2
AS SCYLLA ENTERED THE airport bar, he spotted the toupeed man immediately, and for a moment he was undecided as to what to do, since at their previous meeting they had both tried very hard, if somewhat briefly, to kill each other.
True, that had been Brussels and business, while this was Los Angeles International and, if flying could ever be considered pleasurable, pleasure, but that didn’t make Scylla’s problem any less tangible: Namely, how did you tell a fellow you’d recently made a pass at destroying that now you were off duty and interested in nothing more lethal than a little conversation? You couldn’t just walk up and say “Hi, how are things?” because more than likely there would be a new and unasked-for-hole in your temple before the “things” was fully sounded, Ape was that quick with a pistol.
Ape was working for the Arabs now, Libya or Iraq or one of them—Scylla could never really keep them straight—or at least he had been at the time of their Brussels encounter. As soon as he’d returned to Division, Scylla had asked to see Ape’s file, knowing there would be one and also that it would be thick—Division prided itself on its ability to collect and itemize all information on any adversary.
Not that Ape had always been an enemy. He shifted countries and allegiances frequently, but for six years he had worked for the British, and the two following that for the French. After that he tried freelancing, but evidently that hadn’t turned out well—it never really worked out well for anybody; only the inscrutable and virulent Mr. S. L. Chen free-lanced on a more or less permanent basis. After his attempt at becoming self-employed, Ape moved a good deal more quickly than before: Brazil for a while, then a quick stop in Albania before settling into his present slot with the Arabs.
Scylla stared at the little toupeed man sitting alone at the farthest stool. The genuinely remarkable thing was that he should be faced with the problem of how to introduce himself safely, because it was rare that two such as he and Ape should have gone against each other and both survived. Even though Ape was both shorter and less menacing-looking than Mickey Rooney, he had been absolutely top international level with any kind of small firearm for over a decade, whereas Scylla rated along with Chen as the two fastest at killing with either hand—palm up, palm down, right hand, left, it mattered not at all.
The logical thing, Scylla decided, was to find another bar. Risks didn’t bother him, but the unexpected he always tried avoiding. He had backed several steps out of the place when he paused, because, dammit, he wanted to talk to Ape. You didn’t get that kind of opportunity often, since when Scylla had first entered the business, Ape was one of the fewer than half dozen from any country who could lay legitimate claim to being remotely legendary. Scylla flicked back a bit, coming up with some of the others—Brighton, Trench, Fidelio—all, alas, retired. Violently.
And suddenly Scylla was in motion. He was extraordinarily quick for a man his size, especially at the start; he wasn’t particularly fast, but straightaway speed meant nothing, quickness was all. He had once heard a basketball coach ask another about a young player: “How is his quick?” The phrase stuck—he had not known till then you could be both quick and slow. Scylla moved along the bar behind the stools, and when he was close enough for his move, he threw some recognition on his face and whirled in behind the little man, his powerful arms locking Ape firmly in place, and it looked like two long-lost Elks or Babbitty Rotarians suddenly finding each other and going into their semi-secret greeting as Scylla whispered, “Peace, Ape,” followed by the lightning rejoinder “I’ve none.”
Scylla took the next bar stool, impressed by the speed of Ape’s reflexes; it was what made him unsurpassed with a pistol—not his aim, which was good, but that his bullet was already in the air while the enemy was still aiming. “Does that bother you?” Scylla wondered.
“What? Being unarmed? No, why should it, does it bother you?”
Scylla said nothing, his big hands clasped loosely together, fingers interlocked on the bar.
Ape flicked a glance at them. “But then, you’re never unarmed, are you?”
Scylla shrugged.
“Hands are better,” Ape said. “Close in, there’s no comparison. If I’d had your size, I’d have specialized in hands.”
Scylla thought immediately of Chen, who was far smaller even than Ape, frail, barely a hundred pounds. He would never have brought up the name, but he didn’t have to, Ape did. Scylla had to smile. He hadn’t the least idea where Ape had received his original training, which country, but more than likely it wasn’t dissimilar to his own. Actually, all they really knew about each other was whatever was locked in the files of their different main offices. In a way, this was nothing; in another, all. They could almost, on occasion, mind-read each other, and this was clearly one of those occasions.
