The Third Circle
Chapter 43
Chapter 43
Claire waited on the corner across from the hotel on Tuesday morning. There was a cafe, and she could see a clock inside on the wall. It was five minutes until nine. It was her recollection that she and John had left the hotel restaurant after breakfast and gone to the barber shop around nine. John had placed a bet with Harrison. Lennie had come in. John had introduced them, and then they had walked around the corner to go to the garage. She had looked across the street and seen John, here, near where she was standing now.
The problem was, that recollection was now somehow fading. Her memory of it, crystal clear before she transported, now seemed more on the order of a fuzzy dream or a fantasy, with parts missing. She was now, in fact, feeling that it was the memory she was remembering, and not the events themselves.
She drifted toward the corner, looking across the street. She thought that she ought to see Lennie go into the barber shop any minute now, but it was hard to grasp why exactly it was that she thought that. Also, she suddenly realized that she wasn't sure she would recognize Lennie when she saw him. She realized that she had no recollection of what he looked like!
There was something else, too. Another memory. Something that hadn't fit at the time, but was nevertheless there, flitting around on the outskirts of her consciousness. In the hotel suite, just now, as she was dressing, there had been the sound of a shower. She had thought at the time that it was the shower in the next suite, because she knew that she and John were downstairs having breakfast. But it was coming to her that it had been their shower. Someone had been taking a shower in their bathroom. Who?
There was a familiar face across the street, like a face from a dream. It was the gaunt looking kid who had given John his winning ticket on Friday morning, the morning they learned of Lennie's death. That was strange. He disappeared into the barber shop. She waited, and kept looking around for John and the man who had been with him.
It was her! She was in the shower. She hadn't gone downstairs that day with John to the restaurant! She remembered now. He had gone alone. It suddenly cascaded upon her.
She had never met Lennie!
She looked up and down the street. She had expected John to be here. But why? She hadn't seen him here, because she hadn't even been downstairs on the street herself.
But there he was now! - across the street, coming out of the barber shop of the hotel alone and getting in a taxi. She began running to cross the street but missed the light. She looked frantically for a cab but couldn't see a vacant one anywhere. John's cab disappeared in traffic down Park Avenue.
And here came the kid, Lennie's replacement, out of the barber shop, turning the corner across the street and heading west on Third Avenue. The light changed, and she crossed the street and ran after him, catching up with him near Madison.
"Hey," she called. "You!"
He paused and turned, and she ran up to him, out of breath.
"I ... what's your name?"
"Freddie," said the kid.
"Right,"
said Claire. "You just saw my husband, John Banister, in the barber
shop."
"Oh, that guy," said Freddie. "Yeah, so what?"
"What did he say? Did he say anything?"
"Whadya mean? He bought a ticket, that's all."
"Do you know a kid name of Lennie?"
"Oh, Lennie. Yeah. I heard of him is all. He didn't show up for work this morning. Old Marty was really mad. Got me to do his route. What of it?"
"Is Lennie ... dead? Do you know anything about that?"
"I don't know nothin. Hey. You wanna buy a number?"
Claire suddenly felt a little red light go on. A man was leaning against the building just at the periphery of her vision. The awareness came that he had been listening to their conversation.
"No, I don't want a number," said Claire. The boy turned and trotted away and disappeared around the corner. Claire turned toward the man. He was swarthy, wore a dark suit and hat, had a cigar in his mouth. He smiled and nodded. Someone was behind her. She spun around to face another man.
"Looking for Lennie, eh?"
"I ... no, I just ..."
"Us, too," smiled the man. "Why don't we go for a ride. Maybe we can help each other find him."
"I can't," said Claire, more alarms going off in her head. "I have to ..."
"Sure you can," said the man gently. Something pressed against her lower abdomen. She looked down and saw that he was holding a pistol. "Right over there," he smiled. "That car there."
The man who had been leaning against the building was beside her. He took her arm, and they led her to a black Chrysler parked in a loading zone just beyond the hotel parking garage. There was a third man at the wheel, also dressed in a dark suit and hat. One of the men opened the door of the back seat and pushed her to get in. She resisted. "I'll kill you right here," the man with the gun said softly in her ear. "Get in." He poked her in the ribs with the gun barrel.
Claire climbed in the back seat of the car, nausea sweeping her.
