Killing Everybody

by Mark Harris

  Brown walked north on Castro Street to Market. He waved to the proprietor of The Family Store and to the barbers in Pinto’s. Pinto himself had known Luella’s father, once worked a chair beside him somewhere (it wasn’t too clear). Brown hastened to the corner, standing beside the Bank of America, hoping nobody would bomb the bank before the red light changed, and crossed with the green light to the pedestrian island just as the street-car rose like a surfacing whale from Brown’s father’s tunnel, its motorman this day a young black man with a small black beard and octagonal sun-glasses which he had worn through the darkness of the tunnel.

  Occasionally, years ago, when Brown was a boy, it was his father’s face behind the glass, rising from the tunnel, and if Brown had ever predicted to his father that some day the face would be bearded and black his father would have replied, “Kid, you’re off your nut. God made motormen white.” He stepped up into the car, dropped his fare into the box, and walked to the rear. Step if you please to the rear of the car. It was his father’s policy to get the please in early, driving this tunnel for thirty-five years, retiring, walking the streets of the neighborhood five years more, dying, having provided his son with a start upon life, and wonderfully proud of the boy, too, who could read and write with the best of his class, and went in time to the newspaper and thereby knew all the ins and outs of things, all the reasons for all the manipulations behind the scenes, and met all the big-wigs face to face and visiting notables and stars of stage and screen, no street-car for him, no firehouse, no precinct, no City Hall burn, no sir. “Move down toward the rear, folks,” the black motorman called, and Brown obliged, luckily finding a seat he hadn’t seen from the front. Remember car, he thought; he’d left his car downtown last night when he’d gone riding out with Officer Phelps. He sat. Out of the window, across the street, Manasek’s storefront flew past, where James Berberick had turned, committing himself to Luella; and Brown now with his rubber band on his finger, gliding along his father’s tracks.

  Brown worked diligently. Behind him a western window admitted a brilliant square of sunshine, but he never turned to the window, which sickened him: encrusted by grime, a ruin of neglect, it hadn’t been washed in years. Then the square of sunshine vanished, the day darkened, the lights of the city room went up, and Brown fit his green eyeshade to his forehead, running one finger around his head beneath the elastic, to eliminate snarling, as if the fate of things depended upon his precision.

  This was old habit, old conviction, lingering in Brown from those youthful years of his life when he had indeed believed that much depended upon him, when he had thought of his labor as holy calling, only to discover as time went by that nobody needed the precision he offered, for he offered too much. He was expendable, replaceable; life was cheap. The world demanded in a writer of headlines not wit, not care, not application, not accuracy or devotion or a religious spirit, but only speed, only a rough approximation between the headline and the story below, which was in turn only a distant approximation of the event. “You’re a worrier,” said Schwarzlose to Brown years and years ago, and often since. “You worry too much. It’s only a headline. It’s all over tomorrow,” whereupon Brown in the dead of night, or by the light of the sun through the unwashed window, dropped phosphorous balls everywhere and burned down the Chronicle building, as inflamed priests in all history burned down whatever churches betrayed them.

  But Junie died because nobody worried enough. Cronkite the messenger called warriors “advisors” long after they had ceased to be advisors and had certainly become warriors, though he must have known better, but cared too little for precision or religion or devotion, or couldn’t afford it, and anyhow the point was to hold your audience, make a show, amuse the commuter, entertain the family digesting, don’t bother their heads, keep it moving, make it fast, make it lively, faster, faster, compete, speed it up, whereas precision slowed you down, worrying slowed you down.

