The Gypsy

by Stephen Brust

  He found the table where Timmy D. sat

  And settled in like he wanted to stay,

  Put his money out on the board

  And said, "Hey, boy, teach me to play."

  "THE GYPSY"

  And around it went, like the steps of the csardas,always back to the same place, only different, with anew tension. He was in front of Tiny's, almost exactly twenty-four hours later. What had he done? He tried to remember, and a headache came on. Where were his pills? A walk to an apartment, a conversation, a debt fulfilled, sleep, a meal, a walk in the park, a wolf,and now back here. What had he gained? What had he lost?

  Two girls came out of a bar down the street and walked past him, complaining about the "prick"who had thrown them out. Too young, he thought.

  They stopped and turned back. "What was that?"He hadn't realized he'd spoken aloud. The one who queried him had blonde hair with dark roots and wore a very short leather skirt and stockings. The other,dark of hair and taller, with a fuller body though a younger face, was dressed in tight-fitting jeans with grey splotches on them. They both wore very short jackets that didn't look like they would keep snow or cold out.

  "I said, too young," repeated the Gypsy.

  "Who asked you?" said the blonde.

  "There is a time to be in the adult world, and a time to be in the child's world, and you will cheat yourself if you leave the one too soon."

  They looked at each other and giggled. "What a weirdo," said the dark one. As she spoke, the Gypsy shivered. Something about her voice resonated within him, seemed familiar.

  He shrugged and said, "The road will be there,whenever you set foot on it. But you won't be the same after. You can't go back."

  "Ooooo," said the blonde. "Heavy stuff, huh?"She looked at her friend and giggled again. Then she said, "Wanna get lucky, big guy?" and laughed some more.

  The dark one said, "Chrissy!" in a tone that mixed shock and amusement.

  "Oh, he won't do anything. If he does, we'll scream. Right, big guy?"

  The Gypsy looked away, and said, "If you give all you have to the Fair Lady, what will be left when She's finished?" When he turned back, they were staring at him, wide-eyed.

  "How do you know about the Fair Lady?" whispered the one called Chrissy. Groups of people walked by, ignoring them. The police could go by any minute, but he couldn't leave these two unwarned.

  "There are three worlds," he said. "Each held in place by a tree, each with its sun and moon, each with its own sky full of stars. The top branches of the tree of our world reach to the roots of the next,the roots of our tree reach to the branches of the world below. The Fair Lady comes from the world below, which She has covered in darkness, for She wishes to be the only brightness in the world. She has climbed the tree of Her world and come to ours,and now wishes to cover ours in darkness. To some,She brings gifts, hoping they will serve Her. Others She directs by fear, or by casting their minds in darkness so She is all they see clearly, I am the one sworn to return light to Her world, but first She must be cast out of ours. She is Luci, the seductress,who brings the diseases that waste. Do not listen to Her. She will draw the light from your youth and cast you into the darkness that will ravage your soul."

  He stopped at last. They stared at him, then, without a word or a look between them, turned and ran up the street and were soon lost in the crowds. The Gypsy stood alone, his own words coming back to him.

  "So," he said to himself, very slowly and quietly,not noticing those who took wide detours around the oddly dressed man who stood talking to himself. "So,now I know what I am to do. But I cannot do it alone."

  14 NOV 20:18

  I can see the ravens gather

  From the places where they feast on last night's news

  I am guessing they'd really rather

  Find out exactly who they should accuse

  They can't get me 'til I've collected what I'm owed.

  So I'll keep searching further up this road.

  "UP THE ROAD"

  He drove carefully through the snowy streets, his windshield wipers on the low setting to keep the wet flakes cleared from the glass. He hoped it wouldn't stick. Least bit of snow on the streets, traffic got all screwed up. He didn't want to spend all day tomorrow calling for wreckers and investigating people sliding into guardrails. Shit.

  Home, he shucked off his uniform and got into his sweats. He added his uniform shirt and pants to the rest of his laundry to make a load and took it down the hall to the laundry room. Set it sloshing.

