The Water-Method Man

  Along the riverbank, several cold strollers watched with alarm the giddy flight of this enormous leaking pillow careening into town.

  When we had passed the park, all the streetlights came on and Eddy slowed down, gazing at the row of lamps lit all the way up Clinton Street as if he'd witnessed a miracle. 'Did you see?' he asked, like a child.

  Embedded in his duck Harry hadn't seen anything, but I told Eddy, 'Yes, they all came on at once.'

  Turning to look at me, Eddy choked, opening his mouth, gagging and shouting, 'You've got feathers in your mustache!' Reaching across and grabbing Harry's knee, he shrieked, 'Christ, would you look at his mustache!'

  The duck a near-pulp in his lap, Harry stared at me with hostility before seeming to remember who I was and how I'd got there. Not giving him time to respond with what I feared might be a pawful of feathers crammed down my throat, I turned back to Eddy, and in a small voice, very faint, asked, 'Would you mind letting me out here? This is fine.'

  Eddy slammed on the brakes with a great grinching noise and a jolt that lurched busy Harry head-first into the dash. 'Christ!' he shouted, holding the duck like a bandage against his forehead.

  'Thank you very much,' I said to Eddy, and waited for Harry to slide out of the seat. Sliding after him, I caught a brief vision of my feathered mustache in the rear-view mirror.

  Standing on the running board, Harry offered me the duck. 'Go on, take it,' he begged. 'We got a shitload.'

  'Christ, yes,' Eddy said. 'And better luck next time.'

  'Yeah, fella,' Harry said.

  'Thank you very much,' I said, and not knowing exactly where to hold the sorry duck, I gingerly took it by its rubbery neck. Harry had plucked it quite cleanly, though it seemed to be internally crushed. Only the wing tips and head were still feathered: a lovely wood duck with a multicolored face. There weren't more than three or four pellet wounds in it; the ugliest wound was the naked slit where it had been dressed out. His great feet felt like armchair leather. And there was a dried, see-through bead of blood, like a small dull marble, on the tip of his beak.

  On the curb, along the riverbank sidewalk, I waved to those generous hunters. And heard, just before the slamming of the door. Harry saying, 'Jesus, Eddy, did you smell the cunt on him?'

  'Shit, yes,' said Eddy.

  Then the door slammed, and I was stung with sand spray from the pickup's whining tires.

  All down Clinton Street, the dust of their leaving rises and billows under the hoods of the streetlights, while across the river, on the bank that looks like an Army barracks - stacked with the war-built Quonset huts, now called Married Student Housing - two neighborly wives snap their sheets off a shared clothesline.

  Slowly, I get my bearings and decide which way home lies. But when I take my first step I totter off the sidewalk and howl. It's my feet, they've thawed. Now I can feel each gash from the underwater barbwire, each shard of corn stubble in my soles. Trying to stand, I feel a pellet-like object under the arch of my right foot; I suspect that it's one of my severed toes, rolling loose in my blood-warm boot. I scream again, provoking mute stares from the two women across the river.

  More people scuttle from the Quonset huts, like bomb survivors; student fathers with books in hand or children riding on their wife-sized hips. Someone from this tribe yells over to me, 'What the hell's the matta, fella?'

  But I can think of nothing that would pinpoint it. Let them guess: A man who's been ravaged by the ravaged duck he holds.

  'What are you screaming for?' cries one Mrs Sheet, veering about on the riverbank like a ship tipped by her sail.

  I search their gathering for the most likely Samaritan. Scanning beyond them, I spot a friend weaving between the Quonset huts on his racing bicycle: Ralph Packer, frequent, illicit visitor to these depressed areas of Married Student Housing. Smooth-pedaling Ralph on his racer, stealthily gliding among the harried wives.

  'Ralph!' I hoot, and see his front wheel wobble, watch him flatten himself over the handlebars and dig for cover, darting out of sight behind a hut. I shriek, Ralph Paaacker!' The racer is propelled like a shot; Ralph runs a slalom course between the clothesline posts. But this time, he looks across the river, trying to identify his would-be assailant; no doubt, he is forever imagining student husbands with dueling pistols. But he sees me! Why, it's just Bogus Trumper, out walking his duck.

  Ralph weaves among the onlookers, haughtily pedaling down to the shore. 'Hello!' he calls. 'What are you doing?'

