I prowled up to him, and my mental gears jammed harshly at efforts to process that he was, and he wasn’t. He was present only up to his shins. His former position was demarcated by a charred half-moon on leather sofa cushion and an indentation of roughly head-and-shoulder outline in the glass tabletop. Where Wil’s legs ended, flesh and fabric alike had cauterized into surreally smooth, glazed cross-sections the color of caramel.
Grief and shock at my friend’s freakish death collided helter-skelter with my struggle to reconstruct what had happened. The tableau evoked some association buried deep in my brain full of esoteric rubbish. Spontaneous human combustion! Lurid docutainment on the Discovery Channel had lingered upon photos of victims annihilated except for undamaged stumps below the knees. Unlike historic examples, though, the cause here posed no riddle after brief reflection. Thayer’s précis of the incidents in 1882 referred to “mutual assured destruction” when meteoric samples came into contact with glass. For whatever reason that occurred, it was manifestly also the upshot after too much “color” and its byproducts had accumulated in human cells. At and around their intersection, Wil and the coffee table had simply cancelled each other out, in compliance with some rule of chemistry beyond human supposition.
Had Wil passed out or dozed off and unwittingly slumped face-first against the table, or had he observed or guessed or learned through osmosis of sorts from the “color” itself what the glass would do, and drugged or steeled himself into self-immolation? Perhaps in throes of emotional overload after empathic linkage with Lucinda as she died? Could I have prevented this by picking up the phone last night instead of deafening myself with Iggy and the Stooges? But given the option, should I have? By design or not, he may have been better off, compared with more ravaged casualty in A. P.’s cellar.
A chill lifted the hairs above my denim collar and skittered down my back. At first I credited my body with its own autonomous reaction to this macabre tragedy. When a stiffer breeze ran through my thin graying hair, it broke my horrorstruck fixation on the Ozymandias-like remnants on the rug, just when I had devolved into mouthing inappropriately, “Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair.”
The drapes were drawn apart, but the windows were down. I’d neglected to shut the apartment door, and now I faced a draft that flowed into the hall from window frames completely devoid of glass. Eradicated, I reckoned, the same millisecond as the stripes of gray powder on the floor. Nor did any glass shine in the heaps of trash or in the chassis of the TV, which had only been nudged a few inches backward and a few degrees off a head-on view from the sofa. A uniquely selective shock wave that belonged in no rational physics had consumed all glass and tinges of “color” before it, while exerting scarce impact otherwise. Akin to how that more propulsive backlash had behaved after Thayer exposed gray powder to X-rays.
Taking a breath, I was grateful to the draft for blunting the sting of caustic smoke a little. At my next breath, my knees almost buckled out from under me and I fought to keep from retching. Some new, much worse odor, as of death in swampy fermentation, reminded me of the presence in A. P.’s cellar, but this was tenfold more potent. Behind me, on the hardwood floor at the edge of the rug where nothing had been before, was a sebaceous, mealy puddle that seemed foremost like vomit, maybe because I was too racked with nausea for likening it to anything else. What was it? Not the first time today I compulsively studied something from which I sorely wanted to flinch away.
Contours gradually suggested anatomy, despite my difficulty reading their incomplete, disorderly pattern within mottled, gangrenous gray and olive and ochre. Tiny vertebrae were aligned diagonally and off-center, like the minute hand of a clock. Limbs and extremities were discontinuous ridges, with lengths of disarticulated bone leaching through and disjointed fingers fanned out between webbed tissue, as in the wingspans of bats. And again like the minute hand of a clock, this corporeal slag appeared motionless, but had imperceptibly advanced. Most of its amoebic outline was on top of the rug, and that much closer to me, where I apprehended how much less inert this thing was than I’d thought. Spells of fine, gelatinous quivering possessed it, and tumescent red and blue veins throbbed sluggishly, in the service of brackish vasculature.