"Hi," said the driver over his shoulder. "Who are you?"
Claire glared at him. The man with the gun got in beside her and closed the door. He forced her hands behind her and quickly bound her wrists together with what felt like a short belt of some kind. The other man got in the front seat, and the big car pulled away from the curb, turning south on Madison Avenue.
"Okay," said the man beside her with the gun, leaning his arm on the back of the seat and turning to face her. "Who are you?" His voice was friendly and calm.
"Who are you?" she asked.
He popped her hard on the back of the head with a sharpness that felt like more than just his hand, and there was a brilliant red explosion in her brain. She reeled.
"Who are you?" he asked, in the same calm tone of voice.
"I ... uh ... Claire. Claire ..." she strained for a good last name. He popped her again, and she nearly lost consciousness. Her brain whirled, and she tried to turn around to see what he had hit her with.
"Last name?" he asked.
"Redmond. Claire ... Redmond."
"And are you from around here? Or out of town?"
The car was still heading south.
"Out of town. California."
"California's nice," said the front seat passenger. "I was there once. Real nice."
"I was in Frisco once," said the driver. "Rode the Cable Cars. Real nice on the Nob Hill, there. I remember that."
"So," said the man beside Claire, "What brings you to New York, Mrs. Redmond?"
"Vacation," she said. "My hu ... my husband and I are here on a vacation."
"That's nice," said the front seat passenger.
"So," said the man in the back seat again, "I take it that you is familiar with one ... what's his name?"
"Schoeman," said the man in the front seat.
"Right. Schoeman. Leonard Schoeman. I take it you is familiar with this fellow about whom you was talking to that kid back there."
"I ... I've never met him," said Claire. "My husband knows him."
"I see," he said. "Your husband plays the numbers, does he?"
"Yes. He bets. On the numbers. Yes."
"So, Mrs. Redmond, we are interested in the whereabouts of this party by the name of Leonard Schoeman, which I presume from overhearing your conversation with that kid back there you are as well, is this correct?"
"I ... yes. I was expecting to see him this morning, and ..."
He hit her on the back of the head again. The pain was so sharp that blinding tears came to her eyes and she cried out.
"So, this isn't quite gelling for me, Mrs. Redmond. How is it that you are expecting to see someone you have never met?"
"I ... he was supposed to be with my husband."
"And where is your husband at this time?"
"I ... don't know. I was ... supposed to meet him there, on that corner."
"Are you guests of a hotel?" he asked.
"Yes," said Claire. "We are."
"And which hotel is that?"
"The ... the Waldorf."
"That's nice," said the man in the front seat. "Nice place. Hey, Mike," he said to the driver. "Old Frankie Costello hisself stays at the Waldorf, don't he?"
"I've heard that," said the driver.
"That's what I heard, too. Old Frankie."
"It's a peculiar thing, Mrs. Redmond," said the man beside her, "to see a lady out and about with no purse. You usually don't carry purses?"
"I ... I left in the room."
"I see. So, Mrs. Redmond, what exactly is the nature of your and or your husbands acquaintanship with the Leonard Schoeman party, also I believe, known as Lennie?"
"My husband bets on numbers with him," said Claire. "I already told you that."
"Yes, you did," he said. "You did tell me that. I'm sorry. Now, let me see if I can recall your conversation which I overheard back there with that kid. As I recall, you were inquiring as to whether Mr. Schoeman had passed away or not, is this correct?"
"I ... yes, I asked him that."
"'Is Lennie dead?' I believe you asked him 'Do you know anything about that?' you asked him. Did I hear that correctly?"
"Y ... yes, I guess I asked him something like that. I ... I'm having a lot of trouble with my memory just now."
"I see. So, Mrs. Redmond ... is that your correct name?"
"Yes. Yes, it is."
"Okay. Mrs. Redmond, would you please explain to me why you would ask this kid such a question about Mr. Schoeman? Why would you think that he had passed away?"
"I ... I don't know. I guess ... I was worried about him."
He hit her again. This time, the red explosion in her head was overrun by blackness, and she lost consciousness.
Monday, the evening before, John and Max got to Lennie's apartment in the Bronx at a little past seven o'clock. John gave a cabby a fifty dollar bill and asked him to wait. They climbed the stairs of the tenement, and John knocked on Lennie's apartment door. Lennie opened it. There was the sound of a boxing match on the radio in the background, and the smell of cooked cabbage.
