Just a Corpse at Twilight (21 page)

"Warning shots," said Beth, who had cooked up another lobster for Ishmael, even though the kitchen was closed.

Lorraine thought so too.

"Warning who?" Grijpstra asked.

"Warning you?" Aki asked.

Ishmael wondered what to do without an airplane.

"You get a new plane," Flash Farnsworth said. "Poverty is a state of mind."

Ishmael agreed that a spic-and-span, spanking-new Cessna, feather light, fast even at impulse speed, was what was needed here. But say, for argument's sake, that he actualized himself an aircraft, wouldn't he still be a flying target?

"POW!" shouted Bad George.

They were still laughing when Billy Boy stopped his jeep in the twilight outside the diner, raised his wrist, studied his watch.

"Can't serve beer after closing time," said Beth.

"My place?" Ishmael asked.

Loaded in de Gier's Ford product and Beth's bus, the party drove to Ishmael's old canning factory at the Point. Kathy Two sat on Grijpstra's lap, sticking out her braid-ears, looking out the Ford's side window, her twenty muscular toes massaging Grijpstra's thighs pleasurably. Grijpstra wondered how he could get Nellie and de Gier's cat Tabriz to agree to have a Kathy Two look-alike share their castle.

"Just ask them," de Gier said.

Grijpstra never liked it when de Gier was telepathic.

Chapter 20

The abandoned canning
factory,
de Gier had been told by Flash Farnsworth, contained the complete collection of What.

"Of what?"

Little Flash, weighed down by his bird-nest hairdo, deranged leprechaun in green coveralls and boots, rolling about on a damaged pelvis, might have embellished. "But he's close enough," Grijpstra said, following Ishmael, in charge of the tour. The cannery was square. It hid behind tall brick-faced cracked walls, and peered at the visitors out of half-shuttered windows, like half-glasses on an old man's face. The bigbuilding was overgrown with ivy, turning red at autumn's approach. There was a yard surrounded by sheds. The sheds contained cars, same make: Ford, same model: Pinto.

"Nobody wants Pintos," Bad George said. "He got them all for free."

"Because their gas tanks were supposed to blow up," Flash said. "Not that they did."

Ishmael explained his "theory of contrariwise": Collect out of fashion, be rich on no money.

"Why collect thirty-two identical giveaway motorcars?" Ishmael asked rhetorically. Ishmael explained his "theory of magic multiplication": Placement of identical objects achieves a magical effect. In multiplication possibilities increase magically. Ishmael pointed out the splendor in the placing of identical Pintos facing each other, in four Pintos diagonally arranged, in Pintos mounting another, in upside-down Pintos underneath themselves, in Pintos resting on their sides, tires touching.

"Like making love to twins?" de Gier asked Lorraine.

Beth thought the idea exciting. She suggested going to Hawaii to find identical Akis.

"Identical Beths too?" Aki asked.

There were other demonstrations of multiple magic. Ishmael showed them three objects, overgrown with dried seaweed and lichens. The objects were identical, nonidenti-fiable, and had been brought up by divers salvaging a sunken freighter in Jameson Bay. There was a light bulb illuminating the arrangement displayed on a trestle table.

"Untitled," Ishmael said proudly.

There were also collections ofthe similar nonidentical: rusted bird cages hung in the yard, some with toy birds inside, all with open doors. "Predicament in Birdland," Ishmael said. "Free to go, but where to? Like the crazy man in the Eastern Maine Mental Hospital. Kept in a cage near the nurses' station. He's being good so they open the cage, but he won't step out. He does step out when prodded, but he sits outside, one hand clutching a bar behind him. That's the way he feels safe.

"That was you?" Grijpstra asked.

No other, Ishmael explained. He had given up on religion at the time, had been institutionalized (due to odd behavior), while trying to deal with nothing. But he wasn't ready yet: no free rail for Ishmael while still holding on to his cage.

"It ain't easy," Beth said. "Makes some people fat."

Once inside the cannery there was a doll collection, arrays of tools, masks, neatly labeled boxes on shelves containing nails, screws, washers, nuts, handles, and hinges, writing implements, brushes, pens, fittings, light bulbs and tubes, cutlery, assorted hardware. Ishmael liked sorting through cast-ofls, leftovers after yard sales that he would pick up in a Pinto. Not that he intended to save waste. The entire universe might be waste. The universe could save itself.

"You give this away?" de Gier asked. "Suppose somebody needs something?"

"Come and get it," Ishmael said. "Step right up."

