The Dewey Decimal System

by Nathan Larson

  And it took a lot of talking to convince the men to allow me to retain my pills.

  “It’s not a freaking cyanide capsule, guys. I have a real …”

  In the end Stepan simply popped one. We all sat around for five minutes and after nothing happened, they tossed the vial back to me and we split. By that time they’d chilled out, such that they even let me do my thing with the pistachio shells without asking what the fuck I was up to.

  The atrium of the Maritime is flanked by two Maojacketed robots who nod at my big buddies and don’t seem to notice me. I’m hustled up a set of stairs, which would be an impossible act of athleticism on my part without a little help from my friends.

  Ridiculously, that ancient folk song pops unbidden into my head and lodges there.

  I get by with a little help from my friends I get high with a little help from my friends

  But that’s all I can remember of it, so it just loops.

  Into the crowded lobby, and all at once I’m engulfed in the kind of crowd scene I had thought long gone. I feel dizzy and nauseous, I lose depth perception. The joint assaults me with color and sound. The wall of body heat is sickening, and thankfully I am propelled through and past it with dispatch by the twin heavies, who steer me into an alcove featuring a wall of elevators.

  Surely these can’t be in operation … Armani inserts a keycard into a metal slot, above which are the words, Penthouse Level, Private.

  “Guys …” Surely we can’t be … An elevator door which bears a plate proclaiming the same sentiment slides open, and I’m being forced in its direction. I dig in with my feet; my wingers slide on the marble and I am treated to a blast of pain up my bad leg. “Guys, I don’t do elevators. I’m serious. I have a medical condition.”

  “Let’s go, Mr. Decimal,” Armani is saying.

  “Listen, I’m not trying to be difficult, I just can’t do …”

  Stepan puts me in a headlock, cutting off my windpipe, good Lord does this guy ever want to see me die, I shouldn’t have played it so snarky. He hauls me like a sack of sand into the mirrored closet that is the elevator.

  This is the part where I press the button. Metal elevator. Hallway. Door.

  These thought-bubbles drift by, out of context.

  I’m trying to communicate my inability to breathe by poking gently at Stepan’s thorax. Armani slides the keycard into a panel on the wall and hits the single button. Oh protect me, Jesus, the doors whisper closed.

  The grip on my blowhole slackens and I’m sucking oxygen again, the four-way mirror showing an infinite regress, multiple still lifes of me plus gorillas.

  I look awful. My hat is askew and my nappy head is in need of grooming. In general I look like a pair of trashed leather slouch boots. Everything hangs off me, my sport jacket, my flesh.

  The goons seem disengaged and stare at nothing. The cologne fog is almost visible, I suck at the compromised air through my mouth.

  “I just … It’s not a phobia. I have negative associations …”

  I’m breathing wrong. Feel my extremities tingling, my throat tightening. I start counting backward from ten. I touch the key for strength. I can’t believe I got coerced into a goddamn elevator ride. I fumble for a pill, tip one back.

  But nothing’s happening. I sense no movement.

  I’m getting ready to share my assessment of the situation with the Power Twins, but before I’m able the door slides open, revealing a gigantic, low-lit space into which I am pushed.

  There’s a party going on here as well, though nothing like what’s happening downstairs.

  High ceilings, track lights. Couples and small groupings of well-heeled-looking peeps converse quietly here and there. Modelesque girls and boys in kimonos orbit the room, bearing trays with hors d’oeuvres and drinks. The furniture, although dated, looks expensive and inviting. The art is an impressive mash-up of Japanese wall hangings, suits of armor, a Kandinsky, a couple Hoppers, some Dutch master stuff, and a smaller Rodin statue. And that’s just what I see immediately.

  Multiple wall-mounted plasma-screen TVs play old soundless World Cup footage, probably from 2010. I hear Miles Davis, Kind of Blue if I’m not mistaken, piped in by unseen speakers. A few heads turn and take us in, then return to their conversations.

  I’m led through the room and down a hallway, herringbone wood floors covered with Oriental runners.

