The Man in My Basement by Walter Mosley Page A

Blakey,” he said.
    “Mr. Bennet.”
    “I tried to call,” he said. “But there was no answer.”
    “I know. I got the telegram. Did you get my message?”
    He shrugged his shoulders, indicating that he was there because he received my message. That would have been a good moment for me to take his bag, but I did not.
    “My car is over there.” I indicated the brown Dodge.
    We made our way. Bennet threw his bag in the backseat and we were off.
    “Why did you need me to pick you up?” I asked, turning onto the highway. “You know we didn’t say anything about you paying for a limo service.”
    “I want to be circumspect about this retreat, Mr. Blakey. No one knows where I’m going. Part of the idea is that I am to be kept from everything in my world—completely. I don’t want my car in your driveway or some driver who remembers where he dropped me off.”
    “That sounds illegal, Mr. Bennet. I don’t want to be involved in anything that’s against the law.”
    He looked at me and laughed silently. Then he said, “Not illegal. No. You see, in my world I’m pretty well known, and some people think that I’m important—for their money. I don’t want anybody finding me. This time is my own.”
    Off the side of the highway, I spotted three deer, their luminescent eyes transfixed by my high beams. We sped past them. I thought that at least they were witnesses to our passage.
    “What were you laughing about?” I asked.
    “Ask me later.” Bennet sat back in the passenger’s seat, letting out a deep sigh. It could have been pleasure or the last breath of a dying man.
     
     
    “Can you pull into your garage?” Bennet asked me as we drove up my gravel driveway. “I mean, if we’re going to see this secrecy thing through, we might as well do it right.”
    I almost sneered, but then I remembered Miss Littleneck. She was probably sitting on her front porch, smoking a cigarette and spying on the night. I wasn’t sure if I wanted the neighborhood to know about my tenant, so I opened the garage door and drove in. Bennet and I exited out the back door of the garage and down through the hatch to the cellar. I snapped on the light and immediately Bennet began to inspect my work. I had unpacked and constructed a small red plastic table and chair. These seemed to satisfy him. There was also a futon that I had unfurled.
    “Help me with these,” he said, dragging the table and chair toward the small door of the cage.
    He crawled into the cage, and with a little effort, I passed the furniture in to him.
    He arranged the pieces like a small bedroom. I handed him the clothes and stationery and a few other small items.
    “Pass the crapper,” he then said. I dragged the oval-shaped cylinder to the door, and he strained over it until it was against the back wall of the cage.
    “Now all we need is to put the pump back here and we’re in business,” he said.
    He stood up then and approached me. Looking at him through the diamonds of the cage, I thought not for the first time that the structure might bear more than a resemblance to a prison cell.
    “Have you figured it out yet?” he asked me as if reading my mind.
    “What?”
    Again the silent laugh.
    “What?” I asked again.
    “This is my prison,” he said. “And you are my warden and my guard.”
    “Are you crazy?” The sentence just came out of my mouth. It wasn’t really a question.
    “You like to drink, don’t you, Charles?” he asked. “Why don’t you go up to the house and get us some liquor? I’ll explain to you why I’m not crazy and why this is important for both of us.”
    It was a request bordering on a gentle command. There was no polite answer except to go get a bottle and two glasses. I wanted to be out of his presence for a minute. Anniston Bennet was a man who made you do what he wanted. He seemed reasonable and generous and knowledgeable—not mad. But what he was saying made me want to run.
    I walked away instead. Up toward the house