Revolution Number 9 (27 page)

“Flipper!” Brucie screamed. “It’s me, it’s me!” Flipper wagged his tail, but didn’t let go.

“Flipper! Flipper!”

“That’s enough,” Charlie said. Did Flipper hear something
simpático
in Charlie’s tone or had he simply realized his error? The dog released Brucie’s leg, trotted back the length of his chain, raised his leg, pissed on the rear wheel. Brucie stopped screaming, looked up at Charlie in terror. “What’s wrong with you?” Charlie said. “Don’t you remember me?”

“I’m sorry. Really and truly sorry. I can’t tell you how sorry. Don’t hurt me.”

“Why would I hurt you?”

“Please. Don’t. I’m already hurt. Flipper hurt me.” Brucie moaned and grabbed his leg, letting go the chain. Flipper knew at once that he was free. He scuttled off down the street on his stubby legs, dragging his restraint behind him like a chain-gang felon on the lam. The Chinese man in the parked car rolled up his window as Flipper went by.

Charlie knelt, rolled up Brucie’s pant leg. Brucie shrank from his touch. “You’re going to live,” Charlie said.

“I am?”

“Unless your pet has rabies.”

“But what about you?”

“Me?”

“Are you gonna let me live?”

“Brucie.”

“Yeah?”

“Have you got me confused with someone else?”

The terror faded slowly from Brucie’s eyes, replaced even more slowly by craftiness, undisguised. “Should I?”

“Should you?”

Brucie bit his lip. “Never mind.” He bit it some more. “Hey,” he said, almost cheerful. “So you’re really not mad at me?”

“Why would I be?”

“No matter who I think you are?”

“Who do you think I am, Brucie?”

“A draft dodge—resister, right? I got you ID, didn’t I? Way back when.”

“Right. So why would I want to kill you?”

“Maybe I overcharged you or somethin’. Mistakes happen.” He rolled over, reached for his wallet, withdrew money. Blue cards came spilling out, fluttered down through a grating and out of sight. “Shit,” said Brucie.

“What was that?”

“The mortgage,” said Brucie. “No big deal.” He held out some bills.

“Put it away,” Charlie said. He took Brucie’s hands, pulled him up. The Chinese man was watching from his car. “Let’s go for a drive.”

Brucie cringed. “What kind of drive?”

“A spin.”

“A spin like to where?”

“Somewhere fun.”

“But—”

“I’m not going to hurt you. Do you want an affidavit?”

“Hee-hee,” Brucie said. “That’s a good one. I’ll have to remember it.”

They got in the car, Brucie behind the wheel, Charlie in the passenger seat. Brucie turned the key, stalled, tried again, steered onto the street. Flipper was half a block down, his snout in an overturned trash can. They got him into the tiny backseat and drove on. A motorcycle growled behind them. “Where to?” said Brucie. “Like some real place, right, with lights and people?”

“Berkeley.”

“Across the bridge?” Brucie made it sound like some fraying thing over a jungle gorge.

“Unless there’s a better way.”

“Well, we could go down to San Jose and then maybe …”

They took the bridge. Looking back, Charlie saw Candlestick Park, lit up like a hot spot on an X ray. Not the usual baseball image, Charlie thought. Baseball was romantic, especially to journalists who had never hit a curve, hit a cutoff man, hit behind a runner. Or been hit with a high rider in the face. It wasn’t as romantic at field level.

They parked on Telegraph Avenue, outside a shop selling peasant clothing from South America, and walked to Sproul Plaza. The night was warm and the plaza crowded, but it no longer made Charlie think of an Oriental bazaar. It was just a college campus, U.S.A. Either the magic was gone, or it had become part of ordinary life, and unremarkable.

They sat on a bench. Two men went by. One said, “My white
count’s borderline.” The other didn’t know what to say. A woman glided past on rollerblades. Brucie glanced around briefly.

“Haven’t been here in a Jesus-long time,” he said. He began tapping his foot, like a patient in a waiting room. “What do you wanna do?”

“Talk.”

“About what?”

Charlie turned to him and smiled. “What are you up to these days, Brucie?”

“Same old shit.”

“How’s your father?”

“Pops? Passed away.” He checked Charlie from the corner of his eye. “What about you?”

“I’m a lobsterman.”

“What’s that?”

“Someone who traps lobsters.”

“Any money in it?”

“Not much.”

Brucie grunted. The crafty look returned. “And you haven’t had any more trouble?” he asked.

“Trouble?”

