The Holy

by Daniel Quinn

  The creature that had once been a man named Mike and that now was of some other kind stared back in slack-jawed despair, appalled, as if confronting the vilest horror of hell.

  And he kept coming without a pause.

  Groaning, David pushed himself up and stumbled away. He was running, but he knew it was only a ghastly caricature of a run—the sort they must have done at Dachau for the amusement of the guards.

  Pick ’em up and put ’em down.

  Pick ’em up and put ’em down.

  Come on folks, do The Dead Man’s Shuffle!

  He was only half aware that he was running with his eyes closed, but he became fully and painfully aware of it when he blundered into something waist-high that sent him sprawling through the air. The wind knocked out of him, he lay face down gasping for a minute. Then he turned over to see what he’d run into and began laughing breathlessly. He’d run into the loveliest thing he’d ever seen.

  A dusty, dark green 1988 Volvo sedan.

  He got in, turned the key still in place, and listened with ecstatic disbelief to the crash of ignition, the symphonic thrum of life itself. After opening the windows a crack for ventilation, he turned on the heater, climbed into the back, locked the doors, and curled up on the seat, stroking the velour with heartfelt affection.

  If you can get me now, Mike, you’re welcome to me.

  He was asleep within seconds.

  CHAPTER 28

  In the thin mountain air, the sun turned the car into an oven by noon, and David stirred, moaning freely as his aching legs reminded him of the previous night’s adventures. He sat up and made a methodical survey of the valley and surrounding hills before getting out and limping off to find a handful of snow to quench his thirst. His eyes moving constantly, he ate it hunkering in the shadow of a low pine while he made careful plans for the day.

  Back at the car he emptied a plastic bottle of windshield-washing fluid, scoured it with dirt, and spent the next two hours melting enough snow to rinse it and fill it—another of those tasks easier to conceive than to perform. Then he wrapped it in a shirt, along with a bundle of spare clothes, to ride in the small of his back. Finally he detached from the rearview mirror a hitherto useless compass that Tim had given him a couple Christmases before.

  While making these preparations, he’d considered the question of direction. West was out; he’d spend the rest of the day walking into the face of the sun. East was out; he was half convinced that the events of the previous night had been one long delusion induced by unwittingly immersing himself in hallucinogenic weeds—but only half; if the Dead Man Saloon was really out there, it was to the east. Between north and south he had nothing to go on but intuition, and intuition pulled him south.

  So he headed south.

  –––

  He estimated he could travel at least twenty miles before nightfall. In twenty miles there had to be something—a town, a ranch, a road, a power line. By four o’clock the landscape had changed somewhat. He’d descended perhaps a thousand feet, and the hills were gentler and farther apart. He was only vaguely aware of the difference. His legs were getting wobbly, and he was finding it harder and harder to shake off the recurring notion that it was time to stop and have something to eat. In fact, he was so preoccupied with fantasies of food that he was ten paces beyond them when he realized he’d just crossed a pair of tire tracks. He shook his head and went back, and there they were, crisp and fresh in the dust.

  A long look in either direction gave him no sign of the vehicle that had made them, and he got down on hands and knees to see if there was anything in the tracks themselves that would tell him which way they were heading. There wasn’t. Since it didn’t seem to matter whether he followed them to their origin or their destination, he set out to the east to avoid being blinded by the declining sun. He decided his luck had returned at last when, half an hour later, he came over a rise and spotted the Jeep parked a quarter mile away. He started to run for it, then, seeing that it was empty, slowed to a walk.

  He was about twenty yards away from it when a handful of the track ahead exploded into dust, and he heard the crack of a rifle. He stopped, stunned, not quite able to take in the fact that he’d been shot at.

  “Just hold it right there, mister,” someone called from his left.

  Looking up, he thought for a moment that it was Hilly standing on the rise about fifty yards away. The shape was the same—tall and rangy—but the resemblance ended there. David laughed mirthlessly at the thought that popped into his head: At least this one’s human.

