by Gene Wolfe
The witch waved the cavil aside. “Let me tell you now how I came.” She paused, and for a moment appeared to see something over Barnes’s left shoulder that he would not himself have seen. “I had observed certain portents, in the stars and elsewhere. Because of them I was excited. You may think me, my Ozzie, a woman of the indurated kind, but it is not so—I am capable of feelings that would burst the hearts of many. Like you, I had experienced certain difficulties; at times I am wakeful for long periods and at odd hours. I enjoy music that is—shall we say—an acquired taste, and my visitors are sometimes unconventional.”
Barnes nodded solemnly, having observed something of all these himself.
“Although I paid an excessive rent for an inadequate apartment, I was no longer welcome. I saw the advertisement you saw, and despite its appearing too small a stroke of good fortune for the promises extended to me, yet it was a favorable day, and I came.”
“Let’s say the good fortune was ours, Madame Serpentina.”
The witch ignored this compliment. “All the rest of the day I waited the blessing promised. It did not appear. I returned to my old building hoping some message had come; there was nothing. That night I watched the stars again. I had not been mistaken. You may believe I wondered long over that.”
Barnes nodded again. “I can see how you would.”
“After you left us tonight, I talked with our host. He told me something of his sorrows, his fears. Much more, I think, than he thought himself to tell, because he believed me unenlightened. He is old, and his mind is full of death and no longer so clear as he thinks. In the end, he could not resist a small demonstration of his power.”
“Are you saying Mr. Free is, well, somebody like you?”
The witch’s smile flashed. “You are a man of intelligence indeed, my Ozzie. Like me and yet unlike, for I could not have done what he did. I believe him one of the lesser acaryas. Unless a student is contacted by them, as sometimes happens, she is fortunate to meet and recognize one such in a lifetime. Tonight he let slip something of the greatest importance. My Ozzie, have you never wished to be rich? Powerful? I do not mean what is called wealthy. Nor do I mean power in the sense that a mayor or governor is said to be powerful. I speak of endless riches, of real gold, emeralds, sapphires, and diamonds, and of the power of life and death over hundreds of millions.”
“More than anything else in the world!” Barnes looked surprised at his own vehemence.
“Mr. Free—or rather, the person we are told to call by that name—has concealed a talisman. The acaryas do so at times, putting by their crowns and orbs, regalia more than earthly, to encounter us at a level. Now he lacks strength to take it up again. But if we could find it …”
“You mean this,” Barnes said. “You’re serious.”
“I was never more so. Do not think to cheat me of the prize, Ozzie. You could no more wield such a talisman than you could summon the green-haired wantons of the sea. Less. But if you will help me, you shall be my vizier in an empire encompassing all the world.” The witch’s hands toyed with his own, stroking their backs, tickling their palms.
Icy though the room was, his face was damp with sweat. He drew one hand away and wiped it with the faded sleeve of his robe. “I wish I knew if you’re crazy.”
For an instant the witch glared, then she laughed. “In comparison to me, you are all of you lunatics. No, idiots—save Free. You said you longed for wealth and power, and you are destitute. What have you to lose, my Ozzie?”
“I don’t think you’re crazy,” Barnes told her. “What do you want me to do?”
Breakfast
The fat girl tottered into the kitchen. A golden trumpet of sunshine striking the scuffed linoleum made her squint and press her temples with plump, pink hands.
Her robe was pink as well, pink with the violent, almost ferocious, fluorescent pinkness found only in discount stores. Like her disordered yellow hair, it made her seem an immense doll, still bright, yet abandoned and bedraggled.
The old man rose and pulled the shade.
“You got any coffee, Mr. Free?”
Free shook his head. “Sorry. There ain’t one thing.”
“I couldn’t eat,” Candy said. “I just want some coffee.”
“I ain’t had nothing either.”
“No breakfast?”
“That feller Barnes went out last night and got some stuff, but it’s all gone now.”