  Brown, working diligently beneath his eyeshade, depositing phosphorous balls here and there throughout the building, shooting Cronkite on the seventeenth floor — May their frozen oxygen melt, thought Brown, thinking of the astronauts while driving in slowly behind Stanley Krannick, husband to Luella, bad father to the late Junie, nudging him behind the knees so that he’d fall forward and be gently ground to death beneath Brown’s Goodrich tires. Remember car, he thought, writing in his mind My Very Dear Congressman-Elect McGinley . . . How he could dash those headlines off! “Like nobody’s business,” as one might say, glancing down the copy and spinning out a headline “in a twinkling,” as one might say, all these events, the moon, Chinatown, the draft, the welfare bill, car prices, germ warfare, school boycott, Wall Street, it was all in a day’s work, continuing his letter in his mind You will recall that last night you used vile and obscene language toward me. I am sure that you appreciate that I am hereby giving you the opportunity to apologize. My Very Dear James Berberick I’d like to tear that McGinley pin right off your chest. You don’t know what you’re doing. That man is a murderer. He murdered my son . . . see how he exploits his own son in the wheelchair . . . can’t you put two and two together? . . . you and your glibness, twenty-five million dogs indeed. Excuse me for saying “my son.” I realize that’s not accurate.

  He turned his thought now to the question of the banner head. They Made It. Good enough, if the astronauts safely returned, although the headlines writer himself shared none of the joy of the banner headline he created. He resented the diversion of attention from earth to space. While everyone was looking up, murder was occurring down below. Let them crash on the rocks of Maine.

  Of course, if McGinley were upset Schwarzlose would need to ask himself the question whether that were bigger news than astronauts safe. Barring earthquake or tidal flood or a major assassination things would develop according to expectation — astronauts find themselves and float safely at last to the proper ocean; McGinley wins; leaving Schwarzlose to decide. Astronauts drown. McGinley upset. These things seemed unlikely, but Brown could sketch banner headlines to cover all eventualities, and of course it was possible, and certainly pleasant to dream about, a double adversity, death in space, death down below, sketching in his mind a pleasing banner headline he’d enjoy seeing himself forced to produce for tomorrow’s newspaper:

  Astros Dead, McGinley Harpooned

  and rose and strolled from his place at the horseshoe table where he had been sitting for two and a half hours, to the television instrument where his friends and fellow-workers were observing the most recent difficulties of the astronauts, or, to be more precise, failing to observe anything at all since the most recent difficulties of the astronauts appeared to be their unobservability, their having fallen from the sight of all monitors on earth or in the heavens. Brown stood beside Schwarzlose. “What’s happening?” Brown asked.

  “I’m going to dinner,” Schwarzlose said.

  Resist, thought Brown. Don’t go with him. “Cronkite’s tired,” Brown said.

  “He’s been up all hours,” Schwarzlose said.

  “Tired and unhappy,” Brown said.

  “He keeps talking,” Schwarzlose said, “but he’s got nothing to talk about. They’ve been out of touch for eight hours.”

  “When will we know anything?” Brown asked.

  Schwarzlose addressed the television. “Come on, boys, come out of hiding. I’m hungry.”

  “I’m a bit hungry myself,” said Brown.

  “The bastards might have flown right out of the orbit of the earth,” said Schwarzlose.

  “Is that possible?” Brown asked.

  “Certainly it’s possible,” Schwarzlose said, as if such a possibility were well known. But he himself had heard it only minutes ago, as one of several speculations. Only the other day the astronauts had been gathering rocks and stones on the moon. Biggest moon haul, Brown had written, his banner head expressing enthusiasm. But what did Brown care for the rocks of the moon? F
all down a crater, he had thought at the time. Let them lie helpless on their backs in the ferocious sun, and let their friend in his rendezvous capsule go sailing around and around the moon forever, waiting for his fried friends to show up. Let him be an object lesson to mankind, momento, mind your own business, clean up your own rocks first before starting on the moon. Charity begins at home. As a boy, Brown’s first negative thoughts regarding his church arose from his noticing its mania for foreign missions. Devout Luella! Remember deposit receipt, he thought.

