The Last Coin

by James P. Blaylock

  “What’s he doing, do you figure?” Andrew bit into his third Mrs. Chapman’s and knew at once that he didn’t want it. But he ate it anyway, wondering why he had such a passion for doughnuts, why he couldn’t leave them alone.

  “Watch,” said Pickett.

  Andrew watched, and it became clear at once what Pennyman was doing. He was sowing the field with silver dimes—handfuls of them, which he threw out in a glittering spray. Then he moved on, twenty feet farther, scattering dimes in a wide, purposeful circle that would lead him back around to the oleanders.

  “What on earth? …” Andrew muttered.

  “Same as the belted turtles,” Pickett said. “To attract the two coins.”

  And it was just then that Pennyman found one of the turtles. They saw him bend over to pick it up, and then drop it abruptly when the thing urinated almost heroically on his pantslegs and shoes. They could hear the curse in the still air. Then he bent over again, and meddled with the creature, removing the silver belt before sowing another handful of dimes, peering closely at the ground now, alert for more turtles.

  They were home by seven-thirty, after a half-dozen cups of coffee at the Potholder. The Santa Anas had kicked up, and the air was full of the rustling of tree limbs and the random banging and pounding and howling of the wind-blown seacoast. Andrew went up to visit Aunt Naomi, carrying another bowl of Weetabix and the fixings just in case. Predictably, she was sitting in front of the window again, watching the ocean over the several rooftops. Two of her cats sat with her.

  Surf stormed through the pier, the wave crests licking the bottom of it and blown to foamy white by the offshore wind. The long, booming waves began to break some two hundred yards out, quartering hard in a tumble of churning ocean, re-forming quick and steep and slamming down in the shallows with a crack that must have been audible for miles. City lifeguards had cordoned off the entrance to the pier, which shuddered under the pounding surf, and every now and then a monstrous wave humped up along the horizon, drove in, and smashed straight through the pier railing, surging around the bait house and pouring off again in spindrift sheets of lacy white. The beach was almost inundated, and the tide was still rising.

  Aunt Naomi’s radio murmured. The early morning earthquakes had centered in the Hollywood Hills, and there’d been damage at the zoo. Griffith Park was alive with escaped beasts—apes and peccaries that had gone to ground, some few of them escaping over the hills and into the backstreets of Chinatown. Clouds of bats had swarmed out of the canyons from previously unknown caverns and rifts, and the dry bed of the Los Angeles River had cracked like the shell of a walnut, releasing torrents of subterranean water through a dozen fissures.

  “Sounds almost like the first trumpet, doesn’t it?” Andrew said, fixing up the bowl of Weetabix.

  Aunt Naomi nodded. “I didn’t think I’d live to see it.” She petted one of the cats, who was looking hard at the cereal.

  “Coming along to the treasure hunt tonight?”

  She shook her head. “I’m too tired.”

  “Maybe Dr. Garibaldi …”

  “Dr. Garibaldi is off the case,” she said with a dismissing wave of her hand. “It’s cancer, I suppose, all this bleeding, and he’s too much the fool to see it.”

  Andrew didn’t know what to say. Somehow he had come to like Aunt Naomi and her cats, once he’d understood what made her tick, or rather what had got in the way of her ticking. She’d become a sort of kindred spirit, what with her Weetabix enthusiasm and the joy she took in a cup of coffee. It had turned out, when he paid attention, that she wasn’t a fool after all; she no doubt understood very well what he was doing with the money she advanced him—approved of it even.

  Last night, before the cafe doors opened, she had talked seriously about drinking glasses, about the differences in beer drunk out of pilsners and pint glasses and mugs, pointing out the easy to overlook virtues of paper cups. He had risked telling her about his war with the tumblers in the kitchen cupboard, and she had offered to do her part. She had been full of philosophy, and saw very clearly that all the cheerful little details of day-to-day existence, all the wonderful trifles, were, as she put it, knick-knacks of the human spirit. Andrew was almost teary-eyed now thinking about it.

  “Well,” he said, “Pickett and I are going to be there, at the treasure hunt. I expect it’s going to be an adventure.”

  “Probably more of an adventure than you’ll want,” said Aunt Naomi.

