And just walked away.
When he reached the corner of the street he glanced over his shoulder. Nathan was still standing on the sidewalk staring at him. Had Nathan guessed where he was living? No, he was thrown by the money. That was all it was. Jed shifted his shoulders inside his jacket. So he used to live in the Towers once upon a time. So what. He hadn’t told Nathan anything, had he?
He walked on. Two blocks west he found the thrift store he’d been looking for. Inside he moved from rail to rail. He began to assemble a wardrobe. It wasn’t easy. These were all dead men’s clothes. Why was everyone who died so fucking fat? You’d think a few thin people would die sometimes, but no. It took him fifteen minutes just to find a pair of pants and even then they were three inches too big around the waist and he needed a belt to hold them up. Still, it was a start. In half an hour he was standing in front of a full-length mirror. This was what he had on: a pale-blue turtleneck (it hid the ghosts); a pair of chinos in a kind of rusty ochre colour; brown leather sandals with rubber soles (he’d learned a thing or two from that Sister in the hospital); a grey fake snakeskin belt; and a maroon leather jacket with black buttons and scoop lapels.
‘A bloody Christian,’ he whispered. ‘A missionary.’ And laughed to himself. Because, after all, he was on a mission, wasn’t he? A mission of a kind.
He heaped his own clothes on the counter and explained that he wanted to trade them for the clothes he was now wearing. The woman who ran the place wore a cardigan draped over her shoulders. She shifted her arms inside the cardigan and looked at him sideways. Her jackdaw eye swooped on his most valuable possession. ‘What about the hat?’
He wedged the hat under his arm. ‘Not for sale.’
The woman shrugged. She began to sort one-handed through his clothes. Held a boot up between finger and thumb. ‘Don’t suppose you ever heard of polish, did you?’
‘They’re all black, the clothes,’ he said. ‘You should be able to shift them pretty quick in a town like this.’
‘That may be so, but look at the state of them.’ The woman lifted his frayed jacket and let it drop again. ‘All right,’ she said, ‘you leave your clothes plus fifteen dollars, on account of that coat you got there’s leather,’ and her eye hovered, gleaming, above his hat once more, ‘unless of course —’
He paid the $15 and left. On his way back to the Towers he had to stop in a supermarket and a pharmacy. By the time he reached the thirteenth floor he was drenched in sweat. Silence let him in. He went straight to the kitchen. Silence followed him, stood in the doorway. He began to unpack the bags he was carrying. A block of ice-cream. A tin of minestrone soup. A box of COLOR-U-BLONDE hair dye. A roll of silver foil. And two six-packs of yoghurt (one plain, one assorted-fruit flavours).
He turned. Silence was still watching from the doorway. Silence handed him a card: I WAS WORRIED FOR A MOMENT. I THOUGHT YOU MIGHT’VE FORGOTTEN THE YOGHURT.
Jed had to grin.
WHAT’S WITH THE SOUP? Silence wrote.
‘It’s my throat,’ Jed explained. ‘Yoghurt, ice-cream, minestrone. They’re the only things I can get down.’
Later that evening, when Silence had gone out, he locked himself in the bathroom. He took off his new blue turtleneck and wrapped a towel around his shoulders. He opened the COLOR-U-BLONDE, pulled on a pair of rubber gloves and slowly, meticulously, applied the peroxide solution to his hair. Afterwards he covered his head in silver foil. Almost immediately his scalp began to burn. This reassured him. No change is possible, he thought, without pain. No change is real unless it hurts.
He walked out on to the balcony as the sun set. The city lay in its own haze, buildings dipped in spun sugar, they could melt on your tongue. The sting of peroxide balanced the ache in his throat, almost cancelled it. Tomorrow, he decided. Tomorrow he would make the call.
The evening passed. He stood on the balcony eating fruit yoghurt and watching the planes. A calmness eased into his bones. His blood slowed down. That tortoise, Bob, he was smarter than he looked.
Towards midnight he heard Silence return. He left his bedroom and joined Silence in the lounge. Silence was smoking a joint and watching TV. He offered Jed the joint. Jed turned it down. Silence was staring at him now. Silence put the joint down in the ashtray so he could stare better. Then he wrote on a card and handed it to Jed. Jed read the card and smiled. There was only one word on it:
EERIE.
The next morning he walked into the bathroom and saw a blond stranger in the mirror. ‘Jesus,’ he said. His voice didn’t sound bad. A bit croaky, but OK. He undid the scarf. The ghosts had changed colour. They’d achieved a curious yellow-brown. It reminded him of crème caramel, old banana skins. Or the thin band of pollution that sometimes circled the horizon.
He borrowed one of Silence’s cordless phones and stood on the balcony. The city was making that sound that cities make. Like if you’re told to breathe out slowly through your mouth. He sensed the first drop of rain on his shoulder, he felt it burn into his skin like acid, he heard it telling him that he was special, special. The sound of the rain in that word. The meaning of that word on his skin.
He dialled the Paradise Corporation.
The receptionist put him through to the chairman’s office. A secretary answered. ‘Mr Creed’s at home today. Can I take a message?’
‘No message,’ Jed said, and cut her off.
He dialled the Palace Hotel. ‘Apartment 1412, please.’
‘One moment.’
He could hear the phone ringing in Creed’s apartment now. Then it was picked up. ‘Yes?’
‘Mr Creed, please.’
‘Who’s calling?’
Jed recognised the voice on the other end. It was the Skull. Michael The Skull McGowan. So they were still working together. If that wasn’t loyalty.
‘Who’s calling?’ the Skull said again.
‘It’s Jed Morgan.’ There was a pause, then Creed was on the line. Jed could tell by the silence. He’d know that silence anywhere.
‘Creed?’
‘Spaghetti. How nice. I’ve been expecting your call.’
Jed’s hand tightened round the phone. You could never tell whether Creed was bluffing. ‘What do you mean?’
But Creed just laughed. ‘Your voice sounds terrible.’
‘I’ve had a cold.’
‘It doesn’t sound like a cold. It sounds more like someone tried to strangle you.’
His heart beat hard, the air thickened around him. He gripped the balcony with his free hand. How did Creed know all this? Did he know everything?
‘What do you want, Spaghetti?’ Creed was saying. ‘I’m a busy man. I haven’t got all day.’
He hadn’t thought this out properly. He hadn’t imagined the way it might go. He jumped at some words as they came into his mind. ‘I need some money.’
‘I didn’t think you were interested in money.’
‘I want half a million.’
‘You’ll only start throwing it around. Remember last time.’
‘Half a million. And I want it tomorrow night.’
‘What makes you think you deserve anything?’
‘I’ve got a tape. You want to hear it?’
‘What is it? Violins?’
Jed picked up his pen recorder and pressed PLAY. He held it over the phone. ‘You want me to kill Vasco’s brother? … That’s right … How? … Don’t worry about that … It’s taken care of … It’s nice …’ He pressed STOP. ‘There’s your violins, Creed. Did you like them?’
‘Tape doesn’t stand up in court, Spaghetti.’
‘How about the papers, Creed? Does tape stand up in the papers?’
A silence.