  Schwarzlose had moved away from his side. Brown felt that presence gone. Schwarzlose was leaving for dinner. Brown removed his eyeshade and hung it upon its nail, took his coat, and pursued his old colleague, acquaintance, enemy, “quickened his steps down the corridor in order to enter the elevator with Schwarzlose,” where tonight, as last night and nights before, the message read:

  SCHWARZLOSE

  SUCKS

  or

  SC

  SU

  HWARZLOSE

  CKS

  depending upon whether the door was whole or parted.

  “You didn’t come back after dinner last night,” said Schwarzlose, staring straight ahead at the elevator doors.

  “I’ll be back tonight,” said Brown.

  “How’s the wife?” Schwarzlose inquired in a kindlier tone.

  “Just fine,” said Brown, walking forth with Schwarzlose into the night, standing together for a few seconds on the sidewalk, and parting there, Brown toward the library, or so he intended, so vowed, and so he would if he could.

  He was gaining control of himself. He had worked well tonight, resisted dinner with Schwarzlose, and he intended to return to work after his own. He would be sensible during the hour ahead, write one useful letter, his day’s good deed My Very Dear Father of the Montana Shrine, he began, crossing Mission Street at Sixth but beginning again My Very Dear Rod Serling, I saw an item some time ago that you disown your recent television drama because it inspired a bad action. Please be informed that a true artist bears no responsibility for the actions he inspires. Your obligation is only to tell the truth of your feelings. But perhaps you are not a “true artist.” I hadn’t considered that, walking along Seventh Street toward Market, crossing his father’s streetcar tracks, and remembering that he had eaten a large lunch at Tata Baba Gaga Ferne’s and needn’t eat much dinner. Perhaps he’d eat at midnight with Luella.

  If McGinley did not apologize Brown would harpoon him with a hot harpoon. Zip! Never mind writing letters, he’d go in for action now. He’d poison Paprika. No, the children would grieve. He felt their grandmother’s hand upon his chin. “You don’t need a shave,” the grandmother said. He might form a friendship with that family, they’d barbecue together beneath Harold’s extra-large flag enfolding hamburger fumes. But instead of crossing Market at Seventh he’d walk to Ninth and cross there, and thus avoid McGinley Headquarters by walking Larkin instead of McAllister. How many anonymous letters had he mailed over the years from the mailbox at Larkin & McAllister since that first letter to Stanley Krannick, back in the days when mailboxes were green? Brown had saved Junie from Stanley’s abuse. But McGinley devoured, killed, murdered Junie finally. Thinking these thoughts, diverted, distracted, led astray by his own straying mind, Brown walked McAllister instead of Larkin in spite of his plan to do otherwise, coming upon McGinley headquarters in spite of his plan to avoid it, and of course irresistibly entering, even as he had irresistibly “quickened his steps down the corridor” etc. etc. last night and again tonight.

  No crowd had yet begun to gather. The polls were still open. Later the crowd would come, and the evening would again become festive, as it had been last night — campaign workers assembling from throughout the entire district to tally the returns, to watch the numbers mount, each campaign worker watching especially those precincts where he or she had worked. On the wall the great banner still corrupted the Constitution of the United States. On the ceiling the white clouds floated in illusion across the sky, and angels flew among great birds.

  Several people were seated on folding chairs about the television, watching the screen for the appearance of the astronauts. If the astronauts were to appear at all they were due now; so said the computer. Now or never. “Tonight or never,” Luella had said only today, in another connection. If the astronauts failed to appear they were lost. They had minutes only, to prove themselves, so to speak, to offer evidence of their existence by appearing in the sky. Gentlemen, do you exist, or did you burn up, explode, lose your air, or did you perhaps float out beyond the influence of earth, never to be seen again, as in a fantasy by our friend Brown? Did some nut “down on one knee in the Florida swamps near the launch-pads” pop the rocket, spring a leak? P-sss p-sss p-sss p-ssssssss?

  Brown said politely to a young lady on a folding chair, “Your candidate has slightly misquoted the United States Constitution.” He pointed to the wall.

