The Canal

by Daniel Morris

  "Joe--"

  A wavelet flopped into her mouth. The taste was undeniable. It was decay, it was void matter, it was shit, it was hate, it was everything, it was evil, and it was hopeless, so, so hopeless. Zombie flatulence. Botulism meringue. Fecal gelato. The flavor of body swamp, diaper dingle, amputee stub, and victimless crime. Of toilet tang, typhus, gangrene, spudge, and of prayers very much denied, of prayers sent back to sender with "Fuck you," scrawled on the label. The taste clung hard. Her eyes stung with the aroma of bowels. Joe was there, gasping for air, dysentery spilling off his hair and face. His eyes were bloodshot.

  She dove under and paddled in Henry's direction. Indistinct, gelatinous fry scooted from her grasp. She felt warm pockets of unmentionable. But no child. No son. She went deeper, touching bottom with her hands. The canal floor, the marl, it was icy. She sunk in it; glue oozing between her fingers and sliding up her arms. How deep did it go? Could an entire body get lost in it? Could her son be down there, trapped?

  Rose fought her way back to the surface, feeling explosively ill. She thought she saw Joe, but then the water started tilting dizzily so that it switched with the sky. She was drowning in the air, you see. All she needed to do was swim toward the water where she'd be able to breathe. All she had to do was breathe the water...

  Something pulled her by the arm. Had she found Henry? Was she saving Henry? No, she was being pulled toward the canal bank. Joe was doing it -- now he was reaching around her, pushing her over the top of the embankment. She rolled onto the sandy ground and retched. Joe climbed next to her. He collapsed and then didn't move. Both of them were wearing a layer of black slime.

  After that, someone had revived her. A friend of Joe's, a patrolman named Kozar. The bridge was part of his beat; he'd seen them jump. He promised that they'd find Henry. He swore it. But he was lying. And at that point, the fever had begun to boil away at Rose's brain.

  And that was it. The memory. Those were the names. The name. Henry. It was why she traded Joe and everything else for the top floor. Where she was welcome to remember, to live inside that day over and again, experiencing it backwards, forwards, fast, and slow. Constantly. It was what she needed to do, because she couldn't face anything else. That life could somehow resume from the moment her son died seemed so ludicrous to her, even obscene. There would be no forgetting. There was no such thing as moving on.

  At least the man had stopped talking. At least maybe now he'd leave her alone--

  An unwelcome surge of fitness suddenly welled over her -- a med must have kicked in or some crucial threshold of vitamin was finally achieved. The memory slipped from her completely, taking the names with it. And with that she willed herself back into oblivion.

  *

  Rose's breath skated the ridges of Alan's ear. He was practically in her lap, practically in bed with her and sharing the IV. She had the vocal power of a cotton ball, a whisper, but lousier, and even that was starting to thin to a syllabitic gruel.

  She'd talked, sure, but in circuitous sentences, in phrases that curved back on themselves, dubious meanings spinning in their structure. From what Alan could piece together, her story involved her and Joe, together. And something about the canal. But the rest didn't make any sense. Because Joe didn't have any kid. Was she making that up? Was it something from long ago? Either way, none of it mattered, because it obviously had nothing to do with reality.

  For a minute there he almost thought that he had his guy. He had thought this Henry figure was the cannibal he'd been looking for. He'd begun making plans to corral every Henry in the phone book -- he'd bring them in one by one and there'd be no nice stuff, Vincent and Womack would have brass knuckles and baseball bats. And one of those Henrys would sing. One would spill his scumbag guts.

  But then Alan started getting the impression that he was hearing something else. A tall tale. Mere fantasy.

  Again, the knocking on the door.

  "Rose, stay with the bridge. Think two days ago, you were there."

  She responded with a dose of verbal backwash. The open eye, it had long since closed.

  "What did you see, Rose? Is Henry the ringleader? Is Joe protecting you? Is he in on it? Rose!"

  She was gone.

  Alan withdrew and sagged against the chair. Barely an answer to be found. There was, on the other hand, plenty of failure, plenty to spare. And disappointment. And impending doom, that too. He teased a cigarette out of his pack and hung it in his mouth. He couldn't find the inspiration to light it; it just lay there.

