoda in the back. It was an old MG, dark green and square nosed, and Steve handled it efficiently and with dash. She cut through city traffic recklessly and swung into the drive at 72nd Street, then caught the West Side Highway near the bridge.
Except for a brief hello, Jack had been silent till then, but now he turned to look back at the looming tower of the George Washington Bridge and said, "I jumped off that three days ago. I tried to commit suicide."
Rhoda caught her breath in a quick gasp, and Steve looked sideways at him, her grey eyes narrowed, a cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth. "You're putting us on."
Jack sighed. "I wish I were. Steve, I want you to level with me about that stuff you gave me. It wasn't just DNA, was it?"
"DNA and a little bit more. Why?"
As Jack hesitated she said. "You tell me your dream and I'll tell you mine. Remember that old song? We've got a nice long drive ahead of us. Jack. Tell me what's happened to you and then I'll tell you everything about the DNA."
"Okay." He settled back. "Just do me one Favor. Stop driving as if you were out for the Grand Prix and stay inside the speed limit."