The Caveman's Valentine (8 page)

T
he warm front was still at work, even in the dark. He got to the cave where an old white woman they called Cyclops—because her other eye was just a purplish burned-out socket—was asleep on his mattress.

He took off his new clothes and folded them neatly. He put on his old clothes, then he woke Cyclops and told her to make some room. She rolled over and slumbered on, purred. Romulus sat beside her, looking out into the mist. Against his new-scrubbed skin, his old clothes chafed. They felt clammy, gritty. Didn’t seem to fit. Didn’t suit him anymore.

Furthermore it annoyed him, it always annoyed him, to share his cave with Cyclops.

It was a great nuisance. The cave was too small to share with anybody, and besides, Cyclops had fleas. Romulus would wake up at four in the morning and feel them popping softly against his neck, an invisible wind. Take him days to hunt all the buggers down.

But she had no home.

The woman was dying of six different diseases. She lay there with no blanket on, just her coat, and her calves were exposed and in the dim city-glow Romulus could see her sores. Her legs were patchworked of scabs, boils, fissures, and blisters. In her sleep she reached down and raggedly scratched herself, dug in with her moonstone claws. But wearing all that ancient armor of scab tissue, how could she hope to satisfy the itch beneath? And her breathing was one long death rattle, and her brain was a smoking wreck, and those fortunates like Romulus who
had
homes were simply obliged to share them with those who didn’t.

There was no way around this.

Clearly (however misty, it was a night for clear visions!), clearly, neighbors, if you would trouble yourselves
just a little,
just enough to open your doors and step out and offer up a little villagers’ love no less—why then, Stuyvesant in his tower would be defeated and he’d writhe and cringe and
HOWL!
YOU BLOODSUCKER! DEFEATED BY LOVE!

WRITHING IN HELLFIRE!

Clearly. But Y-rays have bleared every eye and mucked over every heart, and all who live here live only to tremble. Too busy covering their own asses to worry about anyone else. All who sleep now in the dark canyon-tenements of this city sleep fitfully, scared out of their wits, and it’s the same with me isn’t it?—truly Romulus Ledbetter must be just what his daughter says he is—frightened, a rattle-bone coward, or wouldn’t I be standing up and
showing them
what a murderous cruel son of a sick
snake
it is that they bow down before? Wouldn’t I be doing something to try to
stop this horror?

I would. I will.

And then as he sat there muttering to himself, Romulus heard a voice.

“Now you’re putting on airs, baby?”

The voice wasn’t Cyclops. The voice came from the other side of him, and he swiveled. Sheila, his wife, was right beside him. In the cave-shadows, in the dark. She seemed to be floating. Her eyes were gleaming.

She was making one of her little
visitations.

She dosed her voice with sarcasm and said, “Now you think you’re a
detective
?”

“I’m just doing what I’ve got to do. That’s all.”

She scowled. “You doing everything but what you got to do. You got to sit down at a piano. You want to show us you got more will than craziness?
Sit down at a piano.”

“I did. I did just that. Tonight.”

“Yeah, I was there. And did it kill you?”

“Nearly.” They sat silently for a moment. Then Romulus said, “No, I feel that pursuing my musical career would not be appropriate for me at this time of my life.”

“Appropriate? Ap-
pro
-priate?” She laughed, her howlingest, most scathing laugh. “Oh, my. So playing detective,
that’s
appropriate? What on earth do you know about being a detective?”

“I’ve got the eye. I can see things that other people can’t. For example, I know what kind of car the murderer drives.”

“What kind, baby?”

“Well, I know the color, anyway. It was white. Bone white.”

“Oh, sure,” said Sheila. “What else would Stuyvesant drive? Baby. Baby. This isn’t for you. Try music.”

“Go away, Sheila. Leave me alone.”

She stirred herself. “See you in the country,” she said.

“No. Leave me alone. Let me do this by myself.”

She said again, “See you in the country.” Then the color went out of her, and she seeped back into the rock wall of the cave, and Romulus felt, as he always did after one of her appearances, worn out but contented. A kind of rapturous exhaustion. He lay down beside Cyclops and fell into a sound sleep.

I
t was Friday night and the crowds were flowing, and Eel was giving them the hiss.