“Whatever the trouble was that I helped you with.”

“No.”

“So,” Brucie said. He tapped his foot for a while. “You been safe then.”

“Safe?”

“Like no visits from the law, or nothin’.”

“I’ve been safe. How about you?”

“Oh, yeah. I changed my, you know, lifestyle.”

“Then it’s not really the same old shit, is it?”

Brucie blinked. He opened his mouth, to be ready when his brain formulated a response. None came.

“I want you to think back to that summer, Brucie.”

Brucie’s mouth closed.

“The summer that you and I met. And the months that followed. Do you remember that period?”

“Sure. You lived upstairs. Then you split. Right?”

Charlie nodded. “What else?”

“Let It Be
. Wasn’t that the summer of
Let It Be?
There was
the Summer of Love, then the next summer and the next and then
Let It Be.”
He bit his lip. “It all depends on when the Beatles broke up.”

The woman on rollerblades glided by again, like a visitor from a world where only grace mattered. “Did you sell ID to anyone else?”

“When?”

“That summer, or later. Into the next spring, say.”

“Sure. That’s my gig. Was my gig.” Brucie jumped a little, as though he’d been startled. “You’re not workin’ for the cops, or nothin’?”

“Why would you think that?”

Brucie thought. “You’re right. And anyhow why would the cops be bugging me now? It’s too late.”

“Too late for what?”

“For me. Unless there’s a miracle, he said.”

“Who said?”

Brucie waved a tired arm. “This brainy dude I’m makin’ rich. You wouldn’t know him.” His eyes went to Charlie again, narrowing into the crafty look. This time he made an effort to disguise it. It was as though he had had an idea.

“Sounds like you’re the one in trouble,” Charlie said.

“Me? Nah. Just the cost of doing business.”

“What business?”

“Pop’s business. Printing. You know. Engraving.”

“Let me ask you something, Brucie.”

“Ask away.”

“About that summer. Or the period after.”

“Right. The period after.”

“You said you supplied others with ID.”

“Sure, I said it. If you’re not a cop.” Brucie giggled. “Shit,” he said. “Life’s a gas.”

“I’m wondering whether one of your customers might have been a woman.”

“They need ID too. Women’s lib and all that shit.”

“The woman I’m interested in would have been about twenty then.” He described Rebecca, the way he remembered her.

“Don’t ring a bell.”

“Her name was Rebecca Klein, although she probably wouldn’t have used it.”

“Don’t ring a bell,” Brucie said; but his eyes shifted toward Charlie, then rapidly away. He had little control over his body language.

“Are you sure?”

“Sure I’m sure.”

“You seemed to react to the name.”

“The name. Yeah. Rebecca. I reacted to that, yeah. I knew a Rebecca. But it was in the eighties and she was a whore over in Daly City. That’s the only bell it rang. I got the clap. Some bell. Christ.”

Charlie considered other approaches. None seemed promising, not with Brucie. Brucie had been a long shot in the first place. He rose. “See you, Brucie.”

“Huh?”

“Good-bye.”

“You’re leaving?”

“Check.”

“Where are you going?”

“Away.”

Brucie raised a hand, as if to somehow bar his way. Charlie turned, crossed the plaza, passed through the gate and onto Telegraph. He walked for several blocks, paused in front of a comic book store. A blow-up of a blue-faced big-brained being from another galaxy hung in the window. He was saying, “The clue is somewhere in the anti-universe, my dear Xanthanza.” Charlie decided to approach Hugo Klein again, this time more obliquely.

He looked around for a cab. The acne-boy car came to a squeaking stop at the curb. The window slid down and Brucie said, “I can take you back across if you want.”

Charlie got in the car. Flipper was sleeping in the back. Brucie had worked up a sweat in the short time they’d been apart. Charlie could smell him.

Brucie shifted into first and gunned the car through a yellow light. A motorcycle roared behind them. Brucie patted Charlie’s knee. “Hey. Great to see you. You know? Brings back old memories. Those were the days, huh?”

“Were they?”

“Shit, yes. The chicks. Remember? Like willing chicks with no bullshit. A dream come true.”

An acne-boy dream.

“And the music. Jesus.” Brucie, swerving onto the bridge ramp, reached across and flipped open the glove box. Tapes slid out, fell to the floor. Brucie, his head below the dash, scrabbled through them. “Whaddaya like, whaddaya like?” He found something, jammed it in the tape player, jerked the wheel hard to his left to avoid the bridge railing.

“Stairway to Heaven” at 120 decibels plus.

