“Peace on Earth,” I stammered aloud, just in case.
“What?” came Tynee’s voice on the other end.
“Nothing. What’s going on?”
“Someone will knock on your door any minute. Trust them. They will bring you in safely.” Tynee was remarkably cordial, even hospitable, in his tone. In retrospect, it strikes me as suspicious that he was not the least bit irritated or alarmed at my desperate state.
“Okay,” I said tentatively, like a child promising to stop crying if given a lollipop. “Is that it?”
“That’s it.”
“Is there a code word or anything?”
“No, that’s it. I’ll talk to you again in the morning.”
“All right.” I hung up the phone, somewhat disappointed that I wasn’t to be privy to a secret knock.
THE BOOK O’ BILLETS-DOUX
Rosehips: I have a riddle for you. What does everyone have in common that they can never share?
Sweetlick: That’s easy. The recognition that we really have nothing in common. But wait, have we stumbled across a paradox?
Rosehips: You speak nonsense, my lovely! We have much in common. Our genes are all but identical, remember? It is only our sense of self that we think is unique, and that notion is impossible to verify. Upon reflection, however, I suppose you are close.
Sweetlick: Nonsense? Certainly. As a linguistic representation, how could it be otherwise?
Rosehips: Have you the answer to the riddle?
Sweetlick: See, a paradox is only a contradiction of the conditions. Change the conditions and you’ll exorcise the paradox.
Rosehips: You can’t expect to change the subject in written communication. We must focus here. The answer may be a clue in our quest.
Sweetlick: Subjects change themselves, I’m afraid. They can only be controlled by an enormous effort of will. Conversing is best an experience rather than an activity. The answer will turn up.
Rosehips: No it won’t. You at least have to look for something before you can declare that it will turn up.
Sweetlick: Specious monkeybusiness! You bring a smile to my face, sweet babe-a-la-pook-a-la-co-co-pow, but enough of this. Come now, I give up. What’s the answer?
Rosehips: You can’t give up! That’s like committing suicide to discover the purpose of life. The purpose is the process. A riddle demands attention and mindfulness. Ponder your paradox. Answers will come when the time is right.
Sweetlick: Of course you’re correct. The meaning of life is revealed at death. Oop! There it is, it turned up, just as I said. Death is what we have in common that cannot be shared. Your riddle is good, but the paradox will remain until conditions are changed, or until death becomes irrelevant, or as we discover, one by one, that death is shared after all.
41 The next thing I remember is waking up like some luxurious lush, naked and hungover, nestled between silk sheets that did nothing to soothe my vomitous headache. I was in an enormous room decorated in an exaggerated Southwestern desert style. Though I did not appear to be anywhere near a desert, an assortment of cacti filled every corner of the room and occupied the surfaces of the nightstand, desk, and dresser. A tumbleweed bouquet graced the center of the table, set in a vase that matched the angular, zigzag artwork of the Navajo blanket on my bed. The table itself sat under a wagon wheel chandelier, and a variety of American Indian and Western ghost town bric-a-brac decorated the walls. Meeko was sitting on a deck outside, dutifully sniffing at the deciduous forest beyond, and a clamorous chorus of songbirds and insects drifted in along a glaring sunbeam that stretched across the foot of my king-size bed. I sat up and retched.
I located my clothes from the day before, freshly washed, pressed, and folded neatly on a chair across the room. Seeing I was awake, Meeko trotted inside and trailed me happily about the room as I inspected my new accommodations. The bathroom was equipped with a combination whirlpool/shower, a deep-bowl, splatter-proof toilet, a sink I could have taken a bath in, and a dressing room mirror framed by incandescent bulbs. As I flicked the light switch, soft strains of rhythmless music assaulted my throbbing head. I flipped the switch off and on again experimentally, noting that the music followed suit, and feeling a bit like an ape gruntingly examining some new causal connection.
A curiously familiar rap sounded at the door to the suite. “Yes?” I croaked, then cleared my throat and called out again.