"Hi, Lennie," said John. "This is my friend, Max."
Lennie's jaw dropped. "What ... what do you want? How did you know where I live?"
"It's a long story, Lennie. You've got to trust me now. Can we come in?"
Lennie backed up, and John and Max walked into the apartment.
"Oh dear, who's that?" Mrs. Schoeman asked, rising from her rocking chair.
"A ... a friend," said Lennie.
"I'm John Banister, Mrs. Schoeman. A friend of Lennie's. This is Max Steenberg. Please, sit down. We need to talk to you."
The woman dropped back into the rocker, her eyes wide.
"Sit down, Lennie," said John. "I have to talk with you, very serious talk, okay?" Lennie sat in a chair beside his mother. John and Max sat on the couch. "Mr. Steenberg is a private detective, Lennie. We were in Hyde Park this morning. You were there, too. You made a drop at the home of a United States Congressman, whose name is Willard Morrisey. You went up there with a man who works for Fred Lazarini, over by Morningside Park. While you were there, in that big white house, you either said something, or saw something, or heard something. The result is that there's a contract going out on you right now. There were some big hit men from out of town in front of your house, right on the street down there, a couple of hours ago. They checked your mailbox. They're going to hit you tomorrow or the next day. I don't want you to worry, because we're going to keep anything from happening to you. But I want to know what you saw or said or heard in that house this morning."
Lennie stared at him.
"I don't understand," said Mrs. Schoeman. "Lennie's a good boy."
"Do you have any idea what it might have been?" John asked Lennie again.
"I
... I didn't see nothing there," said Lennie. "Just this guy,
that guy you
said, and some other old guy when they took me into this room to give
them the money."
"Morrisey," said Max. "Morrisey and somebody else."
"Yep," Lennie nodded. "I didn't see nothin."
"You just gave Morrisey the money and left?" John asked.
"That's all I did," said Lennie.
"Anything strange?" asked Max. "Anybody acting queer?"
"Only this other guy, he took off out of that room right away when I come in. Seemed scared of me or something. I don't know why. That's it. I just gave Morrisey the money and left. I swear it true."
"Anything else strange happen today, Lennie?" asked Max. "After you left up there or anything?"
"Nope. I just checked back in and come home. Like I was told. I don't know what anybody wants with me."
"Well," said John, "I'll tell you something, Lennie, Mrs. Schoeman. You're really going to have to trust me here. We've been studying this thing, Lennie, and these guys are going to hit you if we don't get you out of here. They know where you live. Do you remember I told you what a dangerous business it is you're in? You know that, don't you? Kids like you end up dead or in prison. Max here can tell you that. But you know that, don't you Lennie?"
"He's a good boy," said Mrs. Schoeman.
"He sure is," said John. "Wants to be a lawyer. I know that too, isn't that right, Lennie?"
Lennie nodded, perplexed.
"Here's the thing," said John. "Right now, you folks get packed up. We got a cab outside. We're going on over to the airport, I'm going to give you five thousand dollars, and you're going to get on the next flight leaving here tonight. You get in a hotel wherever the plane lands. I'll come and get you in a few days. I know a safe place where they can't find you. We'll take you there and get you set up. I'm going to set up a bank account for you so you can get back to school, Lennie. Become a lawyer, if that's what you want. Get a nice little house for you and your sisters and your Ma here."
Lennie and Mrs. Schoeman stared at him.
Max lit a Lucky Strike. "You folks go on and do what this man says," he said. "This is a good thing happening to you tonight. You go on, now, and pack." He looked at Lennie and nodded. Lennie stood up and went into the bedroom. "You got a good boy there, Mrs. Schoeman," said Max. "You know that, don't you? He got on a wrong road out there. They'll kill him sure. We know that. You get out of that chair and go get some things together now. Get your girls."
John stood up and put five thousand dollars on the coffee table. He jotted down Bryce's phone number in Amarillo. "You call this man when you get in a hotel, Mrs. Schoeman. Tell him where you are so we can find you. Hurry up now. We're going to lose our cab."
Three hours later, John and Max stood on the apron at LaGuardia, watching the Schoemans, traveling under the name of Ryder, disappear into the western sky on a plane bound for Minneapolis.