“Led Zep,” Brucie shouted. “Did it ever get any better than that?”

Or something of the kind. Charlie couldn’t really hear him.

The bridge was a glowing span over a black abyss. They seemed to soar across on a current of energy—Brucie’s sudden excitement, the cranked-up volume of the tape player, the souped-up power of the car: each false in its own way. In the southwest, Candlestick was dark, the ballgame over.

“Good to see you,” Brucie shouted. “Shit. I mean it.” This time he left Charlie’s knee unpatted.

Brucie came down off the bridge, turned north onto the Embarcadero. It wasn’t where Charlie wanted to go. He glanced at Brucie, saw sweat shining on his face, and an uncharacteristic purposefulness in his eye. Brucie exited, into the heart of North Beach.

Charlie switched off the music. “You forgot to ask where to drop me,” he said.

“Hee-hee.” Brucie’s smell was stronger. “The thing is, old pal, I think we should drop in on this dude I mentioned.”

“What dude?”

“Or maybe I didn’t. The brainy one.”

“It’s about Rebecca, isn’t it, Brucie? The name meant something to you.”

Brucie depressed his door lock; the lock on Charlie’s side clicked too. “The name. Yeah. The name, but not the person. See, the name I heard before. The little old geezer kept asking me about her.”

“What little old geezer?” Charlie tried to keep his tone calm, casual.

“Oops,” said Brucie.

“Oops?”

“I meant I didn’t get his name.”

“What did he look like?”

“Hard to say.” Brucie stopped in front of a restaurant named Fazool. Across the street lay a park, with an ice cream man standing watch over his wagon, smoking a cigarette; beyond the park a big church, its stone facade illuminated in the night. “An everyday geezer,” said Brucie. “Except this guy was on chemo.”

Now Charlie began to sweat too. “How do you know that?”

“Experience,” said Brucie. “What do you think happened to Pops?”

“I see,” said Charlie, and he did. Brucie opened the door, but before he could get out Charlie gripped his right arm, not gently. “Brucie.”

“Yeah?”

“You turned me in.”

Brucie nodded. “I’m sorry. Really. I got nothin’ against you. Let’s face it—I’d forgotten all about you. But I couldn’t face prison. Did you see that movie, what was it? You know what goes on in those places? I wouldn’t last a day.” With his left hand Brucie brought a silver-plated revolver into view and pointed it at Charlie. “That’s why I’m gonna have to do it again. You’re under arrest.”

Charlie laughed in his face.

“A citizen’s arrest,” said Brucie. “I mean it.” The gun trembled. Charlie let go of his arm. Brucie got out of the car, came around to Charlie’s side, opened the door. “Out,” he said.

Charlie got out of the car.

Brucie pointed the gun at a door in the stucco wall beside the restaurant. “Let’s go.”

“Where?”

“To see the brainy guy. He’ll know what to do.” Brucie motioned with the gun. Charlie moved toward the door. Brucie stepped behind him, touched the small of his back with the
muzzle of the gun. In that one touch, Charlie learned all he needed to know about the future that awaited him if he entered that door.

“I don’t think so,” he said.

“You don’t think what?” asked Brucie, behind him.

Charlie didn’t explain. He’d always been able to move. He moved: ducking and whirling in one motion, then driving up at Brucie’s midsection. His shoulder struck something soft, his fist something hard. Brucie fell back with a grunt; Charlie grabbed at him, caught only a corner of his shirt, which tore off in his hand. Brucie rolled free on the sidewalk, came up on one elbow, the gun pointed at Charlie’s head. His nose was bleeding; the expression on his face primitive. He was stupid enough to be dangerous.

“I’m not taking any more shit,” Brucie said, his voice too loud for whining, not loud enough for shrieking. The gun wasn’t especially steady, but it wouldn’t have to be at this distance. Brucie’s nose twitched, as though he’d suddenly developed a tic. Charlie knew with certainty that he was going to pull the trigger and that there was nothing he could do about it.

A motorcycle burst out of the park across the street, just missing the ice cream man, jumped the sidewalk, spun in a circle around Brucie. The driver was huge, and dressed all in white, except for his black visor. Charlie had a crazy, childish notion that Brucie had already shot him, that he was already dead and this was an angel sent to take him away. But then the motorcycle roared like a killing beast, a hellish beast, and Brucie’s face went white. The driver gestured at him; something shone in his hand. Brucie fell back on the sidewalk, a round red hole now prominent in the center of his white forehead, like a caste mark.