across the city, the man who resembled Einstein let himself into his dead wife’s bungalow by the sea.
The front door, swollen with salt moisture, must be lifted as you opened it; sometimes it stuck anyway. Sand feathered across the linoleum in the hall. Rather than switch on the lights, Aschemann paused and allowed his eyes to adjust to the faint sea-glimmer limning every surface. He made his way carefully to the kitchen, where he wiped the window and regarded the ocean. “How are you?” his wife’s voice said to him. “You see that ship out there?” It was the kitchen of an empty house, empty cupboards, empty shelves, dust and sand in a thin gritty layer on everything. Aschemann ran warm water from the faucet, catching it in his cupped hands to splash his face. Then he went back down the hall and took off his raincoat.
While he was doing that his wife’s voice said, “Can you see the same ship as me, those lights to the right of the Point?”
In life she had constantly asked him similar questions, whether he was standing next to her or lying in bed with some other woman halfway across the city. She had, somehow, never trusted her own eyes.
“I see the ship,” he reassured her. “It’s only a ship. Go to bed now.”
Comforted by this fragment of an exchange the rest of which lay at some inaccessible level of memory, he sat down in the lounge, unbuttoned the collar of his shirt, and dialled up his assistant, to whom he said, “I hope you have something good for me. Because we aren’t doing so well since the other day.” He knew this was ambiguous. Let it stand, he thought.
After the raid on the Semiramide Club, they had argued in the car. “I don’t like to have shots fired,” he had informed her. “Now I’ll have to apologise to Paulie.”
“Paulie is a violent creep.”
“Still. Shots fired is not my way. Find nothing and set light to a wall, is that a day’s work? Threaten some children! The problem with DeRaad will always be the same. He’s never quite intelligent enough for his own good, and never quite stupid enough for ours. That’s Paulie.” He touched her arm. “And drive slower,” he said. “I don’t want to lose this nice car. I don’t want to hurt someone.” She stared ahead, and, if anything, accelerated a little. Moneytown was all round them with rickshaws and pedestrians, the Cadillac embedded in early evening traffic one minute, prised free the next. Stop, start, stop, start: it made Aschemann feel ill.
“They aren’t children,” she said.
“You’re angry, I can understand that.”
The Semiramide raid had left him none the wiser. He had expected nothing less—who, after all, would store a proscribed artefact in the back room of a dance club? Not even Paulie DeRaad. Since then, without quite knowing why, Aschemann had returned repeatedly to the Café Surf, telling himself, Everything proceeds from there. To watch is best when you have no theory. He tracked his bebop golems into the night, observed their lateral slide and vanishment into the hustle of things in central Saudade. It was like a card trick. One in ten lasted a little longer, going as far, perhaps, as to negotiate for a room. “That must mean something,” he told his assistant now. “Ten per cent of them are more than ordinarily restless. They want something. Are they even artefacts as we know them?”
All this, she responded, served only to confirm what he already knew. Aschemann shrugged. “So it’s three in the morning,” he said, “and I don’t understand why you waste your time talking to an old man like me.”
“Vic Serotonin walked into the Café Surf tonight, half an hour after you walked out. I’ve been trying to reach you since.”
5
Ninety Per Cent Neon
“Ah,” Aschemann said.
“I can’t report to you when you disconnect.”
“I suppose not.”
“You disconnect and wander about on your own,” she complained. When it became clear he wasn’t going to answer that,
The front door, swollen with salt moisture, must be lifted as you opened it; sometimes it stuck anyway. Sand feathered across the linoleum in the hall. Rather than switch on the lights, Aschemann paused and allowed his eyes to adjust to the faint sea-glimmer limning every surface. He made his way carefully to the kitchen, where he wiped the window and regarded the ocean. “How are you?” his wife’s voice said to him. “You see that ship out there?” It was the kitchen of an empty house, empty cupboards, empty shelves, dust and sand in a thin gritty layer on everything. Aschemann ran warm water from the faucet, catching it in his cupped hands to splash his face. Then he went back down the hall and took off his raincoat.
While he was doing that his wife’s voice said, “Can you see the same ship as me, those lights to the right of the Point?”
In life she had constantly asked him similar questions, whether he was standing next to her or lying in bed with some other woman halfway across the city. She had, somehow, never trusted her own eyes.
“I see the ship,” he reassured her. “It’s only a ship. Go to bed now.”
Comforted by this fragment of an exchange the rest of which lay at some inaccessible level of memory, he sat down in the lounge, unbuttoned the collar of his shirt, and dialled up his assistant, to whom he said, “I hope you have something good for me. Because we aren’t doing so well since the other day.” He knew this was ambiguous. Let it stand, he thought.
After the raid on the Semiramide Club, they had argued in the car. “I don’t like to have shots fired,” he had informed her. “Now I’ll have to apologise to Paulie.”
“Paulie is a violent creep.”
“Still. Shots fired is not my way. Find nothing and set light to a wall, is that a day’s work? Threaten some children! The problem with DeRaad will always be the same. He’s never quite intelligent enough for his own good, and never quite stupid enough for ours. That’s Paulie.” He touched her arm. “And drive slower,” he said. “I don’t want to lose this nice car. I don’t want to hurt someone.” She stared ahead, and, if anything, accelerated a little. Moneytown was all round them with rickshaws and pedestrians, the Cadillac embedded in early evening traffic one minute, prised free the next. Stop, start, stop, start: it made Aschemann feel ill.
“They aren’t children,” she said.
“You’re angry, I can understand that.”
The Semiramide raid had left him none the wiser. He had expected nothing less—who, after all, would store a proscribed artefact in the back room of a dance club? Not even Paulie DeRaad. Since then, without quite knowing why, Aschemann had returned repeatedly to the Café Surf, telling himself, Everything proceeds from there. To watch is best when you have no theory. He tracked his bebop golems into the night, observed their lateral slide and vanishment into the hustle of things in central Saudade. It was like a card trick. One in ten lasted a little longer, going as far, perhaps, as to negotiate for a room. “That must mean something,” he told his assistant now. “Ten per cent of them are more than ordinarily restless. They want something. Are they even artefacts as we know them?”
All this, she responded, served only to confirm what he already knew. Aschemann shrugged. “So it’s three in the morning,” he said, “and I don’t understand why you waste your time talking to an old man like me.”
“Vic Serotonin walked into the Café Surf tonight, half an hour after you walked out. I’ve been trying to reach you since.”
5
Ninety Per Cent Neon
“Ah,” Aschemann said.
“I can’t report to you when you disconnect.”
“I suppose not.”
“You disconnect and wander about on your own,” she complained. When it became clear he wasn’t going to answer that,
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