The Passenger (The Passenger, #1)(107)

Damn.

Sorry, Bobby. I thought you knew.

He picked up the glass of soda and emptied it in the sink and scooped it full of ice and refilled it and put it back in front of Western.

All that crew from Comer’s. I was kind of surprised to see them all show up.

Maybe they just wanted to be sure.

I thought of that.

Let me see your phone.

Sure.

He swung the phone over and placed it on the bar and Western picked up the receiver and dialed the Seven Seas. Janice answered.

It’s Bobby. Josie said I had some mail. Is Harold there? Well tell him if he’ll bring my mail down to the Napoleon I’ll give him ten dollars.

He hung the phone up. You got anything to eat?

I think there’s some redbeans and rice in the reachin.

How long’s it been in there?

I dont know. I dont remember it bein there back in the summer.

Well let me have a bowl of it.

You got it. You want crackers?

Sure. Let me have a Pearl. Whose paper is that?

Yours.

Sheddan. Goddamn it.

Sorry Bobby.

Just goddamn it.



* * *



—

He was sitting eating the redbeans and rice and drinking his beer and reading the paper when Harold showed up out of breath.

Damn, Harold. You didnt have to run.

I thought for ten dollars I ought to get down here pretty quick.

What have we got?

You didnt have anything. Just an ad from Sears and Roebuck.

You are shitting me.

Yeah. Here.

Western took the mail and handed him the ten. Thanks, Harold.

Anytime Bobby.

He sorted through the envelopes and came upon Sheddan’s letter dated two months ago from Johnson City Tennessee and put the corner in his teeth and tore it open.

    Dear Squire,

This comes to you from the veteran’s hospital in Johnson City where the news is not good. The horseman it would seem has chalked my door and by the time this reaches you—assuming that it does—I may be well on my way to shuffling off this mortal coil. Together with any attendant condensers, transformers, and capacitors. Hepatitis C, with complications stemming from a mostly dysfunctional liver together with various inroads upon other organs traceable to age, alcohol, and a lengthy and eclectic menu of pharmaceuticals over the many years. Dykes has been up to see me several times. Believe me when I tell you there was no line to stand in. He commented to a mutual friend that I was going to find myself consigned to such deeps of the netherworld that you couldnt find me with an asbestos bloodhound. I think he plans an elaborate obituary for the Knoxville rag he scribbles for. Something he’s only done before for one of Gene White’s hunting dogs. I’d thought to give my body to science but obviously they draw the line somewhere. Dykes is on record that there can be no burial without an environmental impact study. One might think cremation an option but there is the danger of the toxins taking out their scrubbers and leaving a swath of death and disease among dogs and children downwind for an unforeseeable distance.

Several acquaintances have remarked upon my sangfroid at this turn of events but in all truth I cant see what the fuss is about. Wherever you debark was the train’s destination all along. I’ve studied much and learned little. I think that at the least one might reasonably wish for a friendly face. Someone at your bedside who does not wish you in hell. More time would change nothing and that which you are poised to relinquish forever almost certainly was never what you thought it to be in the first place. Enough. I have never thought this life particularly salubrious or benign and I have never understood in the slightest why I was here. If there is an afterlife—and I pray most fervently that there is not—I can only hope that they wont sing. Be of good cheer, Squire. This was the ongoing adjuration of the early Christians and in this at least they were right. You know that I’ve always thought your history unnecessarily embittered. Suffering is a part of the human condition and must be borne. But misery is a choice. Thank you for your friendship. In twenty years I dont recall a word of criticism and for this alone deep blessings be upon you. If we should meet again I hope there will be something in the way of a wateringhole where I can stand you a round. Perhaps show you about the place. Look for a tall and somewhat raffish looking chap in a tailored robe.

Always

John





IX


In the last winter the Kid was already given to long absences. Sometimes she’d wake to a sense of someone having just quit the room and she would lie there in the quiet. Everything slowly taking shape in the gray light. Once a scent of flowers.

She went to Tennessee for what would be the last time. She called her grandmother and told her she was coming. They’d not spoken in months and there was a long silence.

Granellen?

She thought that her grandmother was crying.

Maybe you dont want me to come. It’s all right.

Of course I want you to come. I cant tell you how much.

She didnt even have a coat. It had snowed and she walked in the woods. Her grandmother’s boots. She was bundled in sweaters and she wore her grandmother’s coat.

It’s all right, Granellen. I dont really get cold.

Maybe you dont, Child. But I do.

A few flakes still falling. Gray against the gray sky. The great blocks of quarry stone among the barren trees. She knelt in the snow and traced with her hand a ropelike shape she took to be where possibly a snake had been caught out in the early cold.