Dutch Island, the man known to some as Melancholy Joe Dupree lay on his bed and watched the rain fall, harder and harder, until at last his view through the window was entirely obscured. His bones, his teeth, his joints, they all ached, as if the effort of supporting his great bulk were slowly becoming too much for them. Joe moaned and buried his face in his pillow, tears forcing themselves from the corners of his eyes.
Make it stop, he begged. Please make it stop.
A face appeared in the darkness beyond his window, a boy’s face, the skin blue-gray, the eyes dark. The boy reached out as if to touch the glass, but made no contact. Instead, he watched the man in uniform curl in upon himself on the huge bed, until at last the pain began to ease and Joe Dupree fell into a troubled sleep, tormented by the sound of whispering, of gray figures and tunnels beneath the earth, and a boy with tainted skin who gazed upon him as he slept.
The Second Day
Not a shred in the papers,
Becoming all too clear
Not a one cares that she got away.
Now the fear of being found
A little less profound
On a face that’s never been
Fit to laugh.
—Pinetop Seven, “The Fear of Being Found”
Chapter Three
Know me, wife.
The dream ended, and now Moloch’s features fell before him like rain. It was as though a great many photographs had been taken and shredded, the figures caught in the different frames intermingled, smiling familiarly while glancing against strangers from other pictures; yet in this downpour of images, this torrent of memories, he was ever the same. There he sat, beside parents unknown, amid siblings now lost and gone. He ran as a boy across sand and through sea; he held a fish on the end of a hook; he cried beside an open fire. This was his history, his past, yet it seemed to encompass not one life but many lives. Some images were sharper than others, some recollections more acute, but they were all linked to him, all part of the great chain of his existence. He was color, and he was sepia. He was black, and he was white. He was of this time, and he was of no time.
He was Moloch, and he was No One.
Moloch awoke, aware that he was being watched. His ear felt raw where it had been touching the cheap material, the pillow once again drenched with his sweat. He thought that he could smell the woman against his face, could touch her skin, could feel the blade tearing through her flesh. He stirred on his bunk but did not rise. Instead, he tried to identify the man watching him through his smell, his breathing, the soft jangle of the equipment on his belt. Images from the dream still ran through his mind, and he was suddenly aware of how aroused he had become, but he forced himself to concentrate on the figure at the other side of the bars. It was good practice. His incarceration had taken the edge off his abilities in so many ways that he welcomed any opportunity to hone them once more. That was the worst of his imprisonment: the monotony, the terrible similarity of each day to the next, so that every man became a seer, a fortune-teller, capable of predicting the wheres and whens of each hour to come, his precise location at any given time, the irrevocable nature of it all threatened only by the occasional outbreaks of sickness and violence.
Every day the wake-up call came at six A.M. , heralded by horns and coughing and the flushing of toilets. Two hours later, the doors opened and each man stepped outside onto the cold concrete to await the first count of the day. No words were permitted to be exchanged during any of the day’s six counts. The shower followed (for Moloch took every opportunity offered to clean himself, viewing any lapse in hygiene as the precursor to a greater collapse), and then breakfast, always taken seated at the same plastic chair, the food seemingly designed solely to provide energy without nutrition. Then Moloch would head to the laundry for his day’s work, socializing little with the other
Make it stop, he begged. Please make it stop.
A face appeared in the darkness beyond his window, a boy’s face, the skin blue-gray, the eyes dark. The boy reached out as if to touch the glass, but made no contact. Instead, he watched the man in uniform curl in upon himself on the huge bed, until at last the pain began to ease and Joe Dupree fell into a troubled sleep, tormented by the sound of whispering, of gray figures and tunnels beneath the earth, and a boy with tainted skin who gazed upon him as he slept.
The Second Day
Not a shred in the papers,
Becoming all too clear
Not a one cares that she got away.
Now the fear of being found
A little less profound
On a face that’s never been
Fit to laugh.
—Pinetop Seven, “The Fear of Being Found”
Chapter Three
Know me, wife.
The dream ended, and now Moloch’s features fell before him like rain. It was as though a great many photographs had been taken and shredded, the figures caught in the different frames intermingled, smiling familiarly while glancing against strangers from other pictures; yet in this downpour of images, this torrent of memories, he was ever the same. There he sat, beside parents unknown, amid siblings now lost and gone. He ran as a boy across sand and through sea; he held a fish on the end of a hook; he cried beside an open fire. This was his history, his past, yet it seemed to encompass not one life but many lives. Some images were sharper than others, some recollections more acute, but they were all linked to him, all part of the great chain of his existence. He was color, and he was sepia. He was black, and he was white. He was of this time, and he was of no time.
He was Moloch, and he was No One.
Moloch awoke, aware that he was being watched. His ear felt raw where it had been touching the cheap material, the pillow once again drenched with his sweat. He thought that he could smell the woman against his face, could touch her skin, could feel the blade tearing through her flesh. He stirred on his bunk but did not rise. Instead, he tried to identify the man watching him through his smell, his breathing, the soft jangle of the equipment on his belt. Images from the dream still ran through his mind, and he was suddenly aware of how aroused he had become, but he forced himself to concentrate on the figure at the other side of the bars. It was good practice. His incarceration had taken the edge off his abilities in so many ways that he welcomed any opportunity to hone them once more. That was the worst of his imprisonment: the monotony, the terrible similarity of each day to the next, so that every man became a seer, a fortune-teller, capable of predicting the wheres and whens of each hour to come, his precise location at any given time, the irrevocable nature of it all threatened only by the occasional outbreaks of sickness and violence.
Every day the wake-up call came at six A.M. , heralded by horns and coughing and the flushing of toilets. Two hours later, the doors opened and each man stepped outside onto the cold concrete to await the first count of the day. No words were permitted to be exchanged during any of the day’s six counts. The shower followed (for Moloch took every opportunity offered to clean himself, viewing any lapse in hygiene as the precursor to a greater collapse), and then breakfast, always taken seated at the same plastic chair, the food seemingly designed solely to provide energy without nutrition. Then Moloch would head to the laundry for his day’s work, socializing little with the other
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