The Caveman's Valentine (26 page)

Thank you Lavonia Millie and Frazer. I enjoyed your company. I enjoyed watching “Laveme and Shirley.” Frazer, when I get back to NYC I’ll tell the drug pushers you’re coming, they better clear out. On second thought, let it be a surprise.

See you,

Romulus Ledbetter

He took the bus to Lumberton but then he didn’t have enough money left for the fare to New York. So he bought a ticket for as far as he could afford, which turned out to be Wilmington, Delaware.

At Wilmington—it was the middle of the night—he got off, then got back on when the driver went into the station for coffee.

Romulus went all the way back to the bus’s cramped bathroom, and shut the door.

He sat on the john, and as the bus pulled out he put his head in his hands and tried to conceive of how one might replicate, with an orchestral instrument, the song of the chuck-will’s-widow. But the engine noise filled his head and made him sleepy, and as soon as he started to drift the chuck-will’s-widow flew off and the nightmare of the tape presented itself.

He had to keep shaking that nightmare off him.

Then somebody rapped on the door. Well, he’d known that was coming.

He only hoped the bus wasn’t full, so he could let whoever needed to come in, while he slipped into a vacant seat way in the back where the driver wouldn’t notice.

But when he opened the door it was Sheila, and he sat down again. She wedged herself into the bathroom and shut the door behind her.

“Shit or get off the pot, Romulus.”

She didn’t fit very well. He was on the toilet, and she was crammed up against the sink, and their knees touched.

“I’m trying to nab a little shut-eye here, Sheila.”

“In here? This place smells disgusting. Don’t they ever clean these places? Or are you
living
here now? Is this your new home, is that why it smells so—”

“I’m tired, Sheila. Not tonight.”

“You’re always tired. Every time I see you, you’re whining about how tired you are. Poor boy. What’s the matter, you
working
too hard?”

She laughed.

Said Romulus, “I’m not whining, it’s a good tired. I’m whipping the sucker. You thought he was innocent, didn’t you? He’s not the killer type, you said. He doesn’t have it in him. Did you see the show? Did you see?”

“I saw.”

“
What
did you see, Sheila?”

“I saw a lot of fishiness.”

“Oh, bullshit. You just can’t admit when you’re wrong. That’s why I couldn’t stay with you.”

“
You
couldn’t stay with
me?”

“All I need is one more break, baby. One little nudge of proof, and Leppenraub’s in the monkey cage. You know, I think I may be finding myself with this work. I’m happier than I’ve been in a long—”

“All you are is way crazier. Lulu tells me now you’re getting nostalgic. Talking about the
bloodlines,
she says, and all the good old days. Your brother could be
dying,
and Lulu says you’ve got this little smile—”

“I’m sorry about my brother. That news hurts me. But listen—that pain, and all these pains, they’re teaching me something.”

“Yeah? What are they teaching you, boy?”

“Don’t you think you can learn from suffering?”

“Hoo yes. I do. I learn a shitload. Learn that I
don’t want
to suffer no more. Where’d you get that shit anyway? Learning from suffering?”

“But it’s true, isn’t it?”

“Crazier and crazier. Romulus. You think you’re on your way up? You’re going down so fast we going to have to pay a well digger to go find you. What’s with you? Your man Stuyvesant using some new kind of ray on your brain?”

“What?”

“Well you always say that’s where your problems—”

“What do you know? What do you know about a new ray?”

“Shit or get off the pot, Romulus, don’t be so selfish. Others have to use these facilities, too.”

She went out. She shut the door. In a moment she knocked again, and Romulus opened it quickly and demanded:

“What do you know about Z-rays?”

Some white woman. Looked like the sister of the owner of the Shady Rest—though this one had let herself go. Her hair was slack and there were pouches under her lonesome eyes. Romulus bowed to her.

“Excuse me, ma’am. It was moving a little
slow
tonight, you know what I mean?”

He pushed past her. He felt her shiver. But she steeled herself and went on in and shut the door, and Romulus cast around quick for a seat to duck into.