  Back to the apartment. Part of a package of fish sticks, part of a bag of frozen French fries. Dump them on a cookie tray, stick them in the oven. Get out the ketchup. Frost had formed inside the packages from being open in the freezer compartment. The French fries came out wet and hot and steamy. Flavorless.He ate them anyway. Go down the hallway, take the wet stuff out of the washer and stuff it in the dryer. Go back to the apartment and open a beer.

  Stepovich began the nightly ritual of flicking through the channels. Apartment came with cable.Cable TV and roaches, free with the rent. At least having the cable gave him plenty of channels to flip through. He watched about three hours of television a night, and as Ed had once observed, that was a lot,at only three minutes per channel.

  The steamy romances potboiler on four put him in mind of Durand and Tiffany Marie, and he watched the couple on the tube make fish mouths at each other while he thought about what a jerk he'd been today,climbing on Durand about Tiffany Marie. When he got to feeling too abashed he switched to seventeen.Quiz show time, stupid questions and dumber answers, because the contestants were movie stars and they were more concerned with being witty than with getting the answer right. That was him in the park with the horse-hack, and he'd learned about as much from him as he was learning from the show. Click the channels some more, to a rock video of young girls writhing and moaning. He could call Laurie. Hell, he should call Laurie, except that Jennie probably wouldn't put him through. She'd as much as told him to butt out. Not that she would really make him butt out, but she could make it uncomfortable. But he could call and promise he wouldn't say anything to her about what her mom had talked about today. But,hell, that wouldn't fool anybody. Laurie would know why he was calling. She was one smart kid, Laurie was. Growing up so fast. Too fast, and he was missing it. Click the channel selector.

  Thirteen had on a horror flick, with unavenged ghosts and a battered old gypsy woman telling the hero to beware, but also telling him that he was the one destined to free them all. Find out who killed me,that sort of line. Click.

  A cop show. Two partners had gone bad, were dispensing vigilante justice, and the good cop was hunting them down.

  Click.

  Rocky and Bullwinkle. He watched Boris and Natasha once more temporarily vanquished, watched the little fairy sweep up the fractured fairy tale, and was just getting into Shermie and Mr. Peabody when the phone rang.

  Eleven o'clock. No one but Ed ever called him this time of night. He picked up the phone and said,"Yeah?"

  "I thought you said you'd call me," Marilyn snapped. He sat up straight on the couch, zapped the TV set into oblivion.

  "Jeez, I'm sorry," he said, "I meant to, but…"

  "I thought this was so all-be-damned important to you, and so I go ahead and…"

  "It is, it is," Stepovich assured her hastily. Where was his notebook? End of the coffee table. He reached for it, knocked the ketchup bottle rolling onto the floor, but let it go. It was a squeeze bottle, it wouldn't leak much anyway. Grab the pen, and "Go ahead,what did you find for me?"

  "Too damn much, that's what, and not much at all. You want stuff done by gypsies, I got a ton of it.You want stuff done by John Does, possible first name Chuck, I got a ton of that, too. I mean, good lord,Stepovich, half the gypsies in the world have facial scars. Doesn't this man have a tattoo, or a lisp, or a birthmark or anything?"

  "Not that I know of. There was no overlap, no gypsy of that description, possible first name Chu
ck?"

  Marilyn sounded miffed when she replied. "I knew you'd ask that. I knew it. So I dug, and I dug like hell. How about a vagrancy, possible involvement in an arson, six years ago? In Kansas City?"

  "That's not really what I was looking for," Stepovich muttered, not sure if he felt frustrated or relieved.No serial killings in some obscure part of the U. S. at least. No string of crimes attached to that description and name. "Is that all there was?"

  "I swear to God, I been working with you too long.If you aren't too fussy about the gypsy description, I can give you about thirty-two shoplifting cases. Three grand theft auto, two of those from auto dealers in Sacramento, looks like a regular scam. A porno ring in Fort Lauderdale, but the ones they caught weren't really gypsies. Still, there was a Chuck involved. Airplane hijacking. In Oklahoma. Almost funny, that one's so stupid. Cropduster hijacked from one field to another."