"Hm," said Max. "Helluva thing."
"What's that?" asked John.
"Fate, I guess. That kid's supposed to end up in the morgue, and there he goes."
"Yep," said John. He shook his head, trying to clear it. It had started in the cab. Some strange shift. His memories of the last few days had gotten very foggy. Some things were beginning to blur, to fade, and others to sharpen.
"So, I suppose you want the money back," said Max.
"No," said John. "We took the walk, and you stayed with me. But, it's not quite finished. I'd like to ask you to follow them. See they get to Amarillo all right. I'll give you the name of the attorney there that I gave them."
"All right." Max nodded. "So, what now?"
"I'm heading back to Thursday night. See if I can reconnect with my wife. We're supposed to fly out of here."
"How the fuck do I get my clothes back? My wallet and stuff?"
"We can go back right now, if you want. Friday night. It'll cost you a day."
They walked back into the terminal.
"Come to think of it," said Max. "I don't think I want to go back just now. I think I'd rather go back naturally. I think I'll run up to Hyde Park tomorrow. Play a hunch."
"Well, be careful. Here's the Palace key. And here's the Waldorf key, too. I can get another one at the desk. If you go in there Friday morning after seven o'clock, your stuff should be there. Unless none of that happened now. I'm not sure. In that case, they're back in your bedroom at home."
"Where I'm asleep right now. Hm."
"I'll call you sometime Friday at your office. See how it went."
They got a cab and headed back toward Manhattan. John got a piece of scratch paper and pen from the driver and jotted down a note to Bryce, with Bryce's address and phone number, and gave it to Max.
"So," said Max. "You're going to the Waldorf? Won't you run into yourself?"
"No, we're at a play right now. I think. Didn't get home till past midnight."
Got home past midnight. John said to himself. Got up in the morning and went ... where? He couldn't recall. He shook his head.
"You okay?" Max asked.
"I ... I don't think so. I'm getting confused."
"Yeah, it all beats the shit out of me, too, kid." Max slapped John on the knee and leaned back in the seat and chortled.
When Claire regained consciousness, she found herself sitting on a wooden folding chair in the middle of a large cement room that looked like a warehouse. She had a violent headache. Her wrists and ankles were tied so tightly that they stung, and her hands and feet were numb. Her blouse had been torn, and her shoes removed. She ached everywhere. She tried to rub her wrists together to see if the time watch was there, but she couldn't feel it.
The three men who had captured her were sitting some distance away in a little circle, talking intently. A fourth man was pacing around them. He looked over at Claire, saw that she was awake, and approached her.
"How do you do," he said courteously. He was immaculately dressed in a three piece suit and white shirt and tie. "My name is Paul Giordano." He bowed politely. "I want to apologize for this," he said nodding around the room, "and for the behavior of my companions. I am deeply sorry that you have been brought into these circumstances. We have a very serious problem facing us, and we need some assistance, I'm afraid. A young man named Leonard Schoeman disappeared last evening from his home. His family as well, it seems. This was quite a mysterious disappearance, and very unfortunate as well, since it is absolutely imperative that we contact this young man. We have been instructed not to harm him in any way, but he has some information which is very valuable to us, and we need to speak to him. Now, we have every reason to believe that you have been completely honest and forthright in all of the information that you have given to us, and I sincerely believe that you do not know the whereabouts of the lad. However, you may know something that you are not aware of, if that makes any sense at all. I mean, you may know something that you are not aware has any importance, but if we can put it together with what we know, it may help us to find him and reward him for the information he has. Frankly, we suspect some malicious intent surrounding his disappearance, and he may well be in great danger. So, I wonder if you are willing to share with us everything you know about this young man, anything at all, whether you think it might help us or not."
"My ... my hands," Claire said. "They're numb. And my feet. Could you please loosen the cords?"
"Oh, My Dear," he said, "I'm dreadfully sorry. Certainly." He knelt down and untied Claire's ankles. She could smell his cologne. "We don't need these at all, do we? You are going to cooperate with us, I know you are." He walked around behind her and untied her wrists.
"Thank you," she said, massaging her wrists and then her ankles. The time watch was gone.
"Oh, my watch," she said.
"Oh, yes, an interesting looking watch. We have all of your things safely over there. You'll get them all back when you leave."
Things? She had no things. A room key. Some money.
