The Midnight Circus, стр. 8
FinallyI spoke to Bert Koop about it and he was, predictably, sympathetic.And—as it turns out—totally wrong.
“DefinitelyCIA,” he said. “They’ve been bugging my phone, too. Probably going totry and get to me through you.”
“Well,if they think going to war is brave,” I said. “I’ll show them what realcourage is. I won’t say a word.”
“Death. . . ,” Bert quoted, “you do not frighten me.”
“Right,” I said, andreally meant it. After all, I had never actuallyseen anyone dead. Jews don’t believe in open caskets. So death didn’tfrighten me. But the man in black was beginning to.
Itwas about a week after I first saw him that the man in black turned upat our house. Not in the house, but at it, walkingslowly down the road. Grounded on weekdays ’til my grades improved, Ihad been working on my homework curled up on the sofa in the livingroom. I was pretty involved in writing a term paper on War andPeace. Tolstoy had been a pacifist, too, and I was writing aboutthe difference between a war in fiction and a war in real life,especially Vietnam. I don’t know what made me look up at that moment,but I did. And through the picture window I saw him walking alongNewtown Turnpike toward the Weston line.
Ileaped off the sofa, scattering my notes and the AFSC pamphlets aboutwar resistance all over the floor. Sticking my feet quickly into bootswithout lacing them, I ran out the door after him. By the time I gotdown the driveway and to the main road, I was shivering uncontrollably.It was late November and we’d already had two snowfalls; I hadn’t takena coat. But I walked way past the Hartleys’ house, at least a quartermile on up the road, right to the Weston line.
Therewas no sign of him.
Thatnight I came down with a raging fever, missed a whole week of school,an interfaith peace vigil I had helped put together, the start of thebig basketball tournament, and the due date for my Tolstoy paper.Evidently I had also spent one whole day—twenty-four solidhours—ranting and raving about the man in black. Enough so that both mymother and my father were worried. They had called the towncops, who questioned my friends, includingMary Lou. A police car made special rounds the entire week by ourhouse. It seems my father really did have a lot of money, andthere had been a kidnapping just six weeks earlier of an ad man’s kidin Darien. No one was dismissing it as a prank.
Butthen they found the gang that had kidnapped the Darien kid, sheidentified them all, and the special patrols stopped. And once I waswell again, I swore it had all been some kind of wild nightmare, adream. After all, I had a healthy distrust of the police because of myassociation with Bert Koop. I think everyone was relieved.
Except—andthis was the really funny thing—except my father. He made these long,secret phone calls to his brothers and sisters, and even to his UncleLouis, who scarcely had an aggie left, much less the rest of hismarbles. My father rarely spoke to his family; they were theembarrassingpast he’d left behind. But since my night of raving, he insisted oncalling them every night, talking to them in Yiddish. Yiddish! Afterthat, he started going to work late and driving the twins and me toschool before getting on the train to the city. Further, he establisheda check-in system for all of us. I was sixteen and embarrassed;sixteen is the high-water level of being embarrassed by one’s parents.
Itwas two weeks before I saw the man in black again. By that time, withmy grounding rescinded—not because my grades had gone up but becausewe all had other things to think about—and Mary Lou starting to pay adifferent kind of attention to me, I had all but forgotten the man inblack. Or at least I had forgotten he scaredme. I had walked the long block to Mary Lou’s for a study date. Studyon her part, date on mine, but I still got to hold her hand for about aquarter of an hour without her finding an excuse to remove it. Herparents kicked me out at ten.
Themoon was that yellow-white of old bone. It made odd shadows on thesnow. As I walked, my breath spun out before me like sugar candy;except for the noise of my exhalations, there wasn’t a sound at all.
Iwas thinking about Mary Lou and the feel of her hand, warm and a bitmoist in mine, and letting my feet get me home. Since I had gone aroundthat block practically every day since second grade—the school busstop was in front of Mary Lou’s driveway—I didn’t need to concentrateon where I was going. And suddenly, right at the bend of the road,where Newtown Turnpike met Mary Lou’s road, a large shadow detacheditself from one of the trees. He had made no sound but somehow I hadheard something. I looked up and there he was. Something long andsharp glittered in his hand. He was humming a snatch of song and itcame to me across the still air, tantalizingly familiar. I couldn’tquite place it, though a tune ran through my mind: “You are on your waytrying to escape . . .”
Iturned and ran. How I ran! Back past Mary Lou’s, past the Pattersons’,past the new row of houses that just barely met the two-acre standards.I turned left and right and left again. It was dark—the moon havingbeen hidden behind clouds—then light once more and still I ran. I hadno breath and I ran; I had a stitch in my side and I