  He came on warily, the rifle at his side but pointed so that David had a clear view down the barrel. When he was close enough, he traded the rifle for a massive black pistol. He was accompanied by an equally massive black dog that looked like something shaped in a wind tunnel.

  “Watch him, Beast.” The dog lumbered forward, planted himself in front of David, and gave him a look at a set of strong white teeth.

  “Take off that bundle, whatever it is.”

  David untied the shirt sleeves around his waist, and the bundle fell to the ground.

  “Put your hands on your head.”

  “Look,” David said. “Shut up.”

  David put his hands on his head and waited through a careful search for weapons that weren’t there. He winced when he felt the billfold leave his back pocket but didn’t see any point in wasting words on it. He heard the other going through the cardfold, then felt it being returned to the pocket, which he took to be a good sign.

  “You can put your hands down. Get in the car, back seat, right side.”

  David followed orders. “Watch him, Beast.”

  Beast hopped in at the left and sat down facing him. The gunman got in, started the engine, and headed east.

  “Get any sudden bright ideas,” he pointed out, “and he’ll turn you into hamburger.”

  “I believe it,” David said. “What is he—what breed?”

  “Pit bull.”

  Since he knew he wasn’t going to have any sudden bright ideas, David didn’t feel particularly menaced and could look at the blockish black head and massive chest with genuine admiration. He was a solid, well-designed fighting machine, like a Roman gladiator. David reached cautiously for his billfold, and the dog watched, interested but not alarmed. As far as he could tell from a quick inspection, nothing had been taken.

  Now that he was no longer pointing a weapon at him, the driver didn’t seem particularly menacing either. He was smoking, driving one handed, completely relaxed. Under the crumpled, sweat-stained cowboy hat, his leathery face was well-shaped, his expression serene and self-confident. Cleaned up, he would look like a young John Wayne in a sullen mood. Even with a gun in his hand, he’d seemed businesslike and disinterested rather than hostile, and David thought it would be well to establish this as the appropriate tone for their relationship.

  “Believe it or not,” he said, “I’m happy as hell to run into you.”

  “Oh yeah?” The response was distantly polite, as if David had announced he was a Dallas Cowboys fan.

  “I’ve been wandering around out here lost for two days.”

  “Not a smart place to be wandering around, that’s a fact.”

  David chewed on this ambiguous observation in silence for a few minutes, then asked where they were going. The driver ignored the question, and David decided that others like it would be ignored as well.

  He had the feeling he should be more worried than he was, but he just couldn’t seem to manage it after what he’d been through in the past twenty-four hours. After all, if the idea had been to kill him, he’d already be dead. He’d been trespassing, obviously—but also innocently. Once he had a chance to explain what had happened, he was sure there’d be no problem.

  Ten minutes later they angled up a steep track to a mobile home perched on a butte with a panoramic view of the surrounding countryside. The hills were still empty as far as he could see, but at least there was a roughly-graded r
oad leading up to the butte on the other side. With its feminine lines and pastel blue paint, the mobile home looked a bit like a girl stranded in the desert in a fifties party dress; it was up on cement blocks, unskirted, and there were no power lines in sight. A recent-model pickup truck and a 500 gallon propane tank were parked beside it.

  The driver pulled up, got out, unholstered his pistol, and said, “Let’s go.”

  “You don’t need that,” David protested, but the other just waved him on impatiently and followed him up a set of cement-block stairs to the living room.

  Inside, an old man was lying on a couch, reading. He lowered the book and raised his head to peer curiously at David over his glasses. “What have we here, Robbie?”

  Robbie holstered his gun. “Found him wandering around over by the shed.”

  “I didn’t see any shed,” David put in quickly.

  “Ah,” the old man said, swinging his feet off the couch and sitting up. He pulled off his glasses and studied David with interest. His eyes, set in a long, horsey British face, were red-rimmed and heavily pouched. Though slim, he seemed as broad as a door and, when standing, would tower over David by three inches. His dusty-white hair was uncut and limp, giving him a look of dissipation.