  More knocking on the door, a lot harder this time. Truthfully, he was afraid. He was afraid that if he answered, somebody would be telling him about a third body, sucked clean. And if that happened, well, he'd seriously be finished. He'd strike himself down with his own fist. He'd brain himself.

  Another knock. "Detective D'Angelo? Detective?"

  Alan closed his coat, nervously hiding those legs of his. "Mind if I, if I step outside for a moment?" he asked Rose. She had receded back into invisibility, mixing back into the mattress. No, she didn't mind.

  Out in the hallway, he noted the men's grim faces. So, this really was it then. The end. It would be better if they didn't speak. If they simply subdued him with their batons and then loaded him into a van to be delivered to the nearest granite-walled sanatorium.

  Something happened, is what they proceeded to tell him. There had been a call, they said, an emergency. Someone had needed to talk to him.

  It wasn't what Alan was expecting, what they were saying.

  His wife, they said. Something had happened to his wife.

  >> CHAPTER FOURTEEN <<

  Alan skated down waxed corridors, bypassing bypasses, retreating from treatments. He might have passed Rose's doctor, he thought he recognized the voice, involved in some kind of transplant playmaking -- hog heart, robot arm, petri dish nose.

  In the car, he drove dangerously, taking liberties with other lanes and blindly running the busier intersections. Until he finally lunged towards the canal, in the deepening dusk, trading the civilized world for the heathen one.

  As he neared the block, he could see her. Susan. Standing in the middle of the road, an egregious, foul looking stain covering most of her, glistening a raspberry black. A patrolwoman -- fat bottom, skinny top, like a saltshaker -- was chasing her with a pom-pom of towels, swiping at Susan's skunked hands.

  Alan drew alongside, rolling down the window.

  "BLOOD!" Susan bellowed.

  "Are you okay?" asked Alan. He should get out of the car. He should go to her.

  "MURDER!"

  The cop with towels grunted. "She was running crazy. All over in the streets."

  "MAYYYHEMMM!"

  The cop took another wild grab at Susan's hands. "Child, lets have it. Be still."

  Susan was in shock. Death could do that. Death could still impress. Alan couldn't help but notice the bag of leftovers she cradled in her arms, like it were a living thing. She bounced it, whispered to it, comforted it with soothing caresses. The woman had flipped.

  He should be beside her, holding her. But there was the gunge to consider, she was dripping with it. And at the moment she didn't really seem like his wife. More like a civilian. Part of the report. It was normal to have some sort of hysterical type hanging around the murder works. Witnesses to evil deeds. She was just one more. He fought the urge to call her "ma'am."

  A siren announced itself from behind him. Alan checked his rearview mirror -- it was Vincent.

  "Listen Susan..." he said. He couldn't decide what to say next. There was a whole list of possibilities: "Everything's all right," "It's over now," "Nothing to worry about," millions of them, so easy and obvious, all he had to do was choose. But Alan, in his car, Susan in her soggy clothes -- it was amazing how unfamiliar two familiar people could be.

  Alan simply drove away. He slipped his hand out of the window and waved for Vincent to follow.

  They skittered to a stop outside the house. A couple of squad c
ars were already waiting. The house looked terminal. In other words, like part of the neighborhood.

  "Oh, God," said Vincent. "I was just here yesterday. There was this guy, senile as a tree."

  They had filled Alan in at the hospital. They had found his wife and got what information they could. They said Susan had mentioned a Mr. Zarella. Alan was embarrassed to admit that, yes, his wife knew such a man. Once or twice she'd even asked Alan to come along on those visits of hers. But the way she made him sound, like some cough drop smelling specter, some long toothed Casper -- well, no thank you. It wasn't that he necessarily had anything better to do. Just, no.

  Alan mounted the step to Zarella's and carefully leaned inside. Apparently Mr. Zarella had been drowning in his own rubbish. Reefs of it. But Alan, improbably, he didn't mind it. Because back at the hospital, they had told him something else. Something miraculous.

  Answers had been found.