Only now did I have to concede that something animate was inching toward me. Not alive, but imbued with life. And though face and skull had totally subsided into the morass of viscous tissue, two filmy nodules toward its leading edge jolted me when I realized they were eyes, and they were locked on mine. Sprouting from the bodily debris, they upheld their basic structures like stubborn islands after the sea had reclaimed everything around them. Dead eyes, askew and adjacent like those of flounders, but not sightless. Without the faintest gleam of curiosity or emotion, they were cognizant of me, and judging by their soulless fixation, their owner was creeping toward me simply because I was there. It wanted nothing of me, or to do anything to me. I picked up no sense that it knew why it was doing what it was doing, as if the blank slate of infantile perception still somehow informed an utterly alien mentality.
Corpus and mind of baby Morgan had been fodder for something that battened on the material and immaterial as if they were no different, and Wil had been forced to “accept” this ghoulish residue, potentially forever because the permeating “color” functioned as both solvent and adhesive, binding together the corruption it expedited, and to what opaque, inhuman purpose? Wil may have needed no further incentive to lay his head on the coffee table as on the chopping block.
While I pondered all this, the sickening detritus of Morgan had shifted most of itself onto the rug, almost within stomping range. Not about to find out what effect that would have! An indefensible level of contact, even with the thick rubber soles of loafers between it and me. Nor could I abide this mockery of life and do nothing. It made too apt a scapegoat as months of belated anger welled up at fumbling along helpless, semi-hysterical, laboring under a craven shellshock that was bound to be my behavioral norm till further notice. Should I heave some crushing weight at it? The shell of the big-screen TV? No, the risk of splattering was more than I dared imagine, even if a Sorcerer’s Apprentice scenario didn’t result, with some dozen sentient gouts of rancid blood and flesh surrounding me. By the same logic, using the lamp or anything else as a club was out.
What more did I have to work with? Piles of trash. Keeping Morgan in peripheral view, for he didn’t seem to move so long as I did, I scanned the wrappers, cartons, junk mail, cans, dishes, cups within the rubbish. No, an unqualified bust as far as fashioning impromptu harpoon went.
But a lot of it was flammable. One eye still on Morgan, I sidled to the nearest midden. Extracted a 24-ounce Styrofoam tumbler that may have contained gravy or lo mein or a slushie or coffee. The stickiness inside no longer allowed for identification. Plunked a shard of ceramic mug to the bottom for ballast. Added a loose fill of crumpled, shredded newsprint, catalogues, paperback, Yellow Pages. And what luck! On a crust of fossilizing toast perched a dab of translucent butter, which I smeared around the inner rim of the tumbler. Poor man’s accelerant. Yanked my lighter from denim jacket pocket. Nasty as the blend of flaming butter and Styrofoam would be, they hadn’t a prayer of cutting through the fug of unburied death.
Oh shit! While I was rummaging together my incendiary device, Morgan, in stealthy minute-hand manner, had slid past the side table and TV and was slowly stretching a tubular outgrowth of grayish skin and blood vessels toward my left shoe. I skipped back a pace. A cold surge of panic compromised my righteous anger. After a couple of vehement tries that nearly sprained my thumb, I got the lighter going. Dipped it into crinkles of paper above the buttered Styrofoam rim till each ignited, one, two, three, four in rapid succession. The cup was blazing up fast, and fearful now of burnt fingertips as well as this nightmare pawing at me, I fitfully chucked my lowly weapon, which landed upright and dead-center on target.
A spasm throughout the organism, in response, perhaps, to no more than the novelty of being tou
ched, shook the sizzling container onto its side, and scorching contents spilled out. I suppressed a desire to bolt, to give Morgan wide berth without a backward glimpse. I had to see what would happen. The greasy, porous hide around the de facto kindling immediately gave off thin, black smoke, and tiny combustions like candle or pilot lights rapidly multiplied and joined together into a broad-based pyramid of fire, with plastic cup melting at its heart.
