The Wooden Sea (29 page)

As a boy I had the patience of a housefly. I should have remembered that when 1 was watching little Gee-Gee in the computer room. After we stared at each other some more he gestured again, all impatient exaggeration. His whole jiggling twitching body asked, what should I do?

As best I could I used hands and charades to outline a computer monitor. He got what I was saying and nodded. Next I showed him what to do. He lit up like a thousand-watt lightbulb. Boy, did he love these instructions.

Without a second's hesitation he stepped over to where Floon was typing away. With both hands the boy shoved the monitor off its base, and that big fucker _flew _out into space and crashed on the floor.

Time passed. All four of them froze where they were. But then that bastard Floon didn't do what I expected. I thought he would go nuts, berserk, rip himself in half Rumpelstiltskin-style at the loss of his data or the time he'd already put in on the computer doing whatever the hell he was doing. None of the above. With a coolness that was disconcerting he rose from his seat, moved over to the next computer, and started wailing away on that one, not missing a beat.

My one idea flushed, I shoved the door open, walked over to Floon, and smashed him good on the back of the head with my pistol. That did the trick.

Rocking forward, his face hit the screen and cracked it. He had a lot of white hair. I grabbed a handful and banged his head down on the keyboard.

"Kids, get out. Nell, your mom is waiting outside."

The girls took off like water bugs but not McCabe Junior. "That was super cool!"

"Go outside."

"No way! I'm stayin'. You think I'd miss this? Hit him again."

"Go or I'll tell your mother you stole fifteen dollars from her purse so you could go to the car show in White Plains."

His jaw dropped. "How'd you know that?"

Trying not to smile I managed, "Because I'm psychic. Go outside and wait for me."

"Jeez, what a hot turd." On that note he started to leave. "But I'll be waiting for you. Just remember that."

As soon as the door closed, I banged down Floon's floppy head once more only because I felt like it. Thoroughly unprofessional but I was no longer a professional. I searched for his gun. It was in one of his pockets. I took it out and put it in mine.

"McCabe--" he mumbled.

"Shut up, Caz, or else I'll dribble your head some more. Don't think I'm not tempted."

"McCabe, listen--" He sounded half-in-the-bag drunk.

A blast of pain blew across my brain. Not now! Not now, please not.

Raising my shoulders and pulling my head down into my neck, I waited for the worst but none came.

"McCabe, at least look at the screen."

What was displayed there looked like a densely detailed train schedule.

"So what?"

"Tan--" He took a deep breath and started coughing halfway through it.

Blood dripped from his mouth onto the table. "Tan-cresis. It hasn't been invented yet! Or if it has, there is no public mention of it. Is that amazing?

There's not even the word for it in the dictionary.

Nobody knows about it yet."

"I don't know what you're talking about, Caz. And I don't much care."

_"Don't care? _Tancretic spredge? Nuclear transmutation? _Cold fusion, _you idiot! How to do it hasn't been discovered yet!"

I banged his head down onto the keyboard again. This was getting to be fun.

My anger at him brought a good adrenaline load of energy back into my veins and heart. "Don't fuck with me, Floon--your dick's not big enough." And to the tune of the Sam Cooke song

"Wonderful World" I sang:

_"Don't know much about cold fus-ion, _

_Don't know much about Caz de Floon. _

_But I do know that I'll kick your ass _

_And you do know it'll happen fast_--

"I don't care what you're looking for or what you've found, Floon.

Right now you and I are going to leave here. If you do anything along the way that pisses me off I will kill you without the slightest hesitation. I give you my word."

"You can't kill me--you're a policeman."

"Past tense, Caz. Past tense. It's a brave new world. Get up."

"Please, McCabe, listen to me for two minutes. What I tell you will change your life."

I snorted. "What little there is left of it. I don't need my life changed any more than it already is.

What do you want? You've got one minute to say it. So talk."

