"Hey, you bet. What did he do?"
"Nothing directly. It's part of something else. When everything's settled, I'll see if I can let you know."
"Hey, thanks."
"The least I can do," said Stepovich, and returned to his car.
Well, that had turned out for shit. Except that there might be more information on this Coachman on one of the witnesses' statements, if he cared to try and dig through them. If only he'd turned in the knife as evidence in the first place, put the extra charge of concealed weapon, none of this would have happened.
As he was getting into his car, a Chevy very much like Durand's heap drove past. Stegovich stared after the blue car until it faded into the fog. He was sure he was mistaken. Damn, he was getting paranoid.
He found the table where Timmy D. sat
And settled in like he wanted to stay,
Put his money out on the board
And said, "Hey, boy, teach me to play."
"THE GYPSY"
And around it went, like the steps of the csardas,always back to the same place, only different, with anew tension. He was in front of Tiny's, almost exactly twenty-four hours later. What had he done? He tried to remember, and a headache came on. Where were his pills? A walk to an apartment, a conversation, a debt fulfilled, sleep, a meal, a walk in the park, a wolf,and now back here. What had he gained? What had he lost?
Two girls came out of a bar down the street and walked past him, complaining about the "prick"who had thrown them out. Too young, he thought.
They stopped and turned back. "What was that?"He hadn't realized he'd spoken aloud. The one who queried him had blonde hair with dark roots and wore a very short leather skirt and stockings. The other,dark of hair and taller, with a fuller body though a younger face, was dressed in tight-fitting jeans with grey splotches on them. They both wore very short jackets that didn't look like they would keep snow or cold out.
"I said, too young," repeated the Gypsy.
"Who asked you?" said the blonde.
"There is a time to be in the adult world, and a time to be in the child's world, and you will cheat yourself if you leave the one too soon."
They looked at each other and giggled. "What a weirdo," said the dark one. As she spoke, the Gypsy shivered. Something about her voice resonated within him, seemed familiar.
He shrugged and said, "The road will be there,whenever you set foot on it. But you won't be the same after. You can't go back."
"Ooooo," said the blonde. "Heavy stuff, huh?"She looked at her friend and giggled again. Then she said, "Wanna get lucky, big guy?" and laughed some more.
The dark one said, "Chrissy!" in a tone that mixed shock and amusement.
"Oh, he won't do anything. If he does, we'll scream. Right, big guy?"
The Gypsy looked away, and said, "If you give all you have to the Fair Lady, what will be left when She's finished?" When he turned back, they were staring at him, wide-eyed.
"How do you know about the Fair Lady?" whispered the one called Chrissy. Groups of people walked by, ignoring them. The police could go by any minute, but he couldn't leave these two unwarned.
"There are three worlds," he said. "Each held in place by a tree, each with its sun and moon, each with its own sky full of stars. The top branches of the tree of our world reach to the roots of the next,the roots of our tree reach to the branches of the world below. The Fair Lady comes from the world below, which She has covered in darkness, for She wishes to be the only brightness in the world. She has climbed the tree of Her world and come to ours,and now wishes to cover ours in darkness. To some,She brings gifts, hoping they will serve Her. Others She directs by fear, or by casting their minds in darkness so She is all they see clearly, I am the one sworn to return light to Her world, but first She must be cast out of ours. She is Luci, the seductress,who brings the diseases that waste. Do not listen to Her. She will draw the light from your youth and cast you into the darkness that will ravage your soul."
He stopped at last. They stared at him, then, without a word or a look between them, turned and ran up the street and were soon lost in the crowds. The Gypsy stood alone, his own words coming back to him.
"So," he said to himself, very slowly and quietly,not noticing those who took wide detours around the oddly dressed man who stood talking to himself. "So,now I know what I am to do. But I cannot do it alone."
I can see the ravens gather
From the places where they feast on last night's news
I am guessing they'd really rather
Find out exactly who they should accuse
They can't get me 'til I've collected what I'm owed.
So I'll keep searching further up this road.
"UP THE ROAD"
He drove carefully through the snowy streets, his windshield wipers on the low setting to keep the wet flakes cleared from the glass. He hoped it wouldn't stick. Least bit of snow on the streets, traffic got all screwed up. He didn't want to spend all day tomorrow calling for wreckers and investigating people sliding into guardrails. Shit.
Home, he shucked off his uniform and got into his sweats. He added his uniform shirt and pants to the rest of his laundry to make a load and took it down the hall to the laundry room. Set it sloshing.
Back to the apartment. Part of a package of fish sticks, part of a bag of frozen French fries. Dump them on a cookie tray, stick them in the oven. Get out the ketchup. Frost had formed inside the packages from being open in the freezer compartment. The French fries came out wet and hot and steamy. Flavorless.He ate them anyway. Go down the hallway, take the wet stuff out of the washer and stuff it in the dryer. Go back to the apartment and open a beer.
Stepovich began the nightly ritual of flicking through the channels. Apartment came with cable.Cable TV and roaches, free with the rent. At least having the cable gave him plenty of channels to flip through. He watched about three hours of television a night, and as Ed had once observed, that was a lot,at only three minutes per channel.
The steamy romances potboiler on four put him in mind of Durand and Tiffany Marie, and he watched the couple on the tube make fish mouths at each other while he thought about what a jerk he'd been today,climbing on Durand about Tiffany Marie. When he got to feeling too abashed he switched to seventeen.Quiz show time, stupid questions and dumber answers, because the contestants were movie stars and they were more concerned with being witty than with getting the answer right. That was him in the park with the horse-hack, and he'd learned about as much from him as he was learning from the show. Click the channels some more, to a rock video of young girls writhing and moaning. He could call Laurie. Hell, he should call Laurie, except that Jennie probably wouldn't put him through. She'd as much as told him to butt out. Not that she would really make him butt out, but she could make it uncomfortable. But he could call and promise he wouldn't say anything to her about what her mom had talked about today. But,hell, that wouldn't fool anybody. Laurie would know why he was calling. She was one smart kid, Laurie was. Growing up so fast. Too fast, and he was missing it. Click the channel selector.
Thirteen had on a horror flick, with unavenged ghosts and a battered old gypsy woman telling the hero to beware, but also telling him that he was the one destined to free them all. Find out who killed me,that sort of line. Click.
A cop show. Two partners had gone bad, were dispensing vigilante justice, and the good cop was hunting them down.