The Royal Family (60 page)

After an hour he went home. It was still early.

He picked up the phone, dialled, and said: This is Henry Tyler. I waited all night and Mr. Chong never came out.

That’s right, he said, narrowing his eyes. You heard what I said. I figure he’s clean. I figure we don’t need to bother him.

Well, that’s too bad, he said. I don’t want this case. I’m busy.

Fine, he said. I’ll send you an invoice.

Tyler, waiting for hospital visiting hours so that he could go see Irene, whose abscesses had finally won her admission, inspected his reflection on the plasticized marble wall behind the firehouse red beer tap of what used to be Blackie’s Club and was now the Wonderbar although the Blackie’s Club sign was still up above the back door. Oldies on the jukebox brought teary smiles to his alcoholic neighbor. The door of happiness opened on TV. Loreena the barmaid, hand on her hip, served the gesticulating or placidly nodding drinkers.

Well, what do you have to tell me? said Dan Smooth, easing his plump buttock onto the stool to Tyler’s right.

There’s a bull market for twelve-year-olds’ earwax is my news, said Tyler. What else can I tell you? Oh, I know. A stitch in time saves nine. How was Amsterdam?

Don’t talk to me about sewing, said Smooth, with his habitual angry leer. It reminds me of the little girls in pink tutus who—

OK, mum’s the word then, said Tyler carelessly. Buy you a shot?

In a moment, said Smooth. You see, I still have a special secret taste on my palate.

Tyler sipped his tequila silently.

And how are your business worries progressing? said Smooth.

Oh, they’re progressing, all right. I’m barely making my rent and car payments as it is.

You’ll be happier when you let it all go and become homeless, Smooth replied quickly. And, you know, I was just talking with the Queen about you, and she says that’s destined to happen.

After the other Canaanites get put to the sword?

Exactly. And I go to the lions. Not that I’m a Christian or anything . . . Shit. There goes the taste. What a pretty taste. It’s fading now; it’s
gone
 . . . what a shame. Buy me a drink, Henry. The hell with your rent money.

Tyler raised a finger. —Loreena! Could I get a beer for this gentleman?

Sure, sweetie, said Loreena.

How’s everything for you, dear? said Smooth.

The same, said Loreena. I’m thinking of filing a restraining order. Excuse me. That guy down there got eighty-sixed last week. I need to go kick him out. Hey, Domino just told me a good one. What do you get when you cross a nymphomaniac with a kleptomaniac?

A rapist, said Tyler.

Oh, cut it out.
A fuckin’ thief.
Isn’t that rich? Ha, ha, ha!

The bar was getting more crowded now. Tired men, old men, hopeless men, and a pair of whores gradually entered through the swinging door, fluttering about as prettily as the international flags strung over Grant Street. Two drunks were arguing across the pool table.

Dan, said Tyler suddenly, do you think you could hook me up with the FBI? Get me a big job that would last a while?

Hee, hee, said Smooth wiggling his finger in the mouth of his beer bottle. God love you, Henry, are you asking for another favor?

Yeah, said Tyler.

You know I used my influence for you. With the Queen, Henry, with the
Queen
. You know that, or you don’t know?

I know, muttered Tyler, tapping his foot.

And have you profited by your introduction to her?

What the hell’s that supposed to mean?

Word on the street’s you’re giving up on that new Irene she got you. You said all you wanted was to have Irene back and she did that for you and you’re still not satisfied. You’re just a—

I’m going to the hospital to see her.

I rest my case. You’re keeping her in the hospital, not at your place, so what kind of goddamned
caring
is that, son?

It’s all true. And so I don’t know if I’m not trying hard enough—if I don’t have enough faith in the Queen to really love Irene and believe in her—or if I’m actually being faithful to the Irene who’s lying in the ground. And I—I don’t know what to do.

Well, at least you’re sincere, Smooth said. The Queen loves sincere people.

Yeah, Tyler said despondently.

And you believe in justice?

What do you mean?

You believe that if you were working for the FBI you’d be helping good people and punishing bad people?

I, uh—

Tell me a story about our great justice system, Henry.

Know how the police broke this one guy? said Tyler with a sneering chuckle. What they did was they hooked him up to a photocopy machine. And on the glass over the electric eye, underneath the cover, they put a piece of paper that said
“FALSE.”
So every time they’d ask the suspect a question, they’d hit the
“START”
button. And then a piece of paper that said “
FALSE
” would come out. So they’d show that to the suspect and say: See? You’re
lying.
And they broke that guy. He confessed.

All right. Fine. You’re on our side. You’re a Canaanite. And how much influence do you think I have with Louis Freeh?

Let me guess. You’re about to tell me you don’t have any.

Splendid! cried Smooth, loudly enough for one of the drinkers to turn his head frowningly.

Oh, forget it, said Tyler.

We can’t forget it now, no matter how much we both may want to, rejoined the odious man. You’re anxious, I take it, about your actual survival. You’re pissing blood these days. Am I correct, Henry?

Tyler shrugged his shoulders despairingly.

Don’t think I don’t want to help you. We’re
blood
brothers, after all. Tell me we’re blood brothers, Henry.

We’re blood brothers, said Tyler dully, remembering the autobiography of a serial killer which he’d thumbed through some months ago: the murderer, since electrocuted in Florida, had always made his victims parrot at knifepoint some puerile affirmation of sexual or emotional need before he raped and eviscerated them. What a world! I don’t want to be in this world any longer, he thought to himself.

Henry, I can see you’re desperate. All the fight’s gone out of you.

Tyler smiled bitterly.

All the same, Smooth continued, you’re a lucky whore-hound. The Queen likes you; I know she does . . .

What’s on your agenda for the Queen and me? said Tyler, unable to keep the anxiety from his voice.