The NYU tarts and the club slime, the art holes and the once-a-week bridge-and-tunnel leatherettes, the spikes and the usual dregs and walking garbage, Eel was giving them all the hiss. He was down here at his corner of Ninth Street and First Avenue—he had the southwest corner to himself and he was bobbing and rocking and darting with the traffic, hissing, “Sense, acid, ecstasy, smoke, smoke, how can I help you, how can I be of service?”

The patter was just pouring out of him and the last thing he wanted now was Matthew the Weasel pestering him, screwing up his rhythm, but that’s what Matthew the Weasel was doing.

Every time the crowd ebbed, or when the cops would troll by, Eel would fade back and lean against his wall and his mind should have been strictly on business—cash flow, market share, sales ratios, new product development—but Matthew would be right there at his ear, wouldn’t let him alone. Matthew wanted D. Dope. Heroin. Eel didn’t have any D.

“If I had any D., I’d sell it to you, Matthew. But I don’t got none. My
resource
don’t got none.”

“But you promised.”

“I promised before this Rotorooter shit came down.”

Rotorooter was the name of a brand-new kind of heroin, and it was causing a lot of trouble.

Said Matthew, “Give me some Rotorooter.”

“You don’t want Rotorooter, man.”

A gaggle of uptown tourists passed by, and Eel hissed, “Sense, X, ’shrooms, smoke.” They dropped their eyes to the sidewalk, all of them at once,
thud,
and they were gone.

Eel said to Matthew, “Rotorooter’s frying people, man. That’s why the whole market’s tight. Everybody ducking, man.”

Then a great big svelte-looking black guy in a million-dollar suit came by. Guy just glowed with the look of money. Stockbroker maybe, or TV sportscaster.

Said Eel, “Sense, X, how can I serve you sir? Let’s make a deal here.”

The money man caught sight of Matthew and held up. “Matthew . . .”

“Holy shit,” said Matthew. “Rom? What happened to you?”

“Stepping out a little, Matthew. I’ve been looking for you.”

Said Matthew, “Well, this is the place to find me. This is where I live till this asshole comes through.”

Eel said, “Don’t call me an asshole.”

“I’m sorry. Eel,
please.
Sell me something.”

“Nothing I can do for you.”

“Then I’ll take my business somewhere else.”

Said Eel, “Oh please be my fucking guest. Tell you what, go talk to my partner, Shaker. See him over there?”

He pointed, and they looked. Shaker was easy to spot. Big mother, and menacing despite his bright plaid tam-o’-shanter. He was also doing the hiss, and also getting nowhere.

Said Eel, “Go bug him, Matthew. But he don’t have no D. neither.”

Matthew sniffed. He said, “Rom, tell Eel he’s gotta give me some dope.”

“Apparently he doesn’t have any, Matthew.”

“But he promised.”

This million-dollar guy, he seemed to be Matthew’s friend, and this puzzled Eel. What would the man want with a little rodent like Matthew? Maybe he was an old drug connection. Maybe this guy was one of those million-dollar pushers Eel had seen on TV.

Matthew was saying to him, “I’m not a real junkie, Rom. I mean, I do it, but I don’t
gotta
do it. But if I do a little, it makes it seem like Scotty died a long, long time ago. So why not do it? But now I
can’t
do it ’cause this guy’s holding out on me.”

Eel said to the million-dollar guy, “Hey, will you tell your friend?—nobody’s selling no D. Will you tell him about Rotorooter?”

“What’s Rotorooter?”

“You don’t know about Rotorooter either? Don’t nobody read the papers? Rotorooter’s a new kind of shit, they cut it with something weird-ass. Supposed to make you cream your pants, man, cream your whole body, but what it’s doing, it’s killing people. People going down like flies. One of my best customers—but I didn’t sell it to him. Not me. Anyway till this blows over it’s too hot for any kind of proper customer service—”

Some lovely babes bobbled by. Speaking Swedish or something. “What’s your pleasure, ladies? Any little playful substance I might procure for you—”

They looked at him like he was some kind of fecal matter that was trying to attach itself to their shoes.

Ah fuck, thought Eel. Just . . . fuck.

Whenever he let this profession get to him, it got him into a
mood
very quick.

He faded back to his wall. The million-dollar guy was asking Matthew:

“Matthew, did you truly love Scotty Gates?”