Independent of each other, Morgan’s lidless eyes rolled lazily away from me and toward the conflagration on his midsection. They watched passively, without signs of concern. Amorphous flesh didn’t buck or writhe. Pain receptors must have rotted clean out. I stood spellbound, staring at Morgan staring at himself on fire, until a hot updraft of cremation, suffusing the already insufferable stench of oily, spoiled meat, smacked into me. At that instant the smoke alarm, wherever it was, began assaulting me with ear-splitting pulses. For all that compunction about holding my ground till I was good and ready to exit calmly, sensory overkill propelled me out the door, which I slammed behind me if only to seal off sights, sound, and smell. Very little of the bedlam leaked into the corridor, and deathly peace reigned absolute once I was on the stairs.
Blinking in the sunshine on the steps of Dyer Hall, I had to disengage a while from dwelling on those images of Wil obliterated above the shins, of his baby converted into animate slag and disinterested in his own incineration. I could steep myself in this tranquil moment on unpeopled Ellery Avenue, or I could start gibbering, and I’d never make it home that way. But I couldn’t rid my head of the unconstructive notion that Wil had never really wanted to be a parent in the first place.
25
Home again. Jacket I hung up, for once, by the back door, a couple of pegs from the nearest garment, instead of flinging it over one piece of furniture or another, in impromptu quarantine because of the tainted places it had been today. Shoes I exiled to the doormat. Trousers came off and went directly into the washing machine. Washed my hands fervently, on the wrong side of neurotically. Crashed for the remainder of the afternoon. Needed to go blank, let my brain cool down. But unfinished business, loose ends had followed me from town and barred me from relaxing. Didn’t have to dwell on their specifics. Enough to know they were there.
Threw in the towel at 5:30 and turned on the news. Ms. Lathrop’s putative older sister was at the helm, with no word of Dyer Hall going up in smoke. Great. Cross off one loose end. Maybe the fire on Morgan’s back had burnt itself out, or had consumed him without spreading. Such was now an example of situations working out for the best.
Had no appetite, so the hell with supper. Something more important nagged at me, something I had come away with and forgotten about. Had to peel down today’s journey like layers of onion, reconstruct my actions everywhere. The Aviator, Koerner’s, Abdul’s? Yes, I had decamped with an unfinished Mountain Dew after lunch, non-potable by now in the car’s cup holder, but that wasn’t it. Next stop had been Thayer’s vacant quarters, through which I retraced my queasy steps. Into the unwholesome blue glow, the funk of dead houseplants, the stifling kitchen, and bingo! That message waiting for me on the fridge was still wadded in my jacket pocket.
High time I quit my bed anyhow. I half expected Thayer’s note to have spirited itself away, like my green folder the previous time, but no, there it was. I unfolded it and read aloud, “Piscids arrive Tuesday after next. Help yourself to whatever’s in the fridge.”
Might have turned on the computer and Googled the Piscids, but Thayer had said they were meteors, and I had it on his good authority when they were due, so what extra research was needed? The professor had hinted at a life cycle of the “color,” which had traveled earthward in a meteor, become more active during the Perseids, and must have been preparing for climactic exertions the “Tuesday after next,” or else why single out that date in writing?
So in essence, Occam had a week to live. Followed by ill-defined but total devastation. And could I name a local who’d greet my warning without skepticism or hostility? Who except Ranger Metcalfe, and he’d been M.I.A. since sending an e-mail Wednesday night. Yeah, right, another loose end to tie up. Check in at Herb’s home number, make sure he was okay. That need to remember was finally easing up.
A woman answered his phone.
“Hi, I was wondering if I could speak with Herb, please?”
“No. You can’t.” She sounded profoundly grim.
Holy cow, did Herb have a wife? Kids? I really knew as little of him as I did of Castro. What’s more, based on the tone of those three words, I’d blown any chance of finding out. “Is this Mrs. Metcalfe?”
“No. I’m a friend of the family. Eliza’s in no condition to talk. Who is this, please?”
“Jeff. A friend of his.”
“Jeff? Never heard of you.”
“We met not too long ago.”
“Uh-huh.” Great. Whatever the hell had happened, I had blithely strolled into the circle of suspects.
“Look, I have no idea what’s going on. Could you at least please give me a broad outline?”
“If you insist. Do you mind if I have this call traced?”