“The reason Mr. S. L. Chen can kill so adroitly with either hand is because he is a goddamn heathen Chinee, and that kind of thing comes as second nature to Chinks, like all coons can dance.” Ape stared at the trace of whisky left in his glass. “That was supposed to be funny,” he said. “It didn’t come out that way though, did it?” Before Scylla could reply, the little man rode right on: “Now you’ll probably go to your grave thinking I’m a treasure house of prejudice. Ape? I met him once. Bigoted little fart, wig didn’t fit.’ Another.” This last was to the bartender, who nodded, went for a Scotch bottle, poured. “Make it a triple,” Ape said. The bartender nodded and poured.
Scylla ordered what he always did. “Scotch, please, lots of soda, lots of ice,” he said, thinking that Ape was too smart to be ordering triples. Triples were dangerous; your tongue got slow, your brain, your pistol reactions. All this was true, so of course he couldn’t say it; he sought a different avenue. “It’s not a bad wig,” he said.
“Not bad? Jesus, in the wind here today it rose up on my head, the front part did—the back part stayed in place but the front started flapping—it must have looked like it was trying to wave to somebody.” He stared at his drink. “That didn’t come out funny either. I used to be so funny. Truly, Scylla. A comedian.”
“I believe you.”
“You don’t a bit.”
“Does it matter?”
“No,” Ape said, before he said, “Yes, yes it does, a lot.”
Scylla thought it best to say nothing.
“I picked my name,” the little man went on. “I selected my own anonym. They said, ‘What do you want to be known as?’ and I’ve been dead bald since I was twenty-two, and out it popped, not even a pause—Ape,’ I said. After the play Hairy Ape by O’Neill, the American. Don’t you see how funny that is? I was like that all the time, barrels of laughs.”
Scylla smiled, because it was the decent thing to do, and also because it was one of Ape’s passions to keep his origin secret. He spoke no language quite well enough to seem native in it, and by referring to O’Neill as “the American” he seemed to remove that country as a possible home.
“I meant that about the wig,” Scylla said. “It’s absolutely serviceable—not as good as Sinatra the American’s toupees, but then, probably you don’t sing as well.”
Ape laughed. “There was a fellow once—before your time, I expect—Fidelio his name was, and he was crazed to find out where I was from. It was an obsession with him—the slightest clue, he’d track it down in his spare time. I used to pepper my speech with hints for him.”
Of all the legends, Scylla was most fascinated by Fidelio, who’d been a music lover—he’d been something of a fiddle prodigy as a child, but the talent didn’t carry over into adolescence, only his passion for music came along—and he’d been, from what the files at Division said, anyway, the most brilliant of any of them, from any country. “Did you know him well? Fidelio?”
“Know him? Did I know him, for God’s sakes, I retired him—”
“You did? I never knew that—our files don’t say a word about that, how did you do it? It must have been hard, God, it must have been damn near impossible,” and Scyl
la could have gone on, but he stopped before he made a fool of himself. He felt, right then, very much like a young Joe DiMaggio saying to the Babe, “Did you really point your bat and call that home run or was it luck? Did you know you could hit a homer? What did it feel like circling the bases, hearing them cheer? Go on, please, it’s important that I know.”
Ape picked up his glass, looked at the liquor.
Scylla waited patiently. When you were talking to Babe Ruth about home-run hitting, you let him set the pace.
“I’m glad you sat down, Scylla,” Ape said, still watching the whisky. “I was hoping you might. I saw you standing in the doorway.” He gestured toward a painting behind the bar; the glass angled faintly toward the main entrance. “Not much of an image; sufficient, though. I almost beckoned when you started backing out.”
“Why didn’t you?”
Ape sipped his triple—touched it to his lips, really; nothing went down. “This is only my second, and I won’t do more than taste it. I’m far from being intoxicated.”
Scylla missed the thought connection till Ape said, “I didn’t wave because I don’t like to force myself on people. Felt in the way since childhood, I expect.”
