from him and there was a lot of attention to his every need and he kept telling her to find out about the baby and she kept saying, What baby? and it confused him so badly that he was able to snap out of the druggy fog completely and he said, “Hey, darlin'.'
Or so he thought he said, but it was more of Aaaaaaaay sound without consonants and he tried to bear down and concentrate and managed to say it aloud.
“Hey.'
“Hey yourself.'
“Hey. Hey darlin'.'
“Yeah,” she said softly to him. “How ya doin?'
“Hey.” [SOMETHING MUMBLED.]
“What, honey?'
“The baby?'
“What about a baby?'
“Yeah. Howaza baby?'
“Oh. The baby that was in the car. Bill had the baby checked over while we were at the hospital with you. He's going to be fine. The little baby's okay, hon.'
“Thass good.'
“Yeah. You feelin’ pretty rough?'
“No. Feel ffff—fiiiiiiiine.” He grinned and she smiled with him and patted him gently.
“That's great.'
“I lose my finger?'
“No, honey. The doctor will tell you all about the procedure later. It's a new technique and they think you'll regain use of it, at least partially. They said it went real well.” She smiled.
After a few minutes he could feel himself snapping out of the deepest part of the drug fuzziness but he knew he was only halfway out. He didn't want to lose that glow now. It was a good buzz and he figured when he started to lose it the pain would hammer him to his knees. He looked at the thickly bandaged hand and felt nothing.
When he felt himself coming to his senses he talked with Donna about the confrontation asking her about the killer.
“I got him, didn't I?” he asked. “I got him this time?'
“Yes,” she assured him. “You got him this time.'
“No!” He started to tell her about the Man from Kowloon and he changed the subject. “Know what? That little baby is going to be in a big world of trouble. I wish we, you know, could take care of him or something.'
“I know what you mean,” she said, and then she wondered if she did. “You mean like adopt him?'
“I know he had a killer for a father but that wasn't his fault. He's still a little baby.'
“Sure.'
“So tiny. All alone. I mean, we'd do the same thing for a cat or dog.'
“I know.'
“Would you be against it?'
“Adopting the little boy?'
“Yeah.'
“No. I, uh, I just haven't thought about it. But no, hon, I think it's a sweet idea. If you, you know, wanted to adopt a baby. I don't know if we could do it, if they'd let us, but—'
“What do you mean?'
“I don't know if it's that easy?'
“How do you adopt a baby like that? What happens to it?'
“I don't know. I suppose the baby gets placed in a foster home eventually. I don't know exactly what the procedure would be in a case like this, though.'
“Why don't we look into it?'
“Okay. Just remember, darlin', this is a serious commitment. I mean, if it's something we both really want I'd say give it all we can to make it happen, but I'm just surprised you want THIS baby, you know. Considering everything that happened.'
“It breaks my heart to think he wouldn't have a good home. He had such a bad start.” Eichord thought about the little infant being taken from the slaughtered mother and he shivered as he had in the woods.
“You cold?'
“No, I feel GOOD,” he said. She kissed him softly and whispered several secrets then, so grateful that he was alive. And as tired as Jack was, it felt good to feel her touch and her nearness, whispering to him these secrets of romantic love and Romeo and Juliet and the love songs of troubadours and sonnets and bonnets and white dresses on virginal flesh, and he heard her whisper as he drifted off, “You're my dream man. There's nothing I'd like more than to be the mother of your children. You'd make a wonderful daddy.” And he tried to tell her about the baby and how he felt, but the effort of holding his heavy eyelids open was finally just too much and as he fell into a deep sleep he thought that he
“I think it's stupid. What the hell you wanna put yourself through this for?'
“Just let's do it, okay?” Tuny had stayed with him like a Siamese twin. Watching over him. Bodyguarding him. It was absurd, but Jack didn't have the heart to make him go away.
“It's stupid. Y'r a dumb fuck ta come down here. Doc told you stay in bed another day anyway.'
“They don't know everything. Come on.” They walked through the door simultaneously, but Eichord was amused Dana didn't bump him. “What a turkey,” he said.
“I'll catch ya next time.'
Jack made a morgue attendant pull out the stitched, headless cadaver. He ran a set of prints for his own files, checked known scars—the whole bit. Finally he made them show him the decapitated head, the autopsy reports.
Dana said, “Hey, fuckface, enough awready. We gonna stay down here all fucking day or what?'
“I thought you might like to eat down here. We could order some lunch sent in?'
“Key, asshole. What d'ya think I look like anyway—a fucking GHOUL?'
“Yeah,” Eichord said, leaning over and giving his fat friend a little gentle punch on the tit. “That's what you look like around the mammaries. A fucking girl.” But it wasn't funny like when Jimmie did it, so Jack just looked at Dana and smiled. “I guess it's all in the timing.” They went back out into the hot Buckhead sunlight of the more or less real world of the living.
When he got home that night there was quite a bit of mail, but his heart sank when he saw the package that was waiting for him. He couldn't find any markings or anything on it. Obviously Jimmie's printing, with a joke return address from “I.P. Freely, of Vlasic, MASS.” But even without the printing he knew what it was—that soft, rectangular heft of dirty money, so innocent-looking in the IGA brown paper wrapper and transparent tape. Rubber-stamped “RE-ROUTED BY BUCKHEAD MAIL CENTER.'
“How did this come. Donna?'
“It came today.'
“HOW did it come? In the mail or UPS or what?'
“In the mail.'
“It doesn't have any stamps. How was it delivered. Where's the address?'
“OH! Sorry babe. The thing came off and I put it in the trash.” She bent over and plucked something out of a wastebasket. “Here you go.” He looked at the stick-on label and the cluster of postage stamps.