There were no seats available. Everybody was asleep and singles were sprawled into neighboring seats. Romulus took an armrest next to a snoring sailor, and hunched down low out of range of the driver’s rearview mirror. He listened to the crashing sea wind of the sailor’s breathing.

He saw that they were on the Jersey Turnpike.

A minute later the white woman pushed past him on her way up to the front, and Romulus went back to his hiding place. Shut the door. Sat.

And he was just drifting off again when he heard some kind of hubbub.

He heard the sailor crying out, “What the fu—”

He heard something on the PA, indistinctly.

Then, quite distinctly, the sailor cried out in disbelief, “A bomb in the bathroom?”

And others: “A
bomb
in the
bathroom!”

Then the bus hit some rough going and Romulus was pitched forward. Then he realized they’d stopped. He cracked the door.

Hubbub and havoc in the aisle.

Romulus looked quickly all about him. The white woman had not looked like any wild-eyed anarchist, but you never knew with these lonely white women.

Everyone scrambled out. The whole busload of them, spilling onto the turnpike shoulder. The driver waited nobly at his post until they had all stepped off. Then he got out himself.

Then Romulus came out.

The white woman said to the driver, “That’s him.”

“That’s who?”

“The bum.”

“
Bum?
What bum?”

“The one I told you about. The bum in the bathroom.”

“You didn’t say
bomb?”

“I said
bum.”

Another passenger said, “I heard you say
bomb.”

“I never said
bomb.
I said there’s a
bum
in the bathroom.”

This went on, but Romulus had passed out of earshot. He walked down the highway, and thirty pairs of eyes followed him, and he kept walking. He walked seven miles through a cold wind to the Walt Whitman Service Area. Wondering all the while,
What is the nature of Z-rays?

S
o far here’s what he knew, or had divined, or believed he had divined, about Z-rays:

1. Z-rays are green. They had been a viridescent green when they had issued from Stuyvesant’s tower, and a kind of greenish burr or buzzing on the black grass in Leppenraub’s moony field.

2. They’re the color of fireflies, of contentment.

3. They’re potent and dangerous. Perhaps they’re even dangerous to the user (Stuyvesant), for he never used them before. He introduced them now only because he’s worried, profoundly worried, about the course of the investigation.

4. Therefore the investigation must be hitting close to home. Romulus must be on the verge of some understanding that could prove damaging, even fatal, to the schemes and fortunes of Cornelius Gould Stuyvesant.

5. Dream on.

6. You’re getting off the track here. You were trying to think about Z-rays, their unique properties. But all these
whoosh-whooshes
of cars, vans, tankers, and semis are making it tough to concentrate, to keep things in order.

7. All right, Z-rays. They’re subtle and mean. They’re not the generation of reality, like Y-rays. No, no. They’re the
infiltration of illusion.

8. In other words, even your dreams aren’t safe.

9. And maybe the Z-rays are getting to you. Sweet-talking you, throwing you subtly off course.

10. Y-rays make you suffer. But Z-rays throw an arm over your shoulder and tell you, “Sure, suffering’s tough, I know that, I’m on your side. But suffering has its place, doesn’t it? We learn through suffering. All great art and understanding is born of suffering.”

11. Z-rays whisper, “Cast a cold eye on suffering and you’ll be rewarded by the good life—you know what I mean, amigo?”

12. Z-rays whisper, “You know, you’re doing quite well these days, amigo. You’re getting healthier. Sanity is just around the corner, don’t you think? And by the way, don’t you think it’s about time to forget about that silly Stuyvesant character—to leave him alone?”

13. Z-rays whisper, “Considering the joys of fireflies and martinis and extravagant sex and great expansive lawns, aren’t you tired of being such a pain in the ass?”

14. Z-rays whisper, “You could drop your childish paranoia right this second, right here on this highway, and welcome home to sanity and sweetness—WELCOME HOME, AMIGO. How about it?”

15.
Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

H
e caught a ride with a trucker back to the city.

M
essages awaited him at the cave.

Half a sheet of yellow legal paper had been speared on a stick:

Hope you had a nice vacation. Hope you never come back. But if you do, call me right away.