  Alan followed the hallway, kicking through a pile of what looked like chicken bones, and eased into the living room. He hissed, nodding toward the sofa. In the gloom lay a deeper darkness -- a blast zone of brown plasma that radiated from the couch, pancaked against the wall like a pagan flag. A police radio squelched in the backyard.

  "Go outside, I'll meet you there," said Alan. Vincent nodded as he slid past.

  Alan carefully flipped the light switch. The throne of gore came to life, leaping out against the walls. But Alan was more interested in the open briefcase lying on the coffee table. Scattered inside were blood stained enrollment forms, an address book, a street map...and a wad of pamphlets rubber banded together. A name: Lawnhill Cemetery. He recognized the picture, bright lawn under a brighter sky...

  The brochure from the other morning. Breakfast. What had Susan told him...about a salesman? A salesman. If a salesman had been making the rounds, he could have easily wandered into canal territory, to Mr. Zarella's...

  Alan quickly peeked into the kitchen. More bones, and a large amount of pet collars. The air was gridlocked with pests. A cockroach waved from the stove.

  "Alan," came Vincent's voice from the yard, sharply urgent. "Alan, this is major here."

  Of course it was. Because it had finally happened -- Alan had information. Data. Progress. And he was content to savor this, to stand in death's kitchen, knowing he was about to drop one hell of a law bomb all over this goddamn case.

  Alan lingered over a framed photo, glazed with dust. It was a black and white portrait of a young man, presumably Mr. Zarella, smart in an army uniform, strong, alive, arm in arm with a lady whose dimples went finger deep. It was difficult to comprehend how the Zarella in the photo had become the horror that must have haunted this foul swamp.

  Alan stepped out onto the patio, a piece of charcoal crunching like a beetle beneath his shoe. He beheld the enormous pool of chum at the yard's heart. The glot had dried, hardening to a crumbly velvet, an au gratin layer. Gouged tracks showed where Susan must have fallen. Around the perimeter lay frayed and crusted bits of clothing while a trail branched off through an opening in the back fence. Two patrolmen stood with Vincent, by the barbecue.

  "Disgusting, isn't it," said one of the cops.

  "Oh...its not so bad," said Alan. What he wanted to say was, it's beautiful, it's the most wonderful thing I've ever seen. Because to Alan, it wasn't guts and gurd -- it was truth. Given to him like a gift, by his wife of all people.

  Vincent pointed to the barbecue's handle. A meat fork hung there. It was coated in a bark of mealy blood, matter gummed in-between the two tines.

  "And look here..." said Vincent.

  Behind the barbecue there lay a messy heap of clothes. There was a suit coat and slacks, both freckled with small, telltale punctures. Underneath them peeked the heel of a lone loafer, identical to the one they had collected from the first corpse.

  Alan prodded the pants pockets. There would be a payoff, he knew this even before he hit the bulge of a wallet. He knew this because there would be nothing but payoffs from now on. The answers may have gotten waylaid for a while, but now here they were, late but welcome, welcome anytime. Smiling smugly, Alan extracted the wallet with a kerchief.

  There was a driver's license inside. The photo showed a man -- cornered looking, as if stalked by the camera -- in his 40's with a black mustache. There was barely enough daylight left to see by, but Alan could just make out the name: Ray Clifford with an outskirt address. In the money pouch were twenty-two much handled dollars, counted and recounted till they'd turned brown, along with several business cards bearing the baroque crest of Lawnhill Cemetery.

  "Ray Clifford," said Alan. "Ray Clifford is...was in the living room, takes out his briefcase. Gets stabbed with that fork. Gets brought out here. Clothes taken off. And then..." His eyes shifted toward the darkening yard.

  Vincent was looking too, queasily. "...Then dinnertime."

  "Disgusting," said the cop again.

  "Something's missing," said Alan, thinking. "That's just one murder. Who killed the old man and smeared him all over the lawn? And why wasn't he killed first, if this is his house? Where was he when Ray got ate?"

