Warp

by Lev Grossman

  Hollis walked over to the piano, but the keyboard was closed and locked. He buffed away a fingerprint with his sleeve.

  “I’d like to send this next number out to our audience upstairs,” he said. “I hope they’re listening. It’s called ‘You Made Me Love You.’”

  Peters headed through the door at the far end, and Hollis trotted after him. They emerged in a short hallway with an elaborate red velvet window seat. Several corridors fanned out from it. The window looked out onto a few hundred feet of lawn and the next house down the street. It was still too early to see colors.

  Somehow the view was oppressive to me, and I rang for the curtains to be closed.

  “Jesus, Hollis,” Peters said. “Are you even paying attention?”

  “Sorry.” He turned away from the window. “What’s next, boss?”

  “We split up. You do that part”—he pointed down another corridor—“I’ll go around the other way and meet you back at the stairs. In five minutes.”

  “Back in a flash,” said Hollis. “Without the cash.”

  When Peters was gone, Hollis turned and walked slowly down the hall he’d pointed at. Without Peters the house was suddenly quiet. He started opening doors: a guest bathroom, a closet full of linens and old hotel soap, and a door that opened back onto the living room with the piano.

  The last door was a tall archway that led into a second, less formal dining room, surprisingly bright and airy. In the middle was a glass-topped table with a porcelain vase full of dried flowers sitting on a doily. A pair of French doors looked out onto the courtyard; incongruously, they were chained and padlocked shut.

  Hollis pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. The early-morning light reflected off the glass, and he could see traces where someone had wiped the table with a washcloth and left it to dry.

  Millions of years ago the Eastern Seaboard region of the North American continent was entirely underwater, from as far north as Boston to as far south as Atlanta.

  Hollis slouched down in the chrome-and-wicker chair. There were some framed Audubon bird drawings on the wall facing him. What he could see of the courtyard outside was a plain green lawn, with a curious four-cornered fountain made of some kind of patinated metal in the center. At each of the four corners was perched a little cherub, struggling to hold on to a fish that might in warmer weather have been spouting water.

  He felt tired. Time was passing.

  They were sitting together in the library. It was winter, and somebody was sweeping snow off the roof over their heads. They could hear the clumping sound of his boots through the ceiling, and with every push of the pushbroom a whole snowbank drifted down past the window, lit up in the bright winter sunlight, in a regular rhythm. Inside the radiators were going full blast, and it was oppressively hot.

  “Do you ever fantasize about us being trapped on a desert island together?” said Hollis.

  “Not really.”

  “We could catch fish,” he said. “Maybe weave some mats.”

  “I don’t eat fish.”

  “We could pick coconuts. Actually, I can’t stand coconuts.”

  She raised her eyebrows at him over her laptop.

  “It was a sweet idea,” she said.

  More snow fell down past the window.

  Hollis didn’t have a watch, but he guessed he had another minute before he had to meet Peters. He closed his eyes and put his hands over them. A gust of wind rattled the windows, and he shivered.

  You are in a small rectangular chamber.

  A pair of French doors looks East out onto a courtyard.

  There are two doorways, leading West and South.

  You are likely to be eaten by a grue.

  When he got back to the stairs Peters was waiting, leaning against the scroll of the banister.

  “Anything?”

  “Nope,” said Hollis. “Sorry.”

  They were still wearing their coats, and Hollis put his hands in his pockets. Peters turned and started limping up the stairs.

  “Walk this way.”

  On the second floor a polished wooden railing ran all the way around the edge of the stairwell, beginning and ending in little spirals, and overhead there was a grand ceiling with a chandelier. Hallways led off into the depths of the house on either side.

  “Welcome to the Next Level,” said Hollis.

  “Shh.”

  Peters put his fingers to his lips.

  “They’re somewhere around here,” he whispered. “Somewhere near. The bedroom.”

