The Passenger (The Passenger, #1)(3)

Yeah? Well just remember whose hand is on the nandgate Ducky. Because it aint the cradlerocker and it aint the dude in the runic tunic. If you get my drift. Hold it. I got a call. He rummaged in his pockets and produced an enormous phone and clapped it to his small and gnarly ear. Make it quick, Dick. We’re in conference. Yeah. A semihostile. Right. Base Two. We’re on fucking oxygen up here. No. No. Tough titty. Two wrongs dont make a riot. They’re a pack of dimpled fuckwits and you can tell them I said so. Call me back.

He rang off and pushed the antenna down with the heel of his flipper and shoved the phone back into his clothes and looked at her. There’s always somebody that doesnt get the word.

Who doesnt get.

Right. Back to the charts. I know what you’re thinking. But sometimes you just got to go for the equivalence. Run a montecarlo on the motherfucker and be done with it. For better or worse. We aint got till Christmas.

It is Christmas. Almost.

Yeah, well. Whatever. Where was I?

Does it make any difference?

Your number one lab device is going to be the servomechanism. Master and slave. Hook up a pantograph. Put the stylus in the dilemma and rotate. Count to four. Sign to sign. Repeat until the lemniscate appears.

The Kid did a little buck and wing and another long slide across the linoleum and stopped and began to pace again. They’re going for the big Kahuna. Boom boom time on the savannah, Hannah. Plenty of broads in the mix too in spite of all the whining from the sci-fems. I had my people check it out. You got your Madam Curry. Your Pamela Dirac.

Your who?

Not to mention others nameless for the nonce. Jesus will you cheer up? You need to get out more. What was it you said? After the math comes the aftermath? Tell you what. Comic interlude. Okay? Stop me if you’ve heard this one. Mickey Mouse is filing for divorce and the judge looks down and he says: I understand that it is your contention that your wife Minnie Mouse is mentally deranged. Is that correct? And Mickey says: No, Your Honor, that’s not what I said. What I said was she’s fucking nuts.

The Kid stomped around the room holding himself at the waist and laughing his yukking laugh.

You always get everything wrong. What are you laughing at?

Whooh, he gasped. What?

You always get everything wrong. It’s Goofy. It’s not nuts.

What’s the difference?

She was fucking Goofy. You dont even get it.

Yeah, well. We got you. Anyway the point is that you need to snap out of it. What do you think? At the last minute little Bobby Shafto is going to wake from the dead and come and rescue you? Silver buckles on his shoes or whatever the fuck? He’s out of the loop, Louise. Since he duffeled his head in his racing machine.

She looked away. The Kid shaded his eyes with one flipper. Well, he said. That got her attention.

You dont know what you’re talking about.

Yeah? How long’s he been snoozing now? A couple of months?

He’s still alive.

He’s still alive. Oh, well shit. If he’s still alive what the hell. Why dont you come off it? We both know why you’re not sticking around vis-à-vis the fallen one. Dont we? What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?

I’m going to bed.

It’s because we dont know what’s going to wake up. If it wakes up. We both know what the chances are of his coming out of this with his mentis intactus and gutsy girl that you are I dont see you being quite so deeply enamored of whatever vestige might still be lurking there behind the clouded eye and the drooling lip. Well what the hell. You never know what’s in the cards, do you? You’d probably have wound up back in Chitlinland. Just the two of you. Dining on fatback and harmony grits or whatever the fuck it is that they eat down there in the land of the mammyjammer. Not exactly hobnobbing around Europe with the motorcar set but at least it’s quiet.

That’s not going to happen.

I know it’s not going to happen.

Good.

So where do we go from here?

I’ll send you a postcard.

You never did before.

This will be different.

I’ll bet. Are you going to call your grandmother?

And tell her what?

I dont know. Something. Jesus, Jasmine. There’s lots left to do you know.

Maybe. But not by me.

What about the nightgate and the lair of the unspeakables? Not scared of that?

I’ll take my chances. I’m guessing that when I trip the breaker the board goes to black.

We really put ourselves out for you you know.

I’m sorry.

What if I was to tell you stuff I’m not supposed to tell you?

Not interested.

Stuff you really would like to know.

You dont know anything. You just make things up.

Yeah. But some of it’s pretty cool.

Some of it.

How about this: What’s black and white and red all over?

I cant begin to think.

Trotsky in a tuxedo.

Great.

Okay. How about this one. A farmer finds two boll weevils in his cotton patch.

You told me.

I never.

He chose the lesser of two weevils.

Yeah. Okay. Look. I’m putting together some new acts. I got some of the old Chautauqua stuff lined up. You always had a taste for the classics. A little costume repair. Couple of weeks’ rehearsal.

Good night.

I even got a lead on some more eight millimeter. Not to mention a shoebox full of snaps from the forties. Los Alamos stuff. And some letters.