He got another chair from nearby and pulled it over and sat down in front of her. "Now, tell me what you know about the lad. Tell me everything."
"I ... I've been having difficulty with my memory recently," she said. "I'll try."
He darkened, then nodded. "Go ahead," he said.
What can I say? she thought to herself. What was I doing there in the first place? I don't know Lennie. John talked about him. When I got back from seeing Marie, he said he had seen that piece in the paper, in the back of the Times, when he had transported a few days ahead to get the baseball and fight results. It was about Lennie's body being found. He had hired a private investigator. They had gotten Lennie and his family out of town because he was going to be killed. To Minneapolis, John had said. That was ... Monday. Yesterday. I didn't go with him because ... why? Oh, right, what a strange thing. He was gone all day yesterday. We were supposed to go to the theater. He called from the Bronx and told me to go on ahead. He would catch up with me there. He was all involved with the detective.
"Mrs. Redmond?"
"Yes ... I'm sorry." Her mind raced, trying to find words that would make sense. And where was John now? Making his rounds, of course. His Tuesday betting. And I ... I am back at the hotel, getting ready to spend the day at the Museum of Natural History. Then I'm meeting John for lunch in Greenwich Village. We have an appointment with Jack Kline's lawyer after that ... what's his name? ... to go over Bryce's contract proposal.
"We have to go over Bryce's contract proposal," she said. "It's very complicated, moving all of the money around. Getting it all home. Bryce isn't an accountant, but he knows accountants, and he's doing a very fine job."
"I beg your pardon? Who is Mr. Bryce?"
I just mailed something to Bryce Robinson. Some sort of new instructions - and some money! Why would I have done that? "Bryce Nielson. In Flint, Michigan. You haven't heard of him? He's a wonderful lawyer. He represents lots of cereal companies there. We decided to invest in grains. Grains are going to be wonderful once the European markets open up. There's such a food shortage there, you know. Mr. Truman is working very hard to open up those markets. That's what I think. That's what all of the anti-communism things are about, so people will support his programs to rebuild Europe. That's why he fired Mr. Wallace. I think that's awfully clever."
"And, where does Mr. Schoeman fit into this, Mrs. Redmond?"
"Oh, he's there, with Bryce in Flint. He and John went last night, I think it was. Yes, late last night. Lennie was quite interested in the cereal business. I never met him, of course."
The three men who had captured Claire stood up and came closer.
"Let me see if I have this straight, Mrs. Redmond," said Paul Giordano. "Your husband took Leonard Schoeman to Flint, Michigan last night?"
"Yes. You can find him there if you need to talk with him. The family, too, I believe."
"And why were you concerned that the young Mr. Schoeman might have been killed?"
"Oh, that was my husband's idea. He's very paranoid that way. He thinks gambling is very dangerous. I think so, too. Do you think it is?"
"Do you have an address in Flint where they can be reached?"
"No, Bryce was going to call me as soon as they got settled. Bryce Neilson. I don't have an address, no."
"And, your husband was going to come back here to get you? Or you were going to meet him there, or what?"
"I believe he and Bryce were going on to Paris. I was to meet them there. Some big cereal deal. I think the vision is to have corn flakes for all of Eastern Europe. Something like that. Paris is where all the important negotiations are, you know. It's all so complicated. He was to call me in a few days. He told me just to stay here and shop. He does that all the time. 'You just stay here and shop,' he says." She smiled.
The man who had sat with Claire in the back seat spoke. "Mrs. Redmond, why did you tell us earlier that you were to meet your husband and Leonard this morning in front of the Waldorf Hotel? That's where you were, and that's what you told us you were doing there. Do you remember that?"
"Oh, my," said Claire. "Is that what I said? I really need some medication. I left it at the hotel. I have these terrible lapses. I hope I didn't say anything to embarrass you. My husband says I embarrass him all the time. He usually has a nurse stay with me so I won't embarrass people so much. I'm always wandering off somewhere without my medication."
"Nurse?" asked Giordano. "You have a nurse? What, you're sick?"
Claire pointed to her head and made circles and smiled coyly. "I'm better sometimes than others. I've been on insulin a lot for my schizophrenia. See, I was time traveling for a long time. That's what my watch does that you have over there. I jump back and forth in time. I saw the inauguration of George Washington just last week. It was wonderful. Did you know that they had ducks running all over the place back then, right down Wall Street? Canons going off all the time, boom, boom, boom." She smiled. "I don't know if any of this helps."