  "That's not what I meant," Stepovich cut in frustratedly. "I was looking for a felony, or a string of felonies, something serious. The arson and vagrancy were the only ones where there was a good overlap between the name Chuck and the description of the Gypsy?"

  Marilyn sighed. "Almost, I had a feeling you were going to be stubborn on this. I pulled up stuff I didn't even know I could access. Stuff I would have sworn was too dead or too cold. How's this. New Orleans,A stabbing. In a bar. Victim Timothy DeCruz, also known as Timmy Dee, sometimes Tim del Mendicant much on the killer, but the victim had a file of past convictions as long as your arm. Mostly little scams, but the kind that hint he was involved in bigger, nastier stuff but didn't get caught. Cause of the fight was possibly cheating at cards, it was never clearly established. Ugly crime. The medical report comments on the strength required to drive a knife that size through a leather vest and completely into a man's body. The hilt left a bruise, it impacted so hard. Talk about your crime of passion. The guy was either horribly strong, or totally enraged. Witnesses described the killer, and it fits your guy to a tee. But for all that, they didn't seem too hot to help the investigation. The perp was never found."

  A little prickle of certainty ran up Stepovich's spine,that little trickle of instinct that never betrayed him."It's him. When was it, and who handled it?"

  Nasty satisfaction as she said, "August 12, 1935. But the description does match your man."

  "Shit, Marilyn, my guy probably wasn't even born then."

  "Maybe it was his father then. Maybe it's a gypsy crime family, and you're tracking the youngest member."

  He was beginning to get an inkling of just how bad he'd pissed her off. "Jeez. I'm sorry. I guess I wasted a lot of your time today." Cautiously. "You sure that's all there was?"

  He heard her breathe out through her nose in disgust. "You talk to Durand today?" she demanded,ignoring his question.

  "Yeah. Marilyn, I don't think it's quite how you're seeing it. I think he really likes her."

  "That's why he stood her up tonight, right? She turns down a date with a nice college boy to wait fora sleazy-ass cop who doesn't even show."

  "I don't know nothing about that," Stepovich objected.

  "No. Of course you don't. You didn't drag him off on this wild goose chase of yours, did you?"

  "Swear to God, I didn't, Marilyn," Stepovich said fervently. "And Jesus Christ," he said, becoming annoyed in turn, "I lit into my partner like I was going to tear his throat out, just on your say-so, and it turns out the damn fool's in love with her. How do you suppose that makes me feel?"

  "What makes you think-?"

  "I see them together. You don't. All right?"

  "Hmmph. I'd have seen them together if he'd shown up tonight."

  "Marilyn, he's my partner, not my goddamn kid. I did what you told me to, and you were wrong about him."

  "Well," she said, relenting a little. "Well. Maybe I was. Sorry. But you have to talk with him anyway. He's not right for Tiffany Marie, he isn't going to bring any good to her life. You reason with him."

  "Sure," Stepovich said. "Sure, I'll do that. And you talk to her. Okay?"

  "Okay."

  The click as she hung up was a relief. For a moment he stared at the blank television screen. Then he heaved himself up with a sigh to go get his laundry out of the dryer. It was all stuck together with static,and as he sat on the couch and peeled it apart, he remembered the shiver up his back, and wondered how a patrol cop was going to get hold of the notes on a 1935 murder in New Orleans.

  NOVEMBER FIFTEENTH. MORNING

  Raven, the hunter,

  Was content to stay and poach,

  Owl wished to go back home,

  And I, to find the coach.

  "RAVEN, OWL, AND I"

  Raymond had seen three airplanes this morning, and nineteen birds. It was now four thousand, six hundred and twelve days since he had seen his brother,the Raven, and as for his older brother, he had lost count some time ago, much to his regret. Another bird went by overhead. Twenty. He unwrapped his tambourine from the old towels that protected it from the elements, and idly tapped it a few times.

  Raymond looked nothing like an Indian. His face was swarthy, but not in the same way. His cheekbones were high, but his forehead was all wrong. His eyes had just a hint of slant. But still, tourists thought he was an Indian, and so paid him well to guide them through the Rockies, near Boulder. It was just as well.He knew the land. He spent most nights huddled in the ruins of the old "castle" on Mount Falcon, overlooking Red Rocks. He could find the best hiking, rock climbing, and sight seeing. The authorities for the most part ignored him.