Cork

Furthermore, the little red light was winking on the answering machine. His friend Special Agent Jake Claw of the FBI.

“Mr. Ledbetter, we’d be interested in your conclusions regarding a certain greenish, kindly emanation from the Tower of the Perfectly Real and Good. How much do you know, fellow citizen? Have a nice day. Spring has sprung.”

But in fact spring had unsprung. Romulus was freezing. Two of his coats had been purloined while he’d been gone. Only the worst-for-wear remained. He put that on, and wrapped a blanket around himself.

Finally he perused the cave drawings.

They had been sketched on a flat mossless slab of rock above the mattress. A stick figure with a black, oval head. A stick dog, showing its fangs at the stick man.

A piano, a moon, a pentangle, and a telephone number.

Beside the drawings, hanging from a knob of rock, was a brown grocery bag with a card pinned to it. No name on the card, just a red heart painted with fingernail polish. He opened the package. He found the pair of silken boxer shorts that Bob and Betty had given him and that he had last seen when Moira pulled them off him.

He walked down to Payson Street and called Cork, but Cork wasn’t around.

Then he called, collect, the telephone number that Moira had left beside her drawings.

She accepted charges and he asked her, “How’d you find my cave?”

“I went to Inwood Park and I just kept asking. I was disappointed you weren’t there. I wanted to see you.”

“You’d have seen a dirty bum.”

“I know.”

“I stink. I wear a pot for a hat.”

“A what? A pot? Why?”

“Keeps my head warm. I wouldn’t have wanted to see you.”

She held that one a moment. “OK.”

“But thank you. I mean thanks for the drawings.”

“Scrape my number off the rock before I get perverts calling, all right, Rom?”

“Who visited us?”

“What?”

“That night. Who came looking for me?”

“Oh. That was Vlad. I didn’t let him upstairs, though. You didn’t have to run.”

“Moira, I saw a movie yesterday.”

“Was it good? No good movies ever come up here.”

“It was a movie your brother made.”

“Oh. You better not tell me about it.”

“I have to.”

“No you don’t. And I don’t have to listen.”

“Your brother’s a fiend.”

“No he’s not.”

She was weeping.

Romulus said, “You know he’s a fiend. You were there when he tried to kill me.”

“That was Vlad. I’m sure it was Vlad who tried to run you over. Vlad would have done something like that—if he thought it would please David. David swears he had nothing to do with it.”

“And Scotty? What does David say about—”

“He didn’t kill him. He didn’t kill him.”

“You
know
—”

“I don’t care what I know. He’s my brother. I love him. Stop it. He’s a tough man, and sometimes he can be cold, and he’s sick, but he’s
not
—”

“Yes he is. And I’m going to find some way to prove it. Jesus, Moira. You can step out of the fucker’s shadow now. He’s a murderer, he—”

“Stop it. He didn’t kill Scotty. I love him, he’s my brother! He’s scared, that doesn’t make him a murderer. Please don’t hurt him, Rom!”

He listened to her cry.

She said his name again. “Rom.”

“What?”

“If I . . . if . . . Could we see each other again but not talk about . . . my brother? You wouldn’t ask me about my brother?”

“I would. I’d ask you
everything
about your brother.”

“Rom.”

“I’d just keep asking and asking.”

There was nothing from her end for a minute, then she whispered, “Please don’t hurt him, Rom. He’s going to die.”

“Yeah. He’s going to die in prison.”

Then he flinched because he knew the dial tone was coming, and it did.

H
e collected himself, then tried Cork again. This time he got him.

Romulus suggested, “Saint Veronica’s? This afternoon?”

“No.”

“You busy? Tomorrow then?”

“Cut the church shit. Cut all of your shit. All your fairy tales, stuff ’em. Where’ve you been?”

“I took a most intriguing journey—”

“Tell me where, Caveman.”

“North Carolina.”

“How’d you get there?”

“Bus.”

“When did you leave?”

“Monday night. Just before midnight. Why?”

“No, that’s what
I
want to know. Why?”

“Because you recommended I take a vacation.”