“Good morning, Doctor,” came a woman’s aggressive voice, also familiar. “May I enter?”
“Um,” I faltered, extraordinarily confused. “Who are you?”
“Agent Mella Orange, Doctor. Your personal bodyguard. We met last night.”
Anxious to make sense of my lavishly fake surroundings, as well as the apparent bender and resulting blackout I’d had last night, I opened the door. Before me stood a woman of about six feet in height, with dark, shrewd eyes, deep brown skin, and long hair, tightly braided into a rough-and-tumble heap of medusan locks. She was dressed completely in black, and carried a pistol on her hip. She was the most potent woman I had ever laid eyes upon, both physically erotic and maternally intimidating, and could doubtless have fought off a circle of attackers while nursing an infant.
“President Tynee has asked me to inform you that he would like you to join him for breakfast soon.” She was perfectly motionless but for her serpentine eyes, scanning the room warily, and finally coming to rest on me. “He told me to tell you that the kitchen has made your favorite, Italian toast.”
“Italian toast? How did they know that was my favorite?”
“Your account at the Faculty Club was analyzed to identify your preference patterns.”
“Oh.” I crossed my arms in defensive privacy, feeling like she had just jerked my shirt off.
“We’ve also arranged for a new wardrobe to be delivered by tomorrow based on purchases made to catalogs found in your home.”
I stood dumbfounded a moment, my pants just having been yanked off as well. “I can’t recall anything after phoning Tynee last night.”
“I’m surprised you can recall that. You were exhibiting symptoms of anxiety when I arrived, so I gave you a sedative. It results in short-term memory loss, as well as general malaise the following day.”
“Jesus. Did you happen to mention that to me last night?”
“No, Doctor. For security purposes, it was necessary to eradicate your recollection of this sanctuary’s location.”
“What?” I asked calmly, though I felt sure I should be angry.
“It is my job to guarantee your security, Doctor. I use every device available toward that end. The sedation was mandatory, as was the body cavity search.” Agent Mella Orange spoke with martial precision. “I have never lost a client.”
“Body cavity search?”
“Yes, Doctor.” She gazed down at me in supreme authority, completing her degradation ceremony by giving me a swift wedgie with her words. “You’ll be happy to hear that you were not carrying any tracers.”
42 I sat at the end of a gargantuan table, alone, waiting for a man who tolerated tardiness about as much as an infant tolerates hunger. I picked at my gourmet Italian toast, which was in truth French toast. There is, so far as I know, no generally acknowledged toast called Italian toast. My father, however, who was one-eighth Sicilian on his mother’s side but acted as if he were Mario Lanza, taught me from an early age that French toast was called Italian toast. It was not until I spent the night at a friend’s house when I was nine that I discovered, upon politely asking for another piece of Italian toast, that the rest of the country called my favorite breakfast French toast. My request was greeted with laughter, which succeeded in shaming me into adopting the culturally accepted label for bread sopped in eggs and milk and fried.
Much to my chagrin, however, my father’s designation was deeply imprinted, and unless I make a conscious point, I often slip and ask for Italian toast. When this happens I merely relate the story behind my confusion to the waitperson or whomever a
nd usually get a courteous laugh. I can order Italian toast with impunity at the Faculty Club, as all the waiters and waitresses are familiar with the anecdote.
Whatever it’s called, I wasn’t enjoying it. I sat there joylessly, trying to imagine the chain of communication that led to Agent Mella Orange informing me that Italian toast was being served for breakfast. It appeared as though someone had not only examined my account to discern my likes and dislikes, but also must have interviewed the employees concerning my quirks and idiosyncrasies. The strangest thing was not necessarily the suffocating pampering I was being subjected to, or even the gross invasions of privacy. It was that it was actually somebody’s job to build a culinary dossier on me. Someone had interviewed the waitstaff, asking if I always finished my coffee or if there was anything else they could recall, and then noting as significant and important the fact that I sometimes forget what French toast is correctly called.