"Art," Grijpstra said, admiring more Pintos.
"This
is Art."

Not really, Ishmael said. Just something to do inside on rainy days. Or outside, weather permitting.

Kathy Two, woofing, asked Grijpstra to carry her up a flight of narrow steps, too steep for her to manage. The cannery's second floor displayed bookend owls, of stone and other materials, ugly and moody looking, and models of flying dinosaurs suspended from ceilings—some were skeletons that glowed in the dark, some had leathery wings.

"Uselessly wise," Ishmael said. "Beautifully extinct."

There was also an obstacle course that Kathy Two used for performing tricks: leaping through hoops, sitting on a swing pushed by Ishmael, jumping across bars, finishing up by sitting patiently on a stool, both paws up, looking expectant. "Good Kathy Two," everyone said. There was applause. The dog smiled shyly.

"She's learnin'," Flash said.

"Kathy One was rude," Bad George said, "never even gave you the time of the day."

"Not so easy," Ishmael said. "Living on food stamps in a burned-out trailer, keeping a drunk bum of a husband, having Flash for a son."

"She had excuses," Flash agreed, "but never good enough. I told her she'd have to come back as a dog. There she is." He kissed the dog.

Kathy Two snarled.

"I'll be a dog next time I have to come back," Beth told Aki. "You can say you've been there but you don't live long and you sleep most of it."

The music room was part of the third floor, with arrangements from the thirties. Ishmael pulled out picture books to show Art Deco sources. The music room's waint coting was dappled maple out ofa lumberyard fire sale. The higher part of the walls was lizard leather, peeled off a shipment of waterlogged ladies' shoes. Tulip-shaped lamp shades were glued together from colored stained-glass shards.

"You just run into this?" Grijpstra asked.

"It just runs into me," Ishmael said.

"What if you lost the collection?" Grijpstra asked.

Ishmael thought that might be nice too.

Musical instruments were everywhere, centered by a set of drums that Grijpstra arranged around himself, a valve trombone that Beth could play, a saxello, three sets oftablas, a doussn' gouni, and a lyricon that Bad George tried but couldn't do all that much with, a dented and dirty trumpet that de Gier picked up, pods of various sizes, a gourd guitar that Flash put down because ofbroken strings, Ishmael's own upright piano. They couldn't play yet because Flash and Bad George still wandered about, trying things out. A melodica? No. An acoustic bass? Bad George claimed the bass. He found Flash a tuba.

"Good," Grijpstra said, stirring soup with brushes on the snare drum, sideswiping a ride cymbal, setting up an up-tempo groove for everyone else. He worked the crash-cymbal too. "'Bemsha Swing'?" The bass drum thumped. De Gier blew the trumpet. "Beh."

The
beh
didn't go anywhere, not even when Bad George matched it on bass. Grijpstra never left the groove, singing Theloniouss tune to help things along. Bad George caught on, walked the changes, supported the groove. Ish-mael came in too. He had heard "Bemsha Swing" on de Gier*s sound equipment, had tried it before, repeated the theme now, in high note clusters on the upright piano. Flash's tuba put in a hoot that hit it right, encouraging Beth to come in on trombone. Aki sang. Lorraine rang some cowbells.

The ensemble was off then, without de Gier. De Gier shook debris out of his trumpet—a previous player's solid saliva (it was a wonder he didn't get sick), a rats nest—risking bubonic plague just for a little music; what he wouldn't do for others, he said later.

Waiting for de Gier to front on his horn, the ensemble produced waves of rhythm, held steady by Grijpstra on brushed cymbals and snare drum. Trombone and voice harmonized, structured by Bad George on the bass. Flash, barely breathing into the tuba, helped shape the duet. Ishmael trilled more piano notes.

De Gier kept trying. "Beh."

"Tuh
TAH!
the trumpet sang finally. They all had it then. Lorraine too, shaking the theme on a tambourine.

After "Bemsha Swing" came "Endless Blues," de Gier's own composition. The trumpet cried some. Aki's voice cried too. Grijpstra rolled his toms ecstatically, for he was back in the dory, facing Nellie, and Hokusai waves. He played the waves on cymbals. Bad George sounded Mr. Bear's slow footsteps on the bass. Aki sang the loon's chuckle. Coyotes wailed again on the trumpet but there were also the lava beaches of Hawaii's Kona Coast, mostly in duets oftrombone and voice, with long subdued notes to indicate sunsets, volcanos glowing at night, sun-shot froth on cresting waves. Little intricacies on piano and dry ticking against the side of Grijpstra's snare drum supplied contrasts between scenes, also discipline to contain melodrama. A solo by Bad George on the bass, which he brushed gently with an almost hairless bow, impressed Kathy Two so much that she rolled over to display a pink belly, before jumping up to bark sharply. There were car engines growling outside, cutting out when Billy Boy's voice shouted commands. Then there was Hairy Harry's posse stamping up the cannery's stairs.