  There was a silence. Then the radio began to chatter about a collision at sea, about a fishing boat heading in toward San Pedro, trying to beat the rising swell and colliding off the tip of Catalina Island with a vast, barnacle-encrusted whale …

  Andrew puzzled over it. “Something in the wind,” he said.

  “And in the ocean.” She was silent for a moment. “Why don’t you spend some time with Rose today? It’s Sunday. Take a walk. Here.” She hauled her purse out from under the night stand and fished around in it. “Have dinner somewhere nice.” She handed him four twenties and squeezed his hand, not bothering to write anything down in her book.

  Darkness came early. There was hardly any dusk. The full moon rocked above the troubled ocean, throwing a silver sheen across the plowed dirt of the pumpkin field, where two or three hundred people milled about, eating late-night picnic lunches and talking in hushed voices. The apocalyptic weather had somehow leached away the carnival atmosphere that Andrew would have expected. It was almost as if the mass of people, sitting on tailgates and at suitcase tables, felt the coiled tension in the air. The occasional ringing voice of a child sounded as out of place as it would have in church, and almost made the night vibrate.

  Someone had brought along oil drums full of cut-up construction lumber, which had been doused with gasoline and lit, so that here and there around the parking area little imprisoned bonfires burned, throwing shadows onto the dirt. Somehow the effect was weird, almost cataclysmic, rather than warm or cheering.

  When they pulled up in the Metropolitan, Andrew felt almost as if the people ought to applaud him, as if they ought to know who he was. But they wouldn’t believe it even if they were told, and they were anxious only to dig, to find the hermetically sealed ring or the seafood dinner tickets. They’d brought spades and collapsible army shovels and clamming forks. Children carried trowels. Andrew had brought the spoon, and Pickett was empty-handed.

  They spotted Pennyman straight off, walking alone fifty yards distant. And there, parked at the head of the line of cars, was his taxi, the driver waiting inside, reading a paper. Pennyman walked with a limp, as if he had something in his shoe. Andrew bet that it was some sort of detecting device, contrary to rules, but that even if Uncle Arthur’s charity knew about it nothing would be done. For the principal players, the rules would be abdicated that night. Rules were perfunctory now.

  Two tables with folding chairs had been set up between the bonfires, and a half-dozen ladies of Leisure World vintage sat around them, taking five-dollar bills, issuing tickets, handing out little maps, ready to keep track of unearthed treasures on lists drawn up on college-ruled paper. Andrew recognized the woman from the Recliner, but he was too nervous to make small talk. So after he and Pickett had paid their money, they hurried across toward the dirt trail that led into the field from the road, where a little rising cloud of dust swirled up from the wheels of the red electronic car, which bumped along toward them, swerving from side to side, carrying the oldest man on earth. It was Uncle Arthur finally, and Andrew was glad to see him.

  His relief waned, though, when the old man pushed the door open and stumbled out. He was tousled and rumpled, and he looked so ancient that he might have passed for an unwrapped mummy in a glass case. Andrew and Pickett stopped short. The very sight of him cut off Andrew’s hearty wave. Pickett stepped up and shook his hand delicately, unable to hide his fascination with Uncle Arthur’s forehead, which was marked quite clearly with a cross-shaped slash of pink. If Pickett and Andrew didn’t know what
they knew, they might have taken it for a scar.

  The murmuring night was shattered suddenly by a voice behind them that said, “You!”

  Andrew spun around, and there was Mr. Pennyman, looking past them at Uncle Arthur’s forehead.

  For a moment the old man’s rheumy eyes cleared and he peered straight at Pennyman. “Me,” said Arthur simply.

  Pennyman laughed out loud, and Andrew wanted to hit him, to pop him one on the snoot. But they’d been through that, and there was no time for it tonight. Up close, Andrew could see that Pennyman wore an ostentatious belt of silver dollars in a triple row and linked with silver chain mail. He didn’t have his stick, but rested instead against a silver-shod spade. He didn’t in any way acknowledge Andrew’s or Pickett’s presence, but seemed satisfied simply with knowing at last who his real adversary was. He turned around and hobbled off toward the assembled crowd that pressed in anticipation against the ribboned starting rope.

  “We’ve got the spoon in the car,” Andrew whispered when Pennyman was out of earshot.

