I'd never seen him in the light of day, but I thought it was the guy who'd invented aluminium foil. I couldn't believe he was still alive. Blood and clear fluids lapped from his ears. A wave of vertigo rippled through me and I bit down on my tongue and it passed. I bent to him and had no idea what to do. He was finished, he had to be finished because there was three inches of metal burrowed into his brain, but he was wide-eyed and still staring at me with great interest. He licked his lips and tried to move his hands.
'Jesus holy Christ…' I whispered. I didn't have a cell phone. I started to turn and run for my apartment when he called my name.
'Will.'
It was astonishing he could actually see. Death was already clouding his eyes and gusting through his chest. His voice had been thickened by it. It was a sound I'd heard several times before. He sounded exactly like my father when the old man had about three minutes left to go. There was no point in leaving him now. I kneeled at his side. 'I'm here.'
'I lied,' he said.
'About what?'
'I didn't invent aluminium foil. Aluminium foil was first introduced into the industry as an insulating material. It later found diverse applications in a variety of fields.'
'What?'
'It can be used instead of lead and tinfoil in other specified applications. The aluminium foil thickness ranges from 0.0043 millimetres to 0.127 millimetres. It comes with a bright or dull finish and also with embossed patterns —»
'Shhh.'
'Foils are available in thirty-three distinct colours. In 1910, when the first aluminium foil rolling plant was opened in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland, the plant, owned by J. G. Neher & Sons stood at the foot of the Rhine Falls and captured the falls' energy. Neher's sons together with Dr Lauber — oh, Dr Lauber! Dr Lauber! — discovered the endless rolling process and the use of aluminium foil as a protective barrier.'
The ice-pick had ripped through his memories. Even if he hadn't invented aluminium foil, he sure knew a hell of a lot about it. I couldn't quite figure why his head was full of all this, but it was probably no worse than thinking about stealing Dutch Master prints and heading to Aruba. I wondered what I would be spouting on about in my last minute if someone stuck a blade into my brain.
I should've offered up some kind of soothing words to send him on his way, but he looked animated and eager to chat despite the fact that his brains were leaking out of his ears and tear ducts. I should've asked him who had done this to him. Instead I said, 'Why the hell would you lie about a thing like that?'
'I wanted to meet girls. Forgive me!'
In the hierarchy of sins I thought that lying about inventing aluminium foil in order to meet chicks — which in itself wasn't particularly immoral — just didn't rate very high on the damnation scale. I figured if a priest had been handy, he would've given dispensation without much of a problem.
'You're forgiven,' I said. 'Who did this to you?'
'Dr Lauber! Dr Lauber!'
'Tell me who —»
'God, the things I've done. I once struck my mother. I ran over a dog, someone's pet. I broke the hearts of my own children. I hurt a woman, she bled. I shall surely go to hell. Please, Dr Lauber!'
'Shhh.'
'Dr Lauber!'
'Close your eyes.'
He finally did and died that instant.
The cops questioned me full-tilt boogie. They came around in three teams of two. I got the Officer Friendlys, the hair-trigger hardcase growlers, and the plaintive guys who just sort of whined at me and wanted me to admit to murder. I told them his last words and they thought maybe he had ratted out the almighty and vengeful aluminium foil powers that be. They quizzed each other about the name Dr Lauber. They all said it sounded familiar, maybe a hit-man working for the syndicate. Maybe a plastic surgeon who'd gone out of his tree.
I suspected that if anybody Googled the name they'd find him to be the man who'd discovered the endless rolling process with the sons of J. G. Neher.
The whiners took me down to the station and put me in a holding room with a big mirror, where I stared at myself and whoever was behind it and started to re-evaluate the cops in my novels. I'd been trying way too hard. I'd been breaking my ass creating brilliant detectives who solved crimes with the sparsest clues. But these guys were never going to figure out who'd killed the aluminium foil liar, not unless somebody confessed out of hand just to stop all the bitching.
Eventually they cut me loose and I wandered the streets. I was the guy who had to clean up all the blood off the lobby floor back at Stark House. I didn't want to go back yet. I'd seen death before but not murder. I'd written about it and I recognized how far off I'd been from what it really felt like to be in the presence of homicide.
A certain sense of guilt lashed me as I thought about how close I'd come to walking in on the man being attacked. Maybe two minutes, maybe less. Perhaps I could've prevented it. If only I'd moved a little faster. If only I'd run out into the street to see what could be seen. Maybe I would've spotted a killer rushing away or hailing a cab.
I stopped into a bookstore and bought Corben's latest novel. His dedication read: TO ALL THOSE WHO LOVE THE MYSTERIES OF LIFE AND DEATH AS MUCH AS I DO. It was followed by AND TO MY WIFE.
Not even her name, her lovely name. The bastard pasted her in there as an afterthought. How could she read that and not be appalled? How could he expect her not to be upset? I didn't understand it and knew I never would.
I read the first ten pages leaning against the window of a nearby bodega, and read another twenty walking back to Stark House. I sat outside on the front steps for a half-hour and let the paragraphs slide by under my gaze. I didn't know what the hell I was reading. I was too full of my own anger and past to even see the words. I flipped the pages by rote. I looked at the dedication again and tried to see the substance and meaning behind it. Corben didn't love the mysteries of life. I wasn't sure he loved anything at all. I left the book there and went inside.
The cops had put up little orange cones around the murder scene, with yellow tape cordoning the area off. The tape didn't say POLICE LINE, DO NOT CROSS so I tore it down and got my mop, gloves, scouring pads and sanitizers out of the closet. It took me two hours to do an even halfway decent job of it. I had thought it would take longer. There was still a bad stain. I kept having to stop when my hands started to shake. I didn't know if it was because of all the blood or because I'd been so wrapped up in my own problems that I hadn't seen someone else's desperate loneliness. I'd thought I had it bad, but Jesus, dying with the dry facts of aluminium foil on your lips because you wanted to get laid, it was a whole other level of heartbreak.
Ferdinand the Magnifico and Mojo put on little shows for the neighbourhood kids in the garden behind the building. It wasn't much of a garden, but by East Side standards it was practically the Congo. The monkey grunted with certain inflections and Ferdi appeared to honestly believe Mojo was chattering like he was playing Bridge with the Ladies Auxiliary Club. Mojo went «Ook» and Ferdi, with childish glee, raised his arms out and said, 'You see there, clear as the chimes of St Patrick's! He said, 'I love you'. You heard it yourself! Did you not?' The kids said that they could. They giggled and clapped and tossed pennies and nickels. They chased the chimp and then ran away when the chimp chased them. It brightened the place up.
I didn't quite get how Ferdi made enough to pay Manhattan rent while nickel and diming it, but maybe he had tours booked. He could've really cleaned up in South Dakota. It seemed possible. For all I knew Mojo'd sold out Fourth of July at Madison Square Garden.
I'd used three different bleaches and detergents doing additional clean-up work over the course of a week but still hadn't managed to get all the blood out of the tile in the lobby. It had become ingrained, as deep as the aluminium foil liar's guilt.
Something had happened to me that day. My usual brooding and pathos took a left turn into a darker, calmer sea of purpose. I had the increasingly powerful feeling that my life held a greater intent and meaning now, though I didn't know what the hell it might be. I watched the front door. I waited for more murder. I could feel it hovering nearby in every hall. I thought about all the lies I had told to get laid, and wondered if they'd come back