You shouldn’t be doing this talking, Scylla almost said, but since it was true, he didn’t. Something was cutting at Ape. Something horrid was knifing away inside.
“You were going to tell me about Fidelio,” Scylla said.
“I will, I remember—don’t sweat it, Scylla, I’m not drunk and about to start burbling on.”
Whatever it was that Ape was anguished over would soon surface; Scylla could sense that. There wasn’t much he could do but wait till it happened. Still, it wasn’t pleasant waiting, so he shifted to a subject of mutual interest, the time in Brussels when they both survived. Actually, it was a chance encounter, both of them apparently after the same dead passport engraver for whatever reason, and they came on each other suddenly in the same room with the corpse, and Ape fired and Scylla swiped at him with his right hand, but his aim was bad, he missed the neck, connected only with Ape’s shoulder, which was surprisingly muscled, and then Ape tried once more with a shot, but he was stumbling, it was really more a warning than an attempt to kill, and then it was over, one of them going one way, one another. “Why did you miss with that first shot?” Scylla wondered. “Not that I’m sorry, understand.”
“I hadn’t been drinking—I was a teetotaler then, it was over a year ago.”
“Fifteen months, I think.”
Ape nodded. “Shadows,” he said. “Shadows are ruinous to your accuracy. I was high, I expect. I went for your brain but got the wall. If I’d gone for your heart, you’d have been uncomfortable awhile.”
Scylla raised his glass. “To shadows.”
Ape toyed with his whisky.
The loudspeaker announced a further delay of the polar flight to London.
Ape cursed, took a long swallow of Scotch.
“I’m going to London too,” Scylla said, and he touched the First Class ticket envelope in his inside jacket pocket. “Good. I’ve never had company on the damn flight before, eleven hours of nothing’s what it’s always been. I can’t read anything deeper than a magazine on planes. Hedy Lamarr’s autobiography. That was perfect polar reading.”
“I’m flying Coach,” Ape said, and Scylla knew what had been destroying the little man.
“For cover?”
Ape shook his head.
“Mistake, probably.”
Ape shook his head again.
Scylla knew it was best to say nothing. There was nothing to say, really. When you did this work, you went First Class. All the way. There weren’t old-age benefits and pension plans; nobody was guaranteeing job security. If you flew Coach, you did it because it fit the past they’d made for you for the particular task they’d sent you on. The only other reason was to let you know your work ratings were dropping, and once that happened, retirement was a matter of time. Only, of course, you weren’t allowed to retire. Catch-23.
Except it seemed, to Scylla, an altogether shitty act, sending a legend Coach. Christ, give him a job he couldn’t survive, let him go out with a little glory clinging, at least; he’d earned that.
But then, the Yankees traded Babe Ruth, didn’t they.
“I’ve had a good run,” Ape said. “Better than most.”
“And you retired Fidelio.”
“And Trench. Didn’t know that either, did you? Got them both. Very same year. Shadows didn’t exist for me then.” He took another taste of Scotch. “You know what I was thinking before you arrived?”
Scylla shook his head.
“Do you want to?”
I really don’t, Scylla thought; you don’t want to hear from Johnny Unitas that he can’t throw the bomb any more or have Elgin Baylor tell you that his jump shot is gone. “If you feel like talking, talk,” Scylla said.
“I was thinking that there has never been a woman I didn’t pay for, or a child who knew my name, or a wig that enhanced me.”
“Sentimental crap,” Scylla said, hoping it would work ... Pick it up, pick it up, Mr. Loman ...
The little man was silent for a while. Then he broke into a huge laugh. “Goddamn, Scylla, what a good thing to say.” Then he actually smiled.
Scylla nodded and said, “Now get on with the damn Fidelio story or I’ll go look for the Confessions of Lana Turner in the bookstore.”
“First some ablutions,” the little man said, and he hopped off the stool. “You know about that, I’m sure it’s in my file at Division,” and he scurried out of the bar in what was unmistakably a good mood.
The file on Ape mentioned a weakness with his kidneys and a troublesome lower intestine—there had been an operation some years back. So Scylla would have known he was headed for the men’s room, “ablutions” remark or not.
