The Bear Went Over the Mountain

by William Kotzwinkle

  “We cain’t kill him while he’s singing,” said Tiny One, pressing down the barrel of Tiny Two’s gun. “The King Tones might think we disrespecting them.”

  “We wait till they’s done,” said Tiny Two.

  The bear swayed to the tune as he sang, his eyes slitted in concentration, his voice rumbling along at the bottom of the vocal register. Kaiser Wilhelm sang in a strong falsetto, like a hawk on the wind, the sound piercingly sweet and sad, a sound the bear knew well and to which he blended his own thunderous rumbling. When the last note was reached, the leader threw his arm around the bear’s shoulder and said, “Brothah, you sing yo’ ass off.”

  Brother, thought the bear excitedly. His imitation of a human must have been perfect. What a break-through!

  “Okay,” said Tiny Two, “song’s over, we kin pop him now.”

  As Two and One drew their guns, King Cobra looked their way. “What the fuck you think you doing?”

  “That big buster was signin’,” said Tiny Two. “He was disrespectin’ the ’hood.”

  “Get the fuck outa here fo’ I kick yo’ fucking ass,” said King Cobra, who was himself only five feet three but commanded great respect in the neighborhood for his musical abilities. “This be ouh soul brothah.” He tightened his grip around the bear’s shoulder. “Man got a sound like he got, I don’ give a fuck what he signs. You understand me?”

  “Yessir,” said the two Tinys as they put away their weapons.

  “Go beat yo’ tiny baloney ’stead of messing around where you ain’t wanted.”

  The two Tinys slunk back, and King Cobra said to the bear, “Crazy little mothahfuckahs got nothing better to do than shoot peoples up. They don’t know they’s a time and place fo’ everythang. Now—let’s do us a little rap.”

  The diminutive leader of the King Tones could rhyme eighty thousand words in single, double, and triple rhyme. The pulsing rhythm of his rap got the bear hopping up and down excitedly, his arms pistoning back and forth as he sang a drumlike bass-grunt accompaniment. Imperial Decree rolled onto his back and stared at the sky, the whites of his eyes the color of turpentine. He snapped his fingers weakly to the music. “Sound good,” he said. “Sound real good.”

  After the tune was finished, King Cobra said to the bear, “It’s time we got some food into the brother down there, to cut the effect of what he been ingesting. You up for a little bite to eat?”

  “Subagitate with cat meat,” said the bear, his left arm still pistoning to the beat.

  King Cobra bent over Imperial Decree. “You able to rise and walk, Imp?”

  “Think … I bes’ stay put,” said Imperial Decree, his bass voice resonating near the curb and his eyes pointing in different directions.

  “Shit,” said King Cobra, “bus liable to run over his ass, we leave him here.”

  The bear reached down and picked Imperial Decree up with one hand and laid him gently over his shoulder.

  “Much … oblige,” said Imperial Decree, hanging head-down.

  “You got to give up paint thinner, my man, fo’ it kill you,” said King Cobra.

  “Amen,” moaned Imperial Decree.

  Trailing behind the King Tones and the bear were Tiny One and Tiny Two, hands on their concealed weapons. If the Big Buster caused any problems for the King Tones, they’d ventilate his ass.

  “We got us a great restaurant up ahead, name of Ralph’s,” said King Cobra to the bear. “Every Tuesday afternoon Ralph got a seventy-five-cent special.”

  The bear nodded, his nose twitching with the smell that was coming from the restaurant fan. He was feeling very good about the way this day was going. He’d interviewed a gumball, and now he’d made friends, one of whom was hanging over his shoulder.

  They entered the small restaurant, which was crowded with people from the neighborhood. It had a few tables with plastic flowers on them; a counter with several wobbly stools faced the window. The bear sniffed the air and liked what he smelled. He removed his new friend from his shoulder and propped him up by the window.

  King Cobra read from a blackboard on which the seventy-five-cent Tuesday special was advertised. “Fried chicken, french fries, salad, and two slices of bread. Best deal in town.” He leaned toward the bear and said quietly, “Ralph bankrupting himself with the seventy-five-cent special. But he got to see folks eating.”