  On the walls are jazz/Harlem Renaissance memorabilia, a photo of Langston Hughes framed with what I imagine to be a poem in his handwriting, a playbill of Orson Welles’s all-black production of Macbeth, a photograph of Billie Holiday mounted with a lipstick-smeared cocktail napkin, Miles Davis and John Coltrane in conversation accompanied by scribbles of musical notation with the words So What at the top. And so on.

  We arrive at another door, this one looks to be modified as there is no handle on the exterior, only another key card slot and a button.

  “Hands on the wall,” says Armani, spinning me to face it.

  I do as I’m told, careful to avoid the framed bric-abrac. As they frisk me for the second time I believe I’m looking at an eight-by-eleven poster advertising a show at the Savoy in March of 1934, featuring the Chick Webb Orchestra with vocalist Ella Fitzgerald. Apollo champion and songbird of Harlem!

  “Fellows, you know I’m not armed. Stepan here watched me get dressed, for Christ’s sake.”

  Armani’s patting down my calves and doesn’t respond. I’m wearing my very last viable suit, a seersucker with blue stripes, complemented by a white shirt and blue tie, and my usual brown porkpie hat.

  The suit is okay for the current season but I’m going to need to work out something else for the colder months.

  Assuming I can keep myself alive.

  Armani stands and nods to Stepan, who presses the button with his bratwurst of a thumb.

  Presently, Yakiv Shapsko opens the door. Scans me. “Is he unarmed?” he asks the boys in Ukrainian, smiling, not taking his eyes off yours truly.

  They respond in the affirmative.

  Yakiv looks like he just came from work … He’s got on a pair of Dickies, with a cheap dress shirt and tie. He has a napkin from Popeyes tucked in his collar.

  Popeyes. Jesus. Must be the one on 14th Street, the last low-class chicken hut standing. Grew up on the stuff. I shiver inside.

  He extends his hand. I accept it. Greasy. Oh for some sweet PurellTM.

  “Mr. Decimal, just finishing up dinner. Please, come.”

  We enter what appears to be a high-ceilinged conference room. Full wall of windows to my right, looking toward the water and the anemic lights of New Jersey. A glass table, smoke colored.

  At the head of the table is a MacBook Pro from the last year of its production, a large Styrofoam cup with a straw, and a small box of chicken debris. But that’s not what I notice first.

  On the far wall is a massive, I’m talking something like twelve-by-fifteen feet, medieval tapestry I know very well. If it’s not the original, I have to take my hat off to the artist who rendered such an amazing reproduction.

  It’s a work called The Unicorn Is in Captivity and No Longer Dead. It was made somewhere in the area of 1495–1505.

  Yakiv follows my gaze. “Yes, real thing. Thought best to hang on to it rather than see it stolen or damaged. Never know.”

  When I was a kid, it hung at a place called the Cloisters up in Fort Washington. A memory: we went there on some school trip. Chicks dig unicorns, at least they did in the 1980s.

  If I have the story right, John Rockefeller bought this piece and its six companion tapestries in 1922 from some nobility in France … Later on, the series was moved to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

  I can only nod. “Just hope you didn’t get any chicken on it.”

  Yakiv laughs in a relaxed way, and removes the napkin. Once again I feel the profound need for PurellTM.

  “No, not this time. I usually try to eat better but … busy day.”

  In his native language, Yakiv tel
ls Stepan and Armani to remove the garbage, and themselves. He asks about the ID. Authentic, says Stepan.

  As the flunkies proceed cleaning up, I say in Ukrainian: “I see that you’re also a fan of the Harlem Renaissance period.” He registers mild surprise. I continue: “I’m nearly fluent so if you’re more comfortable we can speak your language.”

  Yakiv raises his eyebrows.

  “I had forgotten,” he says in English. “But I think of this English as my native tongue now.”

  “Fine,” I say.

  “No, I am a collector, I … inherit many things. I like many kinds of art. But Mr. Decimal, I do wonder …” He pauses as the big boys exit without a backward glance. “Sit,” he says, sitting himself at the head of the table, indicating a chair next to him. Aeron office chairs.

