They walked on in silence for awhile. The river rippled mystically past on their right, and now they could see the lights of Cambridge on the other side. Pearson thought he had never seen Boston looking so beautiful.
‘The batpeople come in, maybe no more than a germ you inhale . . . ‘ Pearson began again, feeling his way.
‘Yeah, well, some folks go for the germ idea, but I’m not one of em. Because, dig: you never see a batman janitor or a bat-woman waitress. They like power, and they’re moving into the power neighborhoods. Did you ever hear of a germ that just picked on rich people, Brandon?’
‘No.’
‘Me either.’
‘These people we’re going to meet . . . are they . . . ‘ Pearson was a little amused to find he had to work to bring the next thing out. It wasn’t exactly a return to the land of boys’ books, but it was close. ‘Are they resistance fighters?’
Duke considered this, then both nodded and shrugged — a fascinating gesture, as if his body were saying yes and no at the same time. ‘Not yet,’ he said, ‘but maybe, after tonight, we will be.’
Before Pearson could ask him what he meant by that, Duke had spotted another cab cruising empty, this one on the far side of Storrow Drive, and had stepped into the gutter to flag it. It made an illegal U-turn and swung over to the curb to pick them up.
In the cab they talked Hub sports — the maddening Red Sox, the depressing Patriots, the sagging Celtics — and left the batpeople alone, but when they got out in front of an isolated frame house on the Cambridge side of the river (KATE’S MYSTERY BOOKSHOP was written on a sign that showed a hissing black cat with an arched back), Pearson took Duke Rhinemann’s arm and said,
‘I have a few more questions.’
Duke glanced at his watch. ‘No time, Brandon — we walked a little too long, I guess.’
‘Just two, then.’
‘Jesus, you’re like that guy on TV, the one in the old dirty raincoat. I doubt if I can answer them, anyway — I know a hell of a lot less about all this than you seem to think.’
‘When did it start?’
‘See? That’s what I mean. I don’t know, and the thing we caught sure wasn’t going to tell us —
that little sweetheart wouldn’t even give us its name, rank, and serial number. Robbie Delray, the guy I told you about, says he saw his first one over five years ago, walking a Lhasa Apso on Boston Common. He says there have been more every year since. There still aren’t many of them
compared to us, but the number has been increasing . . . exponentially? . . . is that the word I want?’
‘I hope not,’ Pearson said. ‘It’s a scary word.’
‘What’s your other question, Brandon? Hurry up.’
‘What about other cities? Are there more bats? And other people who see them? What do you hear?’
‘We don’t know. They could be all over the world, but we’re pretty sure that America’s the only country in the world where more than a handful of people can see them.’
‘Why?’
‘Because this is the only country that’s gone bonkers about cigarettes . . . probably because it’s the only one where people believe — and down deep they really do — that if they just eat the right foods, take the right combination of vitamins, think enough of the right thoughts, and wipe their asses with the right kind of toilet-paper, they’ll live forever and be sexually active the whole time. When it comes to smoking, the battle-lines are drawn, and the result has been this weird hybrid. Us, in other words.’
‘Ten O’Clock People,’ Pearson said, smiling.
‘Yep — Ten O’Clock People.’ He looked past Pearson’s shoulder. ‘Moira! Hi!’
Pearson was not exactly surprised to smell Giorgio. He looked around and saw Little Miss Red Skirt.
‘Moira Richardson, Brandon Pearson.’
‘Hello,’ Pearson said, and took her outstretched hand. ‘Credit Assistance, isn’t it?’
‘That’s like calling a garbage collector a sanitation technician,’ she said with a cheerful grin. It was a grin, Pearson thought, that a man could fall in love with, if he wasn’t careful.
‘Credit checks are what I actually do. If you want to buy a new Porsche, I check the records to make sure you’re really a Porsche kind of guy . . . in a financial sense, of course.’
‘Of course,’ Pearson said, and grinned back at her.
‘Cam!’ she called. ‘Come on over here!’