  “Want a beer?” Robbie asked, opening the refrigerator.

  David said, “Are you asking me?”

  “Sure.”

  “Yes, thanks.”

  The furniture was all from Goodwill: the old man’s battered sofa, covered in a dingy flower print, two mismatched chairs, and a heavily stained and cigarette-burned coffee table. In a rather pathetic effort at hominess, someone had taken the trouble to hang curtains at the windows: cheap, sun-faded cotton with nursery-rhyme motifs.

  Jack and Jill went up the hill.

  The place smelled of sweat, dust, and cigarette smoke. Robbie tossed David a can of Coors and opened one for himself.

  “I’m Harvey,” the old man said, making it Hahvey, “and, in case he hasn’t introduced himself, this is Robbie. There’s no reason for us to be uncivilized, after all.”

  “My name is David Kennesey.”

  “How do you do? Sit down while we decide what’s to be done with you.”

  “Why does anything have to be done with me?” David asked, sitting down across from him. “I just got lost in the mountains. All I want to do is get back to civilization.”

  “Ah, to be sure. What do you think, Robbie?”

  “Yeah, that’s probably right. Nobody who knew anything would be traveling the way he was.”

  “So,” Harvey said, turning back to David. “You are innocent of any wicked intent, meant no harm at all. On the other hand, you’re not young enough to think that innocence is an invincible shield against misfortune.”

  “No, I know it isn’t.”

  “So, Robbie, what would you do?”

  He shrugged. “Plant him.”

  The old man’s faced crinkled into a delighted grin. “There, you see? For this evening at least, I am your shield against misfortune.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Robbie is by instinct a barbarian, one who thinks all problems can be solved by giving someone the chop. Luckily for you, our lord and master, the all-seeing Charles, thinks otherwise. And so I am here.”

  “I’m sorry, I still don’t understand.”

  “For a bottle of booze a day, a roof over my head, and a monthly pittance, I am Robbie’s master, just as Robbie is the Beast’s master. I am seventy-nine years old, an alcoholic, my eyes are gone, my legs are nearly gone, but Charles trusts me, because my mind is as good as ever.”

  Robbie sighed. “Chuck will tell us to plant him.”

  The old man peered at him disapprovingly over the top of his glasses. “Then we will plant him. Meanwhile, I shall indulge myself in conversation that consists of something other than grunts.” He turned back to David. “You strike me as an educated man.”

  “Most people would say so, yes.”

  “Ah, and modest as well. You might not think of it to look at me now, the associate of riff-raff and losers, but I worked on the Manhattan Project.”

  David raised his brows politely.

  “Oh, you needn’t humor me, my boy. It’s perfectly true. I wasn’t one of the fairest of the fair-haired boys—I was too much a rebel for that—but you’ll find me in a footnote, and I still receive a pension for my contribution.”

  Robbie groaned in disgust, got another beer, and said he was going outside.

  Harvey laughed huskily. “He’s as bored with me as I am with him. I can’t really blame him.”

  “Would you mind explaining what makes me such a nuisance? As far as I’m concerned, I just want to get out of here.”

  “I take it you’re not from these parts. If you were, you’d know it’s not a healthy area for the casual explorer. A great many unmarked graves will open up out here on Judgment Day.”

  David frowned. “Marijuana?”

  “Do you really want to know?”

  “No. That’s the whole point. I don’t know anything and I don’t want to know anything. And in fact I haven’t seen anything.”

  “Ah, but I’m afraid you have. You’ve seen two men, one of them armed, and a mobile home tucked away up in the hills. Very valuable information to a great variety of people, some of them completely ruthless. Very dangerous information for you—and for us. You only have to think it through, my boy.”

  David spent a few minutes thinking it through and said, “Look, there’s no reason for me to say anything about any of this to anybody. It’s none of my business. All I want to do is get out of here. Once I do that, I’ll be five hundred miles away by tomorrow night.”