  The bear nodded. He understood. When you saw people eating, generally they weren’t eating you.

  Ralph appeared in the serving window, sending through a special. He was not directly aware that he was bankrupting himself with his special. He knew something wasn’t adding up, but it didn’t occur to him to question his seventy-five-cent special, because when folks came in, sat down, and ate a good meal of chicken fried in his special batter, he felt everything come together for him. He looked over at Imperial Decree, propped up in the corner. Into the turpentine again, I s’pose. Sing like Pavarotski too. “You oughta make a record,” called out Ralph to Imperial Decree.

  “It’s hard to break in,” replied King Cobra.

  “I broke in,” said the bear.

  “That a fac’?”

  “Through the back window.”

  “Different kind of break I’m referring to,” said King Cobra. He was starting to realize that the Big Buster had a glitch in the head. One of them big slow dudes never caught up to the rest of the class. “We’re trying to get into show business, you know what I’m saying? But we ain’t made the right connection.”

  “Publicity,” said the bear.

  “Come again?”

  “They do have a fabulous sound,” said Bettina.

  Bettina lived in alphabet city on the Lower East Side, on a grungy street that was not particularly safe, but she owned an entire house there, two floors of which she occupied herself. The street was made safer today by Tiny One and Tiny Two guarding her door. The Tinys had whined their way into being allowed to come along. King Cobra had finally relented, as there were people in this neighborhood who wanted to kill him for business reasons, and the Tinys were lethal protectors.

  The bear sat with a plate of food on his lap, concentrating on it. He was pleased with himself for having brought Bettina and the King Tones together. He’d called her and she’d sent a limo immediately, and they’d all ridden in it, eating olives and peanuts.

  “… ’preciate you bringing us, bro’,” said King Cobra softly, beside him on the couch. “Kind of exposure we been needing.”

  “No problem,” said the bear.

  “You evah need somebody bopped,” said the little rapper, “you call the King Tones, we be there for you.”

  The buzzer door on the apartment sounded and the Tinys opened the door for Chum Boykins.

  Boykins looked down in astonishment at two little boys holding mini-machine guns in their hands.

  “You here fo’ Miz Quint?” demanded Tiny One.

  “He’s all right,” called Bettina from the living room.

  “All right?” exclaimed Boykins as he strode into the living room. “What’s going on here, Bettina?”

  “Chum, meet the King Tones.”

  “How do you do?” said Boykins, nodding to the members of the group.

  “Doing jus’ fine,” said King Cobra, “owing to the kindness of some good, good people.” King Cobra smiled toward Bettina and the Big Buster. He now knew that the Big Buster did not have a glitch in the head but was actually a famous writer, ready to share his contacts with a brother. The knowledge of who the Big Buster and his friends were had also changed the feelings of the Tinys. When they walked into Bettina’s apartment, the first thing they saw was the life-size point-of-purchase cardboard image of the seven-foot-two basketball great Fahmahoo Shameel, who’d written a best-selling autobiography for Cavendish Press. The Tinys stared wide-eyed at the life-size Shameel, and Bettina said they could have it, thereby sealing their feelings toward her. They silently swore an oath of loyalty to her and caused their machine pistols to make clicking sounds
of readiness. Now they sat side by side on Bettina’s couch and helped themselves to Bettina’s homemade poppyseed cake.

  Bettina looked at Boykins. “Want to hear more good news?” she asked. “Hal missed his interview with Bryant Gumbel today.”

  “Gumball,” said the bear, nodding affirmatively.

  “Oh god no,” said Boykins. “Did you patch it up?”

  “Bryant was very understanding,” said Bettina. “We go back a long way.”

  “You must never let Hal out of your sight,” said Boykins.

  “We watch him fo’ you!” said Tiny One. “Make sure he get where he got to go.”

  “Bettina, we’re responsible for Hal as if he were our child,” said Boykins. “He’s not used to cities. They confuse him.”

  “It won’t happen again, Chum. Now just listen to the music.”

  “I must say I’m deeply concerned at being met at your door by armed children.”

  “Chum, who do you know in the music business?”

