Then the brat had screeched from the house, and what he remembered now was the expression on Carolyn’s face. It was a sadness with many layers, a disappointment that knew no bounds.
He drove up through the headlands, through the rainbow-rimmed orifice of the tunnel, and finally through some of the outlying suburbs he often heard the names of, never planning to visit. They were supposed to be fancy and dull. He stopped at a stand and bought flowers. A last-minute feeling of wanting something fresher than a rug. He crunched up a few more carrots. Following Adela’s instructions, he cut toward the coast and peeled through Fairfax, then found himself leaving society behind on a shadowy, two-lane road of snaky turns along a shallow creek. Ferns bunched along the shoulder, while redwoods stood like stern elders up the slopes. A pack of motorcycles overtook him. He pulled over and let them swarm past.
He held up the directions. KEEP ON TOWARD BOLINAS. NO SIGN
THERE SOMETIMES. RESIDENTS TAKE IT DOWN SO NO ONE CAN FIND THEM! HIT MAIN ROAD OVER MOUNTAIN, TURN NORTH. FOLLOW LAGOON.
Mac and Cavalier reached the crest and came down, windy, long, toward the Pacific. As promised, the coastal road finally appeared; he had been afraid he would not know a lagoon when he saw one. But there was no mistaking this lagoon. It was a lagoon’s lagoon. It stretched between the road and the roaring ocean, a rustling expanse stirring with fish and creatures with wings.
LOOK FOR SMALL SHED ON THE RIGHT, SOMETIMES USED AS FRUIT STAND. IT MAY BE PINK. TURN ON DIRT ROAD. AFTER A MILE OR TWO, LOOK FOR A LONG PLASTER WALL WITH A HIGH WOODEN GATE. CARETAKER WILL LET YOU IN. IF NOT, TELL HIM CHARLES WARE SENT YOU.
He took a swig out of his hidden bottle under the seat, drove along in a state of excitement and dread. The gravel lane mounted grassy fields dotted with cattle, and he thought he saw a small bobcat on the rise. Then the open hillsides gave way to thickets of redwood, sun spotlighting unexpected nooks in sudden gleams. He, too, seemed to have lit up dark corners of Carolyn’s world, corners she tried to keep quiet. He had meant no harm.
He rallied himself for seeing her, embracing her, being a prisoner of her grace. To become a master alchemist. To take her no and make it yes.
Another mile and various PRIVATE PROPERTYsigns abutted the road. Shortly he spotted a wall that distantly matched Adela’s description. It was covered with straggly vines, more ropy stem than leaf, and piles of ruined machines sat heaped alongside it. The stone torso of an animal stood by a gate, but the animal had no head.
No mention of a headless sphinx in front. Small detail. He pulled over, got out, and checked the fortress. The gate was heavy and high, and from within the compound, he could hear a low murmur of voices. There was a buzzer on the wall, and he pressed it. No reply.
Momentarily, an old white Volvo, the rounded kind reminiscent of hard-boiled eggs, came lumbering up the road. The man at the wheel looked to be so tall he had all but moved the driver’s seat into the back; he was thin as a cattail, and when he saw Mac, he slowed to a stop and lowered his window. Mac stared at the man’s mottled gums—he had no teeth. The woman beside him in the car had white hair and skin equally pale, almost like an albino’s, except that her eyes were not pink. And she wasn’t old. Her features were small and delicate, like a baby’s. A Doberman pinscher, previously dozing on a grimy towel in the backseat, sat up and began to bark at Mac.
“Sonny, get your butt back down there!” the man yelled amiably. He opened his door and climbed out. Indeed, he was tall; he wore a tight Civil War–style undershirt, creased jeans, and orange, high-topped sneakers. “Who’re you?”
Mac looked at the dog in back. Its long teeth were all the more noticeable in contrast to the man’s gums. “I think some friends of mine are riding horses here,” he said.
“You got insurance?” the man said. He was pointing at a dent in the back of Mac’s Cavalier. “I got some friends work on cars, I could get ‘em to pull that out, no sweat. I swear it, they’ll fix you up, you don’t file reports. I’m Glen. She’s Maria.”
“My name’s MacGregor West—Mac.”
The Doberman growled, but Glen yelled, “Shut up, Sonny!” The dog lowered his head.