“Odd time of night to start a vacation.”

“I wanted to wake up in the South.”

“What did you do Monday night before you left?”

“I was in the cave, watching the Knights game. Before that I rode the subways, raising a little scratch for the trip.
Why?”

“See anything unusual that night?”

“I saw a million unusual things. I was on the New York City subways. Why?”

“How long you been back?”

“An hour.”

“You heard any news about your friend Matthew Donofrio?”

Suddenly Romulus realized he was on the phone with a cop, and the phone went cold in his hand. What a cop knows about the people we know, we never want to hear.

“Matthew? What about Matthew?”

“Well. He’s alive.”

“What happened?”

“That’s what so many of us are wondering. They found him out by the Henry Hudson Parkway, on the slope under the Cloisters. Just a heap, they found. Let me see. His jaw’s busted, his hip’s busted, his left tibia I understand looks like what we used to do to Turkish taffy bars on winter days, what else? His right wrist don’t work. They carved something on his cheek, but you can’t see what it is. They ruptured his spleen. They banged up his head. The left side of his face hasn’t quite woke up yet but they say it will.”

“What
happened
to him?”

“Who can say?”

“What does
he
say?”

“He says he was drunk and he walked into a tree. What do
you
say, Caveman?”

“I guess he’s scared to talk.”

“Or else they’re just nasty fucking trees you got in your neck of the woods. You send your trees to guard school?”

Romulus didn’t say anything.

Said Cork, “Hey, I’m sorry—sorry I was a wise-ass there. He was—you’re pretty close to him, huh?”

“Where is he?”

“Bellevue.”

“Bellevue? But that’s way the hell down—”

“That’s where they take deadbeats.”

“I’ll call you back.”

“Wait a minute, Caveman. Just wait one goddamn—”

I
f you’re in training for hell, thought Romulus, do your warm-ups in Bellevue.

The man standing before the desk had blood all over his shirt, which had been a beautiful satin thing with tassels. The nurse kept telling him over and over that he was at the wrong desk, that he needed to go to the emergency room. He didn’t understand. An orderly told him in Spanish. The man said something back, but not in Spanish, or English, or any other tongue that Romulus was familiar with. He tried to unbutton his shirt. The nurse said forcefully, no. The man then recited, in English, in a voice equally as forceful as the nurse’s, the Pledge of Allegiance to the United States of America. Seemed to be the only English he knew. Also seemed to think that was
enough.

As though all you had to do was flash a little loyalty, show them your puppy-dog devotion to your old pal America, and they’d take out the bullet. As though it were just that simple.

But he looked to be no more deluded than a dozen other suppliants in that waiting room.

Romulus marched past them all. Strode purposefully right through the double doors into the bowels of Bellevue, and no one stopped him, and he was instantly lost.

No one that he met in his wanderings had heard of Matthew Donofrio. Romulus kept shuffling along, kept asking. He shuffled through miles of corridors, serpentine and sulfurous. He received glimpses—slender, lightning peeks—of astounding horrors, before doors were shut in his face. He shuffled in circles, in barbed diagonals, in spirals. He went up and down stairs, up and down like a hospital graph. He made a handful of friends, and hosts—howling legions—of enemies.

For hours he journeyed. Then at the end of a long withering tunnel he came upon a fat little South Pacific idol, a pagan totem with a woman’s face and a nurse’s uniform. The totem asked him what he was doing out of bed.

“They told me Matthew Donofrio might be up on floor five.”

“This isn’t the fifth floor.”

“No?”

“But really,” she said, “you’re not a patient? You’ve really come to visit Matthew Donofrio? Well, for Pete’s sake. It’s about time he had a visitor.”

Then she took him to see Matthew.

His jaw was bandaged and his brow, and the rest of him was under a sheet, so Romulus could see only a bit of his swollen purple skin. He did see the eyes, which had no expression. Romulus turned back to the nurse.

“Is he in a coma?”

The nurse was gone, though. Matthew answered for her. “No. He’s not in a coma.”

A tiny voice. His mouth hardly moved. He said, “Did you bring me any morphine, Rom?”