Candy yawned, pulled out the top of her pink robe, and glanced down at herself. “Wait till I get dressed.”
“Got nothin’ else to do,” the old man said. When she was gone, he opened a closet, got out a broom, and began to sweep. The kitchen had not been swept for a long time. Strange crumbs and crusts mingled with the gritty dust; there were bent beer-bottle caps and little splinters of broken glass. He opened the back door and pushed them all into a backyard filled with rubbish and gay with morning glories.
“Here I am,” the fat girl said. Under the plastic coat she wore a pink sweater (near relative to the pink robe) and a black wool skirt. Her shoes were open-toed sandals with thick wooden soles. “Get your coat, Mr. Free. I’ll treat you to some eggs.”
“That’ll be good.” The old man sighed. “I ain’t had no eggs in quite a time.” He stood the broom in a corner.
Outside, sunlight danced on the snow. “Your feet’s goin’ to freeze,” he told her as they went down the front steps.
“Lost my boots,” the fat girl said. “I must have left them up at Marty’s.”
“And come home barefoot?”
“He drove me,” the fat girl said. “Anyway, somebody did. Maybe I’ll have to buy some more.” She was combing her hair with her fingers. Its short, springy curls came closer and closer to their normal appearance each time her fingers passed through them. “If I seem kind of crabby, don’t pay attention. I’ve got the most terrible headache.”
“You seem real fine to me.”
“Thanks. I feel like I’m going to chuck.”
“I ain’t never had words with an egg in my whole life.”
Candy giggled. “Me neither.”
The Sandwich Shop was open again; they took a booth near the front. “I love these damn things,” she said. “I’m never comfortable in a chair.”
The old man nodded solemnly.
“They ought to take into account that some people are bigger. Like, look at those stools at the counter. They’ll kill you. Sitting on a bed is okay, but you can’t rest your back.”
A middle-aged waitress brought them menus.
“I just want coffee,” the fat girl said. “You’ve got the bottomless cup, right? All the refills I want?”
The waitress said, “Fifty cents.”
“Uh huh.”
“I can’t read this,” Free announced. “But I know what I want. I want two basted eggs. Can I have some ham?”
“Ham,” the waitress said.
“Uh huh, go ahead,” the fat girl told him.
“Then I want some. Tea, if it ain’t too much trouble.”
“Tea.” The waitress nodded and went behind the counter. “Blind ’em. Country on the side.”
“Coffee will fix me up,” the fat girl said. “But it’s better with a little liquor in it.”
“That’ll go for most things.”
Candy giggled again. “I bet you were a swinger. A big, good-looking guy.”
The waitress returned with ice water, cups, and tin teapot. “You want cream and sugar?”
“Lots of sugar,” the fat girl told her. She dumped three packets into her cup, stirred it negligently, and drained it, then sat for a moment with her hands pressed to her temples. “More!” she called after the waitress. Free was moving the tea bag up and down in his pot; the fat girl leaned toward him, lowering her voice. “Can you still get it up, Mr. Free?”
He chuckled. “How’d I know that?”
“If you want to try, just ask me. When I’m not so wasted, okay? If you can’t, don’t worry
about it. I’ve seen it happen with a lot of younger guys.”
“You’re a kind-hearted woman, Miz Garth.”
The waitress refilled the fat girl’s cup and dropped a fresh handful of sugar packets on the table. They bore the likenesses of poets: Byron, Shelley, Keats.
“I’m a sick one,” Candy said. “My head hurts me like you wouldn’t believe.” Her plump fingers trepanned the poets.
“Wish I knew something to help you.”
“I know already. I took four aspirins before I came downstairs the first time, and I drank about a quart of water. Now just give me six or eight cups of coffee and I’ll be fine.”
“Used to know a man that breathed steam. Him and me had a pot we’d make stew in and suchlike, and he’d fill her with water and set her on the fire till she boiled. Then he’d take her off and put his head down and pull a blanket over him.”
