Dhalgren

looked at Kid again, frowned, responding to something Kid could feel moving in his face but could not identify. '… maybe not that long,' Denny recanted, dubiously. He disappeared.

More people moved in the hall behind him.

'Hey, Kid,' somebody said, but was gone when he looked.

He went to the post and climbed up after Denny. In the corner, he sat back and watched the boy thumbtack Koth the Dark Angel next to the day-glo Scorpio. Now Denny emptied the other bags between his knees. 'I guess,' he said after a moment, 'she really got it all. That was pretty nice of her, huh?'

Kid nodded.

Denny crawled over the mattress, hesitated, then put his head in Kid's lap. Kid rubbed Denny's neck, looked down, surprised. Denny took two deep breaths.

He's gonna cry? Kid wondered.

'You all right?' Denny asked in a perfectly controlled voice.

'Yeah,' Kid said. 'What about you?'

'I'm fine,' Denny said, listlessly. After a while, he said, 'I'm gonna go down and check things out, huh?'

'Okay.'

He sat alone, listening to the sounds of the house. Once he picked up Denny's radio and turned it on. There was not even static. No battery?

He turned the glass dice, watching reflected ghosts of his face. He turned up a mirror on his chain; comparison of the two images told him nothing. But he looked back and forth.

Someone banged on the boards beneath him.

'Hey, you up there? Kid?'

He opened his eyes; the dice rolled from his lap as he crawled to loft's edge.

Black eyes, broken tooth, hair with a braid undone: Between huge shoulders, the smooth and the scarred, Nightmare grinned. 'Hey, you got yourself a real nice nest set up for you here, huh?'

'How you doin', man!' Kid swung his legs over, dropped to the floor. His body tingled, heels, chin, knuckles and knees.

Nightmare took a stiff step back, another to the side, and bobbed his head. 'Yeah, you really got yourself set up. Really nice.' He looked into the hall, nodded at someone who hailed him. 'Stealin' all my folk away from me?' He glanced back, brows high and forehead furrowed. 'You're welcome to the scroungy motherfuckers! The niggers are okay. But the white ones, man. Shit…!'

Dollar said, 'Hey, Nightmare—'

Shoulders raised; head lowered, Nightmare spat on the floor.

Dollar swallowed, and disappeared at a gesture of Nightmare's fist.

Nightmare turned, annoyance and concern weighting the ends of his eyebrows, the corners of his mouth. 'Fuckin' psycho! You gotta treat these bastards like horse turds, man! Like fuckin' monkey puke! They all like you now. But you're gonna have to show 'em soon.' He turned his boot on the gobbet. 'And watch out for the ladies, they are particularly bad.'

'Nightmare,' Kid said, 'most of the time, I can't even tell which ones the ladies are!'

'Got a point there.' Nightmare nodded. 'Altogether, how many you got here?'

'Don't know.'

'I never did neither.' In the hall, Nightmare squinted at the ceiling; 'Yeah, this is going to be interesting.'

Kid followed him.

'Somebody told me you fool around with boys, huh?' Nightmare nodded again, considering. 'I was in reform school four years. Yeah, I know about that shit.' He leaned out on the service porch (where two blacks manhandled a chipped washing machine), and pulled back, still nodding. 'So you got Copperhead, Glass, and Spitt all here in the nest with you. That's pretty cool, I guess. I wouldn't have the balls for that I tell you that now.'

'Which one is Spitt?'

Nightmare's face swung back, ruptured with disbelief. 'Which one is Spitt?' Disbelief erupted into mockery. 'You wanna know which one is Spitt?' Mockery erupted into laughter. 'Hey, Spitt! Come here.' He turned in the hall.

'Yeah?' The white youth came from the room. A matted belly, massing toward the pubic, disappeared under a turquoise and silver buckle. A scar careened across the tight, bald pectorals, and turned down toward his navel. He wore no vest. His only chain was his projector. Wrists and forearms were furry, his biceps veined and bald. His cheeks wore the few hairs of someone who could never have a beard. 'What you want?'

'The Kid here thought he'd like a formal introduction. Kid, this is Spitt. Spitt, this is the Kid.'

'Huh?' Spitt said. 'Eh… Hi.' He wiped a wet hand on his black jeans and held it out.

'Hi,' Kid said, but didn't shake.

Spitt put down his hand and looked uncomfortable. 'I was in the kitchen, trying to wash up some of the God- damn dishes. They ain't gonna stay clean very long, but I thought for the first day, maybe. Did you want something?'

'You go on back,' Kid said. 'Nightmare's a clown, you know? Yeah, and throw out some of that garbage, huh?'

'I was gonna.' Spitt's eyes flicked, questioning, between them. He looked down, moved his feet a couple of times, grunted, then went into the other room.

'Now you mean to tell me you don't know who put the split in Spitt's tit?' Nightmare demanded; with his finger, he flicked the orchid hanging at Kid's neck. It ticked and chattered in the chains.

After silent seconds Nightmare, aping frustration, shook his head and assumed a theatrical whisper. 'He's the guy you cut, man, when him and Glass and Copperhead first beat the shit out of you up at Calkins'! You mean you didn't know that?' Nightmare's expelled 'Ha!' of laughter made at least two of the scorpions in the front hall turn around. They turned back. One, a black Woman, was hammering a nail into the wall, using a piece of plank to hit with. 'They been tellin' me you're a little punchy sometimes, too. Like you're not always there, you know? Well, I tell 'em just to watch out for you, huh? The Kid knows what he's doing better than any of you motherfuckers, I tell 'em.'

'Glad you think so,' Kid said. 'You going to stay here?'

'Me?' Nightmare buried a thumb in the links looping his chest. 'Am I gonna stay here, with these scroungy motherfuckers?' The thumb wagged. The links rattled. 'Shit!'

'What about you and Dragon Lady?'

'We're around, you know. Dragon Lady used to have this all-suede gang, man, over on the edge of Jackson. You know where Cumberland Park is?'

Kid nodded.

'Man, they were some mean motherfuckers. I mean, man…' Nightmare looked in the living room again, stepped inside.

Kid followed.

On the table in the corner were stacked a dozen copies of Brass Orchids.

'You got to watch out, down there,' Nightmare said. 'I mean it's getting pretty hungry, down there. Since the water main broke, it's just been sort of terrible. Two guys I know already got killed, down there. Yesterday. And somebody else two days before that.'

'I heard most of the people moved.'

'And the one's that are left, man, are pretty God-damn strange, you better believe it. Dragon Lady got her nest down there. She's pretty cool, you know?'

'And you're really going to leave all this for me?'

'I don't want it.' Nightmare frowned at the table.

'Why?'

'You asked me that already.'

'And I may God-damn well ask you ten times more, too! Until I find out.'

'I told you I was just curious—'

'Me! Why me!' The three scorpions who came through the room now and didn't look were making a noticeable effort. 'Come on, Nightmare. Talk to me.'

'Well; you come.' Nightmare turned around and leaned his butt on the table edge. 'You go. You got a certain