  Yakiv clasps his hands and looks out the window for a bit. I desperately want to disinfect. Consider asking if he has PurellTM. Decide against it.

  The man cuts a decent profile; he’s got a strong jaw, is going gray, and at one point wore earrings.

  Then: “Tell me what I’m missing. With respect to your methods.”

  “How do you mean … ?”

  “Well,” he laughs, and spreads his hands, “first you approach me cold, on the street, and present bogus Homeland Security ID …”

  “I work for Homeland Security, the ID is not bogus.” I know it’s futile; I have the sense that I’m being completely outclassed here.

  “Please, Mr. Decimal. Less than half minute on the phone with Washington, I determine this is not true. Homeland Security only exists like theory now.”

  Grasping at straws, I try: “That’s of course protocol. If I’m in the field, it’s standard procedure to deny any knowledge—”

  Yakiv waggles his hand dismissively. “Come on. Not worth our time to be like this.”

  I shrug. “You’ve been misinformed.”

  “No, I have not,” says Yakiv. “But there’s frustration I do have; I have yet to figure out who you actually are, and for whom you operate. It’s a frustration.”

  “Your sources are probably—”

  “My sources, impeccable. They occupy very highest level of government both in this country and elsewhere. How is it that you speak Ukrainian?”

  The truth is? I don’t remember. My theory is I had several languages downloaded into my brain at the NIH. But I say, “Took a night course. It’s a hobby kind of thing.”

  Yakiv blinks at me. “That’s your answer?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you have Ukrainian girlfriend or wife?”

  “No.”

  “Who takes Ukrainian-language class?”

  “Guys like me.”

  “Okay then: why do you assault my wife and child in my home, for no clear reason?”

  My turn to blink. “Poor planning.”

  “Can you elaborate on this?”

  “Poor planning, poor execution. You had proved uncooperative, so I took a different approach—”

  Yakiv smacks his hands down on the table, hard, but doesn’t modulate his voice a bit. “Please don’t be insulting. Listen to me: I know you aren’t working for federal government, or foreign government as far as I can tell. You might be insane, but I know you’re not this lone operator. By the way: thanks for not damaging my car. I like this car.”

  I don’t respond. I think that’s best for the moment.

  “For one: you were evacuated from my former home via military helicopter. You were treated at military facility, and allowed to simply walk away when it pleases you. The operation you have was extremely expensive one, and any medical files on you, if they exist, have been destroyed. This is difficult, to make an organization on your own, Mr. Decimal.”

  Yakiv opens his computer.

  “Now, we pulled prints off Nissan that you ditched day before yesterday, plus mask and gloves in my car.”

  I’m wracking my brain; was I really that fucking stupid? Apparently.

  “I know you’re careful. All we got was single partial thumbprint off of ignition wire housing in Nissan. And some partials off driver’s door handle in this Prius. Nobody’s perfect. So from this, we are able to trace you …”

  My stomach is churning. This is suddenly a nightmare. I don’t want to know. Yakiv turns the screen toward me. I’m fondling my key.

  There, on the screen, I’m looking at a younger, even more haunted-looking version of myself with a bald head and multiple facial lacerations.

  The Mac’s resolution is painfully high-def.

  “To National Institutes of Health. Where you were known as John Doe. This is annoying. Mr. Decimal, of course this is an alias, or some kind of joke about your current residence …” He pauses, perhaps expecting me to chime in. I don’t. “At any rate. According to their files you were initially admitted to Walter Reed several years back, you have symptoms of this Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, having been in active branch of the military, stationed at unknown location. They don’t specify which branch, but having checked with all of them, your records could not be located.

  “Main symptoms being ‘extensive memory loss, disturbed sleep, paranoid episodes’ … blah blah blah. You were classified ‘nonfunctional’ and transferred to NIH for participate in some sort of trial study cofunded by feds, plus private insurance like BlueCross/BlueShield, and drug company Pfizer. The nature or result of the study, this is not outlined. There is only one reference to this study that could be located. And no record of release, or any subsequent actions for you.”