  They chose a direction at random and walked until they found a door. It opened onto a long rectangular library. Peters made a show of peering in around the doorway and motioning Hollis to come in after him. The room was dimly lit by a torchère halogen lamp. Bookshelves ran floor to ceiling, filled mostly with old red-leather-bound Complete Works with gilt lettering on their spines.

  Peters opened a drawer in one of the cabinets and rummaged around. He took out a box of condoms.

  “Look,” he said, holding it up. “We’re in the Library of Love.”

  He put it back and sank down heavily in an armchair. He looked tired.

  “Help me, Gamera! Gamera is the friend of all children. Why are we doing this again?”

  “Alienation,” said Hollis. “Don’t you remember? It’s the zeitgeist. We’re victims of the fin de siècle.”

  “Who’s alienated? I’m not alienated.”

  “I am.”

  “No, really?” Peters said. “Is that a fact? Hey, what’s that thing in your pocket? You aren’t still carrying around that beer, are you?”

  “What, this?”

  Hollis took his hand out of his pocket. He was holding a black leather blackjack with a wooden handle.

  “Just a little health insurance,” he said.

  Everybody’s a comedian.

  “Jesus Christ!” said Peters. “What the fuck is that thing? Do you want to go up on armed robbery, or something? What’s the matter with you?”

  It was almost full daylight outside. A strong white light was pushing its way into the room around the edges of the blinds.

  “It’s technically nonlethal,” said Hollis. Peters snorted.

  “Well, put it away. What do you think this is, Fists of Fury? Where’d you get it, anyway?”

  Hollis hefted it experimentally, slapping it against his palm. The leather of the pouch was filled with heavy round pellets that felt like buckshot.

  “Some pawnshop. A couple of months ago.”

  “What for?”

  “Beats me. It was an impulse buy. Point-of-purchase.”

  “Super,” said Peters. He lay back in the armchair again and closed his eyes.

  Hollis went back to work. He went through a pair of secretary desks, but he found only papers: bank statements, insurance papers, tax forms, birth certificates. When he was done he carefully closed the last drawer and checked the clock on the wall, which was brass and shaped like a barometer. It was 6:07. Birds chirped outside. Next to the clock hung a painting of a clipper ship on a windy day, with its sails flying, caught in the middle of mounting a long, blue-green swell chased with shreds of white foam.

  Hollis read the title out loud to himself.

  “Flying Cloud. Beating to Windward.”

  “You said ‘beat,’” said Peters.

  “Maybe I should run away to sea.”

  Peters snorted again.

  “Don’t laugh,” Hollis said. “I think they still have merchant marines, somewhere. Or something like that.”

  Somewhere down the hall, a door opened and closed.

  For a long second neither of them moved.

  “Uh-oh,” Peters whispered. “Did you hear that?”

  Hollis nodded.

  Before he could say anything, Peters was up and tiptoeing over to the door. He looked both ways, then slipped silently out into the hall.

  When Hollis looked out into the corridor it was empty. Peters was already at the far end, peering around
the corner.

  “What are you doing?” Hollis called after him, in a hoarse whisper.

  He was doomed if the Devilfish reached the open sea. It would take him out into the depths and drown him.

  Peters glanced back at him for a second without answering, then disappeared around the corner. When Hollis reached the corner he saw that the hall went on much farther, back into one of the rear wings, with a series of identical doors on either side. Peters was making his way forward along the wall step by step, crouched down.

  “Where are you going?” Hollis whispered, but too softly for Peters to hear him.

  They heard another door closing, from farther down the hall, and Peters froze, then ducked into a doorway on the right. Hollis was left standing by himself in plain sight. The far end of the hall was barely visible in the dimness. He walked farther up, to where Peters was hiding.

  He was in a tiny pink-and-blue-tiled bathroom, standing in the bathtub. He put his head out from behind the pink shower curtain.

  “Lock it,” Hollis whispered, miming turning a doorknob, and Peters nodded. He closed the door, and Hollis stepped back into the hall. The latch clicked.