  Harvey nodded approvingly. “Yes, personally, I believe you. I have a very trusting nature. I love everyone.”

  “Won’t this Charles take your word for it?”

  “Ah, Charles.… No, he won’t take my word for it, because he knows I have a trusting nature. However, all is not lost. Charles is a gambler. If he likes you and is in an optimistic mood, then he’ll stuff a hundred dollar bill in your shirt pocket and send you on your way.”

  “And if he’s not in an optimistic mood?”

  Harvey shrugged. “We must hope for the best.”

  David looked around the barren room. “How do you get in touch with him?”

  “We don’t. We’re completely cut off here. But he’ll be driving up in the morning. Would you like another beer?”

  “No, but I could use some food. I haven’t eaten in a day and a half.”

  Harvey chuckled. “I haven’t eaten in a week myself—rarely do when I’m on the booze—but help yourself.”

  David was rummaging in the kitchen when Robbie stalked in and asked him what the hell he was doing.

  “Looking for something to eat.”

  “Get out of there. I’ll fix something.” He opened a cupboard and started taking down cans.

  “Did you think I was looking for a knife?”

  “No. If you’d found one, I’d’ve taken it away from you,” Robbie said. “I just don’t like cleaning up other people’s messes in the kitchen.”

  “Sorry.”

  Robbie snorted with grim humor, a man used to dealing with idiots and incompetents.

  “Particle acceleration, I told them,” Harvey said, sitting with a glassful of bourbon at the table while David and Robbie ate. “Of course, it’s all the rage now, but I was telling them in 1944 that there’s no future in fission. Very unpopular it made me then, I can tell you. Now, of course, they’re beating their brains out trying to find a way to drive a proton into the nucleus of a hydrogen atom. Quite hopeless.”

  “Why is it hopeless?” David asked.

  “Well, you see, they’ve fastened on the hydrogen atom because it’s the simplest—only one proton. But, relatively speaking, its electron is as far away as the earth from the sun.”

  “You mean they’re working on the wrong atom?”

  “Definitely
.”

  “Which one should they be using?”

  “Ah,” Harvey said. “I would say cobalt. Twenty-seven protons, and with the electrons much closer to the nucleus, you see. Much more compact, much more manageable.”

  Robbie wiped his mouth with a paper napkin, set it down beside his plate, and said, in a completely amiable tone, “You know, Harvey, you really are fulla shit.”

  “Ah, the Neanderthal awakens! And what is your choice, Robbie? Carbon, perhaps?”

  “When was the last time you were in a laboratory?”

  “Oh, it’s been well over thirty years now.”

  “Then you don’t know shit about it.”

  Harvey chuckled agreeably. “Robbie thinks the wizards of Los Alamos may have revised the subatomic structure of the universe in the past three decades without letting anyone know about it.”

  Robbie folded his arms and tilted his chair back. “Where do we stand right now, Harvey? We’re even, aren’t we?”

  “No, you owe me.” Harvey turned to David to explain. “He bet me ten thousand dollars that John Steinbeck wrote The Good Earth.”

  “Okay. I’ll bet you another ten thousand that fusion is achieved with the hydrogen atom.”

  “You mean first, rather than with any other atom.”

  “That’s right.”

  Harvey shrugged. “I won’t live long enough to collect, but very well. You can pay it to my estate.”

  “Would you rather arm wrestle for it?”

  “Why? Are you feeling stronger than usual tonight?”

  “You want to arm wrestle or not?”

  “By all means,” Harvey said, rolling up his sleeve to expose a pale, flabby arm. He flashed David a raffish smile. “Someday I’m going to buy him a tee-shirt that reads, ‘Born to lose.’ ”

  The two men locked hands and glared at each other across the table. After a minute, their eyes were popping and their arms were trembling, muscles bunched. Harvey’s face split in a foolish grin. “No cheating,” he gasped.

  “I don’t need to cheat.”

  “Argh,” Harvey grunted, forcing Robbie’s hand down to within an inch of the table top. It hovered there for a few seconds and then began to rise.