Chapter 21

Being instructed not to shun force while exercising a warrant to search the cannery for illegal warehousing of controlled substances, the posse smashed most of Ishmaers collection ofWhat. There was also some prodding with nightsticks and name-calling in gruff voices. "Tongue and Groovers" referred to Beth and Aki, "Short Retards" covered the skippers, "Aliens in the Mist," "Hippy-Yippy," and "New-Born Nihilist" took care of the others.

Most of Ishmaers arrangements were no longer intact after half a dozen deputies, flown in from remote corners of the Twilight Zone, in storm-trooper boots and Boy Scout hats, ran out of breath.

Nothing much found, nothing much left.

The posse departed as it had come. All-terrain vehicles roared and drove off with squealing tires.

There were no wounded, only bruised: Beth on the buttock, Bad George on the shoulder.

"Oh dear, oh dear," Grijpstra sympathized, surveying what was left of a flying dinosaur's twenty-foot leathery wingspan, kicking broken owls aside, keeping Kathy Two away from smashed jars.

De Gier held up a bear mask, found under rubble the marauding deputies had thrown out of windows. He checked the mask's labels. One said REFUSE IMPORTS; the Other, MADE IN CHINA.

Aki put it on. "Can I have this, Ishmael?"

"Sure," Ishmael said. He mentioned his "joyful destruction theory." "Dinosaurs had it good for millions of years. Then the thing got old and they were happy to leave." He spread his arms. "We can't have too much destruction."

Beth agreed. The collection ofWhat had indeed gotten old. She had noticed cobwebs.

"Haven't been looking at this stuff much lately," Ish-mael said, shoving remnants aside. Ishmael's living quarters and guest rooms, carefully arranged showcases of furniture from the forties and the fifties, complete with period books, drapes, carpets, and appliances, had been smashed and ripped by the diligent deputies, then kicked into corners.

De Gier invited all homeless persons to sleep in the pagoda.

Lorraine paddled home to Bar Island holding de Gel's pen-size but ultra-strong flashlight in her teeth. She didn't really want to as—Beth pointed out—there might be associations, but she didn't want to leave her kayak either and she was night-blind. Beth and Aki drove back to Jameson. Grijpstra and Ishmael rowed dinghies from the Point to Squid Island. Ishmael took de Gier and Bad George, talking about the challenge of space. For once he'd clean up the cannery and have a bonfire in the yard. He'd have four stories of space, to fill at will. Ishmael felt excited. He developed his theory of pre-creation, which had to do with serenity, from which creation would start herself up again.

"We're friends now?" Grijpstra asked Flash in the other rowboat. "Remember Mr. Bear eating the dead lady in the tunnel? Care to tell me who dug the dead lady's grave?"

"Never dug no grave in no tunnel," Flash Farnsworth said. He admitted to seeing Hairy Harry and Billy Boy carrying in the corpse. But the idea ofdigging her up to fool de Gier was Flash's. "What with your pal drunk as a skunk, didn't know what or nuthin' . . ."

"Never knows what or nuthin", Grijpstra said.

"Didn't work out too good," Flash said. "Worse now, right, Krip? No boat. No airplane. Cannery all stoved in. Hairy Harry gettin' stronger. Damn tootin' right I'm a rebel. We'll make it work again. Remember Pearl Harbor, Krip? But now I'm tired."

"Europe to the rescue," Grijpstra said, pulling the oars. One oar slipped, he fell over backward.

Flash tittered.

De Gier was waiting on Squid Island's dock. "You bed them all down for the night," Grijpstra said, "and give me the key to the Ford product, please."

"Phone the netherworld," de Gier asked. "Cross the final frontier. Call on the ogres. Release revenge."

Chapter 22

"Maybe we should do this," the commissaris said, tapping the table where he had spread his maps.

Katrien wasn't sure.

The commissaris rested his finger on Rogue Island. "But, Katrien . . ."

"But they're dealing with the sheriff of Woodcock County," Katrien said, "with an elected official. Please, Jan, this is a civilized world now, there must be better ways. Tell them to have the villain arrested. . . ."