“I went to classes about abused children today,” Maria said from within the car. “For some, there is no exit.”
“Wait, so who’s— Is this—”
“Preschoolers I work with. I see bruises. Parent or child always has excuse,” she said. “Julio has head lice. I am getting him special shampoo. Some neonates aren’t bathed enough.”
By now, the tall man was wrestling with the gate. Through the back of his tight shirt, his knobby vertebrae stacked up in plain relief. He plied open the heavy door enough for the car to get through, then jumped back in the egg and sputtered in.
Mac followed and found himself in a dusty field filled with cars and partial cars. The driveway continued over a rise. All around him were numerous broken-down, scavenged hulks, with doors and mirrors missing, even entire seats pulled out. Yet some of the vehicles were whole and looked as if they’d been driven recently. Gas cans and oil trays and a ratchet set glinted in the sun. What the hell was Carolyn doing here?
“This week we made feely book out of carpet squares,” said Maria. She was gathering her supplies from the trunk. “There’s bear, dog, lion, cat, and crocodile. We used linoleum to make crocodile.”
Despite the fact that he wanted nothing to do with the couple, Mac couldn’t help noticing that the woman kept forgetting her articles. “ The crocodile,” he said.
“It’s important for neonates to use all five senses,” she said.
He was carrying his flowers in one hand, his rug in the other. “Are there horses here? I’m looking for someone named Carolyn Ware.”
Glen checked him over, then closed the gate behind them. Sonny began to bark and growl, which made Glen yell, “Sonny, get your butt back in there!” The dog slunk back and did full-circle turns with his muzzle pressed to the ground. “Sonny got mange,” he said. “You bet there’s horses, they always giving Sonny a mouthful of hoof. We the caretakers.” And he motioned for Mac to follow them, along the inside of the wall, on a dry, littered path leading to a trailer and a barbecue pit. Around the fire a group of guys sat, some on a log, pitching horseshoes into the dust. The pit smoked, full of crackling pieces of meat. “Hey, this is— What’s your name again?”
“Mac.”
“Mac. Say welcome.”
The guys nodded and a few said “Welcome.” Most wore variations of the same black pants and white T-shirts; several had elaborate tattoos, and most of their heads had been shaved close to the skin. Glen said, “So, like I was telling you before, this one rottweiler was so bad, he smashed in the back of some dude’s car, saw his own reflection in the chrome! Those things are so vicious. I gotta have one. Problem for me is Sonny, who’s like a son to me, and he wouldn’t take no shit from no other dog coming ‘round the place.”
Sonny, who had been lying in a self-made hole in the mud to cool his mange, sprang up at the mention of his name and trotted over to Glen. Glen pounded him a few times on the ribs and then shouted, “Get your butt back over there!” The pinscher obediently crawled back to his hole, and the men nodded with approval.
“Farmer gave us five bushels of lettuce heads!” Maria said. She was on her knees, holding up a lettuce head caked with mud. “Twenty wooden pallets, too. I’ll sell pallets in paper. It’s more fusstrating trying to sell things at flea market,” she said.
From where they stood, Mac gazed at the driveway, circling up through scattered tufts of dry grass. Over a distant hill, a black horse came cantering, raising pinwheels of dust. Mac squinted, bunched his hand over his brow to block the sun. Though the helmet might have disguised her, he could see the person atop the steed was Molly Ware.
Mac watched as she kicked the horse and turned it; she was an expert rider. The animal took off with a quiver to the lower flanks of the field, and in the distance Mac made out a small barn and corral.
“Thanks, I
see what I came for.” He started off down the path.
But Sonny’s nails came clipping along through the stones, and Glen was following fast on his heels. “You gotta keep it quiet, we watch out for a sick guy here. The big man’s gotta rest easy.”
“What big man?”
“Maria, she the washer and cleaner, I cook. He got the sugar and can’t breathe too good. I bring him the paper, and get this, he don’t want the local Gazette, he don’t even want the San Francisco. He want The New York Times! I gotta go all the way to Fairfax for that.”
“Whose place is this?” Mac said, surmising the answer.
“Name’s Mr. Glootto. He famous, I guess.”
“Glootto? You mean Galeotto.”
“Call him what you want, don’t change much.”