  'The most awful screaming,' says the woman under sail.

  'Thump-Thump?' Ralph calls.

  But all I can say is 'Ralph!' I detect a witless sort of ecstasy in my voice.

  Ralph balances, back-pedals, then lunges forward, raising his front wheel off the bank and slithering ahead. 'Up, Fang!' he commands. If there's a man who can leave rubber smoldering with a bicycle, it's philandering Ralph Packer.

  The bridge rails cut him up and paste him together, a collage of feet and spokes crossing the river to me. Oh, help is here. I put my weight on one knee, and gently wobble to my feet, but I don't dare take a step. I hold my duck up.

  Staring at the plucked bird and at my feathered mustache, Ralph says, 'Jesus, was it a fair fight? From here it looks like a draw.'

  'Ralph, help,' I say. 'It's my feet.'

  'Your feet?' he says, and rests the racer against the curb. As he tries to steady me someone across the river starts hollering, 'What's the matta with him?'

  'It's his feet!' Ralph shouts, and the crowd stands under the clotheslines, troubled and murmuring.

  'Easy, Ralph,' I tell him, tottering to his bike.

  'This is a very light bicycle,' he tells me. 'Be careful you don't bend the crossbar.'

  I don't see exactly how I can avoid bending it, should it decide to bend, but I perch as weightlessly as possible under the sloped-back handlebars and wedged between Ralph's knees.

  'What do you mean, your feet?' he says, wobbling us down Clinton Street. Some of the married students wave.

  'I stepped on lots of stuff,' I say vaguely.

  Ralph warns me not to dangle my duck so far over the handlebars. 'That bird could snag in my spokes. Thump-Thump ...'

  'Don't take me home,' I say, thinking that I should clean myself up a bit.

  'Benny's?' says Ralph. 'I'll buy you a beer.'

  'I can't wash my feet at Benny's, Ralph.'

  'Well, that's true.'

  Unsteadily, we arrive downtown. It is still light but growing darker; Saturday night begins early here because it's over so soon.

  Shifting my weight on the crossbar, I feel my forgotten condom crinkle. Attempting to adjust myself, I neatly insert my toe between the chain guard and the rear wheel; the pain makes the sky pitch. Lying toppled on the pavement in front of Grafton's Barber Shop, Ralph makes a loud vowel sound. Several sheeted men raise their shaved skulls above the backs of their barber chairs, watching me writhe on the sidewalk as if they were owls - and me, a club-footed mouse.

  Ralph releases unspeakable pressure by removing my boots, then whistles at the multitude of flaklike wounds, boil-sized swellings and punctures caked with mud. He takes charge. Back on the bicycle, he holds my boots, laced together, in his teeth, while I balance myself and the duck on the crossbar, fearful of my bare feet in the terrifying spokes.

  'I can't go home like this Ralph,' I plead.

  'What if that duck has friends?' he asks, my laces slipping through his teeth, causing him to lunge with his mouth as if he meant to eat the boots. 'What if that duck's friends are looking for you?' he grunts, turning up Iowa Avenue.

  'Please, Ralph.'

  But he says, 'I have never imagined feet like yours before. I'm taking you home, baby.' Our timing is perfect. My rotten car is smoking by the curb; Biggie is just back from shopping, and the car is trying to breathe again, throbbing and overheated from its mile-long journey at twenty miles an hour.

  'Slip me into the basement, Ralph,' I whisper. 'There's an old sink in
there. At least I can wash my face ...' I am remembering the scent which the hunters found so gloriously a part of me. And the feathers in my mustache? There's no need for Biggie to think that I plucked this duck with my mouth.

  We totter over the side lawn past my retired neighbor, Mr Fitch, still raking so that the snow will have clean, dead grass to fall on. I wave the duck at him unthinkingly, and the old codger says brightly, 'Ho! I used to do some hunting myself, but I don't get around like I used to ...' He stands like some brittle ice carving, propped on his rake, not at all puzzled by the absence of a gun. In his day they probably used spears.

  Ralph scoops me off by the cellar-door, and though it's quite clear to Mr Fitch that I'm in no condition to walk on my own, he doesn't seem troubled; in his day, no doubt, casualties were to be expected on a rugged duck hunt.

