Read Online Very Old Bones by William Kennedy - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: William Kennedy
Ads: Link
rode in the Mercedes with an underworld figure of notable dimension, I moved into a realm of possibility that included illegalities permissible to The Man Who Is, always
stopping short of what might be considered serious criminality, of course. No need to venture that far into a new career.
Meister Geld took me to a small movie theater where we stood in the back and watched a scene from a German melodrama in black and white: A woman in a kitchen backs away from a threatening man
and reaches for a knife. Close on the knife, as man of menace, undeterred, comes toward her. She thrusts. Close on knife entering his stomach. He crumples. She backs away, runs out of house. Close
on man, dead. He opens eyes, removes knife from his stomach, no wound visible, rises, puts knife in sink, no blood visible on it, opens cabinet, takes down whiskey, pours self a drink, drinks,
looks toward door, smiles.
The Meister grew bored and climbed the stairs to a second- floor office beside the windowed projection booth, the office similarly windowed to give access to the screen. The office was cluttered
with German movie posters and photographs of naked women. The Meister hung his coat upon a hook, sat in his leather chair, and asked: “Do you like to travel, Lieutenant? May I call you
Orson?”
“Travel pleases me. Orson is my name.”
“One may make a great deal of money by traveling, especially if one is an American officer like yourself.”
“I’m in the mood for money,” I said.
“From the black market?”
“Everybody does it.”
“The army frowns on it.”
“But they do very little to discourage it, especially among officers. My partner in this deal is another officer.”
“I can’t tell you how it pleases me to hear this,” said the Meister. “I sense an alliance of substance.”
In agreeing to travel for the Meister, I perceived a change in my attitude toward myself and others. Clearly, I thought and acted faster and with more resolution than other men, knew what others
would think before they thought it, knew, for instance, when I caught the Captain biting his nails, and he then guiltily hid his hands, that he was behaving like a recidivist thumbsucker, which is
to say an autoeroticist. How swift the demon Orson—or is it Oreson-Whoreson?—faster by a whisker than old Freud devoid.
As he listened, the Meister unfolded the tale of his childhood in the war, early soldierhood in the Wehrmacht, surviving the bombings of Frankfurt, aiding in their aftermath (his half a foot
then only a stump), putting out fires, carrying wounded to belowground shelters. The boy into man became the peddler who could get anybody anything at a price by the time he was twenty-three. He
crossed into the British, French, and Russian zones during the early occupation years with great ease and casualness, owning papers of four nations, fluent in five tongues, and with a sixth sense
for survival.
He stole an artificial leg from the hospital where he recuperated, sold the leg to an amputee for two hundred cigarettes, bartered the cigarettes for a live pig, traded the pig to a butcher who
supplied the mayor of Darmstadt in exchange for the loan of a Leica and a roll of film, bided his time until he had secretly photographed an American lieutenant colonel in bed with three
Fräuleins and a Doberman pinscher, blackmailed the colonel into lending him his automobile, drove to the officers’ quarters and cleaned out another colonel’s vast hoard of
medicine, chocolate, uniforms, military insignia, and whiskey, imposed these gifts on a black marketeer known as the King of Mannheim, and earned himself the right to deal in currency for the King,
which was his goal from the outset.
The Meister carried a pistol, which was visible in the crotch of his left arm, and as he dropped references to this killing, that murder attempt, I grew wary of getting thick with his mission,
which I had yet to understand. But as he unraveled the operation,
stopping short of what might be considered serious criminality, of course. No need to venture that far into a new career.
Meister Geld took me to a small movie theater where we stood in the back and watched a scene from a German melodrama in black and white: A woman in a kitchen backs away from a threatening man
and reaches for a knife. Close on the knife, as man of menace, undeterred, comes toward her. She thrusts. Close on knife entering his stomach. He crumples. She backs away, runs out of house. Close
on man, dead. He opens eyes, removes knife from his stomach, no wound visible, rises, puts knife in sink, no blood visible on it, opens cabinet, takes down whiskey, pours self a drink, drinks,
looks toward door, smiles.
The Meister grew bored and climbed the stairs to a second- floor office beside the windowed projection booth, the office similarly windowed to give access to the screen. The office was cluttered
with German movie posters and photographs of naked women. The Meister hung his coat upon a hook, sat in his leather chair, and asked: “Do you like to travel, Lieutenant? May I call you
Orson?”
“Travel pleases me. Orson is my name.”
“One may make a great deal of money by traveling, especially if one is an American officer like yourself.”
“I’m in the mood for money,” I said.
“From the black market?”
“Everybody does it.”
“The army frowns on it.”
“But they do very little to discourage it, especially among officers. My partner in this deal is another officer.”
“I can’t tell you how it pleases me to hear this,” said the Meister. “I sense an alliance of substance.”
In agreeing to travel for the Meister, I perceived a change in my attitude toward myself and others. Clearly, I thought and acted faster and with more resolution than other men, knew what others
would think before they thought it, knew, for instance, when I caught the Captain biting his nails, and he then guiltily hid his hands, that he was behaving like a recidivist thumbsucker, which is
to say an autoeroticist. How swift the demon Orson—or is it Oreson-Whoreson?—faster by a whisker than old Freud devoid.
As he listened, the Meister unfolded the tale of his childhood in the war, early soldierhood in the Wehrmacht, surviving the bombings of Frankfurt, aiding in their aftermath (his half a foot
then only a stump), putting out fires, carrying wounded to belowground shelters. The boy into man became the peddler who could get anybody anything at a price by the time he was twenty-three. He
crossed into the British, French, and Russian zones during the early occupation years with great ease and casualness, owning papers of four nations, fluent in five tongues, and with a sixth sense
for survival.
He stole an artificial leg from the hospital where he recuperated, sold the leg to an amputee for two hundred cigarettes, bartered the cigarettes for a live pig, traded the pig to a butcher who
supplied the mayor of Darmstadt in exchange for the loan of a Leica and a roll of film, bided his time until he had secretly photographed an American lieutenant colonel in bed with three
Fräuleins and a Doberman pinscher, blackmailed the colonel into lending him his automobile, drove to the officers’ quarters and cleaned out another colonel’s vast hoard of
medicine, chocolate, uniforms, military insignia, and whiskey, imposed these gifts on a black marketeer known as the King of Mannheim, and earned himself the right to deal in currency for the King,
which was his goal from the outset.
The Meister carried a pistol, which was visible in the crotch of his left arm, and as he dropped references to this killing, that murder attempt, I grew wary of getting thick with his mission,
which I had yet to understand. But as he unraveled the operation,
Similar Books
