The Box (3 page)

Remal began a smile, a comer of his mouth curving. Then suddenly he turned to the clerk. “He landed on your company’s pier, Whitfield. The responsibility…”

“It—is—not!”

“You interrupt, Whitfield.”

“I know what comes next. I should persuade the captain to get the paperless lunatic out of the country.”

Remal waited but this turned out to be of no help.

“Head office of my shipping firm is in London. I can’t telegraph for instructions and get an answer before the captain leaves. I can’t ask him to stay—his ship isn’t a company vessel. My company leases both pier and depot from your state; it’s a small shipping point only, which is why I am executive clerk on this station.” The clerk sat up, feeling ridiculous with the pomp of his speech. He therefore put his arms on the rim of the tub, sat straight, and imagined he was sitting like this on a throne.

“Whitfield,” said the mayor, “how can you refuse all responsibility for a sick man who lands on your pier?”

“Oh, that,” and the clerk let himself slide back into the water. He looked up at the ceiling and said, “Of course I will visit him in the hospital.”

There was more talk, polite talk guided by Remal, but it was clearly tapering-off talk. It showed how flexible Remal was. It showed, perhaps, that the mayor was thinking of another way.

“Perhaps it will all be very simple,” he said and got up.

“Perhaps the man will die?”

“Of course not, Whitfield.” Remal smoothed his tunic and took a deep breath. This showed how large his chest was. “He will wake up, talk, and explain everything.” And Remal walked out.

The man from the box did not talk for several days.

Chapter 3

At first they thought that he was in a coma. He was extremely unresponsive, and of course there had been the blows on the head with the axe handle.

They washed him and shaved his face and put him to bed.

Then they thought of it as a deep sleep, due to extreme exhaustion. But for that diagnosis he slept too long. Catatonic stupor was suggested, but that did not fit either. When they sat him up he collapsed again.

They let him lie in bed and attached various tubes.

“Same?”

“Same.”

They were French nurses and the older one was in his room because she had to switch glucose bottles. The younger one always came in a few times each day to see how the man was doing.

“Look at him,” said the younger one. “How he looks.”

“You look at him, Marie. I know how he looks.”

“A baby—”

“Marie,” said the older one, “he does not look like a baby. With that face.”

“He’s just thin.”

“You talk about babies a great deal, Marie.”

“Don’t you think he looks gentle?”

“Well, he’s asleep.”

“I think he looks gentle. I think that he probably is.”

They watched how he tried to turn in his sleep….

He tried to turn in his chair but the man behind him cut the heel of his hand into the side of Quinn’s face, not hard, but mean nonetheless, and effective. I’m not going to make more of this than it is, Quinn thought, this is just meant to be one more of his talks. With trimming this time, but just a talk.

Quinn kept his head straight, as he was supposed to do, and looked at Ryder behind the leather-inlaid desk. How a fat bastard with a sloppy mouth can be so hard, thought Quinn. How? I’ve got to find out. I must find this out.

Ryder sat still in his chair on the other side of the desk and the window behind him showed a very well defined stretch of electrified skyline. That’s why he looks so impressive, thought Quinn. That and the red silk bathrobe. And the desk, and the tough guy behind me.

“You got maybe a lot of education,” said Ryder, “but you ain’t smart, Quinn.”

“Can’t get over it, can you, that you never got past reform school?”

Ryder shook his head at the man behind Quinn’s chair and said, “Don’t hit him again. That’s just smart-aleck talk.”

“Smart-aleck lawyer talk,” said the man behind Quinn. “They’re all alike.”

“No, they’re not,” said Ryder. He coughed with a wet sound in his throat. Then he lowered his head, which added another chin. And suddenly he yelled, with a high. fat man’s voice. “This one ain’t smart enough! You, Quinn! You were hired to be smart in this organization, not stupid, you shyster, not stupid enough to try and slice yourself in!”

Ryder closed his eyes and sat back in his chair. He wheezed a little, which was the only sound in the room.

Quinn said very quietly, “I’m not slicing myself in. I’m improving the organization.”

“Hit him!” said Ryder without opening his eyes.

Quinn got a jolt on the side of the head, and when he tried to get up the man behind him cut the edge of his palm down on Quinn’s shoulder.

