“Yes.”
“More than anything?”
“Sure.”
“Then there isn’t any holdup, is there?”
Bill didn’t answer.
When they got back to the carnival Conrad was outside, smoking a cigarette, looking at the stars. He watched Bill and Gidget carefully. Gidget got out of the car and nodded at Conrad and went inside the motor home. Bill thought about the wrench a moment, then went over and stood by Conrad, bummed a smoke. Conrad lit him up.
“So,” said Conrad, “you’ve taken up smoking?”
“I used to smoke my Mom’s cigarettes. But just when I was nervous.”
“You’re nervous?”
“Not really. I don’t know. I guess.”
“About what?”
“Life.”
“You stayin’ out of ditches?”
“Sure.”
“I mean little ditches with hair round the edges.”
“Sure. Old man just sent us into town for paint, that’s all. How’s it with Synora?”
“U.S. Grant? Hell, no one really calls her Synora. She’s talking about shaving her beard, though. Then maybe that’s what she ought to be called. She’s lost some pounds lately, thinking about going straight and looking good. Me, I guess I’m stuck this way or no way.”
“She not going to stay with the carnival?”
“I don’t know. I seen this special on TV the other night. It was on carny folks, about how all of ’em really love the life. Let me tell you, from my viewpoint the life sucks. If she can leave the carnival, go straight, I was her, I’d do it. She could maybe even get that electrolysis, or whatever it is that removes hair permanently.”
“That’d be all right, I reckon.”
“What I figure, she leaves, well, that’s it for me. Unless she wants to keep a dog in the suburbs. You know, buy me a little doggie bowl, take me for walks. She leaves here, she’s got some kind of degree she earned by correspondence. She don’t have to do this. Me, I not only don’t have a degree, I look like a goddamn dog.”
“But a very nice dog.”
Conrad laughed.
“It’ll work out.”
“Yeah,” Conrad said, dropping his cigarette butt on the ground, grinding it with the leather band on his hand. “It’ll work out all right, but I may not like how it works.”
Conrad looked up at the whirligig. The starlight made the paint shine, though you couldn’t really tell anything about the color.
“I got to give it to Frost,” Conrad said. “Damn thing does look better. Least in the dark.”
“We didn’t finish,” Bill said. “We got to do that tomorrow. Up there at the top we got places to paint.”
“Yeah, well, I should have got up there and helped him, I guess. I was pretty hard-ass. Actually, I’m quite a climber, I just don’t want him to know it. So I lied.”
“It don’t matter. Tomorrow morning we’ll finish. I’m dreading the shit out of it, but we’ll get it done.”
Conrad pulled back his rubbery lips and showed his teeth. There were bits of tobacco in them.
“Bill, you know, you’re all right.”
“Thanks. You ain’t so bad yourself.”
“You fish much?”
“Used to, some.”
“That river out there calms down tomorrow, we ought to drop a line in there. Whatdaya say?”
“It’s something to think about.”
“I got the tackle.”
“Well, all right.”
“Good. Me, I’m going to see if I can catch a program on the television, then see if I can get lucky with Synora.”
“Yeah, well be careful doing that. You’ll get stinky on your dinky.”
“One can hope.”
Twenty-six
In the Ice Man’s trailer, late at night, early morning actually, Bill sat on the stool where Frost sat when he lectured about the Ice Man. With eyes closed, the hair dryer in his hand, held between his legs limply, Bill went over the spiel Frost gave, imagined himself giving the talk while wearing a suit the color of vanilla ice cream, a peach- colored shirt, and a dark blue tie. He imagined two-tone shoes, white and brown, polished to the point of being blinding.
He imagined a crowd around the freezer, hanging on his every word. All the women in the crowd were as pretty as Gidget, but not so fire-kissed. The women were looking down at the Ice Man, sneaking looks at the old man’s privates, glancing now and then at Bill as he talked with authority. All of the women wanted him. Bill was certain of that much. It was in their eyes. They wanted Bill because the Ice Man, a dead messenger from the past, had heated them up, sending out sensuality from beyond death, frost, and petrification.
He wanted them too, and would give each their turn, and the men would not care, because they knew, absolutely knew, he deserved it and that for him to have their women was an honor.
Bill opened his eyes and gazed down at the glass. It was frosted. He slowly lifted the hair dryer between his legs and struck the button. The dryer roared and gave a burst of hot air, heated the glass, and caused the frost to dissipate.
When he stared down at the Ice Man – appearing suddenly as if rising out of a block of ice – Bill experienced a sensation of dropping inside the freezer and entering into the Ice Man and looking up and out of his eyes. Above him was the water-beaded glass, and through it he could see his face looking down with hollow eyes and through his empty sockets he could see his empty universe. No stars. No moon. No form. Just void.
It was such a disconcerting feeling Bill had to close his eyes so that he could neither see what he saw or what he thought he saw. He wondered what was going on inside him.
Until Frost, Bill had felt there was just him as he was. There were no sides to it. Good and Bad weren’t real to him. They were words. Now he felt he had seen some light and had liked it. Frost had shone the light on him. Frost had believed in him. And now he had a friend, Conrad, and the light was brighter yet.
Then along came Gidget, dragging shadow, looking like, tasting like, some calorie-filled confection, and he had tasted her, and he had felt as Adam must have felt when he bit into the apple. Light going out. Dirt giving way beneath his feet, grabbing at roots and vines that wouldn’t hold.
Bill took a deep breath. He told himself he had to hang on, had to poke his shoes into the dirt and make toeholds. Had to climb up and out and into the light. Had to not do this thing Gidget wanted. Had to stay out of that ditch Conrad warned him about. Only Conrad was wrong, it wasn’t a ditch. It was a crevasse.
The hair dryer droned on. Bill tried to find a spot for himself behind the sound, some place to hide, but he couldn’t. His misery was larger and louder than sound. He opened his eyes again and looked at the Ice Man.
All you got to do is not do it, he thought.
All you got to do is leave it be.
You haven’t got the wrench, weren’t able to get it, so you can’t do it anyway, so you don’t have to do a thing.
You don’t have to touch that woman again. Nothing makes you do it but yourself, and you are the captain of yourself.
Let it pass and you’ll be okay.