As they followed the drive through a dry gully and up again, Mac could hear from time to time the hard hooves pummeling the ground, ripping through the dry, wide paddocks down the hill.
Trying to reconcile it all, he said, “Carolyn and Molly Ware, they spend a lot of time here?”
“Sure they do. Just ‘bout every Sunday.”
“Every Sunday.” He shook his head in disbelief.
“I feed the horses, they say thank you, we all get along real good.”
You think you know a person. “Where’s she now? Carolyn.”
“House or down below.”
The house was long and ramshackle, once stylish with high windows and an angled roof, now corseted in a tangle of woody shrubs and strangling vines. As Mac approached with his offerings, Glen said, “Listen, anyone ask, you promise you say this your idea?”
“Promise,” said Mac.
“I got nothing to do with it?”
“Nothing.”
“He don’t have much visitors,” Glen mused. As they drew closer, he said, “Maybe you get to talking to him, maybe he listen to you.”
“About what?”
“Benefits! Maybe I get some teeth!”
“Why would—”
“No insurance. Maria can’t hear too good in one ear,” Glen said.
Sonny rumbled.
“You mean, see if I can get you insurance?” Mac said. He felt like screaming.
“I’m just sayin’, is all.”
13
It took him a moment to see. So bright outside, the inside all the blacker. He found himself in a cluttered room, buried alive in the man’s things. Beneath the piles of papers and books were the bare bones of what had once served as a habitable home. A long divan was concealed by folded laundry, rumpled bags, boxes, hangers, balls of string, bottles, baskets full of mail, a fan, and an old steel adding machine the size of a typewriter. Tables and armchairs were heaped high. The floors were swept, but around the edges he could see that nothing was quite clean. Dry grass, seeds, and little pebbles were welled up in the grooves by the walls and table legs, and despite some dust-free islands, thick, fuzzy grime gathered wherever a hasty cleaning had failed to reach. In the center of what had probably been the living room sat a neglected grand piano, but it was hardly recognizable as such; the closed lid was warped and cracked and covered with bottles and jars filled with murky lumps and liquids. “Jeez,” Mac said. “What’re those?” “Hell if I know,” said Glen. “Come on back here.”
“Carolyn hangs out in here?”
“She got ideas for us sometimes, like we put trash in bags.”
“What about Charles Ware, does he come around?”
“Who’s that?”
Blood pounded in Mac’s temples.
He followed Glen through a rabbit warren of rooms, each more disordered and crowded than the next. Still, there were little touches that showed someone was trying. A broom leaning against a table, a jam jar filled with water and sprigs of sweet peas, a pile of stiff, sun-dried towels.
Sonny sniffed his hand and licked it. Even remembering the dog had mange, he squeezed one of the pliant ears. He’d always been a sucker for comforting animals. He had a moth-eaten koala bear he’d slept with until he was about fifteen.
Glen led him to a closed door pinned with old posters and prayer flags. He knocked, then pushed it open so they both could look in.
“She’s not here,” said Glen.
“What about— Is he?” Mac whispered. “Can I go in?”
It was a dark room with the curtains drawn, and Mac could barely make out what was ahead. In a few seconds, he was able to detect the form of a large four-poster bed taking up much of the space, and as his eyes continued to adjust, he saw that the floor was littered with plates. A rusty wheelbarrow, brimming with paper and debris, sat parked at the foot of the bed.
The bed itself contained a massive human being, but numerous ragged blankets, none of which seemed large enough, were piled on top, so it was hard to tell where the bed ended and the flesh began. A considerable head rested on the pillow, surrounded by a gathering cloud of hair; a gray beard tangled with the blankets. A tall green tank like a torpedo, with various valves and gauges and a hose that looked like an elephant’s trunk, stood by.
The man stirred in his cocoon. “Who is it?” he rasped.
Mac was startled, and jumped at the rumble of the voice. He heard a dull crunch under his shoe.
“This my friend Gregor. He want to talk to you,” Glen said.
A thick, fleshy hand groped at the night table and lit upon a hefty flashlight, which then sent a beam into Mac’s face. Mac saw purple-and-white twirling parasols of light.
“Hey,” Glen said. “Turn that thing off. Hungry again?”
“I, I, I— Yes.”