In any case, there is one dining room detail that person somehow overlooked. Raised in the suburban cul-de-sacs of consumerism and suckled on the vapid teet of television, the buxom blather of the boob tube, I have always detested pure maple syrup.
43 At last Tynee entered the dining room, accompanied by a formally dressed waiter whose steroidal size more properly matched the immensity of the table. “Dr. Fountain!” Tynee greeted me as he traversed the length of the table, requiring twice as many strides as his muscly maître d’. “Glad to see you’ve recovered from your ordeal last night.” Upon completion of the trek, Tynee extended his hand to shake mine. Reluctantly, I stood up and he shook my hand like we were old classmates at a reunion just about to say the hell with it and give each other a backslapping hug. Thankfully, embraces were not forthcoming.
“Enjoying your Italian toast, I hope?” He snapped his fingers at the waiter, who placed two covered platters on the table, one in front of Tynee and the other off to the side. At Tynee’s nod he removed the lids with as much flair as his muscle-bound physique would allow, revealing a plate of French toast for Tynee and an inexplicable cucumber and celery stalk on the other.
“Italian toast all around, eh, Doctor?” Tynee laughed and lifted his plate slightly. He glanced at my plate of cold, soggy, but gourmet French toast. “Is everything okay with your Italian toast?”
“To tell you the truth,” I said, deciding to take full advantage of my coddling situation, “I don’t really care for pure maple syrup. I prefer regular grocery store syrup, you know, high-fructose corn syrup and preservatives, with artificial maple flavoring.”
“Not a problem.” He looked up at the waiter. “Volt, do you have anything like that in the kitchen?”
The mesomorphic tower of muscular obsession spoke with a jarring French accent. “I am afraid not, sir. My keetchen eez a gourmet keetchen. I use only zee finest ingredients.”
“Well, find a way to get some!” Tynee reverted to his usual commanding tone.
“Of course.” Volt the Waiter and Chef bowed and strode quickly out the door.
Tynee beamed obsequiously at me once again and poured some pure maple syrup on his French toast. “So where were we, Doctor?”
I looked at him blankly, for we had not yet discussed anything more substantial than French toast and syrup. “Well, I’m concerned about a few things.”
He waved me off and seized the vegetables off the second tray, clutching the cucumber in one hand and the celery in the other. “You and I have a lot in common, Doctor,” he said, holding the vegetables before him ponderously, as if perhaps we were both salad tossings.
“How’s that?”
“We thought we’d humor you this morning with Italian toast, but in all honesty, I have the same problem, only with me it’s cucumbers and celery.” He placed them back on the tray, sporting a sneery grin as if he’d just told a dirty joke.
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“I can’t get it straight either. I’ll be talking about this,” he pointed to the cucumber, “and I’ll call it celery. And vice versa.”
“How about that.”
Tynee nodded, pausing to take a bite of his French toast. “I suppose it doesn’t really matter. After all, words are just arbitrary designations, right? As long as at least two people agree on what’s called what, words work just fine.” He took another bite. “Mmm, I’ll tell you what though.” He slapped me on the shoulder, now that we were comrades in confusion, I suppose. “This is the finest I-talian toast I’ve ever had.”
44 I should mention at this point that I had not yet decided whether I would actually take the assignment. I only agreed to be sequestered at the sanctuary for my peace of mind. I’m a scientist, after all, and we aren’t generally known for our courage.
I finally managed to express my reservations and grievances toward the end of breakfast, or rather, when Tynee was finishing his, for although I’d gotten my Aunt Jemima and a fresh order of French toast, I had the appetite of a crapulent mortician. In between gurgles of bald nausea, I complained that the cloak-and-dagger escapades were a little unusual for an academic project. I didn’t like being followed, or knowing that I might be in danger, and I especially didn’t like being drugged. I also told him, in so many words, that I felt like I had pushed the concept of a hangover to a heretofore unsuspected level of misery.
Ignoring everything but my last sentiment, Tynee smiled his dirty-joke smirk again. “Right. I heard all about you last night.”
“What?”
