Waiting for the Galactic Bus (25 page)

“Char, this would be a great time for those new stress vitamins,” said ever-helpful Randy.

Drumm motioned impatiently. “Miss Stovall, if you please.”

“Simmy, how about my kosher special?”

“On the way, mum.” Simnel took a giant towel from the rack — only to have it plucked from his grasp by the kosher special, who opened it invitingly for Charity. Her heart leaped: God and the Mounties had arrived in time.

“Jake! I’ve been living right after all.”

“Charity —” Surveying the astonished and suddenly respectful faces around him, Jake couldn’t supress a giggle. “Let me take you away from all this.”

“Jake, I never saw anyone so beautiful in all my life or so in time,” she vowed passionately, booting at Randy with the vigor and precision of a halfback. “Outa the pool, Flipper! Towel, Jake. I mean please, Mr. Iscariot.”

He spread the towel expertly between Charity and the other men as she rose to wrap herself in it. “The rest of you freeze. You, the brain trust with the gun: you’re tired of carrying it, so put it down.”

Dazed but obedient, Roy Earl leaned the rifle against the tub. Charity skittered out of the bathroom, grabbing for the first clothes to hand. “Thanks, Jake. I’m always getting rescued without a stitch.”

“Won’t hurt sales,” Veigle offered. “Don’t worry, we’ll find you. You’re money in the bank.”

Jake turned on him lethally. “I said freeze. All of you.”

Something in the voice. Dressing hurriedly, Charity herself froze at the sound of it. Everything about Jake now was scary, even his back. She wriggled into jeans and a T-shirt, jammed her feet into tennis shoes.

“You won’t get away with this, Iscariot,” Drumm blustered. “Friend of the Prince or whatever, you’re not big enough to cross the Leader.”

“Oh? Anyone want to get paid off now?”

Charity couldn’t see the exact movement of his right hand, but Drumm, Veigle and the guard shrank as far from him as possible. With a yelp of pure terror, Randy jumped clear out of the tub like a hyperactive salmon and sprinted out of the bathroom, trailing wet bubbles down the stairs.

“Ready, Charity?”

“Got my running shoes on. Think I’m gonna need’em.”

Judas/Jake scooped up the rifle and tossed it to Simnel. “Entertain the callers until we’re gone.”

Hurrying downstairs to the open elevator, Charity remembered her fled roommate. “Randy?”

Hidden but plaintive: “He’s not going to pay anybody off, is he?”

“No, but there’s some Seconal in the bathroom. Take the whole bottle.” She jogged into the elevator after Jake and punched for down. Nothing happened. “Hey, elevator, move!”

“Please enter correct instructions,” the elevator balked. “I used to be a —”

“I
know,
“Charity screeched. “You had great cheekbones. GO, stupid!”

“I most certainly will not.” The elevator didn’t.

“How’d you like to start life over as a stamp pad?” Jake offered with the calm of a poised cobra. “Basement, please.”

The doors closed. They wafted downward to the piped music of Lawrence Welk. With a moment to breathe at last, Charity gazed adoringly up at her savior, the Archvillain of the Christian World. He looked beautiful. “Jake, did I ever tell you you remind me of James Mason?”

“Thank you. I always liked his work.”

“Would you mind just this once if I kissed you?”

“Delighted, Miss Stovall. It’s been a long time since the last. Ruth Snyder,” Jake recalled tenderly. “Incompetent murderess but a very nice woman. Be my guest.”

He didn’t kiss well at all. His lips were slightly cold. Charity was faintly disappointed. She felt the hard knot of the leather bag against her throat and went cold herself. Under the ricky-tick elevator music, she heard again the voice almost forgotten — very familiar and much closer now.

Char-i-tee...

   III  

BANALITIES

    27   

Judas with strings

Jake ran red lights with such reckless abandon, Charity kept looking back to see if they’d picked up any traffic cops.

“Don’t worry about that.” Jake took a corner with squealing tires. “The heat leaves me alone.”

“Where are we going so fast, anyway?”

“A place you’re ready for.”

“Someplace real that makes sense,” Charity yearned.

“With rules, order, regulations.”

“Where people live like folks —
look out that car!”

Jake swerved with the reflexes of a fighter pilot, throwing Charity against her door. “Lordy, where’d you learn to drive?”

“Never did, actually. Just sort of picked it up. No accidents yet.”

“We’re not there yet.” Charity crossed her fingers and prayed silently. “Wherever there is.”

“As requested, reality.” Jake kept his eyes on the street ahead. “And Alice said, ‘Who cares for you, anyway? You’re nothing but a pack of cards.’ And as the pack rose up and came pelting down on her, Alice woke up to reality. Getting dark.”

Jake switched on his high beams. A startled pedestrian leaped back out of their lethal trajectory. Jake geared down and curved smoothly into a side street. Downtown Below Stairs slid by Charity’s open window, garish with neon.

