Drowned Hopes Part 34

And the mean old guy-Tom-said, "What's he doing up in this neck of the woods? Long Island boy. He followed you, John, you and Andy. He's on to the caper. He wants the dough for himself."

Teeth chattering, Doug found voice at last, saying, "I, I, I, I got a girlfriend, she's M-M-Myrtle St-St-Street."

"That's the next block over," said a short blunt angry woman in a flannel s.h.i.+rt.

"No-no-no," Doug stammered, "that's her, that's her-"

"His girlfriend can put flowers on his grave," Tom said. Then he smiled very unpleasantly at Doug and said to the others, "He's a diver, right? Let's take him to the reservoir, see how he dives with weights around his neck."

"We need him to get the money," John said.

"I don't," Tom said.

The other woman in the room, taller, calmer, said, "Tom, you're letting John do it his way, remember?"

Tom shrugged. "You like this diver?" he asked John. "You want this diver in our lives?"

The other fellow present, a red-haired jaunty guy who looked as though he'd be an excellent street fighter, said, "Let's see if he likes the deal. Make him the offer, John."

Offer? "I accept!" Doug cried.

They all stared at him, too surprised to be mad; even Tom looked nearly human for a second. Andy, nodding, said, "That's what I call low sales resistance."

John, sounding almost sympathetic, said, "Listen to the offer first, Doug."

"Okay," Doug said. He still had to keep swallowing, and pinwheels had started to dance in his peripheral vision. But he would listen to the offer first, if that's what he was supposed to do. Listen to the offer first.

"You know what we're going for in the reservoir," John said.

Panic again! "Oh! Well, uh-"

"We know you know," John told him, sounding more irritable. "Don't waste our time."

"Okay," Doug said. "Okay."

"Okay. So here's the story."

Then John made the offer, something about this and that, and percentages, and diving, and Doug nodded all the way through the whole thing, and when John finally stopped talking and looked at him for a reaction, he smiled big at everybody in the room, smiling through his nausea, and he said, "Okay. Fine. I agree. It's a deal. Where do I sign? Sounds fair to me. Hey, no problem. I'm with you. By all means. Sure! With pleasure. What's to argue? Shake on it! You got a-"

"Oh, shut up," said the short woman in the flannel s.h.i.+rt.

Then there was the drive to the city. The red-haired guy, whose name turned out to be Stan, drove Doug's pickup, with Doug as his pa.s.senger, following Andy and John down the Thruway in a Cadillac Sedan da Fe with MD plates. ("Listen, I can drive," Doug had said, but, "No, you can't," John had told him, so that was that.) Before leaving the house on Oak Street, a phone call had been made to somebody called Wally, and now they were all going to the city for this Wally to show Doug something. Sure; whatever you guys say.

Along the way, Doug tried to befriend this guy Stan, but it didn't work out too well. His opening gambit was, "You know John and Andy a long time?"

"Uh-huh," said Stan. He drove with both hands on the wheel, both eyes on the road.

"I just met them," Doug said. "Recently. I taught them how to dive."

"Uh-huh."

"I could, uh, teach you to dive, too, Stan, if you want. You know, a pal of John and Andy, I wouldn't charge you any-"

"Did you ever," Stan interrupted, "see a three-sixty?"

Doug looked at Stan's expressionless profile. "A what?"

"A three-sixty."

"I don't know what that is," Doug admitted, little flutters of panic starting up again in his stomach.

"No?" Stan nodded. "I'll show you," he said, and suddenly floored the accelerator, and the pickup flashed past the MD Cadillac into an empty bit of highway, traffic ahead and behind but none right here, and then Stan flicked the steering wheel left, yanked it right, simultaneously did something fast and tricky with brake and clutch and accelerator, and the pickup spun all the way around in a circle in the middle of the road-still going sixty miles an hour toward New York-wound up facing south again, s.h.i.+vered once, and drove on.