Quinn exhaled with a sudden sound, like a cough almost, and bent over in the chair. He bent and stayed there. Of all the things he wanted to do—mostly violent and some quite insane—he did none of them. He held still with the pain in him and felt he could actually see it. A red wave with blue edges. Don’t move, don’t move, because that way, Ryder, that way I’ll get you later for this.

“Those unions are mine,” Ryder was saying, “and that sews up the waterfront. I think you’re trying to undo that for me, Quinn.”

“All I really did…”

“You’re lying, Quinn. You reshuffled the North end docks so that I got less say-so and you got more. And clever too.”

“Shyster clever,” said the man behind the chair.

“No. Not crooked at all. That’s where he got me. Never occurred to me to look for a straight way I could get robbed.”

“Okay, Ryder,” and Quinn sat up. “The set-up is still yours and the fact that you’re making less money has to do with the racket squeeze and nothing with me.”

“Then how come you’re making more money, Quinn?”

“I’m not.”

“You’re lying.”

“Should I hit him?” said the man behind the chair.

“Shut up. Quinn, you listen to me. You been working good the two years you’ve been over to my side, good like a real hustler. But do it for me, not for you.”

Nothing else came and there was just the wheezing from Ryder, and then a clink. When Quinn looked up, he saw that Ryder had put his false uppers into the water glass. He was going to bed.

“You mean you’re done?” said the man behind Quinn’s chair. “He’s walking out?”

“Sure,” said Ryder. All the words made a flabby sound. “He’s smarter now than he was.” Ryder bunched his empty mouth, then let it hang again. “And he knows we got methods—”

My God, what a face, thought Quinn. And I wish I had hit him and his face looked like that because I had done it to him.

“Out,” said the man behind the chair. “You got the message.”

After that, on the street, Quinn just walked. But it wasn’t enough moving for all the holding still he had done. He concentrated on a dream that came out ugly and strong, red, with blue edges—and then I go over, cool as cool, I don’t listen any more. I am cool as cool, fire inside though, fire in fist now, and suddenly ram that into the executive pouch—poof! plate jumps out, face collapses, fat lips hanging down, and I step on the plate, a crunch of pure pleasure—

“No, Ryder, you shut up and you listen because
I
pulled
your
teeth. No, Ryder, why hustle for you? And why is it I can make more than you but hustle for you? And why is it I’m smarter than you but it makes no difference? Why try being like you and get pushed for it, not being like you? Answer me, Ryder. Don’t flinch when I’m screaming. Just answer me. What’s the big answer—Ah, forgot, you haven’t got any teeth.” And then cool with my rage inside me, I hand him his plate, pink and white stuff that’s left of it, something like splintery gravel, and let it dribble into his water glass. And I leave and laugh. I want to laugh very hard, this is funny, I laugh harder, this could be so funny, why in hell can’t this be funny….

“Same?”

“I don’t know, Marie. Would you close the windows for me?”

“Look. He’s sweating.”

“I know. The first time. Close the windows for me, Marie, while I strap this.”

“But the heat…”

“Sirocco coming. Doctor Mattieux put a note on the board.”

“Ah. I hope this one is short.”

“They are sometimes the strongest.”

“How the last one screamed, you remember? How that sand can scream.”

“You have pinched the curtain in the window.”

“Oh. Why are you strapping him?”

“Mattieuxs order. He has been too restless.”

“Perhaps he wants to wake up?”

“In the meantime the straps, so he cannot cut himself on the needle.”

“Why doesn’t Mattieux wake him up? Perhaps just a little ammonia, perhaps no more and he would wake up.”

“Doctor Mattieux said, perhaps he is in this coma because he needs to be.”

“You know, Renee, he doesn’t look gentle today. He looks very much as if he were suffering.”

They watched how he tried to turn in his sleep….

He did not dream of the good times, the times when he had reached out and touched success; only the failures became important. He didn’t dream how he had gone ahead and split the organization right down the middle, the sweet sight of the power running right out of Ryder’s hands, the sweet sight of Ryder himself full of threatening talk, sweet silence from Ryder while he, Quinn, felt the better man, because he was worse than Ryder.

He dreamt how he tried to turn in his bed and couldn’t.

“Who in hell…”

“Lie still.”

“That’s all right,” said another voice from across the dark room. “Let him get up. So he’ll know.”