“That was a different kind of headache,” the fat girl told Free. “Or maybe not.” She had drunk half her coffee while he spoke. “See, what I’m doing is maybe the same thing, only on the inside. Your buddy put his water in his pot and I put mine in mine.” She patted her belly. “Now I’m boiling it. When we get back to your house, I’ll pull the blanket up for three or four hours.”
“You might not get your sleep out,” the old man said. “They’re comin’ today.”
“Who’s coming?”
“Them that’ll wreck my house.”
“They tell you that?” the fat girl asked.
Free did not reply.
“Just a hunch, huh? Mr. Free, you know I’ll do anything I can. But hunches don’t always work out.”
“Mine do, Miz Garth.”
The waitress brought Free’s eggs and ham, and more coffee for the fat girl.
“Listen, I used to have a boyfriend who was a hunch player. Like, he’d look over his form and see a horse called Try Me, and it would hit him. That was his horse. ‘Guilty,’ I’d tell him, but he’d go nuts unless he had something down on Try Me. Or he’d see a robin fighting a glass door, and then there’d be this horse Gallant Portal. Sometimes they paid, but he never had any cash, and he took mine.”
The old man looked up, interested. “Gallant Portal win?”
The fat girl shook her head, then looked as if she was sorry she had. “Finished three or four places out of the money. Andy—his name was Andy—was always after me to lose some weight. I was always after him to quit the horses. It got to where we made each other feel awful all the time.”
She stirred in sugar. “One time I was in this hotel, and I met this really nice, kind of elderly dentist. Some girls will meet a john like that and say a hundred bucks and if he says no they’ll say seventy-five and so on depending on how low they’re willing to go, and sometimes I do that too, only it depends on the john, what I think he’s like. This time what I said was listen, I’m starving, you take me to dinner and we’ll go up to your room and it’ll be great. So we went down the street and I had a lobster and maybe a dozen oysters, plus the baked potato and that junk.
“About an hour after that I was going uptown and I went past a pizza joint. The dentist had slipped me fifty and I was feeling flush. With a certain type, mostly your older johns, you can let them feed you and then give them a good time and act like you like them, and they’re liable to give you damn near anything. Anyway, I went into the pizza joint and got a large with everything, and I was sitting there in the booth with a bottle of Diet Pepsi and it came to me that Andy was like me and I was like Andy. I could have walked right past that pizza joint, but if I had there would have been another one down the street, and I would have gone in because I passed up the first one. And if I couldn’t, I’d just as soon die.”
“Ain’t you never wished you didn’t want to eat so much?” the old man asked.
The fat girl was waving at the waitress. “More coffee, and a pecan waffle with sausage on the side.”
“Not that it’s my business,” the old man said.
“I never have,” the fat girl told him. “Only I wish sometimes I wasn’t so—you know—obese. Once I roomed with a girl that would go out and eat a big meal and come back to our place and stick her finger down her throat. Puking so she’d look good to the johns. She cut her wrist once in the tub. It didn’t kill her, but various things went on after that, and I don’t think I ever saw her again.”
“Miz Garth, don’t you do that.”
“Not to worry. What were we talking about? I forgot.”
The waitress called to the cook, “Step on the nuts. Pigs.”
“Headaches,” the old man said.
“Yeah, only I wish you hadn’t reminded me. I got a winner.” The fat girl ripped a paper napkin from the dispenser at the back of the table, dipped it into her water glass, and pressed it to her forehead. “My brain hurts. Why don’t they ever have contests for stuff I can do? If they gave cups for headaches like they do for bowling, I could take a bath in mine. We got any hot water?”
The old man lifted the lid of the tin pot.
“I mean back at your house. I could use a nice bath—just lie in the tub and soak. That might make me feel better than anything.”
“The heater went when they cut off our gas, but I got a little bottle-gas job set inside the furnace to keep the pipes from freezing. I’ll have to keep a eye on that anyway so’s it don’t blow up the place ’fore the wreckers come. Maybe I could pipe some bottle gas over to the water heater for you.”