Doug wasn't breathing. His mouth was open, but he just wasn't breathing. He'd seen an entire sweep of the outside world flash past the winds.h.i.+eld-the gra.s.sy center strip, the road behind them with the Cadillac in it, the forest beside the road, and then the proper road again-in just about a second; too fast to panic during it, so Doug was going all to pieces after it.

Stan the driver, without speaking, slowed the pickup and let the Cadillac pa.s.s. Andy, driving that other car, grinned and waved at Stan, who nodded with dignity back. And Doug hadn't breathed yet.

Finally he did, a long raspy vocal intake of breath that hurt all the way down. And then at last Stan spoke. "That was a three-sixty," he said. "You talk to me some more, I'll show you some other stuff I know."

Doug kept very quiet the rest of the way to the city.

Wally turned out to be some sort of freak of nature, short and fat and moist. The only good thing you could say for him was that he didn't seem to be mad at Doug for any reason. He even welcomed Doug to his weird apartment-it looked like an appliance repair shop-with an eager smile and a damp handshake, as he said, "You want some cheese and crackers?"

"Uh," Doug answered, not sure the others would permit.

No, they wouldn't. "No time, Wally," John said. "Show him the model, okay?"

"Sure," Wally said.

The "model" turned out not to be an actual toy train set kind of model at all, but a series of pictures on a television screen connected to a computer. Part of it was an animated movie, and much of that was pretty.

Doug stood there behind Wally, unaware of anything except the necessity to do what he was told: look at the model. After this, he'd be told something else to do, and he'd do it. He gazed at the screen, totally unaware of John, beside him, frowning at his profile. He was unaware of John finally shaking his head in irritation, raising one hand, and making a fist, with the knuckle of the middle finger extended. But he was very aware when John suddenly rapped him on the side of the skull with that knuckle.

Ow! That hurt! Doug flinched away, wide-eyed, staring at John, betrayed. He was doing what they wanted!

But John was dissatisfied. "You're daydreaming," he said. "You're asleep here. Your eyes aren't even in focus."

"Sure they are! Sure they are!" In his renewed panic, Doug was only grateful that mean old Tom hadn't come along. Surely, if he were present, he would right now renew his baying after Doug's blood.

Not that the others were being pleasant. Andy, crowding in on Doug's other side, said, "What's Wally showed you so far?"

Doug gasped at him. "What?"

"What did you see on the computer?"

Doug groped for an answer. "The model!"

"Of what?"

Doug stared from cold face to cold face to wet face. Desperate, he blurted, "I didn't know there was gonna be a test!"

John and Andy looked at each other as though trying to decide how best to dispose of the body. Between them, seated at his computer but twisted around to look up at Doug, Wally suddenly said, "Well, you know what it is; he's in shock."

John frowned at Wally. "He's what?"

"In shock," Wally repeated. "Look at his eyes. Feel his forehead, I bet it's cold and wet."

Andy pressed his palm to Doug's forehead, made a yuk! face, and pulled his hand back. "Right you are," he said, wiping his palm on his trouser leg.

Getting to his feet, taking Doug by the unresisting arm, Andy said, "Come on over here and sit down."

Doug crossed obediently to the sofa and, at Wally's urging, sat down. But then Wally said, "Bend down. Put your head between your knees."

"Why?" Doug asked, febrile again. "What are you gonna do to me?"

"Nothing," Wally a.s.sured him, gently pus.h.i.+ng Doug's head forward and down as he turned to say to the others, "What did you do to him?"

"Nothing," Andy said, but he sounded defensive.

"Offered him sixty thousand dollars," John said sulkily.

"Hardly anything," Stan said.

Bent way over with his head between his knees, looking at the bolts, batteries, floppy disks, Allen wrenches, F-connectors, and other electric and electronic debris under the sofa, Doug felt oddly safe, as though he were in a cave, hidden and protected. He even felt brave enough to squeal on Stan. "Three-sixty," he muttered.

