out onto those streets tonight, no way. Even if he could work up the courage, Lucy would use a butcher knife on his crotch when he got back.
He went into the kitchen and dialed the phone. On the third ring a man’s voice answered with a recitation of the telephone number. The voice was tired, the English perfect. “Six-six-five, oh-one-oh- five.”
“This is Poor Richard.” He had picked his code name himself. Easier for him to remember, they said. “It wasn’t there. It wasn’t at the dr—“
“Verify please.” The voice was hard, exasperated.
“The Bullets play the Celtics tomorrow night at Capital Cen- tre.”
“I’ll call you back. Where are you?”
“Seven-two-nine, seven-four-oh-one.”
The Minotaur
“You’re at home?” The voice was incredulous, outraged.
“Yeah, I—” He stopped when he realized he was talking to a dead instrument.
Shit. He would have to call again. He had to find out what the hell was going on. A pay phone. Lucy was going to come sweet- Jesus holy-hell screaming unglued. What a night! He picked up his jacket and eased the front door shut behind him.
From her seat on the top of the stairs, Lucy heard the door close. She had started to come down earlier but stopped when she heard him enter the kitchen and pick up the phone. She had heard his side of the conversation and she sat now trying to figure it out. “Poor Richard” he had called himself. It wasn’t there. The Bullets play the Celtics? A code of some sort?
What is he into? she asked herself, her horror growing. He had looked so stunned when she said she knew. That look was the verification she needed that he was cheating on her. But how did that fit with a code and nonsense sentences? Was he placing bets with a bookie? No, he wasn’t spending money she didn’t know about. Something to do with his job at the Pentagon? Could he be spying, like those Walkers several years ago? No, that wasn’t possi- ble. Or was it? He would do it if he could get away with it, she decided. In their eleven years of marriage she had found him a man who always put himself first.
What else could it be? My God, what other possibilities were there?
The sun was still embedded in the gray scud over the ocean on Saturday morning when Jake and Callie walked through the gap in the low dune on their way to the beach. Callie trailed along behind him on the narrow path, her hands tucked into the pockets of her windbreaker.
He strolled as he always did, his eyes moving restlessly across the sky and the sea and the naked sand and coming to rest often on her. Whenever she was with him she drew his eyes. It had been that way since they first met, one of the little unconscious things he did that told her without words what she meant to him. This morning walking beside him she was acutely aware of his glances.
“How did your little interview with the soul stripper go yester- day?”
“He says I have to come to grips with your decision to ram that transport in the Med last fall.”
Jake stopped and turned to face her. He looked bewildered. “What the hell are you worrying about that for?”
“For a week I was a widow.”
He turned away and looked out to sea. It was a moment before he spoke. “You may be again someday.” He faced her. “Women live longer than men these days. I don’t have a crystal ball, Callie. Jesus, we can’t stop living because we’re mortal.” He gestured an- grily. “I may get hit by a meteor ten seconds from now. I may get run over by some drunk when I step off the curb at—“
He stopped because she was walking away from him, along the beach, her arms wrapped around her cheat.
He hurried after her. “Hey—“
“For a whole week you were dead. You had killed yourself chas- ing those damned Arabs and I was left here all alone!” He put his hand on her arm and she jerked away, whirling to face him. “You knew how much I loved you and… and… when they called and said you were alive, the memorial service was scheduled for the next morning. I was going to bury you. You were dead!” He enveloped her in his arms and she pressed her face against his shoulder.
After a while she stopped trembling and he murmured, “Still love me?”
“Yes.”
“A little bit or a whole lot?”
“I haven’t decided.”
With his arm around her shoulder, he started them walking north again. In a moment he paused and kissed her, then they resumed their journey with their arms locked together.
Something white. Whatever it was that blocked Toad’s gaze, it was white. He closed his eyes and the pain and nausea washed over him, enveloping him. Ye gods… Something hard and cold against his cheek — he opened his eyes again — and white. Lotta light … He moved. Shit! He was lying in a fucking bathtub.
He raised himself slowly. His head felt like it was coming off. He was still dressed in his khaki uniform, but it was wrinkled and had vomit on it. He still had his shoes on. Oh God, he felt worse than he had ever felt in his entire twenty-eight years, felt like he had been dead for a week or two. He sat up slowly. His head was being hammered on by an angry King Kong. After a moment he grasped the shower handles and faucet and hauled himself erect. He swayed as the blood pounded in his temples with every beat of his heart. Then he tried to step out of the tub. He tripped and sprawled heavily on the floor, striking his head against the bottom of the sink cabinet He lay there, too sick and dazed to move.
Amid the pain he heard the door open. “Good morning.” A woman’s voice.
Toad flopped over and squinted against the ceiling light. Rita Moravia!
What had he done to deserve this? It’s true, life is all misery and pain.
“I’d appreciate it if you would transport yourself to your Own room, Tarkington. Now. I don’t want anybody to get the wrong idea about you and me.”
He tried to speak. His mouth was dry and tasted of sour vomit. He cleared his throat and licked his lips. “How’d I get here?”
“Pour men carried you in here last night. We thought someone should keep an eye on you during the night. I volunteered.”
“Aren’t you a sweetie.”
“I want you out of here, Tarkington.”
He hoisted himself up and staggered past her. He was going to have to find another bathroom pretty damn quick. He went through the little sitting room and got the door open and was hustling down the hall when he heard her voice behind him. “We’re flying at two this afternoon. Meet you in the lobby at ten till twelve.”
Jake sat on the crest of the low dune and watched the glider mov- ing north, away from him above the dune. He had its nose pointed obliquely forty-five degrees out to sea, but the velocity of the in- coming wind was such that the plane stayed more or less over the dune. He was holding her low, only eight or ten feet up, to take advantage of the upward vector of the breeze as it crossed the low sand hill.
“Better turn her back this way,” advised the eleven-year-old aviation expert from up the street.
Jake banked the plane. “Keep the nose up,” David urged, his voice rising. Jake fed in back stick. Too late. The right wingtip kissed the sand and she cartwheeled. David was up and running instantly.
The boy was examining the wreckage when Jake reached him. The rubber bands that held the wings to the fuselage had popped off, which undoubtedly minimized the damage. “A hole in the wing Monokote and a busted spar in the right horizontal stabi- lizer,” the youngster advised cheerfully. “Not bad. Yippy-skippy! You gotta remember to feed in a little back stick on the turns,”
“Yeah. Let’s take it over to my house and fix it”
“What kind of planes do you fly in the navy?” David asked as they walked down the beach with the pieces of the glider in their arms.
“A-6s mostly. Last year I flew the F-14 some.”
“Wow, those fighters! Did you see Top GunT
“Uh-huh.”
“My dad bought that movie for me. I must have watched it a couple dozen times. When I grow up I’m gonna