“First you put that away,” Glen said. “You don’t get nothing when you behave like this.”
Mac blinked his eyes. He could hear Glen wresting the flashlight from the man’s grip and by then could see well enough to watch Glen place it on top of a pile of books across the room. The man began to gasp and cough.
“You calm down; I’m gonna fry you up some catfish,” said Glen, who left them alone then.
Mac took a deep breath.
Steady. Thar she blows!
“Well, hello,” he said. He could see why Carolyn had tried to keep him away. Still holding the flowers and the rug, he cleared his throat. “I’ve been wanting to meet you. My name’s MacGregor West—”
The man began to cough, and the bed creaked and shook, and Mac had the impulse to thump him on the back, but there was no access to the man’s back. He was one with the bed. His hand groped for the hose that issued from the tank, and he lifted it to his mouth and began to inhale. Mac could hear the shallow gasping and sucking. After the attack subsided, the man grabbed from the folds of his bed a small, spiral-bound pad, into which a pencil had been stabbed. He removed the pencil and began to scratch. Finished, he propped it up for Mac to read:
THOSE FOR ME?
Mac felt embarrassed. “Well—”
THANK YOU,wrote the man.
Mac handed the man the bouquet and dropped the rug. He was breathing fast, as if he’d been running. “I’m very sorry to bother you like this. I had no idea.” He tried to gauge the man’s state of mind and kept going. “I didn’t even know this was your place, but I’ve wanted to meet you for a long time. Because—I think you knew my mother.” He stopped. Galeotto’s head was levitating off the pillow, and he sniffed at the flowers. “In fact, you might be the only person left on earth who knew her—besides her sister. It’s possible you only knew her physically, but—” What a horrible thought. He stopped himself. Blood, he thought, could be the very last thing a person tasted, was likely the first, and was never far off in between! Mac had torn a hole on the inside of his cheek.
“I’m— I don’t know . . . what you’re talking about,” came the voice, squeezing through a meaty throat.
“I have a picture of you and her,” said Mac.
“Your, your mother?” His cough was deep and wet. “Show me.”
The blankets roiled like the sea, and then a flannel sleeve began to emerge from the
folds. The hand on the end of it was open flat.
Mac reached for his wallet. He pulled out the picture and examined the image before placing it in the outstretched palm. The palm closed and pulled in toward the generously proportioned head.
“Can’t see,” said the man.
Thus Mac moved over and parted the faded, brittle curtains, letting in some afternoon sunshine. The room didn’t benefit from exposure; it looked drab and frozen in time. The man was squinting and peering at the picture an inch from his face. He took only the briefest glance before laying it down on his chest. Beneath the blankets his massive legs began to kick, and his coughs came in great cascades.
He picked up his pad and wrote:
IT’S ABOUT TIME. WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG?
Tears sprang to Mac’s eyes, so rapidly were the words volunteered.
A pea green room, dank, ratty, a man half the size of an elephant—all his wondering and suffering came down to this?
Engineering this reunion, from time to time but not regularly or frequently, had mostly been by chance. Wipe your eyes, boy! Wipe your woeful eyes.
So Mac ended up saying, “Works for me,” rather nonsensically.
“Good!” The man coughed up phlegm.
Now what?
A classic case of Be Careful.
What.
You Wish For.
You stupid jerk. The wafting wonder of a wish-state, where he’d housed himself for years. Put down your bags now, make yourself at home?
“Nice to finally meet you,” he managed at last.
“Life happens,” the man said, and coughed.
“So, it’s really true?”
“I don’t know . . . what you’re talking about,” the man uttered, and when Mac’s face fell, he emitted a strangled laugh. “Bad. Joke.”
“Oh,” said Mac. He tried to smile at the bad joke, but tears came back to him instead.
“I say . . . that whenever … I don’t know what … to say,” Galeotto choked out.
Mac wiped his wet eyes on his sleeve, reminding himself not to grow too eager. “You don’t look like you’re doing too well.”
Galeotto produced an inhaler from the folds of the bed, took a long, snarling drag from it, then boomed in a newly fortified voice, “Wasn’t that long ago . . . women were all over me. I had it made. Girls and more girls, you should have seen it! I had a setback. Which is why . . . you find me . . . here . . . like this.”
MacGregor Tells the World Page 19