“If you insist.”
Somehow that prompted her to grant me the benefit of the doubt, though hopefully she was bluffing. “Hold on, I’m taking the phone in the other room. No point repeating this in front of her.”
“Thank you. I’ve been concerned about him.” At any rate, a slew of butterflies had been beating wings against my stomach wall for a minute or so.
“He didn’t come home from work yesterday.” The voice had dropped into a lower, more guarded register. “When he was four hours late, Eliza called the police, but they put her off with the usual crap about waiting twelve hours to declare him missing. She tried the hospitals and even the city morgue, three times, but no one of his description ever turned up.”
I dreaded the direction this was heading and wished I hadn’t asked, but the figurative horses were out the gate and galloping. As if this recital may have had some therapeutic value.
“This morning the police got off their duff, and when Eliza said his last known whereabouts had been the Parks Department by the reservoir, they sent one measly car out there. She went on her own. The cops started by interviewing Herb’s coworkers, but they were useless. Down with that bug that makes people dopey and out of it. The police are apparently shorthanded from guys calling in sick with the same thing.”
“I’m glad you and Mrs. Metcalfe aren’t affected.”
“Well, we live a few houses over the line in Hoyle. It hasn’t spread here yet, as far as I can tell. But as it turned out, the men didn’t have to widen their search off the hiker trails. He was in plain sight, face down, feet still on the path in the middle of some boulders and dead trees. The one who found him shouted for his partner, and Eliza happened to be in earshot. There was a lot of blood. She went kind of crazy. He’d been stabbed and pretty badly hacked up. And not only had the killer made no effort to hide the body, he’d also dropped the murder weapon right next to it. A rusty old saw, the type with a pointy tip.”
I went cold, and was thankful I’d had no supper to risk retching up. Couldn’t say how many seconds passed before I realized my informant was waiting for me to express my feelings. “I’m sorry, that’s beyond horrible. I’m beyond shocked.” That amount of babble seemed to satisfy her.
“After they got her calmed down, Eliza called me on her cell. When I arrived, the place was lousy with uniforms and forensics and a photographer and the coroner, which I was already expecting from all the official vehicles clogging up the parking lot. I took her home, and then prevailed on a neighbor to drive me out again to fetch Eliza’s car. Funny, but Herb’s car was nowhere to be seen. Not by the Visitors’ Center, and not in the driveway at the house.”
I grunted to acknowledge it was funny, and she resumed.
“As long as I was in the vicinity, I hiked back to the crime scene, in case anyone had further information I could
pass on to Eliza. Well, I stepped into a disaster area. You know, a homeless person’s been holing up for years in some ancient cabin, on land off limits to the public. Herb told us after a few drinks at dinner once. It’s one of those public secrets. The homeless person was the prime suspect right off the bat. Especially as you could see the shack from where Herb was lying. Except now it was completely engulfed in flames. Nobody would give me a straight answer about what had gone wrong. The chief and a lot of backup had surrounded the cabin to make an arrest if the squatter was inside, and suddenly it was an inferno. One medic told me he thought he’d heard screaming from in there, but nobody else would even talk to me about it. So if the homeless man was the murderer, that’s all the justice he’d ever suffer in this world. Nothing left of him to bury.”
Just as well that no pregnant pause here obliged me to act shocked, because I wasn’t. Destruction of evidence with implications for much more than one nasty homicide? The liquidation of a “homeless person” whose capture would have opened a gigantic drum of uncontrollable questions? Occam’s “top cop” on site although the deceased was nobody of so-called consequence, and in charge of operations when the proverbial shit hit the fan? Moreover, where were the Staties or the Parks Department in country technically outside Occam’s jurisdiction? All these mysteries swirling around, in fact, merely beclouded the core issue of who had actually killed Herb Metcalfe and dumped him beside an implement that pointed, as it were, to the wrong perp. As if I had to narrow down the parties who’d overplayed their hand before Herb’s ingenuous delvings could tarnish civic order and those sacrosanct property values!
The Color Over Occam Page 21