“Have you got a watch on you?” Halsyon asked.
Restraining his start of surprise at Halsyon’s normal tone, the art dealer took out his pocket watch and displayed it.
“Lend it to me for a minute.”
Derelict unchained the watch and handed it over. Halsyon took it carefully and said, “All right. Go ahead with the pictures.”
“Jeff!” Derelict exclaimed. “This is you again, isn’t it? This is the way you always — ”
“Thirty,” Halsyon interrupted. “Thirty-five, forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, ONE.” He concentrated on the flicking second hand with rapt expectation.
“No, I guess it isn’t,” the dealer muttered. I only imagined you sounded — Oh well.” He opened the portfolio and began sorting mounted drawings.
“Forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, TWO. 5 ”
“Here’s one of your earliest, Jeff. Remember when you came into the gallery with the roughs and we thought you were the new polisher from the agency? Took you months to forgive us. You always claimed we bought your first picture just to apologize. Do you still think so?”
“Forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, THREE.”
“Here’s that tempera that gave you so many heartaches. I was wondering if you’d care to try another? I really don’t think tempera is as inflexible as you claim and I’d be interested to have you try again now that your technique’s so much more matured. What do you say?” •
“Forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five, FOUR.”
“Jeff, put down that watch.”
“Ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five.”
“What the devil’s the point of counting minutes?”
“Well,” Halsyon said reasonably, “sometimes they lock the door and go away. Other times they lock up and stay and spy on you. But they never spy longer than three minutes so I’m giving them five just to make sure. FIVE.”
Halsyon gripped the small pocket watch in his big fist and drove the fist cleanly into Derelict’s jaw. The dealer dropped without a sound. Halsyon . dragged him to the wall, stripped him naked, dressed himself in his clothes, repacked the portfolio and closed it. He picked up the dollar bill and pocketed it. He picked up the bottle of carbon ink warranted nonpoisonous and dashed the contents into his face.
Choking and shouting, he brought the nurse to the door.
“Let me out of here,” Halsyon cried in a muffled voice. “That maniac tried to drown me. Threw ink in my face. I want out!”
The door was unbolted and opened. Halsyon shoved past the nurse man, cunningly mopping his blackened face with a hand that only smeared it more. As the nurse man started to enter the cell, Halsyon said, “Never mind Halsyon. He’s all right. Get me a towel or something. Hurry!”
The nurse man locked the door again, turned and ran down the corridor. Halsyon waited until he disappeared into a supply room, then turned and ran in the opposite direction. He went through the heavy doors to the main wing corridor, still cleverly mopping, still sputtering with cunning indignation. He reached the main building. He was halfway out and still no alarm. He knew those brazen bells. They tested them every Wednesday noon.
It’s like a Ringaleevio game, he told himself. It’s fun. It’s gamfcs. It’s nothing to be scared of. It’s being safely, sanely, joyously a kid again and when we quit playing I’m going home to mama and dinner and papa reading me the funnies and I’m a kid again, really a kid again, forever.
There still was no hue and cry when he reached the main floor. He complained about his indignity to the receptionist. He complained to the protection guards as he forged James Derelict’s name in the visitors' book, and his inky hand smeared such a mess on the page that the forgery went undetected. The guard buzzed the final gate open. Halsyon passed through into the street, and as he started away he heard the brass throats of the bells begin a clattering that terrified, him.
He ran. He stopped. He tried to stroll. He could not. He lurched down the street until he heard the guards shouting. He darted around a corner, and another, tore up endless streets, heard cars behind him, sirens, bells, shouts, commands. It was a ghastly Catherine Wheel of flight. Searching desperately for a hiding place, Halsyon darted into the hallway of a desolate tenement.
Halsyon began to climb the stairs. He went up three at a clip, then two, then struggled step by step as his strength failed and panic paralyzed him. He stumbled at a landing and fell against a door. The door opened. The Faraway Fiend stood within, smiling briskly, rubbing his hands.
“Glikkliche Reise,” he said. “On the dot. God damn. You twenty-three skidooed, eh? Enter, my old. I’m expecting you. Be it never so humble…
Halsyon screamed.
“No, no, no! No Sturm und Drang, my beauty.” Mr. Aquila clapped a hand over Halsyon’s mouth, heaved him up, dragged him through the doorway and slammed the door.
“Presto-changeo,” he laughed. “Exit Jeffrey Halsyon from mortal ken. Dieu vous garde.”
Halsyon freed his mouth, screamed again and fought hysterically, biting and kicking. Mr. Aquila made a clucking noise, dipped into his pocket and brought out a package of cigarettes. He flipped one up expertly and broke it under Halsyon’s nose. The artist at once subsided and suffered himself to be led to a couch, where Aquila cleansed the ink from his face and hands.
“Better, eh? Mr. Aquila chuckled. “Non habit forming. God damn. Drinks now called for.”
He filled a shot glass from a decanter, added a tiny cube of purple ice from a fuming bucket, and placed the drink in Halsyon’s hand. Compelled by a gesture from Aquila, the artist drank it off. It made his brain buzz. He stared around, breathing heavily. He was in what appeared to be the luxurious waiting room of a Park Avenue physician. Queen Anne furniture. Axminster rug. Two Morlands and a Crome on the wall in gilt frames. They were genuine, Halsyon realized with amazement. Then, with even more amazement, he realized that he was thinking with coherence, with continuity. His mind was quite clear.
He passed a heavy hand over his forehead. “What’s happened?” he asked faintly. “There’s like … Something like a fever behind me. Nightmares.”
“You have been sick,” Aquila replied. “I am blunt, my old. This is a temporary return to sanity. It is no feat, God damn. Any doctor can do it. Niacin plus carbon dioxide. Id genus omne. We must search for something more permanent.”
“What’s this place?”
“Here? My office. Anteroom without. Consultation room within. Laboratory to left. In God we trust.”
“I know you,” Halsyon mumbled. “I know you from somewhere. I know your face.”
“Oui. You have drawn and redrawn and tredrawn me in your fever. Ecce homo. But you have the advantage, Halsyon. Where have we met?
I ask myself.” Aquila put on a brilliant speculum, tilted it over his left eye and let it shine into Halsyon’s face. “Now I ask you. Where have we met?”
Blinded by the light, Halsyon answered dreamily. “At the Beaux Arts Ball. ... A long time ago… Before the fever…”
“Ah? Si. It was ½ year ago. I was there. An unfortunate night.”
“No. A glorious night… Gay, happy, fun… Like a school dance … Like a prom in costume…”
“Always back to the childhood, eh?” Mr. Aquila murmured. “We must attend to that. Cetera desunt, young Lochinvar. Continue.”
“I was with Judy… We realized we were in love that night. We realized how wonderful life was going to be. And then you passed and looked at me… Just once. You looked at me. It was horrible.”
“Tk!” Mr. Aquila clicked his tongue in vexation. “Now I remember said incident. I was unguarded. Bad news from home. A pox on both my houses.”
“You passed in red and black… Satanic. Wearing no mask. You looked at me. ... A red and black look I never forgot. A look from black eyes like pools of hell, like cold fires of terror. And with that look you robbed me of everything ... of joy, of hope, of love, of life…”