Giordano stood up, nodded to the men, and walked toward a doorway at the end of the warehouse. The man who had sat with Claire in the back seat of the car took his pistol out of a holster under his suit coat and walked around behind her. She heard the hammer click back.
Oh, my sweet Jesus Christ, she shuddered to herself. This is it! Oh, my God, they're going to kill me, right now!
John said good-bye to Max Steenberg on Monday night in front of the Palace
Hotel, and continued in the cab to the Waldorf. It was half past eleven.
He walked into the lobby and instinctively reached in his pocket for his
room key. It wasn't there.
Of course it wasn't. He had just given it to Max. He stopped at the desk and got another one and went upstairs to the suite.
He walked to the terrace and looked out over the city. He looked toward Broadway, where ... where Claire was just now getting out of the theater and ... what was the play? John drew a blank. It was gone. For a moment, he thought he had seen the play, too. But he hadn't, of course. He had gone with Max to take Lennie to the airport Somewhere in there it seemed as though he had phoned Claire - here at the hotel - but of course that was impossible.
He walked back into the room. He was going to transport somewhere. But where? He tried to remember. He lay down on the couch, trying to settle into himself. He closed his eyes. He was trying to remember things, get everything straight in his head. He was spiraling down, falling into a blur of dream-like memories.
Claire, in what felt like the last seconds of her life, found herself staring into the eyes of the two men facing her. One looked away. The other looked at her oddly and smiled. It was the man who had been driving the black car.
No it wasn't. "Hey," said the man behind her with the gun. "Where the fuck is Mike?"
The other man in front of her turned to look at the driver. "I don't know," he said. "He was right here."
The man they thought was Mike was still looking at Claire and smiling. They couldn't see him.
"Hey, Paul," The man behind her called. Giordano had reached the door. He stopped and turned. "Mike's fucking gone. He just disappeared."
"What?"
Claire was resting in the eyes that were smiling at her. She was beginning to drift. The darkness ...
John's memories were colliding together as he lay on the couch, spinning around him like the little dive bomber gnats back home, zooming in, zooming in. He wasn't alone, of course. He knew that. The dream came back to him that he had had in Amarillo after they had driven back from St. Louis in 1976 - trying to arrange those meaningless squares on the moving surface. This was exactly like that. Nothing would fit. And then he had awakened from the dream and opened his eyes and known that the staring man was there in the room with him. Like right now. He opened his eyes and looked across the coffee table into those eyes. They had been hollow in the dream. They weren't hollow now. They were filled with so many dimensions of intensity. All things were in those eyes. It's time to go, he whispered to himself. The darkness was enveloping him. He let it bathe him. The staring man seemed to nod. There was a smile somewhere in those eyes. The words came again: It's time to go.
He was falling, falling as he had in his worst nightmares as a little boy. There had been a canyon in those dreams, a bottomless canyon whose walls and spires were of sun-drenched colors, odd colors, naked colors. He would be afraid in those recurrent dreams that he would fall upon a purple spire and be gorged, but he flew down past all of the sandstone spires, on down faster and faster toward the infinite emptiness below. In the dreams, he would always awaken in terror, but he wasn't going to wake up now. He was going to fall all the way into the ancient oblivion of the chasm below.
But the canyon wasn't bathed in sunshine now as it had been in his childhood dreams. It was bathed in darkness. All of the darkness he could imagine was down there, coming up around him. Relentless, timeless darkness. He was going now where the staring man wanted to take him. There was no resistance to that now. There was no place to stand to offer any resistance. All of the places to stand were far above him somewhere, lost. All of his images of any reality he had ever known had taken flight like birds and disappeared into some ageless sky.
"Sky's the limit," the Genie had said. That was a joke, of course. There wasn't any sky. Never had been. It was all just an illusion. That's all anything was. He understood that now. Understood it perfectly. Even his consciousness itself. That was just a crazy illusion of some kind. And now, that was flying away, too.
And there was Claire, coming up through the flowers. They were all in full bloom. What an amazing gift that was, that he had always been able to see her grace so clearly, the profound acquiescence to her unfolding. She was laughing, all smiles, carrying a bouquet she had gathered. He watched her as she approached. She waved. The earth was so warm against his skin. He was floating in the warmth. There, beyond Claire, was the sea. It smelled like low tide, mixed with the smell of the eucalyptus.