"All right." He touched his forehead and winced. He looked at his fingers and didn't appear to know what to do with the big smear of blood there. That made me feel just fine.

I looked at my bare wrist and put an imaginary watch against my ear to check to see if it was functioning. "My watch tells me you've got about thirty seconds left on your minute, Caz."

"Stop! You should be grateful to me for what you are about to see. If nothing else I will show you how to become very rich right now. In five minutes. Just give me five minutes--"

"Two. I already have enough money."

"Two. All right. I'll show you." Once again he slid over-- to computer number three. At the rate we were going there would be no more machines left in the library by the time we left. His fingers started machine-gunning away and whatever info he was calling up flew onto the screen.

"I know that site! Yahoo! Finance."

"Correct. Now watch," he said while typing something in. A moment later a full screen of market research appeared on a company called SeeReal. The stock ticker abbreviation for it was SEER. Individual shares in the company were selling for four dollars and fifteen-sixteenths.

SeeReal had been in business three years but hadn't made one penny's profit yet.

"SEER. Very symbolic name, Caz. Selling for four dollars a share? Wow, right up there with Intel, huh? Time to go."

His voice went up up up. "No, no, you must listen! SeeReal has discovered a substance called naterskine. That line of research will lead them to creating something called tancretic spredge.

Once that happens this company will become ten times more important and powerful than General Electric. Believe me, McCabe. That is why I was so shocked to realize it hasn't happened
Page 162

yet. None of this information is in either the latest dictionary or encyclopedia. It's as if someone named Bill Gates asked if you would be interested in investing in a new company he was founding called Microsoft. And if you give me a little bit more time to work here I will find a great many more of these things for you. Invest in them now and within five years you will be as rich as Croesus."

"Floon, you're shit on the bottom of my shoe. The sooner I scrape you off, the better. For some unimaginable reason you were given the great privilege of being allowed to travel back in time thirty years. Time travel, for Christ's sake. An absolute all-out four-star miracle. But what's the first thing _you

_do? Get online so you can surf the Web for ways to make money. You disgust me."

"That wasn't what I was doing."

"I don't care what you were doing. Get up."

"Don't be an ass, McCabe. Neither of us knows why we were sent back here.

Nor do we know if we'll ever be returned to our proper time. So why not make the most of this while we're here?"

He believed I was here for the same reasons he was. "You think I was sent back here from jour time?"

He blinked exaggeratedly and slowly several times. When he spoke again his voice was pure sarcasm. "Well, _hello, _are you not standing here with me now when the last time we saw each other was in Vienna?"

"Floon, you're sixty years old. Do I look sixty years old?"

"That doesn't matter--"

"Yes, it matters a great deal. Your being sent back here was a mistake. My being sent back here was a correction. This is my time; it ain't no mistake for me."

Clearly unimpressed, he crossed his arms. "How do you know?"

I was about to answer but then thought why bother? "Because the aliens told me. Let's go."

"What aliens?" Now he looked like he believed me.

"You haven't met them yet? The Martians from Rat's Potato? Nice fellows. They live behind the Crab Nebula. When they come to Earth they disguise themselves either as paramedics or well-dressed black men wearing expensive watches.

Move."

"Where are we going?"

Where _were _we going? Until that moment I hadn't really thought about it, what with all the swirl going on. But Floon had a point. I couldn't take him to jail because that would involve too much time explaining to the people down at the station house and I had no time to explain.

"Don't you want to know what I was doing on the computer, McCabe?"

"No and be quiet." Where the hell was I going to take him?

The door flew open and little me appeared. "The cops are here."

"Where? Didn't I tell you to go outside?"

"I did, Mr. Stupid. But now the cops are out there. That's all I came in to tell you. I thought you'd want to know. They brought two cars and now they're talking to that librarian across the street."

Thinking out loud I said, "Maeve must have called them."

With a taunt on his face and in his voice Floon asked, "Are you going to have me arrested, McCabe?"