“Thanks,” the fat girl said. “I mean that. You really think they’re coming today, huh?” Without removing the napkin from her forehead, she emptied her cup and put it down.
“About them prizes,” the old man said. “They don’t amount to a spot on a hog. You take bowlin’, you mentioned that yourself. What matters is that a certain feller can get down all the pins about any time his turn comes up. The cup just tells that. It ain’t the shingle makes a doctor.”
“Liquor makes you sleep too hard,” the fat girl murmured. She had shut her eyes, and was leaning her head against the padded backrest. “Last night you couldn’t have got me up with a gun.”
“You got things you could win prizes for, if they gave them. Maybe they don’t, but you’ve got them things, and that’s what counts.”
“With you,” the fat girl said.
“With me, yes. What counts, period.”
“You’re a gentleman, Mr. Free. They’re damn near all dead.”
“There’ll be gents when Ben Free is gone and forgot, Miz Garth.”
The fat girl opened her eyes; they were large, bloodshot, and startlingly blue. “I think it’s going away. I feel a little better.”
“I figured you did when you asked for that waffle.”
“That was just a habit,” the fat girl told him. “If you’re like me, you eat when you feel good because you feel good, and you eat when you don’t because you don’t.” She dropped the damp napkin on the floor and rummaged in her purse for a cigarette. “You smoke, don’t you, Mr. Free?”
“Sometimes.”
“Here, have one of mine.” She braced her wrists on the edge of the table to strike the match, and when the waitress brought their food she asked for a pack of Viceroys.
“This here is a good cigarette,” Free told her. “Usually when I smoke, it’s a pipe, or maybe the doc will give me a cigar.”
“I thought blind people didn’t,” the fat girl said. With her own cigarette between her lips, she was cutting up her waffle.
“I ain’t blind! I can see smoke, for Pete’s sake.”
“I didn’t mean to make you mad.”
“I ain’t mad!”
“Okay. Like some of my waffle?”
“I got plenty,” the old man said. “Thanks to you.”
“You won’t forget about fixing the hot water for me?” Shifting her cigarette to her left hand, the fat girl forked waffle into her mouth.
“Course not. You think I’m mad. I ain’t mad, I just ain’t blind. Never will be, n
either. Won’t live that long.”
“Really.” The word was nearly drowned in maple syrup.
“I s‘pose you’ll be feelin’ better when you’ve had that bath?”
The fat girl nodded and swallowed. “Maybe I ought to tell you when I’m out? I mean, so you can turn off the heater and all that stuff.”
“Your room’s right over mine,” the old man said. “I’ll hear the boards creakin’.”
In A Wall
“Ah, there you are, Mr. Free,” Barnes said. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“Not in the right spots, I reckon. Me and Miz Garth was out to breakfast.”
The fat girl smiled at Free. “I’m going to go upstairs now and get ready for that soak. I’ll be seeing you.” On the second step she turned and blew him a kiss.
“Got to fix up the hot water,” Free said. “Promised I would, and it’ll take a bit for it to get hot.”
“Of course.” Barnes drew his threadbare topcoat around himself more tightly. “I’ll come along and help, if I can.”
“Don’t need no help, but you can come. You want to see me?”
Barnes nodded. “It’s rather … I can’t say personal. Private, right? Perhaps we should go—”
Free interrupted him. “You come with me, then. I got to go pipe up that heater, and down there’s about as private as anyplace.” He shouldered his way past Barnes and without looking back to see if he were following strode off toward the rear of the house.
“I think I should explain that I’m not really here on my own behalf,” Barnes began, hurrying after him. “Madame Serpentina asked that I talk with you.”
“If she’s cold, I can’t help it—they shut off my gas. You tell her if she’s got any more complaints to make them herself. I’ll listen, and I don’t bite much. I got nothing to work with here, but I’m doin’ the best I can.”