  The hall was still empty. There was a framed poster hanging on the wall next to the bathroom door, a Monet painting of a haystack. Hollis went over to it and turned it around to face the wall. He took a pen out of his pocket and wrote

  NE TRAVAILLEZ JAMAIS

  in big block letters on the brown paper backing. Then he stepped back into an open doorway.

  Somewhere in the house the furnace switched itself off with a loud click, followed by silence. His throat tickled, and he had to fight back the urge to cough.

  For a minute nothing happened.

  I had this dream where we were all on the Enterprise.

  Just when he was about to check the hall again, he heard a footstep on the carpet a few feet away.

  Mr. Donnelly was standing in front of him.

  He was very fat. He faced away from Hollis, looking at the door of the bathroom where Peters was hiding. Hollis held his breath. Mr. Donnelly’s shoulders were broad and very red, with symmetrical patches of dark hair on them. There was a rip in his underwear, and his sleeveless white undershirt had sweat stains under the arms. His calves were pale and bristly above his black socks.

  Hollis kept his hand on the blackjack in the pocket of his overcoat.

  I had this dream.

  Mr. Donnelly put his hand on the doorknob of the little bathroom. Hollis tensed. After a second he seemed to change his mind, and he took it back. He looked over at the picture that was hanging facing the wall and reached out and took it in both hands. Moving with exaggerated carefulness, as if he were still half asleep, he turned it back around again and took a step back to look at it, to make sure it was level. Hollis could hear the noise of his deep, calm breathing.

  Then he turned and started shuffling back down the hall the way he came. Hollis stepped out of the doorway and stood behind him.

  The sun is going down on a salt marsh. The tide carries a skiff faster and faster out to sea.

  These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.

  Mr. Donnelly moved like a sleepwalker, his heavy bulk swaying a little from side to side. Standing in the middle of the hall, gripping the blackjack in his pocket, Hollis watched him go. He turned the corner and was out of sight.

  Come get some, sugar.

  Hollis looked over at the picture again. His heart was racing, and he was having trouble breathing, as if he’d just been running hard. He took in a long, unsteady lungful of air, then let it out again.

  A post marks the channel to the ocean.

  The bathroom door opened, and Peters looked out. He was breathing hard too.

  “What happened?” he whispered.

  “Not too fucking much.”

  “I was behind the shower curtain.” He put his hand on his chest. “Held my breath. What do you think?”

  “I doubt he’s coming back.”

  Peters nodded, and he looked over at the doorway where Hollis had been standing.

  “What’s in there?” he whispered.

  “I don’t know. Looks like somebody’s study.”

  Peters went over and looked inside.

  “Are you going to check it?” said Hollis.

  “Just for a second.”

  “I’ll keep watch.”

  Said the Joker to the Thief.

  “You do that.”

  Hollis waited at the door while Peters searched. He threw back the curtains, revealing a full view of the front lawn: the grass was now visibly green in the thin early-morning light, and the miniature lamppost had been turned off. Hollis could hear him going through the room at top speed, opening and shutting drawers and swearing, pushing aside clothes hangers in the closet, wrestling a drawer out of its slot. He leaned his head back until it rested against the wall. His eyes closed.

  Something in his mind clicked, and he opened them again. He went back over to the Monet poster and pushed his hand up behind it: there, in one corner, he could feel two keys taped to the brown paper backing. He ripped them off. The keys were bronze-colored, and someone had written HOUSE along the tape in blue ballpoint pen.

  “Dude,” he said urgently. “Come here.”

  He snapped his fingers, and Peters stopped searching and came out of the study.

  “What is it?”

  Hollis tossed him the keys, and Peters caught them one-handed.

  “When a thief thieves a thief,” Hollis said, “God laughs.”

  Peters just stood there for a second, turning them over in his hand.

  “Jesus,” he said, unbelievingly. He looked up at Hollis. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  He shoved the keys in his pocket and started walking quickly down the hall back towards the stairs. Hollis checked the hall in the other direction, but it was clear. When he turned back, Peters had started to run.