“Rom! Rom, Jesus—”

“No, I mean truly. It wasn’t just a crush, was it? It wasn’t just lust. It was love?”

Matthew didn’t say anything for a while. Then he said, “All I know is I think about him all the time and I wish I was dead with him.”

More customers, Eel gave them the hiss. No sale. Gone. He glanced across the street. His partner, Shaker, had just struck out again, and he looked depressed. General business downturn, all across the board. Dmitri—Eel’s man, Eel’s resource—was going to be pissed. But it was Dmitri’s own fucking fault. The problem was there was no product innovation. Lack of ingenuity on the supply side, that was the problem. Little runners like Eel and Shaker were always clamoring for something new to entice their customers with, and what did the
resources
come up with? Rotorooter.

He faded back, and the rich guy was saying:

“Because, Matthew, tomorrow I’m going up there.”

“Up there? Where? Leppenraub’s?”

The million-dollar guy nodded.

Said Matthew, “Oh shit, Rom, no. Don’t do that. He’ll kill you.”

“But there’s no other way. Look, Matthew, I know he did it—I can feel it. And I know he works for Stuyvesant. But I’ve got to find out how I can prove it. And the only way to do that is to go stick my head in the lion’s mouth. Which I expect he’s going to bite off.”

“But why? Rom, you don’t have to do this for me.”

Said the million-dollar guy, “Out of your hands. Matthew, I don’t care if you’re pressing your charges or not. I’m pressing your charges. All you have to do is tell me if you truly loved Scotty.”

He stood in front of Matthew and looked in his eyes. But all Matthew said was, “I wish I was dead with him, that’s all.”

Then the suave guy gave Matthew a little piece of paper. “That’s my daughter’s number. Lulu Ledbetter. I’ve told you about her, lots of times. She’s a cop. I know you don’t like cops, Matthew. None of us likes cops. But she’s OK. You get into any kind of trouble, you call her. Right? And you take care.”

There were more customers, more of this modern disdain for the honest working tradesman, and when Eel turned around again the million-dollar guy was gone.

And Matthew was still whining at him.

Eel crossed the street, went up to his partner Shaker. He said, “Shaker, I gotta get something for that kid.”

“Who’s that?”

“That stupid dago over there. He wants dope.”

“Scrape some dandruff off your shoulder, give him that.”

“Business sure sucks tonight, huh?”

Said Shaker, “Yes it does. This business always sucks. Eel, do you realize we’re almost
drug kingpins
? We’re supposed to be driving Maseratis. Why don’t you buy some flour, give him that.”

“Flour?”

“Gold Medal flour, give him some of that.”

“Where am I going to buy Gold Medal flour?”

“In the deli here.”

Eel said, “I don’t think they sell flour.”

“Oh. Eel, do you realize we’re almost
drug kingpins,
you realize that?”

“Almost. Yeah.”

Said Shaker, “And yet I cannot pay my fucking rent.”

T
hat night Romulus sat up with his back against the back wall of the cave, and he shut his eyes and quietly shepherded all the Moth-Seraphs into the lowest districts of his brain. Every last Seraph. Then he built barricades to keep them from climbing up again. Barricades to hold back their rage, to fence in their fury. Huge iron-spiked gates he built, and he built them to be
strong
and it took him hours, but sometime before dawn he was finished, he had every passageway sealed. Then he practiced his chuckling for twenty minutes, and then at last he was ready, and he let himself get some sleep.

N
ext morning he put on Bob’s suit again. He carried the sleek coat because he didn’t need to wear it, it wasn’t cold at all. He went down to the gate of Columbia University at 116th Street, and there he met his old schoolmate Arnold. They gave each other big hugs.

“Old hangdog Arnold,” said Romulus.

Arnold was the same tall gangly ugly kid he’d known long ago—except now, of course, he’d put on the makeup of middle age. Seemed to Romulus he’d put on a little too much. Too much jowly sallow on the cheeks, too shock-white the hair. Made him look kind of sad, Romulus thought.

“Twenty-five years, Arnold?”

“Thereabouts.”

In a rented car they drove north.

The sun slid up out of the haze, and the day evolved into a magnificent warm slab of open time. So that on top of everything else, on this of all days, Romulus had to come down with a massive case of spring fever.

They rolled down their windows, and whenever they stopped for a red light, birdsong flew in.