  He slaps the laptop closed.

  “This kind of information blackout, again, is very difficult to achieve. And expensive. Especially military records. So.”

  I drum my fingers on the table and smile apologetically. Thinking: things to be thankful for. The bruisers at NIH shot me up with a host of experimental drugs, one or two of which wound up being the heretoforementioned Superflu inoculation, which never made it to the general public. Hence my continued presence here on God’s green earth.

  Things to be thankful for. Or perhaps that was the worst of all possible tortures the good doctors could conceivably subject me to. Depends on how you look at it.

  But Yakiv continues, “And yet, here you are. This city laminate appears to be authentic, Class 1, like mine, essentially allows us freedom, this movement anywhere.”

  “Yup. I’m a first-class citizen.”

  “So by elimination, I move forward, assume you work for this city in some capacity. Am I right?”

  I examine my fingernails.

  “That’s okay. I don’t need confirmation from you. I think I have this much figured out. Work for the city, or you are making work for one of my competitors. Which I very much doubt, as we have their organizations under close observation.”

  Suddenly and inappropriately, I feel very much alone. And with respect to my loyalties, where do they lie?

  I might not like Rosenblatt personally, but he has certainly taken care of me when things have gone awry. On the other hand, his motivation for that is self-serving, so he doesn’t get in trouble, and these precarious situations only ever come about at his behest.

  And he keeps me stocked, in the medication department.

  How did I meet DA Rosenblatt? I simply don’t remember.

  “Mr. Decimal. In what context did you learn Ukrainian?”

  See above. I don’t remember. “I told you, continuing education. Call me a dabbler.”

  “A what?”

  “A dabbler. You know, a little bit of this, a little bit of that. I just yearn to learn. Know what I’m saying?”

  Yakiv looks at me. Taps his fingers on the glass. Rotates his chair 180 degrees, facing the priceless unicorn.

  “I am wondering what my,” he pauses to cough, “what my beloved wife had to say for herself. Or what she may have told you, related to me or activities of my business.”

  “What makes you think she told me anything at all?”

  “Because I know my wife.”
>
  “I don’t do marital stuff. I don’t get involved. That’s a black hole, man.”

  Yakiv spins back around, slow. “Then what do you do? That’s the, uh, crux of the question here. What do you do, Mr. Decimal? What is your line of work?”

  “I’m a librarian.”

  “Well, you’ve chosen perfect place to live. You know, I try to keep my organization as, what is it, civil as possible.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Oh, absolutely. I don’t care what impressions you may have about me or my business, but let me give you example. Let’s take this situation here. You, attempting to, I don’t know what, abduct me? Interrogate me? Harm me some way? Then bringing a firearm into my former home, with my wife and young child present, making threats, terrifying them …”

  “If I might, and I’m not debating any of this, when you sum it all up it was in fact your wife who shot me, not the other way around. With her own firearm.”

  “She was well within rights to do so and you know this. Were you in her place you would have done same thing, or worse, no? My wife, you should be aware, was in Latvian NAF, also involved with NATO activities in Kosovo, 1999.”

  Don’t know what the NAF is, I’m embarrassed to admit, but like I said the woman had a steady arm.

  Yakiv continues: “So she has assimilated, this is okay, but is hardly, what do you say, your average American housewife. But listen to me now. Wishing as I do to understand your motive and employer, or employers, I could, just for example, torture you.”

  “Yes, I can imagine that we’re headed down that road.”

  Yakiv holds up a hand. “But listen to me. I tell you now, this is not how I conduct affairs. Torture, this is for old Soviet Union, and also now for you Americans. Am I wrong?”

  “Are we discussing politics now? Listen, I don’t go in for torture. But that’s only because it gets you bad information, not because I give a shit. Everybody knows that, it’s a short-sighted practice.”

  “I agree with you, 100 percent. So we’re what, pragmatic. We talk things through.”