  I am carried into the cellar like a bag of coal, wearing my boots like a yoke on my shoulders, and finding the cool slime of the cellar floor most soothing to my feet. Ralph's ursine head looms through the opening. 'All right, Thump-Thump?' he asks, and I nod. As he closes the flaps quietly, he slips in some last words. 'Thump-Thump, I trust some day you'll tell me about this ...'

  'Sure, Ralph.'

  Then I hear Biggie's voice from the kitchen window. She says, 'Ralph?' and I creep deeper into the cellar.

  'Hi, Big!' says Ralph cheerfully.

  'What are you doing?' There is cold suspicion in her voice. That's my good Biggie, never fraternizing with the likes of lecherous Ralph Packer. Though it's a foolish moment for it, I feel proud of her.

  'Um,' says Ralph.

  'What are you doing in our cellar?' Biggie asks.

  'Well, I wasn't exactly in your cellar, Biggie.'

  I grope blindly towards where I think the cellar sink is, knowing there's little time before I'm discovered, making up whole novels in my mind.

  'Playing a game, Ralph?' says Biggie, more playfully than I like. I can't help thinking. Don't let up on him, Big. Be merciless.

  Ralph laughs unconvincingly just as I step directly on the trap that's always laid for Risky Mouse, the fierce wombat trap, the crusher of small spines. I think it sprung directly on one of those boil-like wounds the barbwire made, because the whole cellar seemed to light up and I could see everything around me for a moment, just as if the light switch by the stairs had gone on. I couldn't stop the scream, because I didn't realize what I'd stepped on until it was at a crescendo. Its forceful volume must have shattered poor Fitch into thousands of tiny ice cubes beside his rake.

  'What was that?' Biggie shouted.

  Ralph, the coward, surrendered instantly. 'Thump-Thump. He's in the basement ...' He added gratuitously, 'It's his feet,' as through the cellar window I saw him sprint across the lawn to his getaway bike.

  Mr Fitch, in a voice miles away, said, 'Good hunting!'

  To Fitch, Biggie said, 'What?'

  'Good hunting!' Fitch repeated, while I wore the mousetrap like a shoe to the sink, opened the rusty faucet and frantically sloshed my face in the dark.

  'Bogus?' Biggie called; she thumped on the kitchen floor above me.

  'Hi! It's just me!' I yelled up to her.

  Then the real light came on, and I could see Biggie's lower half at the top of the stairs; I could also see well enough to remove the mousetrap.

  'Bogus? What's going on?'

  'Stepped in the damn mousetrap,' I muttered.

  Biggie sat down at the top of the stairs, allowing me to look up her skirt. She said, 'But what were you doing down here, anyway?'

  I had already surmised that it was going to get complicated. The answer prepared, I said, 'I didn't want to frighten you with my feet. Thought I'd clean myself up a bit ...'

  She leaned forward, confused, and stared at me. From the bottom step, I tilted the sole of one foot up at her; a dramatic gesture; she squeaked. Then I held up the duck.

  'See the duck, Big?' I said proudly. 'I've been hunting, but it's hell on the feet.'

  Well, that threw her off - that, and the artful way I propelled myself up the stairs on my knees. In the hall, still kneeling, I handed her the duck, which she promptly dropped.

  'Bringing home the dinner,' I said winningly.

  'It looks like someone's already eaten it.'

  'Well, we've got to wash it, Big. Clean it up a bit, then roast it in wine.'

  'Give it brandy,' Biggie said. 'Perhaps we can revive it.'

  Then Colm toddled down the hall and sat next to this oddly feathered surprise. May he remember me as the father with fancy presents of all kinds.

  Colm protested when Biggie slung him over her hip and helped me down the hall to the bathroom.

  'Easy, oh easy, my feet,' I murmured.

  Biggie examined me all over, searching for some specific explanation. In my ear? Under my mustache?

  'You went hunting?' she began again.

  'Yes ... You know, I've never been interested in hunting before ...'

  'That's what I thought,' she said, nodding. 'But you went hunting and you shot a duck?'

  'No, I don't have a gun, Big.'

  'That's what I thought,' she said, pleased enough so far. 'So someone else shot this duck and gave it to you?'

  'Right!' I said. 'But it was hell on the feet. Big. I was retrieving them in the marshes. Didn't want to get my boots wet, but I didn't know there'd be so much stuff on the bottom.'

  'What are boots for?' said Biggie as she started to draw a bath for me. I sat on the toilet, and remembered that I had to go. 'Your pants didn't get wet, either,' she remarked.