  Hollis jogged after him. The first floor had been dark when they first searched it, but now the curtains glowed with the sunlight behind them. Hollis walked through the entrance hall into the dining room, where he found his can of beer where he had left it on the table. He took it with him. In the kitchen the clock in the microwave said 6:18. He scooped up the rest of the six-pack from off the counter. They were frosted with moisture, and he swiped away the wet rings with his sleeve.

  Peters was already waiting for him in the little storage room. Hollis carefully closed the heavy inner door behind him.

  “Quick, Marty!” he said hoarsely. “Back to the DeLorean!”

  Outside on the landing they had to blink their eyes against the light. There was no frost, but it was chilly, and water glittered coldly on the grass. Hollis took a moment to wrap his coat more tightly around him before he stepped off the porch. They jogged across the lawn and part of the way down the street before they gave it up and slowed down to a walk.

  “Jesus,” Peters said. “I think I’m going to have an embolism.”

  Hollis felt dizzy. It had been a couple of days since he’d had a real meal. He touched his chin with his hand: he was already growing a thin, straggly goatee. It was an effort to keep walking straight; he glanced over, but didn’t seem to notice. Yellow and red leaves settled and spun their way down through the clear air.

  A Volvo station wagon was warming up in the driveway of the Victorian farmhouse across the street, sending up a plume of white exhaust, but the driver paid no attention to them. When they got to the Lexus, Peters unlocked it, and Hollis squeezed in past the fir tree on the passenger side. The moment he sat down he felt completely drained, and he let his head loll back against the headrest.

  “You okay with driving?” he said.

  “Of course.”

  “I feel like fucking hell,” Hollis said. “God, look at all this fucking daylight—it’s so disgustingly cheery.”

  Peters started the engine, and the headlights came on, pale and weak in the early-morning light. He snappe
d them off.

  “Guess we won’t be needing those.” He cleared his throat. “You want a cigarette?”

  “God, no. Is there any food in this thing?”

  Peters shrugged, released the brake, and cranked the wheel all the way to the left. He pulled out into a tight U-turn. The street was wide and empty, and he floored it.

  “Slow down!” he said, to himself. “You’ll get us all killed!”

  Hollis sniffed.

  “So are you going to call that girl?” Peters said. “The one you met at Amanda’s?”

  “Jesus, I already told you, I went out with her. It didn’t fly.”

  “You could still call her,” said Peters.

  Hollis looked out the window at the houses.

  “I would prefer not to discuss the matter further.”

  With his eyes half open, Hollis watched the scenery fly by. For a long time neither of them said anything. There was forest on either side, pine trees, and signs for frost heaves and deer crossings. He couldn’t tell if they were taking the same route as before or a new one.

  He closed his eyes.

  * * *

  When they got to the center of town they came up on a yellow school bus, and Peters stopped to wait for it. He nudged Hollis. A high school girl was hurrying to catch it, coming towards them along the sidewalk.

  “Look at that.”

  She had a pale, clear oval face and ringlety brown hair that fell down to her shoulders. She wore her backpack with the straps over both shoulders, and she jogged towards the bus with her thumbs hooked behind the straps. Hollis watched her getting on.

  “La beauté,” he said, “c’est la promesse de bonheur.”

  “She’s more your type, chum,” Peters said. “One of those Andie MacDowell types.”

  Shall I have her sent round to the castle, milord?

  Aye. And see that she’s given a good bath first.

  When they reached the on-ramp to the highway, Peters took it without slowing down.

  “Hand me my shades, would you?” he said. “I think they’re in the glove compartment.”

  Hollis found them. Peters put them on in front of his little round glasses and looked at himself in the rearview mirror.

  “I am become a Callow Youth,” he said solemnly.

  They were in the commuter rush from the suburbs into Boston, but it was too early for the highway to be very crowded. Accelerating up to highway speed, Peters reclined the seat a notch and leaned back.