  "M-maybe whoever it was...they came and was using his place," said Vincent. The fear in Vincent, it was emerging. It was a slow degeneration: purple bags were forming under his eyes, he started shedding layers of sweat, his necktie began messily uncoiling itself. "What if they k-kept him hostage. T-t-till they ran out of things to eat. Oh hell, and I was here. I spoke to him. What if...what if he was trying to tell me he needed help? What if--" Vincent started hugging himself.

  Alan laid a firm hand on Vincent's shoulder. "Don't get ahead of yourself, Vince. Don't let your emotions guide you. We must always be in control, Vincent, always." He spoke gently, evenly. He had a hands on both Vincent's shoulders now. Was this how God felt when he addressed those dim, foolish children of his? Who would never have their shit together like he did?

  "But you're good police, Vince. And maybe even a good friend. And when all this is done -- and it will be, soon. And when Joe is gone -- and he will be, soon. I want you to be my new partner. Because in spite of everything, I know you'll get the job done."

  In Vincent's face there was a growing peace. Or at least, that's what Alan wanted to see, and so he saw it. That was the best part of being in control. You could tell reality to go screw itself. What mattered was your reality.

  The air was filling with the sound of rallying sirens, the troops arriving in force. "Now get out front," he said, "and make sure those fucks don't ruin my crime scene." Vincent thanked him. To Alan it sounded very exuberant and praising, half sung, like to the heroes of old.

  When he was alone, Alan lit a cigarette. It would be his last, a victory puff. It was incredible to think how he'd been -- he'd given up, hadn't he? He'd actually tossed it in. And now, all of a sudden: switch. He was on top. He was in command. His legs were just plain legs again, average accessories. And his problems were in massive, yellow retreat, burning crops and blowing bridges the whole way. They knew what was coming, saw it writ large across the horizon. Yes: THE SOLUTION. The solution was here at Mr. Zarella's. Links would be found. Clues would be unraveled. Like a bloodhound, Alan sniffed the truth.

  He took a virgin's drag -- no inhaling. Cheers. Dirty habit anyway. He threw the cigarette into the empty lot next door.

  It was peculiar though, how, with the last of twilight, the night seemed to surge with unexpected strength. How a strange breeze, canal smelling, sticky and foul, suddenly floated in from the yard.

  What little light came through the doorway had begun to falter. Oddly, he could no longer see beyond the stake in the lawn...and then he couldn't even see that far. The darkness was coming closer, almost to the porch, where it seemed to hesitate.

  Was...was there was something there? In the murk? That breeze. Alan couldn't seem to get his gun out of its holster. He held his breath. Something was there...it was--

  "Anyone home?"

  Alan blinked. The yard was ba
ck, the stake, the fence. Although the fence was swaying somewhat, those parts that were still standing. No breeze. No smell.

  "Hello?" From indoors. Womack.

  Tricks, pointless tricks of the mind. Fatigue could do that. It was the exhaustion, that was all, and the stress.

  Alan hastily ducked back inside. Womack was wearing a plastic poncho, looking himself like a bag of Susan's leftovers, as he contemplated the couch, appearing impressed.

  "If you like that," said Alan, "there's more in the yard."

  "You'd never know a body could hold so much stuff," said Womack, who then added seriously, "Bleecker is on the way. And brother, he's really got it out for you. Tell me you got some sorta plan because--"

  "Don't worry about it," breezed Alan. Breezing was something you could do when you'd stumbled across the motherload. You could also whizz, bop, or croon, that's how good you were feeling. Alan explained all the details. He felt himself grow stronger as he did so. He felt power returning to him.

  "Ahoy that," Womack finally grinned. "I never doubted you for a heartbeat."

  Vincent emerged from the hallway leading a train of officers. They all stopped to have a good, fair look at the blood-funked walls. Even Alan took time to appreciate its art. The atmosphere was festive. They had a real breakthrough on their hands.

  Too bad about the screaming, though. Really killed the mood.

  Fortunately, Alan was no longer beholden to such actualities. It wasn't screaming he was hearing, it was laughter. Jocular, good-natured. Laughed by guys in sweater vests, at the Polo Lounge. Amicable. Then less amicable. Then disturbing. Then desperate.