"I'd rather have you stuffed. Now shut up. I have to figure this out."

The two regarded me as if I knew what I was doing. Floon was impassive, the boy very happy and excited. I hadn't ordered him out again which meant that for the time being he could stick around for whatever was coming next.

As fast as my limping head could think, I tried sorting through my options.

If we stayed in the library, Bill Pegg would eventually assume some kind of hostage situation was going on and take the appropriate steps. That did not bode well. I liked Bill very much but knew he had dreams of glory, most of them unfulfilled. Here was a chance for him to take charge big-time but that was not necessarily a good thing.

A simpler way would be for us to just walk out of the library. But both choices led to the same thing--hours wasted explaining and sorting this bizarre situation out afterward. I could not afford to waste that time.

"What about the basement?" Junior asked but his question didn't register in me until some beats had passed.

"Huh?"

"The basement. What if we snuck out of here through the door in the basement?"

"Why sneak?"

"Because the cops are outside, dumbbell! Jeez, you want them to catch you or something?"

"Who is this child, McCabe?"

"He's my son."

"I am not!"

"Well, close enough. How do you know about the basement?"

"Because I know a lot about this place. I have pretty well explored everything around here. Me and this guy, we found a way to sneak out downstairs through a fire door--"

Scorched brain notwithstanding, I remembered what the boy was talking about, remembered jimmying the lock on a door downstairs when I was his age. Al Salvato and me. I spoke that name before I had a chance to think, "Al Salvato."

Little Fran nodded because it was obvious that's who he was talking about.

And he was right--we could easily sneak out that door and after a few strategic lefts and rights, be gone from this neighborhood in five minutes.

"You're a smart kid. And since you came up with the idea, why don't you lead the way?"

"Okay."

I took Floon's arm and pushed him in front of me. He didn't resist, which was clever, because if he had I would have hit him on the head again. We left the computer room and, turning right down the hall, walked till we got to a wide staircase. The kid took it two quick steps at a time. Us old men were slower but we made it to the bottom too.

The kid waved for us to follow him. "That door's over here."

"How `bout this quick-witted boy, Floon? He's actually going to get us out of here. No wonder I'm so smart--I started young."

"What the hell are you talking about, McCabe?"

"Never mind. Just follow that little genius."

As I was reaching out to push the door open, at the last moment I noticed a sign on the wall saying it was an emergency fire exit. When it was opened an audible signal would be heard.

I assumed that meant some kind of horrendous screeching racket to scare off any rascals trying to weasel out of the library with stolen books. Any horrendous screeching racket would not help my plan to tiptoe out of here and make a stealthy escape.

"May I make a suggestion?" Floon didn't wait for permission. "When you open that door it will set off an electronic alarm. Just in case you didn't read the _schild _there."

"It's called a plaque, Floon, or a sign. Not a _schild. _I already know there's an alarm."

"Yes, well, I would guess that if you looked a bit you'd find a wire to it that you could disconnect."

That made me suspicious--especially because he spoke in such an even tone.

"Why do you care if we get out of here now?"

"Because I don't want to be arrested. There are other things I would rather be doing than sitting in a jail cell."

"You won't be doing anything until I'm finished with you. And then I'll put you in jail myself."

The boy scowled at us, hands on hips. "Are you two guys going to talk all day or are we getting out of here? Come on, let's go!"

It took five minutes to locate the wire and with a snick of the boy's fat brown Buck pocketknife, seconds to cut it. Then we were outta there and the door was banging shut behind us. We walked up a small hill, down past a thin creek, looked back, and the library was gone.

And so was my uncertainty about where to go.

"Take a right here."

"May I ask where we're going?" Every time Floon spoke it came out sounding both pedantic and amused. It was a voice you wanted to hit with a baseball bat.

"To George's house."

"Why? We were just there!" For the first time his voice cracked into something annoyed and vaguely human.

The boy poked me in the side. "Who's George?"