  Uncle Arthur cupped a trembling hand to his ear and said, “Eh?”

  “I say we’ve got the spoon!”

  “God damn the moon!” the old man rasped, but the effort of it seemed to shake him. He stepped back, almost stumbled, and closed his eyes for a moment.

  Then he blinked at them, as if he were just waking up, and gave Andrew a squint-eyed look. “I was up in Alberta once,” he said, nodding.

  Andrew swallowed hard, his mind racing to make sense of the Alberta business. It didn’t compute, somehow. Maybe Uncle Arthur hadn’t come to the point yet …

  But it seemed he had. He stood blinking at them, swaying in the wind. “Little bit of railroad work,” he said.

  “Ah,” said Andrew. “About the spoon …”

  There was an explosion just then—a blast of yellow fire that lit up the whole western horizon, as if the entire city of Long Beach had detonated.

  “Oil fire!” cried Pickett. “Looks like Signal Hill!”

  Another explosion rocked the night, and a tongue of bright blue flame shot away and licked the sky. The air was suddenly full of the shriek of sirens and the hot wind blew out of the east.

  The masses of people stood staring. If one had run, all would have followed. But in the full minute that they stood immobile, unbelieving, it became clear that there was nothing to do, no place to run. The fire didn’t pose a threat; it was several miles away. They’d paid their five dollars … The woman from the Recliner rallied them, snatching down the rope, letting them out into the field, shouting about rolls of coins, diamond rings, toys. “Hurray!” someone shouted, and all of a sudden there was cheering and running, as if it had been fireworks igniting in the west, and not oil storage tanks.

  Uncle Arthur squinted at Andrew suddenly and said, “Are you the son?”

  “God help us,” muttered Pickett.

  “I’m the nephew,” said Andrew. “Do you remember me?”

  “Of course,” said the old man. “Sure. The bearded man, with the sheep. Did you cut it off?”

  “Cut what off? I don’t wear a beard.”

  “We had a device,” he said, thinking hard, “that would burn your beard straight off. Roast your head like a potato if you didn’t look sharp. I sold them door to door. At least I think I did. Wish I had one now.” He gave Pickett a particularly hard look. “Did I tell you I was in Alberta? Why don’t you shave off that damned silly mustache?” he said. “Looks like a damned caterpiller.”

  “Get the spoon,” said Pickett, smiling and nodding at Uncle Arthur. He jerked his hand at Andrew, as if to propel him toward the car. “Sit down, sir! Take a load off.”

  “Ach.” Uncle Arthur waved him away in disgust, and then slumped back down onto the seat of his car. Lord knows how he’d driven that far, but his part in the War of the Coins was over, at least for the evening.

  “The damned moon!” said Pickett as Andrew hurried back toward him, the spoon in his pocket. “This would have to happen tonight.”

  “Maybe we better do something for him. Call someone.” Andrew looked sadly at the old man, whose head slumped against his chest now. He appeared to be sound asleep, breathing laboriously.

  “He’s two thousand years old,” said Pickett, heading out toward the fields. “He won’t die until it’s time, and if it’s time, then heaven help all of us. All the doctors in the world wouldn’t be worth the quarter it took to call them.”

  For an hour they had no luck. Andrew carried the spoon in his back pocket, and somehow he didn’t like it at all. He’d always felt it was vaguely repellent, but now it felt as if his back pocket housed a throbbing, poisonous lizard. It was warm, too, and not simply because it was pressed against him. For ten minutes it had got hotter and hotter, and he had taken it out and wrapped it in his handkerchief. But then it cooled again, only to heat up and cool twice more during their stumbling search of the fields.

  All around them people dug happily in the moonlit earth. There were shouts and cries. A boy ran past howling with joy, carrying a little plastic treasure chest filled with rhinestones. Another waved a tangled handful of chandelier crystals. A thin woman in a too-short dress unearthed a fist-sized hunk of amethyst, and then cursed under her breath and flung it down again, and then a little girl who couldn’t have been above four picked it up and tilted it into the moonlight, oohing and ahing at the watery purple glow. A little over a half hour into the hunt there was a shriek from near the perimeter of the field. The diamond ring was found. Half the treasure hunters left grumbling.