  'Well, I took them off too. There were just those guys there, and I couldn't see getting all messed up.'

  Testing the water, Biggie pondered this. Colm crept to the bathroom door and peered down the length of the hall at the peculiar bird.

  Then I had my fly open, and my feet painfully spread to straddle the hopper. I fumbled myself out and commenced to pee, while Biggie stared grimly at my pecker and watched me fill up the condom. Until the pressure and lack of noise was suddenly, awfully, apparent to me and I gazed down to see my growing balloon.

  'And just who went on this little hunting party, Bogus?' Biggie yelled. 'You and Ralph Packer and a pair he picked up?'

  'Scissors!' I screamed. 'For God's sake, Big. Please. This could make an awful mess ...'

  'You shit!' she screamed, and Colm fled down the hall to his friend the peaceful duck.

  I feared Biggie would start stomping on my bleeding feet - as soon as she was logical again - so I struggled out of the bathroom, first on my heels, then more comfortably banging along on my knees, cradling the bulbous rubber in one hand. Colm clutched the duck, determined not to let his charging father take it away.

  As I was only a few feet from the kitchen door, midhall, someone knocked on the front door at the hall's end and called, 'Special Delivery! Special Handling!'

  'Come in!' Biggie screamed from the bathroom.

  The mailman entered, waving a letter. It happened so suddenly that he startled Colm, who shrieked back down the hall, dragging the duck after him. I waddled three more painful knee steps to the kitchen door, still clutching my balloon, and rolled out of sight into the kitchen.

  'Special Delivery! Special Handling!' the mailman announced again flatly - not having been forewarned of the possibility that he might ever be in need of a more appropriate remark.

  I peeked out of the kitchen. Obviously the mailman was pretending to be totally blind. Biggie, now at the end of the hall, appeared to have forgotten that she'd told anyone to enter, and was glowering at the mailman; in her mind, he was in some way connected with my hunting trip.

  Bless his poor brains, the mailman shouted once more, 'Special Delivery! Special Handling!' then dropped the letter in the hall and ran.

  *

  Skidding the duck along in front of him, Colm edged toward the letter. Another surprise! And Biggie, thinking that I too might have escaped, hollered, 'Bogus!'

  'Here, Big,' I said, ducki
ng back into the kitchen. 'Oh, please just tell me where the scissors are.'

  'On a hook under the sink,' she said mechanically, then added, 'I hope you cut the whole thing off.'

  But I didn't. As I snipped in terror over the sink, I saw Colm crawl past the door, shoveling the duck and the letter down the hall.

  'There's a letter, Big,' I said weakly.

  'Special Delivery, Special Handling,' Biggie mumbled, the dullness heavy in her voice.

  I flooded the nasty thing down the drain. In the hall Colm squawked as Biggie took his duck, or the letter. I looked at the bruised toes on one foot and thought, At least it wasn't your neck, Risky Mouse. Now Colm was garbling affectionately, talking to what must have been the duck. I heard Biggie ripping the letter. Without the slightest change in her flat voice, she said, 'It's from your father, the prick ...'

  Oh, where have you gone, Harry Petz? After your splendid attempt, do they keep you in a nailed-down chair? Would you mind, Harry, if I borrowed your track-tested racing seat? Would you think me plagiaristic if I took a turn on your well-oiled casters and had a go at that fourth-floor window and that parking lot below?

  19

  Axelrulf Among the Greths

  THERE IS A moment in Akthelt and Gunnel when the subtle depths of a mother's priorities are probed. Akthelt wishes to take his young son Axelrulf along with him on his newest campaign against the warring Greths. The lad is only six at the time, and Gunnel is distraught that her husband could conceive of such heartlessness. 'Da blott pattebarn!' she exclaims. 'The mere baby!'

  Patiently Akthelt asks her what, precisely, she is afraid of. That Axelrulf will be slain by the Greths? If so, she should remember that the Greths always lose. Or is it that the talk and habits of the soldiers are too coarse for the boy? Because she should at least respect her husband's taste; the boy will be well protected from such excesses. 'Dar ok ikke tu frygte!' ('There is nothing to fear!'), Akthelt insists.

  Shyly, Gunnel confesses what she fears. 'Among the Greths,' she tells him, not looking him in the eye, 'you will take a woman.'