“Agent Orange debriefed us. I must say, I had no idea a professor like you could be so, how shall I say, licentious.”
“What are you talking about?” I demanded, feeling anger at last. “I can’t remember a damn thing about last night.”
Tynee forced the smile from his face. “I’m sorry, Doctor, but the sedative was necessary. This is a top-secret project we’re involved in.”
“Top secret? Does that mean I have no privacy? Come on, the kitchen knows all the details of my eating habits?” “Of course it means you have no privacy,” Tynee interjected. “And anyway, I’m surprised you don’t recognize Volt. He’s been working at the Faculty Club for the past few weeks, keeping an eye on you ever since you were identified as a candidate for this project.”
“What?” I said, flustered and shirtless once again. “What about ordering me a new wardrobe? What’s that all about?”
“Agent Orange gathered that information last night, although she had a difficult time of it with you all over her.” Tynee flashed his locker room grin once again.
“I suppose strip-searching me was necessary as well?”
“The body cavity search,” Tynee made a point to clarify, “was necessary only during your initial entry. Henceforth, you’ll always have an escort in and out, and no more sedatives either. I guarantee.”
“Wait a minute,” I challenged, fumbling as I pulled out my purple envelope. “It says here that a team of agents was watching my every move.”
“Yes?”
I leaned forward. “I was in the passenger seat of a car yesterday driven by a maniac at over 100 miles an hour. How was whoever the hell supposedly watching me then?”
Tynee looked at me, expressionless. “You’re going to have to elaborate your point.”
“I’m saying I think this is bullshit!” I began to raise my voice. “I’m in no danger, and no one has been watching me. Jesus!” I threw up my hands, befuddled and belligerent. “How do I know I haven’t been slipped other drugs? How do I know this isn’t all a setup to make me paranoid to get me to agree to come here and work on this project?”
Tynee smiled as if I was suddenly the butt of his raunchy ha-has. “Remember that riot you witnessed on the Green yesterday?” He creased his brow derisively, the furrow forming a wishbone above his nose. I wished he would shut up.
“How did you know I was there?”
“Do you think I have stealth helicopters patrolling campus preachers, Fountain? The CPC was watching you then, and they were watching you when you were on
the freeway.”
I slumped back in my chair, beaten into submission, save for one last punch-drunken swing. “What if I refuse to work on this project . . . on ethical grounds?”
Tynee’s face darkened, as if he had just belted back a shot of some mad scientist’s Jekyll and Hyde cocktail. His lickspittle grin became a hurlspittle sneer. “You’ll be released,” he growled. “Not only from this sanctuary, but from any employment opportunities at any educational institution in this hemisphere. I’ll see to it that the only job you’ll be able to get will be teaching high school biology to a bunch of oily-faced teenagers who’ll shoot spitballs and small firearms at your head when your back is turned.” Tynee pulled another purple envelope out of his jacket and handed it to me. “On the other hand,” he relaxed and regained his diplomatic composure, “if you do accept, the CPC will provide you with room and board here at Valhalla Acres, and remunerate you generously for your services.”
The envelope contained a cashier’s check written in the amount of ten million dollars. My research stipend, Tynee called it.
I agreed to work on Operation Small Change wholeheartedly that morning, and despite any hang-ups or hangover, I was smiling like a Cheshire cat on laughing gas.
45 After breakfast, Tynee escorted me back to my suite, where we waited on the patio with Meeko to meet with the head of the CPC. He was part Italian too, Tynee told me, although he referred to his French toast by the traditional moniker.
As we were talking, the door to the suite opened and a spotted but husky old man marched in. He was General Veechy Kiljoy, the chairman of the CPC. His face was hard enough to deflect a cannonball, and his stride could have sprained the hamstrings of a kangaroo.
“General, come in!” Tynee said with an outstretched arm. Meeko scrambled toward the door to greet the new person. This consisted of frantically sniffing General Kiljoy, and thrusting his nose between the overstarched trouser legs of the general’s military uniform.
Just a Couple of Days Page 9
