He hadn’t worked out how he would break into the man’s house but, as it happened, this was no problem at all. Though the man in the cardigan had locked his front door, the back door was open. So, Baddeley walked into a spotless kitchen. At least, “spotless” is what he thought on entering. But it was more that the place seemed uninhabited, expectant. There were no cobwebs and not much dust. The rooms were in order, the furniture arranged “just so.” The lamps and wicker wastebaskets, the books in bookcases and the pictures on the walls were all neatly arranged. The place smelled faintly of incense. The further he went into the house, the less likely it seemed that anyone actually lived there.
Despite his sense that something wasn’t right, Baddeley placed a copy of his manuscript — which he’d optimistically brought with him — on a coffee table in the living room. He left the house by the door he’d come in, resolving to return the following morning. But as Baddeley closed the kitchen door behind him and turned to go, he was confronted by the man in the yellow cardigan.
Caught off guard, Baddeley stuttered.
— I’m sorry. I’m sorry, he said. The door was open. I thought there was someone home.
The man stared at Baddeley a moment.
— I’m home now, he said.
— That’s just it, said Baddeley. I thought a friend of mine lived here. That’s why I went in. I must have the wrong address. — Stop lying, said the man. I’m Avery Andrews and I know who you are, assassin.
When he thought about this moment later — and he was to think about it often — Baddeley thought about how strange his face must have looked. On learning that he had found Avery Andrews, the emotions that coursed through him were myriad, contradictory, and sharply experienced. He felt excitement, wonder, fear, confusion, guilt, deference, arrogance, and disbelief. And each emotion must have imposed its own fleeting expression on his face.
— But, but, but…, he said.
Andrews interrupted him.
— I apologize, he said. I shouldn’t have called you “assassin.”
Let’s play this out. — Play what out?
was Baddeley’s first thought, but he almost dutifully followed Andrews back into the house. They walked through the kitchen into the living room.
— Don’t sit down, said Andrews. I don’t like housecleaning.
Baddeley stood, as Andrews sat down on the sofa. Andrews saw Baddeley’s manuscript, picked it up from the coffee table — Baddeley’s heart raced as his idol touched its pages — and threw it so that Time and Mr. Andrews hit Baddeley on the shoulder.
— You don’t know anything about my work, said Andrews. None of you do. You’re all deluded.
The bitterness in Andrews’ voice was so corrosive, Baddeley accepted his own insignificance as if it were an obvious fact.
— Yes, he said. But if only you’d help me interpret your work, it would be even more popular than it is.
— Are you out of your mind? asked Andrews. I write poetry. It’s not meant to be popular. Anyway, I can’t help you interpret what I don’t understand myself.
It was not going as Baddeley had hoped. He was certain a mind as acute as Andrews’ would know the springs and coils of its own mechanism intimately. If only he could coax certain things from the poet.
— Mr. Andrews, Baddeley said, I really believe people would have a deeper appreciation for your work if…
Andrews cut him off.
— You don’t understand, he said. I can’t help you. I know nothing about my poems. I don’t understand them at all. The only thing I know for certain is where they come from. I’ll share that with you. That’s what you want, isn’t it?
On hearing Andrews’ words, it was — for Baddeley — as if a distant star had entered the living room. Did he want to know the source of Andrews’ poetry? Yes, he most certainly did.
— Thank you, Mr. Andrews. You don’t know how much it would mean if you helped me understand where the poems come from.
For the first time, Avery Andrews smiled.
— They come from God, he said.
— Oh…, said Baddeley. They come from God.
He did not hide his disappointment.
— I believe it’s God, said Andrews. But I’ve never asked. I’ve been too busy taking things down. You can decide for yourself. It would have been difficult for Baddeley to say which aspect of this moment shook him most. Was it the change in Andrews’ tone, from bitter to… something else? Or was it Andrews’ strange offer to show him how the poems came “from God”? With creative types, there was always the possibility of madness, but Andrews’ poetry had always seemed to Baddeley so sane and clear that the idea the poet himself was mad had not once — not in all the readings and re-readings — occurred to him.
Baddeley assumed Andrews would invite him to his desk, to the place where inspiration touched him and then lecture him about creativity. He did not imagine that Andrews would take him to see the “god” in question. But it appeared that’s what Andrews intended to do. They walked to King and from there they took the streetcar.
— I prefer to walk, said Andrews. But I’m tired.
And he paid Baddeley’s fare.
Where’s this madman taking me? Baddeley wondered. But he went anyway. Avery Andrews was determined to show him something and Baddeley’s love for Andrews’ work was sufficient to spur him on. But how strange genius was! Like something from a world where they breathe iridium.
As they approached Bathurst, the Wheat Sheaf tavern looking gothic in the silvery afternoon, Andrews spoke.
— So, you want to be a poet, he said.
— I don’t have the talent to be a poet, answered Baddeley. I only wish I could write the poetry you write. It would…
Andrews cut him off.
— I wanted to be a novelist, he said. I’ve always hated poetry. They got off the streetcar at Bathurst, and Baddeley, alert in the company of Avery Andrews, looked up at the world. In one distance, the city rose to a craggy peak of metal, cement, and glass. In another, it was the lake that seemed to rise, like the inside of a glinting, grey-green cup. Behind them was the Parkdale from which they’d come.
— We’ll walk from here, said Andrews.
Which they did, going wordlessly north, until they came to the Western.
We’re going to Radiography 11A, Baddeley thought, alarmed, but they went, rather, to the fifth floor of the north wing. As they left the elevator, Avery Andrews stood still a moment before moving towards Ward 55A.
Now, disappearance generally moves along a line from “done with mirrors” to “sudden drop.” The suddenness of a disappearance is, of course, part of what makes it uncanny. And if, on entering the room, Avery Andrews had disappeared in any of the “usual” ways, Baddeley would have been dismayed and, no doubt, frightened. But as the two went into Ward 55A, Andrews was absorbed by the room. It was as if the man were a streak of ink blotted up, his disappearance taking a full five seconds: time enough for Baddeley to wonder what was happening; time enough for him to realize he was alone in the same room he had entered in the hospital’s basement — thirty feet by thirty feet by thirty feet, white. More than that, it was now obvious to Baddeley that the room could not be as it appeared to be, its dimensions making it impossible to fit between the fourth and sixth floors of the Toronto Western.
As much as Baddeley feared the madness of others, he was even more terrified of losing his own sanity. At the “absorption” of Avery Andrews, he looked away, as if he’d inadvertently seen something taboo. No sooner did he look away, however, than 55A turned into a typical ward: a ceiling ten feet above them with four banks of fluorescent lights; four beds, all of them occupied; a window looking out on another wing of the hospital, beyond which he could see more buildings and smoke rising from a tall chimney.