Quinn knew who it was even before he was out of the bed and before he could see well enough. He said, “Ryder, you son of a bitch! Ah, there’s two more? The strong arm? You don’t think…”

“I don’t have to, Quinn, and as for you, it won’t do you any good.”

“You have those goons lay a hand on me, Ryder, and you think I don’t have the set-up to make you float down the river by six in the morning?”

“Tut, tut, such violence. Show him, Jimmy.”

There were, after all, two of them and they hadn’t just woken up. They got him without a punch. A silent, panting affair. A wrestler. Not one punch but all wrestler, and the other one could murder me any place, any way, with his buddy’s grip crippling me out of shape. And he’s just standing there, doing what—

“Ryder, listen to me. I’ve got a call coming in, five in the morning, and if I don’t answer…”

“I’m not interested, Quinn. Whyn’t you watch what he’s doing?”

What is he doing?—Ryder wiping his sloppy mouth, the gorilla behind me not moving a muscle and neither can I, and the other—knife? No. Fountain pen? I should sign them a document?

“I left standing orders, Ryder, I told you once, that should I get roughed up…”

“No violence, Quinn. Look.”

Damn, this grip on my back, my arms like worms, and the waiting, the waiting, and why don’t you hit—ah, the other one heard me think, coming over—

“Ryder, for God’s sake—”

“Doesn’t hurt, Quinn. Just a little sting.”

And the man comes over and carries the syringe and a needle. A small, cold-looking thing like that and I’ve never been so scared in my life.

“Ryder, what in
hell—
”

“No violence, Quinn, nothing like it. But you’ll end up a changed man.”

“Where’ll I put it?” said the one with the needle.

“Any place. What’s the difference?”

“Come on already,” said the one holding Quinn doubled over. “He’s trying to struggle or something.”

“Ryder!
What is it?
”

“Trip around the world for you, Quinn. In a coffin. Ever hear of the method?”

“My God, Ryder—”

“You’ll be a changed man, Quinn. Maybe a better one. Give it to him, Jimmy.”

Ryder, for heaven’s sake—and I didn’t even feel it, didn’t feel anything at the start of such an important—Letting go of me now? You let go too soon. Watch what I mean by you let go too soon—too thick this air, too thick in the brain, but you, Ryder, I get you, don’t float away, Ryder, oh my God please don’t leave….

“How he sweats.”

“But he’s lying still now. Put the fan in the door, Marie.”

“Mercy, how that sirocco screams.”

“Not yet, really. It will get worse….”

Dead. Dead? Nonsense. I wouldn’t ask if I were. But this nonsense of not knowing what’s up or down. Drug in the head explains it, explains everything. Yes. Feeling fine. Feel fine with gray cotton inside of me and black cotton outside of me. Ah, not cotton at all but space to move. Black space to move. Closet? Of course, of course. Everything else is pure nonsense. For the moment I can only remember sheer
nonsense
. Everything will be all right—
all right!
There
must
be a door,
must—
I
must stop screaming—

Fine now. At the bottom of panic it is very quiet. No, no. There is no need to move. Careful now, leisurely so as not to frighten. I am not frightened. I can say it. Say box. You see? Since box, by any other name, still makes no sense—Easy, please, please—

And I remember as a matter of fact that a Seventeenth-Century nobleman who had displeased his king was made to spend nine, was it nine? Was made to spend all those years in a cage, having fewer conveniences, fewer water cans. I am sure, no little cabinets full of provisions, no little pills. And for example once a child was found in a closet without light, the child moon-white and lemur-eyed, but it got out! Got Out!
Got to get out!

—How dull inside my head. But better this way, much better and thank you, little pill. And though dull, I will check again, check the entire universe, all the cans, all the boxes in boxes what blessed certainty—

One, two, three, five… Watch it.

One two, two, three… No! I insist on the right count, left count, right, twoop, threep, foa, one twoop, rip,
rip
to pieces, I am ripping
apart!

—And cannot stand the screaming any more, I can’t any more, can’t, though wish I were more tired. Dead tired. No! Don’t go out! Please, little flame, don’t go out! And please stay little inside your egg and then sometime when it cracks, little flame, you can leap more—Crack? Wait! Don’t go out, little flame, jump a little—