  It was full dark, and the stars were out in all their glory, the Pleiades as clear as spring water, looking like he could touch them. Four chipmunks gathered near his small fire. He held out nine pieces of bread for them to nibble from his hand. He couldn't always tell them apart, but two of these he recognized. One was a small, old female he called Brandy, and the other a very dark, large male whom he had named Fleetwood, after a Cadillac he had owned many years before. FIeetwood took the bread and said, "The Raven is flying. It is time for the Owl to do the same."

  Raymond studied the chipmunk, surprised at how calm he felt to be addressed by the animal; it was almost as if he'd been waiting for something like this,and perhaps he had been. He said, "It is years since I've seen the Raven, or the Dove for that matter."

  "It is time to see them both," said Fleetwood.

  "Where?" said Raymond.

  "That I cannot tell you."

  Brandy spoke in a high, clear tenor. "The road will tell you. It is only for you to set foot upon it."

  Raymond nodded. "If it is time for me to find my brothers, then find them I will. But what is our task to be?"

  "I cannot tell you that, either."

  "Will there be a way home again?"

  "That will depend," said Fleetwood, "on whether the Coachman is loyal."

  "You mean sober."

  "Well, yes."

  "And on whether your brothers are loyal, as well,"said Brandy.

  "That's clear enough," said Raymond. "I'll set out in the morning."

  The chipmunks nodded, and accepted more bread,and spoke no more to the gypsy guide who looked nothing like an Indian.

  WEDNESDAY, AFTER SCHOOL

  She can find your secret madness,

  She knows your secret name.

  What demons do you hide, my friend?

  What creatures lurk inside, my friend?

  To her, you know, it's really all the same.

  "THE FAIR LADY"

  "I stole it," Laurie said boastfully. Or tried to. The words didn't come out quite right, and she wondered if Chrissy could hear they weren't quite true. Laurie had gone to the stupid rummage sale at the youth center yesterday evening after Chrissy had stood her up to go downtown with that Sue and her friends.Now she wanted to make Chrissy feel as if she'd really missed out on something; not just Laurie finding the black sort-of-tapestry cloth that now covered her bed, but the adventure of Laurie stealing it.

  And Laur
ie really had intended to steal it. She'd wrapped it up in the two dollar silky bathrobe she was going to pay for and stuffed it in her shopping bag with the old books Jeffrey wanted and the sweater she thought her Mom would like. The tapestry with the weird old square-footed animals on it was marked twelve dollars, and she wanted it but couldn't afford it. So she decided to steal it. All the way up to the cashier she'd justified it, thinking this rummage sale was supposed to raise money for the youth center,and all the stuff was donated anyway, so it wasn't like they were really losing money when she took it.But then the lady at the counter had just said, "It's all three dollars a bag after five o'clock," and had taken her money. Six months ago, she would have told Chrissy the whole story, and they'd have laughed about it. Now she just wanted Chrissy to believe that she had stolen it.

  But Chrissy only stared at it for a minute. She didn't even seem to notice that all Laurie's dolls and stuffed animals had been packed away, or that there were candles and incense set out on her dresser or the way she'd hung towels over her curtains to make the room dimmer. Chrissy's eyes got that apprehensive look they sometimes got lately as she stared at the tapestry spread. "Looks like something of Hers," Chrissy said in a whispery voice, and then giggled in a funny way. Like she'd meant to whimper and giggled instead.

  "What?" Laurie demanded, feeling stupid. Again. Lately she always felt stupid, or left out when she was around Chrissy. It was the same way she and Chrissy had felt when they were in the bathroom at school and some of the popular girls came in and started talking about boys and makeup. Only this was worse, because it was Chrissy making her feel like there was something big and important going on, and she was too much of a kid to understand it. If Chrissy grew up and left her behind, then she'd really be alone.

  "Those things, there. Like lions only sort of square.She's got a thing like that. Except it talks. And it looks even weirder than those things do." Chrissy's voice trailed off and she continued to stare at the bedspread.