bureaucrats in the U.S.A. respected paper. Using a variety of techniques ranging from mail-drop correspondence schools who sold diplomas to forged documentation, Solomon Royal became the learned and lettered Dr. Solomon Royal, complete with a fabricated past that implied he might be of Jewish descent. The truest thing in his story was the fact that he'd “escaped from the Nazis.” But Solomon Royal escaped them as they were on the brink of war, in the late 1930s.
A natural manipulator, Royal used media to build a legend to reinforce his web of lies with checkable pictorial proof. Before long there were pictures of him “taken in World War II” as he worked with American servicemen, photos captioned with dates that could then be reproduced in other stories that repeated the same mythology and cushioned and insulated the lies with another generation of journalism. As the years passed, those who knew Royal, or who had been treated by him, repeated the legend until it became part of the community folklore. Dr. Emil Shtolz, product of his own brilliant imagination, had successfully reinvented himself.
At the moment, the legend was driving slowly into a chat-covered driveway some fourteen miles from his clinic and turning off the ignition of his humble used car.
“It's Doc Royal,” the woman inside the farmhouse said in that pleased tone people reserve for the individuals for whom their affection is greatest. She turned from the window to the elderly man seated at the kitchen table. “I tell you that man has been so good to us. We could never have kept Buck home without Dr. Royal helping the way he has. He's wonderful!'
“I know he's a real blessing to this community,” the man said in a surprisingly deep, resonant voice. It was a voice used to commanding the attention of a congregation from the pulpit, and the years had not dulled its powerful thunder, but it was too loud in the small kitchen and he noticed it. “I've heard some wonderful things about him, Mrs. Jenks, I truly have.'
She was pushing back the folding doors that separated the front room from the kitchen. A chrome hospital bed was the only object of furniture in the small front room and a white-haired man occupied it, staring unblinking at the ceiling.
“It's Doc Royal, honey,” she told the man in the bed. Even though they said the signals didn't get through she thought maybe sometimes he might be able to understand, so she still spoke to him as if he could comprehend.
“I thank you for the coffee and I'll just go on directly,” the man said, pushing away from the table and standing with considerable effort, old, brittle bones popping loudly. “I've got to drive to Caruthersville.'
“You're welcome to stay now,” she said.
“No, no. I'll go on.'
“I do appreciate you coming out like this, Brother Peterson,” she said, and they chatted amiably until the footsteps and the knocking punctuated their conversation.
“It's open. Come in,” she called, moving in the direction of the back door as it swung open.
“Hello,” the Jenks's family doctor said, coming in to the familiar kitchen. “Hello,” he said again, nodding to the man with her.
“Doc, this is Brother Peterson from Canalou,” she said, smiling at their old friend.
“Oh, we see each other around.'
“We sure do, we sure do,” the older man shook hands with Dr. Royal. “I'll go on, Mrs. Jenks,” he said.
“Don't let me run you off,” Royal said.
“I've got to be going,” he responded, moving with octogenarian singleness of purpose. The woman walked to the door with him and when she got back Dr. Royal was already standing in the front room looking down at the man in bed.
“Buck asked for Budrell Peterson to preach the—” she started to say funeral but the word stuck and she said “—the service for him when it's time.'
“Oh? Well, that's nice.'
“Brother Peterson's Pentacostal,” she said.
“He'll give you a dandy. I heard one he preached not long ago and it was quite eloquent. Hello, Buck,” he said, putting his hand on the bare arm of the man in the bed. Fiery blue eyes blazed from a gaunt, haunted stare.
“Look who's here. I wish you'd get me out of this gol’ dang thing.'
“What gol’ dang thing is that?'
“This heliocopter,” the bedfast man said, a bandaged hand weakly simulating the pattern of a spinning blade. “They land this dang thing in the field where the wolves are and stir them all up.'
“You're not in a heliocopter,” the woman said sharply, “Buck, you're at home.'
“That's a hydraulic lift,” Dr. Royal said, pointing to the large device that stood beside the hospital bed. “That's how Naomi gets you up to change you. You're at home, Buck.'
“How many wolves you kill today?'
“Would you please fix me up with a pan of warm water?” he said to the woman.
“Sure,” she said. “He heard some coyotes by the house the other night. That's what set him off.” She went back in the kitchen.
“Them wolves hurt me,” the man said.
“We'll fix that,” Dr. Royal said. Naomi Jenks was running water. He had a syringe out and put it on the bed where the man's emaciated legs were carefully bound with soft cloth. He pushed at the man's gaunt flank very gently.
“How many wolves did you kill today?” the man repeated. Royal swiftly injected the contents of the hypo into the man's exposed anus.
He felt a surge of power akin to a sexual thrill as he returned the syringe to its case. He wished he could be present when the solution worked its way through the man. He loved working with the elderly, animals, and the very young—anything that was helpless. Nursing homes and hospices were particular favorites for his games, which for many years had acted as the surrogate for his perverted drives.
The woman came back in the room with a pan of warm, soapy water. “There you go,” she said, smiling.
He took some paper towels, tenderly cleaning the man where he'd soiled himself. The bowel movement was like an infant's, Royal was pleased to note, and he cleaned the fragile, parchment-like skin with the greatest tenderness.
19
Solomon Royal parked at the bottom of the steep incline and began his slow ascent. He was just past seventy and still in good health, physically, but it was a cold day, it was a pretty fair climb, and he took his time. The Aters house—if you could call it a house—was an old sharecropper's shack on the edge of a small farm owned by a lady who lived in Florida. Locally it was called the Lawlesses place, though Ferg Lawlesses was long deceased.
The new owner never got around to tearing the shack down. The Diamond Ranch outfit farmed the ground for its absentee owner, and their foreman had let old Mr. Aters and his family move in.
Aters was gone most of the time, a drinking man he was, and his wife, a woman in her fifties, their six children, and assorted livestock somehow survived on this piece of barren ridge. No electricity. A hand pump. Dr. Royal knew they lived rough.
He was breathing hard, blowing pretty good, by the time he reached the top. Tar paper on boards, just this side of a shanty. Coal oil smell ... kerosene. He recalled what it was like to live like this.
A girl of about ten with a dirty face opened the door for him. She had old eyes already. He entered without asking and spoke to the room, “Where is he?'
“Over here,” Mrs. Aters said. She was stout and had a doughy face with the same wary gaze as her child's. She pushed a filthy cloth back and he saw the little boy. He moved over toward him, still with his coat on, and set his bag down beside the bed.
“I need the lamp,” he said, and they moved the strong light beside him. Huge shadows shot through the room and the pungent smell took him back to another time, as he prepared to ply his trade.