  There were silver dimes aplenty, scattered here and there. And they found a turtle, Andrew and Pickett did, beltless, and wandering purposefully toward the oilfield fence. They let it go. One o’clock came and went. Pennyman was still at it; they could see him methodically shoving the silver tip of his spade into the earth at calculated points.

  Then the spoon started to heat up again. That’s when Andrew figured it out. It was like a child’s hot and cold game—literally. He would stake his fortune on it. They quit wandering then, and followed the spoon, pretending for Pennyman’s benefit, though, that they weren’t up to anything at all. When they passed the old man at a distance of some ten yards, the tip of his silver shovel jerked into the air and the shovel spun end over end, torn from his hands, skiving down into the dirt six feet away so that the whole blade was buried.

  “Let’s go!” whispered Pickett urgently, and Andrew pretended not to have seen the shovel’s weird behavior. When they looked back, Pennyman spaded furiously in a cloud of rising dust, throwing big clods back out of the way.

  “Did the spoon make it do that?” asked Andrew.

  “We have to think so,” said Pickett. “Either that, or he’s found one of the coins. But even so we have to go on. We can’t wrestle him for it. Not yet. Not with the spoon in your pocket. He’ll end up with all of them that way. Is it still hot, or is it cooling off?”

  “Heating up even more,” Andrew said. “Whew!”

  “There!” cried Pickett under his breath.

  Down among the clods shown a glint of reflected silver moonlight. They bent over to look. The spoon began to vibrate in Andrew’s pocket, and he was possessed with the intense desire to drag it out of there, to throw it as far and as hard as he could. It seemed to weigh a ton, as if it would push his feet right down into the dug-up earth and anchor him there forever.

  It was a turtle that Pickett had seen. It was half-buried, as if he’d dug in to hibernate the rest of the spring away. On his back was the landscape painting, half-flaked off, and girding it around was the belt of Navajo silver.

  “Watch it,” Andrew said as Pickett bent over to pick it up. “Remember what happened to Pennyman this morning.” The thought of Pennyman reminded Andrew that the old man might well be watching, and so he stepped in behind his friend in order to shield him. It wouldn’t do to have Pennyman figure them out. Andrew could see that he still dug away, though less furiously now, as
if he were tiring.

  “Holy smoke,” muttered Pickett. “Will you look at this.”

  On the turtle’s underside, clinging as if magnetically to the silver belt, was a ball of fused dimes, big as an orange. Pickett jerked it off and turned it over in his hand, tilting it into the moonlight. “There’s one,” he said, tracing the outline of the edge of a larger coin that thrust up through the dimes. “No, both of them. They’re sandwiched together, back to back. We’ve got them both.”

  Andrew slammed his hand against his pocket, where the spoon jerked and danced. He was certain that if he didn’t hold it down it would tear the pocket right off. Both of them set out, pretending still to be searching. Pennyman was hard at it, poking randomly with his silver spade, having given up on the hole he’d been digging. Andrew was sure that at any moment he would figure out what had happened with the spade business and be onto them. He would certainly think it monumentally suspicious when they left the field and went home. Almost everyone had by now, but Pennyman would assume that Pickett and Andrew would stay until they were successful or else had been defeated. Their leaving now would point to their success.

  The bonfires were out. Only a big propane lantern burned on the table where the woman from the Recliner sat reading a book. She waved cheerfully to Andrew, pointing toward her list and widening her eyes, as if wondering whether he hadn’t found something nice. He waved back, trying hard to look calm and maybe just slightly disappointed, but nearly shaking with anxiety. If Pennyman hadn’t seen them talking with Uncle Arthur, if he hadn’t seen the cross on the old man’s forehead, there would still be the chance that he thought they were simply there to dig for rhinestones and nickels, and were going home because they were tired, like the rest of the people.

  He would know, though. Andrew was sure of it. “Put the ball of dimes in the trunk,” he said to Pickett as the two of them hurried toward the Metropolitan. “I’ll take the spoon up front with us.”

  “Right,” said Pickett. “Keep them apart. Let’s take it easy driving out of here. If Pennyman catches on and heads for the taxi, then step on it.” They eased the trunk lid shut, then climbed in and backed out.