“Where are we going?’Suming we get there in one piece.”

“The Club Banal.”

“Club what?”

“Banal,” he defined: “the classically ordinary, predictable, unremarkable, unchanging. Not the worst, a long way from the best. Boring.”

“That’s a dumb name for a club. I already got bored out of my gourd by Randy Colorad.”

“The Banal is much more than that,” Jake explained. “The working heart of Below Stairs. Leaders come and Drumms go, but the bureaucracy remains. And there’s the brothel.”

Charity hoped she hadn’t heard him right. “The what?”

Jake shrugged. “I believe the American term is cathouse.”

“Now, look,” Charity argued, offended. “All right, I made some mistakes, and maybe I’m not a real nice girl anymore, and maybe that ain’t much of a loss, but I don’t deserve to be sent to a... a white slave house.”

“White slave?” Jake laughed with honest amusement. “Melodramatic wench, the Banal has a variety of jobs, and you’ll like Elvira Grubb, the manager. Everyone says what they mean. What they’ve got to say, that is, and as far as it goes. But as ordered, reality. Reason and order, ponderous sanity, regulations. The very cosmos invalid until reviewed, countersigned and filed in triplicate. Very safe and no surprises. And... here we are. Feel at home.”

The cab slid to the curb before a neon-fronted building with a crowded bar from which brassy music blared out over the whole sleazy block. A little daunted, Charity didn’t want to leave the safety of Jake just yet.

“Thanks again. Every time I need saving, there’s you.”

“Scared, Charity? It’s just like the world, the same confusion. Don’t be impressed.”

Charity’s glance dropped to the age-blackened leather pouch around his scarred neck. “There’s something I — don’t be mad, but I just gotta ask.”

“I know.” He tapped the pouch. “They all do.”

“You can tell me to mind my own business.”

“Perhaps you’re not ready for it yet.”

She met his gaze levelly. “Hey, Jake, I’m getting readier by the minute, or ain’t you noticed? I mean about what I used to think was good and bad.”

“Ah — a sea change.”

She slid over to touch his cheek, caring about him. “Why, Jake?”

“The same old question. Why did I do it?” He looked past her in that distant, detached way of his. “You know, all those films you saw never got it right. Yeshua was my friend.”

“Who’s he?”

“Jesus: that’s what the Greeks made out of his name. He was my friend, he loved me. Actually Yeshua was one of the two best minds in Judea. I was the other. Freely admitted; my modesty fell with the rest of me. But in those days I was something of a Fundamentalist myself and not at all forgiving. I never forgave him for not being what I wanted him to be... a god, a messiah. We needed to believe in miracles then, too; nor were we any more critical than you.”

Charity found it difficult to stay on the subject with him that close. “I was taught you were the lowest thing on earth or in hell.”

Jake laughed again. “That’s leaning on it, don’t you think? What I am in fact is the oldest but most effective plot device of the trite world. People need a villain, Charity. Without me, Yeshua would have been a ripple in Roman history. One dissident rabbi leading one splinter group out of dozens, a footnote for Hebrew scholars. People have short memories for also-rans. The way things turned out, I don’t imagine he’s any happier than I am. I have to go.” Jake leaned over and brushed her lips with his. They weren’t warm, but Charity felt the sincerity. “The ride’s on the house, Miss Stovall.”

“Don’t you ever get lonely, Jake?”

He took a moment to consider the question. “No, not the way you mean it. Besides, who’d live in that house of mine?” Jake slipped the gear into neutral. “Rotten weather, a snotty embezzler for a watchdog, and I’m not much company.”

“Don’t put yourself down.” Charity opened her door and got out.

“Don’t go sticky,” Jake snorted. “You’ll spoil my theological image.”

“Don’t worry about that. You’ll always be a son of a bitch.” Charity slammed the car door and leaned in through the window. “Just kind of a nice one.”

“Queen of the Treacle Harvest.” Jake gunned the motor. “If you’d been with us, you’d have fallen in love with Yeshua just as Mary did. Women have a weakness for celebrity. Go on, I’ve got a call.”

BARION
TO
COYUL
:
SINCE
STOVALL
NO
LONGER
INTERESTED
IN
STRIDE
,
OBJECTIVE
SEEMS
ACCOMPLISHED
.
SHOULD
EXPEDITE
.
STRONG
REASONS
TO
TERMINATE
.

COYUL
TO
BARION
:
WHAT
’
S
ACCOMPLISHED
?
SHE
IS
MERELY
AFRAID
OF
HIM
.
WILL
TERMINATE
WHEN
SHE
’
S
SICK
OF
HIM
.
YOU
SAID
NO
QUESTIONS
.
DON
’
T
BUG
ME
.