“No, I don’t have any.”

“Nobody does. People I trust here, you know, people I never did no harm to, they lie like pushers. They keep all the morphine for themselves.”

There was something on the next bed. Or it was part of the bed, a bed-tumor—except that it breathed. Romulus tried not to look at it.

“How long you been in here, Matthew?”

“I got no fucking idea. What month is it?”

“March.”

“Yeah but what year?”

“Who did this to you, Matthew?”

Matthew murmured, “Guess what, I’m cured. I don’t cry no more.”

“Who did this to you?”

“Guys with no faces.”

“No faces?”

“Just like the fucker you’re always talking about.”

“Stuyvesant.”

“I always thought you were full of shit, Rom. Now I know better. You’re right. Leppenraub and your fucker Stuyvesant, they’re in this together.”

“How many were there?”

“Two.”

“Did you hear their voices? Leppenraub, did you hear—”

“I don’t know. I know one of them never said nothing.”

“But the other one? What did he say?”

“He didn’t say much either. They wanted to know where you lived.”

“Why?”

“They wanted the videotape. Did you see the videotape, Rom?”

“Yes.”

Matthew winced, but he didn’t cry. “It’s all about Scotty?”

“Yes.”

“I showed them, Rom—I showed them where your cave was. The guy used a knife on me. He was going to draw a picture of a tree on my face with a knife. He didn’t though. I guess because I showed them where your cave was. I don’t remember showing them. I mean . . . I
do
remember, but I wish to fuck I didn’t. I wish to fuck you had some morphine.”

“I don’t have any. Who drew the picture?”

“He didn’t, because I told them where you lived.”

“But which one? Which one was the tree artist? The one that talked or the other one?”

“The silent one. Rom?”

“What.”

“What did they do to Scotty in the videotape?”

“Scotty’s dead. You can’t do anything for him. You should try to forget about him.”

“OK.”

“You’ll forget about him?”

“Sure. Rom?”

“What?”

“What did they do to him?”

“They hurt him. That’s enough to say.”

“Why does Leppenraub do that to people?”

“I don’t know. I’ll find out. Matthew, why didn’t you tell my daughter about these guys?”

“Your daughter?”

“Yeah. I gave you her number.”

“I lost it, Rom.”

“So why didn’t you tell the cops?”

“They wouldn’t have believed me. They’d have said I was crazy.”

“You should tell them.”

“Or else they
would
believe me. Just for a minute, you know, Rom? You know how sometimes you believe people just for a minute before you realize they’re fucking with your head? So they’d believe me like that till they called Leppenraub, and he’d set ’em straight, show ’em how I was just fucking with their heads. Then he’d come here to this room late at night like I keep waiting for and he’d carve the rest of that tree in my face and then he’d kill me. And they’d have lots of hospital forms, and all those forms would all say I just checked out. Checked out against doctors’ orders. The way street people do, you know? No forwarding address.”

Romulus had nothing to say, but to say nothing meant listening to that breathing in the bed next to Matthew’s. So he said:

“Matthew, you’ve
got
to—”

“I’m not scared of him killing me, Rom, I want him to do that. He killed me already when he killed Scotty, so great, let him finish it off. But first, see, he’ll want to finish that tree. Don’t let him finish that tree, Rom.”

“I can’t do shit unless you help me. You’ve got to talk to the cops. Or let me talk to them—”

“No. If you tell the cops he’ll finish that tree. You know he will.
Promise me
you won’t tell the cops.”

“Maybe they’d help.”

“The
cops?”

Put it that way, how could Romulus argue?

He stood for a long time looking down at his friend.

“All right,” he finally said. “I won’t tell them, Matthew.”

“Can you get me any morphine?”

“I can’t.”

“Just a little something off the street?”

“Do you have any kin, Matthew? Anybody you want me to—”

“They’ve been notified. Nobody’s come by yet, but I’m sure they’ll all be piling in here any minute.”

More silence. After too much of it, Romulus glanced over at the next bed.

Said Matthew, “He’s all right, Rom. He just forgets to breathe sometimes. He’ll remember in a minute.”