"What a perfect spot," she said. "This was such a good idea."
"Yes, it was," John smiled. "Perfect."
"Full circle," she smiled, sitting down with them.
The man looked out to sea. "That's all yours," he said, smiling and moving his arm in a circle. It was a nice voice. A deep and clear voice.
"It feels like we're inside it all," said John.
"You are," the man smiled. "That's where everything is."
"It was that way all along," said Claire, burying her face in the bouquet.
"Have you been here long?" John asked.
Claire broke into laughter. "I just got here," she said. "This is where all the music comes from." Her voice melted into him.
"It's where the bugs go in the winter." Said the man. He looked at John with seriousness, and then grinned.
John broke into gales of laughter. "Of course," he said. "Where else?"
"Hiding up in the trees," Claire pointed, giggling.
"With the horn-whacking rams," said John.
"Actually," said the man somberly, "I buried them all over there." He pointed.
"Yeah," said Claire. "In a plastic bag." They all fell over in laughter, rolling in the soft grass and flowers.
"Okay, I have a question," said Claire, sitting up and folding her arms around her knees. "Is it okay to ask questions?" She giggled.
"Fire away," said the man, leaning up on his elbow and putting a long blade of grass in his mouth.
"What did you think of the inauguration?"
They rolled in laughter again.
"The speech," said John. "Did you catch the speech?"
"Yeah," said the man. "I got inside for that."
"What did he say?" asked Claire.
"He said that basically everything was going to be all right."
Claire and John doubled over in laughter again.
"Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain," said John, trying to get his breath.
They laughed for a long time, and then fell silent. Claire and John lay back on the carpet of soft grass and let the sun bathe their skin, let the soft, warm ocean breeze waft over them. "This could be anywhere," John finally said.
"It is," said the man.
"What happens when everything stops," said Claire.
"The thing in between everything," said John.
"Between, under, around," whispered Claire. "Where all the children come from."
"This is where we got married," said John.
"I know," she said. "It's the third circle. Inside our rings."
"Grace," said John.
"It's the unfolding," she said.
"So," said John, rolling over and leaning up on his elbow to face the man. "This is it? All the time, this was it? Where you were trying to take us?"
He nodded.
"You scared the living shit out of us in your damned Desoto, you know that?"
"Not me," he smiled.
"It's the dream," said Claire. "Everybody dreams about what scares them most. It's always just their own dream, though. Right?"
The man smiled again. He was seeming to fade. It wasn't a man, thought John. It was a woman. No. It was ... just a spirit? Something he remembered from somewhere. He looked at Claire. She saw it too. There wasn't anyone there with them. It was just them. Not even them. Something else. The bluff was gone, too. The sea, the flowers, the trees, the sunshine. It was perfect. They weren't there anymore. They were in the back seat of a taxicab. John looked in the rear view mirror in the front seat. The driver saw him looking at the mirror and smiled and nodded. A nice face. A young face.
"Did you enjoy your visit?" He asked.
"Very nice," said John.
"It's a great city," he said.
"Have you lived here long?" asked Claire.
"Oh,
yeah, I grew up right here," said the driver. "Where are you
folks
from?"
"California," said Claire.
"I've never been there," said the driver. "What's it like?"
"Lots of bugs," said John.
"Bugs?"
John looked at Claire, and they laughed.
"Oranges, too," said Claire. "Great oranges. Oak trees. We live on a mountain."
"I miss it," said John.
"Me too," said Claire. She leaned over and kissed John. "I want to go home," she whispered. John felt a tear on her cheek. He smiled, putting his arms around her and holding her close.
"Shall we?" she asked. "I think I sent Bryce all the money. Everything's going to be whatever it's going to be."
He nodded and smiled. "Everything's going to be whatever it's going to be." She watched him set the "home" button on his time watch. He took it off his wrist and handed it to her. "You want to drive?"
She smiled and nodded and took the watch. "I lost mine in a warehouse anyway."
John reached in his back pocket. His wallet was still there. A wallet. Some wallet. He had bought so many. He took it out and tossed it into the front seat. "Keep the change," he told the driver.
Claire pressed the lever.