He had only raised his glass with Ape barely out of sight when he decided, just-like-that, to change his ticket and go Coach—it was not a traumatic decision if you were the one doing the deciding. Scylla left the bar immediately, made his way to the Pan Am windows, waited surprisingly little time, explained what he wanted, got it, just-like-that, and made his way back to the bar. Probably his gesture was the same as Ape’s outburst, sentimental crap, but if the Fidelio story had any texture, any coloring at all, there would never be a better time to hear it, and the Trench tale too, and Scylla made a note to say exactly that when Ape realized they were flying together, so that way Scylla could seem an interested executive on the rise rather than a premature mourner for the dead.
Scylla took his place at the bar again, and waited for Ape to return. He finished his Scotch and soda slowly.
The other stool stayed empty.
Scylla ordered a refill.
And took a sip.
Obviously, something was very much wrong.
Another sip.
It’s none of your affair, Scylla reminded. He sat alone and quiet at the bar for a moment, then took a large swallow of Scotch. Probably it was the size of that swallow that determined his next actions, because he never drank a lot without the door being locked, and you certainly didn’t get that kind of privacy in airport bars, which meant he was giving in to anxiety, which meant he must really want to hear the Fidelio story, which meant he had to do something other than sit, so Scylla got up and walked toward the men’s room.
The sign on the men’s-room door put it all in perspective. “Sorry, Pipe Trouble. Please Use the Facilities at the Bottom of the Escalator. Thanks.” It was taped to the door, written in ink in a neat hand. Scylla nodded to himself, remembering that the escalator was a good distance away, which explained why the little toupeed man was so long gone.
He was halfway to the bar when he decided the sign was a phony. Scylla turned and went back to the men’s-room door, wondering why he was so sure. Probably it was the word “Facilities”—no one said “Facilities”—you developed a sense for things after a while. He knew the sign was false, just as he
knew the door was locked, but he gave it a slight push anyway.
It was locked, but locks meant nothing to Scylla, he had a way with them, and he reached into his pants pocket. Everybody was always talking about skeleton keys, writers were always writing about skeleton keys, but Scylla knew they were nothing, not unless you had a hundred different sizes and styles. Picks were the thing, and he always had one, and one was all you needed if you had the gift of touch when it came to tumblers. He took out his pocket knife, small, two-bladed, and ordinary except that he had altered the tinier blade, thinned it slightly, given it an almost imperceptible hook, so that it wasn’t much of a pick really, no decent locksmith would want to take it on an important job; still, it sufficed, and Scylla inserted it noiselessly into the lock once, got the feel of the tumblers, ripped up and down, and that was that.
Scylla lurched drunkenly into the men’s room, made his unsteady way toward the sinks. There were two others in the place, a young Caucasian engineer in overalls, who was working on the overhead pipes, and a Negro janitor, who was cleaning up, pushing an enormous canvas garbage sack along. “Martinis ’re killers,” Scylla slurred to the black man, and he ran the cold water, tested it. “Martinis ’re killers,” he slurred to the engineer.
“Hey, off,” the engineer said, coming toward Scylla: “Pipes are screwed up.”
Scylla blinked stupidly, turned off the spigot.
“Didn’t you read the sign?” the Negro said.
“Sign?” Scylla said, very perplexed. “Said men’s room, ’course I read th’ sign, natur’ly I read th’ sign, wouldn’t want a buncha ladies screamin’ at me.” He shook his head. “Martinis ’re killers,” he said to the mirror, and turned the cold-water spigot on again and put some water on his face.
The engineer turned the spigot off, while the black went for the door, opened it, glanced to see if the sign was gone. “You can’t use the water, mister, really. I’m sorry, but you can’t.” He was very polite and sincere, and Scylla wondered who had retired Ape, he or the black, and were they Arabs or enemies of Arabs. It didn’t matter much to Ape any more. He was resting, Scylla knew, at the bottom of the canvas sack.
The Novels of William Goldman: Boys and Girls Together, Marathon Man, and the Temple of Gold Page 96