  “It’s too late to change anything now,” the young lady replied in a practical way. She wore a paper hat flying the McGinley colors.

  “I’d like to see McGinley,” said Brown.

  “Congressman McGinley?” she asked, taking her eyes from the television. But Brown’s eyes alarmed her, and she returned her own to the television: three men dead or dying in space were easier to accommodate than one live angry man at her elbow. It was remote, like the corruption of the Constitution.

  “Very well,” said Brown, “Congressman McGinley.”

  “He’s at a staff meeting,” said the young lady.

  “I’m on my supper hour,” said Brown. “I haven’t much time. He’s got to apologize to me.”

  The young lady rose from her chair and crossed the floor to speak to an associate, an older woman who was stapling colored streamers to patriotic paper hats while watching the television. Absorbing the young lady’s message, glancing for a millionth of a second at Brown, the older woman, in a casual way, leaving paper hats and streamers behind her, but carrying her stapling machine with her (for thievery had been astounding in spite of the watchfulness of Officer Phelps), left the public area of the store, passing through a curtained doorway to a private interior. There she aroused Officer Phelps from a nap to tell him that she and the “other girls,” being still “rather shaky” from last night’s bomb scare, wished he were among them instead of asleep. “A funny man’s out front,” she explained.

  On a second cot lay the candidate McGinley. With Officer Phelps, he arose to peer through the curtain at the “funny man.”

  “I see two funny men,” said Officer Phelps, who saw not only Brown, father of his late friend Junie Krannick, but also, at this moment entering the headquarters, James Berberick. Officer Phelps recalled Berberick’s face from last night at the hour of the bomb scare. We, too, recall seeing him “among the shuffling crowd, another James,” on page 23, and at Lala’s today, and at Luella’s, and back at Lala’s again. We have come to know him rather well.

  “There’s that fuck-off creep that gave me a hard time on the shake line last night,” said the aspiring Congressman.

  “He’s harmless,” said Officer Phelps in a professional tone, but he instantly regretted his callousness: how little to say of a man with “a sophisticated moral code . . .”!

  “Which is the other?” McGinley asked.

  “That fellow by the door,” said Officer Phelps. “He hangs around.”

  “The funny man wants to see you,” the older woman said.

  “I’ll be back in an hour,” McGinley said, though incorrectly; he would never be back.

  “Shall I tell him that?” asked the older woman.

  “I’ll tell him,” said Officer Phelps, drawing his necktie to his Adam’s apple and stepping forward into the store, or headquarters, approaching Brown, and asking him with a friendly smile, “Are you the funny man?” They shook hands. Officer Phelps was somewhat frightened by the
ferocity of Brown’s expression, the tight white lips, the intense eyes, which the young officer mistook as hostility toward him — toward Phelps himself — as if Brown had been reading Officer Phelps’s mind these twenty-four hours, whose scenes and pictures were vivid developing images of love not only for Brown and for the memory of Junie, but for Brown’s “wife,” too, Luella, whom Officer Phelps had met last night in her real-estate office; whom he had attempted to see again at her home this morning, only to encounter Lala, Iris, and subsequently Brown in quest of a dog; and whom he would yet see tonight by appointment, a meeting he had for several hours been anticipating with fantasies not unusual to young policemen — an interview, a discussion of the citizen’s problem, a friendly touch at last, a second touch of increased warmth, and so forth and so on, love and affection, comfort and bliss. He’d protect her from her brutal husband, that Stanley, that father-oppressor of Junie — such were the difficult duties of a policeman. But now Brown was here. What did this mean? What was wrong? Had Luella developed “cold feet”? Officer Phelps knew of these cases of women suddenly overcome by their own guilt, and issuing complaints against suitors when in fact they had been themselves at least half to blame for the vibrations of love. “We keep meeting,” said Officer Phelps, “and I’ve got to confess that the pleasure is all mine, believe me. I understand you want to see Congressman McGinley. He’ll be back in an hour. Can you wait?”