Number one: You came to me, not I to you. Number two: You begged me and bribed me to set you up with the Queen. True or false?

I’ve got to go to the hospital, said Tyler.

To visit
Irene,
I know. Let me come along, Henry.

Are you a sadist? asked Tyler in slow quiet wonder.

Anyhow, it’s not your job you’re worried about, said Smooth, gazing smilingly into his eyes. If I truly believed you cared about that, I would never have picked you up. It’s your sister-in-law’s
rotten, stinking twat . . .

Nothing about Irene was rotten or ever could be, said Tyler steadily.

That’s what I like about you. Caught in an obsession—a delusion, really—and a very harmful, antisocial one, and the man will not give up! Hey, Loreena! This man fucked his own sister-in-law to death and now he—

Tyler leaped off his stool and was already cocking his arm for the punch when Smooth kicked him in the stomach. Tyler doubled over retching.

I’m a black belt, you know, Smooth whispered, his breath tickling Tyler’s ear. You had
to be
humbled.
Now here. I’m putting three hundred dollars in your pocket. Don’t thank me. It’s not from me; it’s from the Queen . . .

He knew by then that it would never work out with the false Irene, but he knew also that he didn’t even have to tell her, that unless he physically assaulted her she would never regard him with all the bright-eyed watchful head-turns of a sick pigeon on the sidewalk, still strong and fearful at the very beginning of its death-struggle, because except physically the false Irene could not really be hurt anymore, so all he had to do was not see her and maybe not even tell the Queen that it hadn’t worked out because the Queen had tried to be good to him—he continued in awe of her, fearing to reject her gifts. Last time he’d seen her she’d stood naked against a concrete wall, supporting her little breasts with her hands while the other girls started drawing snakes on the wall, and he didn’t know what to make of it—were they playing or was it a ceremony or what? Dan Smooth would undoubtedly have told him the answer, but listening to Smooth left him almost exhausted.

A siren went by. Irene wiggled a loose black tooth and finally pulled it out. Her breath reeked of decay.

(But he recollected the time he came by dead Irene’s early one morning and knocked at the door for a long time until Irene woke up. John was away on business. When Tyler embraced her, her body likewise gave off a sour smell which shocked him.)

This black guy, this dope dealer put a gun in my mouth, the false Irene explained. Said that was the only way he could come. I started cussing him out and I got out of there, but not before he whacked me in the teeth with his gun, and this tooth here was funny ever since. I think it died a long time time ago, maybe right after he did that.

Here’s a tissue, he said. Why don’t you pack it in the hole until it stops bleeding—yeah, that’s good.

You’re a nice guy, Henry, she said dully. I wish I could be nicer. I don’t know why I can’t, but I just can’t.

He stroked her hair.

I used to wish I was dead, she said brightly, but one day I woke up and realized I was already dead, you know, where it counts, so why not relax and not make a big stink?

I know another dead Irene who—

But dead people do stink no matter what they ever meant to do . . . And now it’s easier . . . Hey, can you gimme five dollars? Just five. I’m not greedy. I’m not well; I need some medicine, you know what kind . . .

Sure, he said. Here you go.

Where do you get your money from anyway?

From business.

Oh, I’m sorry, baby. I didn’t mean to butt in. I didn’t know you had anything to hide. I mean, the Queen told me you’re in love with a dead girl and I’m supposed to be her, so I just kind of figured you’d . . .

Tyler said nothing. A fly landed on Irene’s filthy neck and she wearily brushed it away.

Can I tell you my real name? she said. My real name’s Consuelo.

He felt gratefulness and pain. She wanted to share something with him after all; she
was freeing him from her; now she could not be Irene anymore; he had to admit that Irene would never be his or even be with him, and alone he would live on and on.

My husband took the fall for my brother, Consuelo said. My brother’s no good. He got caught by that three strikes law. Suspicion of robbery, they said. It was only suspicion. He’s doing three months. An’ some whore named Chokecherry, kind of a frightening name, well, she and he . . . So I started . . . doing . . .
this
 . . .

She was crying.

Oh, God, she sobbed. I started doing this, but I was doing this before, and I was lying to you to make you feel sorry for me but you don’t care and I don’t want you to care, I don’t even . . . I’m just a piece of shit. What do I have to lie to you for? You’ve always been decent to me; you don’t judge me, but I—

So when does your husband get out, Consuelo?

Oh, it doesn’t feel right when you call me by my name; I should never have told you. . .

Driving down Nineteeth toward the Golden Gate, he reached the gas station at Pacheco and turned right, coming home amidst the whitish houses whose dormer windows bulged blindly like the eyes of dead frogs. The neighbor’s blue flashing light was on. The trees were snipped and sculpted alike from lawn to lawn—Italian cypresses and then bonsai’d trees. He had been with the false Irene too long now. He could scarcely fathom this place. He honestly could not understand why God had put him here in this cool clean zone while the false Irene and the Queen and all that crew had to live in filth. Or was it their choice? Or was it heredity, destiny, class conflict, inevitability? He was angry with everyone, even with the Queen.

He awoke with the taste of the real Irene’s cunt in his mouth.

After a week of mendacious coolness the heat had returned. Tyler’s car was at the local shop, Sacramento labor being a relative bargain, so he walked down to J Street where across from the palm-tree’d square once called Freedom Park by the Wobblies, then Plaza Park by the corporations which had transformed Sacramento from a hot slow farming town into a desperately ugly conglomeration of malls and industrial parks, then Wino Park by those who had eyes, then Cesar Chavez Park by those who, like Tyler, deify the dead, he found the pawn shop of his recollections, where he inspected gold chains, then strolled past the cigar shop to the next pawn shop whose gold chains were supposedly new, and in this abode of discounted joy the woman drew herself up behind the counter and said: Well, what is it?