  “I know people. Why?”

  “Because the King Tones are going to be big, and you could be part of it.”

  “I’m a literary agent, Bettina.”

  “I’m talking megahit time, Chum.”

  “I see.” Boykins was up to a forty megahit dose of Prozac, his serotonin level was high, and Mickey Mouse’s harsh demands for obeisance had all but faded. The King Tones looked as if they would present major worries, as one of them had wing nuts in his hair and another smelled strongly of turpentine. He had to ask himself, will another problem client neutralize the wonders of Prozac and turn me back into an automaton?

  “King Cobra, Kaiser Wilhelm, and Imperial Decree,” said Bettina.

  “King Cobra … Kaiser Wilhelm … and Imperial Decree …” Boykins had opened his notebook and was writing in his small, precise hand. Then he looked at the children on Bettina’s couch. “And who are they?”

  “We the Tinys,” said Tiny One, his cheeks stuffed with cake.

  “They’re going to be regular visitors,” said Bettina, who had fallen for the Tinys. Their angry little faces, their paranoid little gazes, and their brilliant little brains had stolen her little heart. She looked at the Tinys now and was suffused with henlike feelings for them. They were a pair of prodigies, wandering in a cloud.

  The King Tones began to sing, and the bear looked on with great pleasure. People were eating cake and his new friends now had what every human being needed, an agent and a publicist.

  Vinal Pinette walked through the woods alone, through swirling snow. When he came to the steep hillside he worked his way slowly down it to the cave.

  The day was bright and the air still; a blue jay fluttered by, piercing the air with its sharp cry and then sailing on down the valley. Pinette pushed aside the pine boughs that covered the mouth of the cave and crawled in.

  Arthur Bramhall was far back in the darkness, curled up on a bed of grass and pine boughs. The wall of the cave was spotted with frost. Pinette watched Bramhall breathing and marveled at the depth of his sleep. “I knowed you was tough, Art, and here’s the proof of it.”

  Pinette squatted on his haunches, keeping his friend company.

  “Is he in there?” asked a voice from behind him.

  He turned and saw the fur-bearing woman standing outside the entrance.

  “Yup,” he said, backing out through the cave door.

  “You don’t think that he’ll freeze to death?”

  “He’s got a rhythm going. You break it, he could croak. Leastwise, that’s my view of it.” Pinette shook the snow off the peak of his cap and readjusted it. “They say that an Eskimo can just curl up in his igloo and doze for months. Some make it, some don’t.”

  The fur-bearing woman had great respect for Vinal Pinette, whom she saw as an elder who knew the ways of the forest. “He’s on a spirit quest, isn’t he?”

  “Whatever he’s on, I ain’t one to interfere. Not when a man’s got a rhythm.”

  Pinette and the fur-bearing woman walked back through the woods together, along a path the snow was rapidly covering.

  The bear’s appearances on the network morning shows weren’t easy for him. He did not fully grasp what a television studio was, and each visit to one filled him with anxiousness. But Bryant Gumbel had been impressed: Hal Jam had not once mentioned the title of his book during their interview. Gumbel felt this was the mark of a real artist, who didn’t feel the need to point to his work; actually the bear had forgotten what the title was. When Harry Smith interviewed him on CBS This Morning, Bettina had the title written on the bear’s shirt cuff, which he looked at throughout the entire interview, but referred to the book as Shirt Cuff. With some trepidation, Bettina put him on the air shuttle to Boston.

  I’m the first bear in the air, he said to himself as he looked at the earth far below him. Seat’s a little snug, but they give you peanuts. Everything a bear needs to tide him over.

  When he entered the Boston terminal he was met by a plump woman holding up a copy of his book. “Hi, I’m Julie Moody, your media escort.” The bear followed her dutifully. Just my type of female. The bearish silhouette. Smells about forty-two.

  After they claimed his luggage, she led him out of the terminal into the parking lot. “I’ll have to take you straight to your first interview. After that you get a break and can settle into your hotel. Here’s my car.”

  She opened the front door and he climbed in.

