‘Will you listen to that? Will you I mean listen-to-that?’
‘We gonna hang somebody or what? How about that nigger in the jail? How about him?’
‘Busted out didn’t he?’
‘Hell he did. He—’
‘Yeah but listen, I wanta be the Wizard or I don’t be nothing.’
‘If he’s still in jail who the hell raped them women at the Meeting Hall? I heard—’
‘Bullshit man, they ain’t raped they just got excited.’
‘—perial Wizard, goddamnit is anybody listening to me?’
‘Piss on all this, I’m going to the Idle Hour.’
This seemed a good idea to others, and indeed the whole mob made its way — arguing, shoving Roderick almost as much as they shoved one another — towards Main Street.
‘No but seriously if you’re gonna form a Klan Klavern you—’
‘Will you listen to that? Will-you—?’
‘Yeah see Miss Violetta Stubbs they found out she’s got a kid!’
‘Aw Jesus doesn’t that make you sick? Nice old lady like that raped by a black—’
‘No listen—’
‘I say we hang the bastard right here in front of the Idle Hour. I say we teach him a lesson!’
‘Piss on that I’m going—’
And in a moment, they were all gone, leaving Roderick alone in the street. Immediately the sheriff’s car drew up, flashing all its lights: red, blue, green, tangerine, ochre and plum.
‘Get in, Wood. I’m taking you in — for your own protection. No, in the back.’
Roderick climbed into the cage in the back, and allowed the sheriff to drive him the thirteen yards to jail.
‘County’s too damn busy, you know?’ Sheriff Benson led him inside and snapped on the handcuffs. ‘Like we had a riot earlier at the Meeting Hall, Mrs Dorano trying to throw rocks at Miss Violetta, can you beat that? And now this. Hell I didn’t hardly get time to see Hollywood Squares, hell of an evening.’ He kicked Roderick into a cell, hauled out a blackjack and began beating him carelessly around the face.
‘Ouch! Look is this — ow, this for my own protec — ouch! My own protection? Because I, ouch, you take off these cuffs I could protect myself…’
‘What?’ The sheriff had not been looking at his victim, but through the open door at the TV in his office. Someone was trying to name nine brands of beer in thirty seconds. Sheriff Benson looked at the weapon in his hand. ‘Sorry, son. Just gets to be a habit. I guess.’ Slamming the cell door, he added, ‘Hope I can still count on your support come election day?’
Roderick was not surprised to find a black man in the next cell, even though the man was not wearing faded overalls nor playing a harmonica.
‘Hi man. My name’s Roderick Wood. What’s yours?’ Ignoring him, the man continued taking his own temperature. ‘I’m in protective custody. For my own good. What are you in for? Oh, I hope you don’t find this paint on my face offensive. No insult intended, man. See what it is is mourning. See my Pa died — he’s not really my Pa, in fact he’s not really anybody’s Pa, he’s a woman. Only I didn’t know that, when he looked at this gas bill for a million dollars and just keeled over. Only now I find out he’s not dead and he’s not a he either. Now he lives I mean she lives in the factory. So when I thought Ma, who really isn’t a woman either she’s a man who used to write science fiction that all came true, I thought she was doing witchcraft but it was only scientific stuff to revive Pa. Boy was that ever a shock! I mean last time I had a shock like that was when these gipsies kidnapped me and sold me to this carnival where I was supposed to tell fortunes. Duking, they called it. You know that was about the only time I ever went out of town anyways, oh except when Ma and me went to the city to get me a new eye, this burned-out store only when she left me there I got pretty scared because here was this same carny guy with a pinball on his finger, wouldn’t you be scared? And I didn’t find Ma again until later when I was in one of these two limousines that crashed into a art gallery—’
‘Really?’ The man held the thermometer up to the light. ‘Been seeing a lot of movies have you, sport?’
‘I used to watch them on TV a lot, when I was living with these people in Nevada I think it was only the guy beat me up with a hammer—’
‘Subnormal. As usual. Still say I’m coming down with something, maybe that virus thing that’s going around… I don’t know… “Physician, heal thyself” — Ha! If I could heal myself I wouldn’t be a physician, I’d be a miracle-worker. The name is De’Ath, by the way. Dr Samuel De’Ath.’
‘Pleased to meet you. I’m Roderick Wo—’
‘Yeah I heard you. A robot trying to break into the movies. Do me a favour, will you, look at my throat? Can you manage the light and the tongue depressor with those cuffs… Good. Now I say Ah… see anything?’
‘It’s all pink! I thought it would be, well more—’
‘Pink hell, is it red? That is the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question!’
The sheriff’s head appeared around the door. ‘Did I hear somebody mention the good old sixty-four-thousand-dollar question? Used to be my favourite, doggone it, with the old isolation booth and the — No? Don’t neither of you boys like game shows? If you do, speak up — I can always bring the TV in here and let you watch with me. Just let me know.’ The head vanished.
‘It’s not red, Doc.’
‘Funny, it feels… and my pulse is slightly elevated too… I wonder…’
‘Doc, do you think that mob will break in here and drag us out and hang us?’
But by now the doctor was listening to his own heart. ‘I know I ought to get out more, jog a little, get plenty of exercise. But somehow… last time I went out was with this priest, Father O’Bride, kept calling me a natural until I started missing easy shots, you know? Guy’s kinda weird anyway, kept telling me about this idea of his for a fourteen-hole golf course with every hole a Station of the Cross — what do you mean, hang us?’
‘Well you know, hang us.’
‘Not a chance. You’ve been seeing too many movies again, sport. Old movies. People just don’t hang people any more. A necktie party in modern dress? A lynching in the post-literate electronic age, the global village? Klan vengeance, in these days of low-lipid diets and consumer awareness? String us up, just when civilization is hitting its stride with, with male contraceptive pills and Mickey Mouse telephones? With giggling gingerbread and soul-searching politicians and reconstituted gratification? Not a chance, sport.’
After a moment, he added, ‘What an admission of failure! To turn their backs on, on the great American menu of therapies, and just go sneaking off in the night with a rope — impossible!’
After another moment, ‘Improbable, anyway.’
Roderick said, ‘I just hope when they come for us, Sheriff Benson will get out there with a shotgun on the front steps and tell them all about, uh, justice, uh, how the foundering fathers brought forth a nation where liberty and just—’
‘I’d rather not discuss it any more, okay? God, it isn’t as if I haven’t got enough to worry about! Heading for a major health crisis just when I need all my strength for a long court battle over this gingerbread business, not to mention this little smear campaign, trying to discredit me before I blow the whistle on their dirty little operation.’
‘Who?’
‘Kratt Enterprises, that’s who. Or I guess they now call it KUR Industries, might as well call it Mass Poisoners Incorporated, what with their — well I’d better not talk about it off the record, but their day is coming.’