Read Online The Last Coin by James P. Blaylock - Free Book Online
Authors: James P. Blaylock
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down the hallway, listening.
A vacuum cleaner rumbled somewhere on the second floor. Rose was working away. God bless her, thought Andrew, as he and Pickett slipped out through the back door and headed toward Andrew’s Metropolitan, parked at the curb. Knowing that Rose was at work wrestling the bungalow into submission was like knowing there was coffee brewing in the morning. It gave a man hope. It made things solid.
There were days when it seemed to him that the walls and the floor and the chairs he sat on were becoming transparent, were about to wink out of existence like snuffed candle flames, leaving only a smoky shadow lingering in the air. But then there was Rose, looming into view with a dust rag or a hammer or a pair of hedge clippers, and the chairs and walls and floors precipitated out of the air again and smiled at him. He’d be a jellyfish without her, a ghost. He knew that and reminded himself of it daily.
So what if she was short-sighted when it came to beer scrapers or imported breakfast cereals or just the right bottle of gin or scotch? She had
him
, didn’t she? He had a genius for those sorts of things. She didn’t have to bother with them.
The Metropolitan grumbled away toward the highway, blowing out a plume of dark exhaust. If he was lucky, Rose wouldn’t have heard them go, and he could slip back in later, undetected. Pickett would want to stop at Leisure World and look in on old Uncle Arthur, but there wouldn’t be any time for that. This was business. He’d have to settle the score with Aunt Naomi that afternoon, or there’d be trouble.
Good old Aunt Naomi. In the light of day—when she wasn’t snoring, when her cats were out stalking across the rooftops—it was easy to take the long view. The idea of Rose pulling things together made it even easier. Sometimes. In truth, sometimes it just made it easier to feel guilty. He sighed, unable to keep it all straight. Well,
he’d
look to the delicate work. It was the best he could do. No one could ask more of him than that. What had his father said on the subject? If it was easy, his father had been fond of saying, they would have gotten somebody else to do it. Or something like that. It seemed to apply here, in some nebulous way that didn’t bear scrupulous study. He realized suddenly that Pickett was talking—asking him something.
“What? Sorry.”
“I said, what do you want with poison?”
Andrew stayed up late that night reading in the library. Mrs. Gummidge and Aunt Naomi played Scrabble upstairs until nearly eleven; then they went to bed. Rose had been asleep for hours. Pennyman had turned in at ten. By midnight the house was quiet and dark; only the pole lamp in the library burned. Andrew felt like a conspirator, but in fact he wasn’t conspiring with anyone. This was
his
plot, from end to end. He hadn’t even discussed it with Pickett, although his friend had agreed to come round early in the morning, pretending to be on his way to the pier to fish. At six A.M., Andrew thought, smiling, the tale would be told.
He waited for the stroke of midnight, just for the romance of it. Then, feeling as if his chest were empty, he tiptoed up the attic stairs carrying the dead ‘possum in a bag. It was starting to ripen, having been found yesterday in Garden Grove, already dead and torn up by something—cats, probably. That would be a stroke of luck if he played his cards right. It was dark on the stairs, but he couldn’t use even a flashlight. Being discovered now would mean … He couldn’t say. They’d take him away. Men in lab coats would ask him deceptive questions. They’d whirl his brain in a centrifuge and come to conclusions.
He let himself into the little, gabled cubbyhole, so that he could climb out the window onto the roof. The ladder had been a wash-out the night before; he wouldn’t chance it again. He could see the shadow of Pickett’s telescope in front of the casement. Slowly, carefully, he hauled it aside,
A vacuum cleaner rumbled somewhere on the second floor. Rose was working away. God bless her, thought Andrew, as he and Pickett slipped out through the back door and headed toward Andrew’s Metropolitan, parked at the curb. Knowing that Rose was at work wrestling the bungalow into submission was like knowing there was coffee brewing in the morning. It gave a man hope. It made things solid.
There were days when it seemed to him that the walls and the floor and the chairs he sat on were becoming transparent, were about to wink out of existence like snuffed candle flames, leaving only a smoky shadow lingering in the air. But then there was Rose, looming into view with a dust rag or a hammer or a pair of hedge clippers, and the chairs and walls and floors precipitated out of the air again and smiled at him. He’d be a jellyfish without her, a ghost. He knew that and reminded himself of it daily.
So what if she was short-sighted when it came to beer scrapers or imported breakfast cereals or just the right bottle of gin or scotch? She had
him
, didn’t she? He had a genius for those sorts of things. She didn’t have to bother with them.
The Metropolitan grumbled away toward the highway, blowing out a plume of dark exhaust. If he was lucky, Rose wouldn’t have heard them go, and he could slip back in later, undetected. Pickett would want to stop at Leisure World and look in on old Uncle Arthur, but there wouldn’t be any time for that. This was business. He’d have to settle the score with Aunt Naomi that afternoon, or there’d be trouble.
Good old Aunt Naomi. In the light of day—when she wasn’t snoring, when her cats were out stalking across the rooftops—it was easy to take the long view. The idea of Rose pulling things together made it even easier. Sometimes. In truth, sometimes it just made it easier to feel guilty. He sighed, unable to keep it all straight. Well,
he’d
look to the delicate work. It was the best he could do. No one could ask more of him than that. What had his father said on the subject? If it was easy, his father had been fond of saying, they would have gotten somebody else to do it. Or something like that. It seemed to apply here, in some nebulous way that didn’t bear scrupulous study. He realized suddenly that Pickett was talking—asking him something.
“What? Sorry.”
“I said, what do you want with poison?”
Andrew stayed up late that night reading in the library. Mrs. Gummidge and Aunt Naomi played Scrabble upstairs until nearly eleven; then they went to bed. Rose had been asleep for hours. Pennyman had turned in at ten. By midnight the house was quiet and dark; only the pole lamp in the library burned. Andrew felt like a conspirator, but in fact he wasn’t conspiring with anyone. This was
his
plot, from end to end. He hadn’t even discussed it with Pickett, although his friend had agreed to come round early in the morning, pretending to be on his way to the pier to fish. At six A.M., Andrew thought, smiling, the tale would be told.
He waited for the stroke of midnight, just for the romance of it. Then, feeling as if his chest were empty, he tiptoed up the attic stairs carrying the dead ‘possum in a bag. It was starting to ripen, having been found yesterday in Garden Grove, already dead and torn up by something—cats, probably. That would be a stroke of luck if he played his cards right. It was dark on the stairs, but he couldn’t use even a flashlight. Being discovered now would mean … He couldn’t say. They’d take him away. Men in lab coats would ask him deceptive questions. They’d whirl his brain in a centrifuge and come to conclusions.
He let himself into the little, gabled cubbyhole, so that he could climb out the window onto the roof. The ladder had been a wash-out the night before; he wouldn’t chance it again. He could see the shadow of Pickett’s telescope in front of the casement. Slowly, carefully, he hauled it aside,
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