It was the janitor who liked to mop the John with his cap turned around backward. In his streetclothes he seemed to have gained about fifty IQ points and a rather amazing resemblance to Armand Assante. Pearson felt a small pang but no real surprise when he put an arm around Moira Richardson’s delectable little waist and a casual kiss on the corner of her delectable little mouth. Then he offered Brandon his hand.
‘Cameron Stevens.’
‘Brandon Pearson.’
‘I’m glad to see you here,’ Stevens said. ‘I thought you were gonna high-side it this morning for sure.’
‘How many of you were watching me?’ Pearson asked. He tried to replay ten o’clock in the plaza and discovered he couldn’t — it was lost in a white haze of shock, for the most part.
‘Most of us from the bank who see them,’ Moira said quietly. ‘But it’s okay, Mr. Pearson — ‘
‘Brandon. Please.’
She nodded. ‘We weren’t doing anything but rooting for you, Brandon. Come on, Cam.’
They hurried up the steps to the porch of the small frame building and slipped inside. Pearson caught just a glimpse of muted light before the door shut. Then he turned back to Duke.
‘This is all real, isn’t it?’ he asked.
Duke looked at him sympathetically. ‘Unfortunately, yes.’ He paused, and then added, ‘But there’s one good thing about it.’
‘Oh? What’s that?’
Duke’s white teeth flashed in the drizzly dark. ‘You’re about to attend your first smoking-allowed meeting in five years or so,’ he said. ‘Come on — let’s go in.’
3
The foyer and the bookstore beyond it were dark; the light — along with a murmur of voices —
was filtering up the steep staircase to their left.
‘Well,’ Duke said, ‘this is the place. To quote the Dead, what a long strange trip it’s been, right?’
Pearson agreed.
‘Is Kate a Ten O’Clock Person?’
‘You better believe it,’
‘The owner? Nope. I only met her twice, but I have an idea she’s a total non-smoker. This place was Robbie’s idea. As far as Kate knows, we’re The Boston Society of Hardboiled Yeggs.’
Pearson raised his eyebrows. ‘Say again?’
‘A small group of loyal fans that meets every week or so to discuss the works of Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Ross Macdonald, people like that. If you haven’t read any of those guys, you probably ought to. It never hurts to be safe. It’s not that hard; some of them are actually pretty good.’
They descended with Duke in the lead — the staircase was too narrow for them to walk abreast — and passed through an open doorway into a well-lit, low-ceilinged basement room that probably ran the length of the converted frame house above. About thirty folding chairs had been set up, and an easel covered with a blue cloth had been placed before them. Beyond the easel were stacked shipping cartons from various publishers. Pearson was amused to see a framed picture on the left-hand wall, with a sign reading DASHIELL HAMMETT: ALL HAIL OUR FEARLESS
LEADER beneath it.
‘Duke?’ a woman asked from Pearson’s left. ‘Thank God — I thought something had happened to you.’
She was someone else Pearson recognized: the serious-looking young woman with the thick glasses and long, straight black hair. Tonight she looked a lot less serious in a pair of tight faded jeans and a Georgetown University tee-shirt beneath which she was clearly braless. And Pearson had an idea that if Duke’s wife ever saw the way this young woman was looking at her husband, she would probably drag Duke out of the basement of Kate’s by the ear, and never mind all the batpeople in the world.
‘I’m fine, darlin,’ he said. ‘I was bringing along another convert to the Church of the Fucked-Up Bat, that’s all. Janet Brightwood, Brandon Pearson.’
Brandon shook her hand, thinking: You’re the one who kept sneezing.
‘It’s very nice to meet you, Brandon,’ she said, and then went back to smiling at Duke, who looked a little embarrassed at the intensity of her gaze. ‘Want to go for coffee after?’ she asked him.
‘Well . . . we’ll see, darlin. Okay?’
‘Okay,’ she said, and her smile said she’d wait three years to go out for coffee with Duke, if that was the way Duke wanted it.