Wally leaned down close; being Wally, he didn't have to lean down very far to be close. He said, "What was that, Doug?"

"Three-sixty."

"Oh, for Pete's sake," Stan said, "that wasn't anything at all. That was just to amuse him."

Sounding scientifically interested, Andy said, "Do you think that's what put him in shock? When Stan popped the wheelie?"

"Tom," muttered Doug.

Stan said, "What did he say?"

Wally was the translator: "He said, 'Tom.' "

"Well, yeah," Andy said. "There are times when Tom's put me in shock, actually."

"Myrtle," Doug muttered.

" 'Myrtle,' " Wally translated.

"That's the street where his girlfriend lives," John explained.

"It's her name," Doug muttered, but Wally wasn't listening this time, he was saying, "This poor fella's had a whole lot of things happen. No wonder he's in shock."

John said, "How long till he starts tracking again?"

"Gee, I don't know, John," Wally said. "Till he gets over it, I guess."

Doug rolled onto his side on the sofa, drew his knees up in fetal position, and closed his eyes. Not noticing him, the others kept talking. Soothing sounds. Very soothing. Surprising how soothing a soothing sound can be in its being soothing. Totally soothing.

Doug's eyes opened. Time had pa.s.sed. The room was darker. The room was empty.

Doug sat up, memory exploding in his mind like a fragmentation grenade. Myrtle. John. Angry living room. Spinning car. Television model. Soothing. And now: alone.

Alone. Even the cheese and crackers were gone. The door was over there. The apartment was silent.

Doug, pay attention. The door is over there.

Cautiously, he got to his feet, then to his toes. On tiptoe, silent as a moth in a sweater, he crossed the messy living room to the door, silently reached out to the k.n.o.b, silently turned it, silently pulled the door open.

"Look out!" screamed a voice. "She's got a knife!"

Doug shrieked and dropped to the floor.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n mothuhf.u.c.kuh, Ah'm gone cut your mothuh f.u.c.kin b.a.l.l.s off!"

Wally, startled from his dinner in the kitchen by the sudden sound of his scream alarm-haven't heard the crazed woman with the knife for quite some time, he reflected-hurried into the living room to find the hall door wide open and Doug flat on his face on the floor. Wally crossed to Doug, tapped him on the shoulder, and Doug screamed and fainted.

Light. Voices. Doug, eyes squeezed shut, reoriented himself gradually into s.p.a.ce and time, and on this try memory entered like a gamboling lamb, easy and sweet. He remembered everything, and even understood why he was lying on the floor. The only thing he was confused about was why he hadn't been sliced into tiny ribbons by that crazed woman with the knife.

Don't argue, Doug; just accept.

He rolled over onto his back, opened his eyes, squinted against the light, and sat up. And Andy's voice said, "Here he is now. Sleeping Beauty."

"Slipping Beauty," said John.

Doug looked over toward the sofa and chair, and the usual four were there, gathered around the cheese and crackers: Wally, John, Andy, and Stan. The maniac woman was nowhere to be seen. "All right," he said. "Okay. Enough."

"I'll go along with that," John said. "You sane now?"

"I think so," Doug told him. "And I'll make a deal with you. I don't know who that woman was, or what her problem is, or where she is now, but I'll do whatever you want if you keep her away from me. I never want to see her again. Okay?"

They all looked at one another, as though baffled. Then they all shrugged at one another. Then John said, "It's a deal."

"Good," Doug said, feeling vast relief. "Now I can do it. I'll pay attention to the model, I'll think about the salvage job-"

John said, "The what?"

"Salvage job," Doug said. "That's what you want, isn't it? Bring up something from the bottom of the reservoir. That's a salvage job."

Andy, with a happy smile, said, "There, you see? A professional. As soon as you get the right guy, you got a vocabulary and everything."

"I remember about salvage jobs," John said, sounding irritated again. "From that book I got. Marine Salvage."