  “I love your book,” said Mrs. Moody as she got behind the wheel. “It’s so romantic.” She gave him a sideways glance. “Was it all imagination?”

  “I found it under a tree.”

  “Where lightning strikes,” agreed Mrs. Moody as she worked her way through the heavy terminal traffic. “Dear me, what a mess, and you’ve got a live interview. Do you think we might fit through there?” She took her car off the road, into a restricted airport construction site, past large pieces of earthmoving equipment and construction workers hysterically waving flags and shouting at her. She waved back and drove on through the site, then back out onto the road, far ahead of the traffic jam. She stole another glance at her novelist. “You write so beautifully about nature,” she said with a sigh. She was now speeding along the highway toward Boston. As she worked the brake and accelerator with dexterity, her skirt rose above her knees. Remarkable the variety of shape you get in the human female leg, thought the bear to himself. Lady bears all have pretty much the same fuzzy shape.

  He closed his eyes and breathed Mrs. Moody’s numerous provocative scents, concentrated within the confined space of her car. Mrs. Moody got the strangest feeling, as if she were riding naked. Gracious, she thought to herself, and rolled her window down.

  They entered Boston and threaded their way through city traffic toward the TV studio. The bear rode quietly and comfortably, looking curiously at people, and at Mrs. Moody’s legs, admiring them. There were no thoughts in his head. He enjoyed looking at the people and at Mrs. Moody’s legs. Streets came and went, and Mrs. Moody’s legs moved as she drove, and his mind was like a tranquil lake, in which passing images were reflected.

  “You’re very quiet,” said Mrs. Moody. “Do you like to meditate before you give an interview?”

  “What’s an interview?”

  “It’s good to be a little blasé. But you don’t want to lose your spontaneity. I’ve seen it happen to so many authors. After a few dozen interviews, they start giving the same answers to the same questions, and all their freshness is gone.”

  The bear had no idea what she was talking about, so he looked out the window. He sensed that human understanding was something like a net, with loops being added to it constantly, and he could imagine a human being nimbly casting this net; but when he imagined this net of understanding in his own paws he saw himself getting tangled in it, and finally being brought to his knees, pitifully thrashing about inside the shimmering mesh as shadowy figures approached with clubs.

  Mrs. Moody pulled into a parking lo
t. The bear climbed out and followed her into a large building. A security guard issued them identity cards. The bear smoothed his out carefully as they walked along. “Hal Jam,” he said, looking down at the letters that spelled his name. He liked having this identity card because it showed everyone he had an identity.

  “We go in here,” said Mrs. Moody, “to the green room.”

  “It’s not green,” remarked the bear as they sat down in the small waiting area.

  “Green rooms usually aren’t,” said Mrs. Moody.

  Again, he marveled at the complexity of human beings, who called a room green when it wasn’t green. What did it mean?

  A young man entered the green room that wasn’t green and said, “You’re Hal Jam?”

  The bear pointed to the identity card on his lapel. The young man put out his hand. “I’m Scott Emery, assistant producer. We’ll be going on in about five minutes. Can I get you anything?”

  “Popcorn,” said the bear, who often confused being on TV with watching TV. This was because he was a bear.

  “I don’t think we have any,” said Scott Emery. “We have some Cheesy Things, though.”

  “Good,” said the bear.

  Scott Emery went away and returned a few moments later with Cheesy Things in a bag. “I hope these’ll take the edge off. I’ll be back when we’re ready for you.” He switched on a monitor mounted on the green-room wall, which carried the interview now in progres—a doctor discussing the latest surgical techniques.

  The bear nibbled the Cheesy Things contentedly, and Mrs. Moody was impressed by his calm manner. Authors got very little actual airtime, and their publicists had told them that every word counted and that they must speak in sound bites. Consequently, young authors especially were filled with nervous tension beforehand, as they tried to rehearse their sound bites. But the only bites Hal Jam seemed to be concerned about were those he was taking out of his Cheesy Things.

  Scott Emery returned and announced they were ready for him. The bear followed Emery onto a set built around a working fireplace. The anchor woman was in one of the chairs beside the fireplace. Destiny and Desire was in front of her on a low table, and the book was glowing.