They began as a rustling. They carried up from the floor, from behind the linoleum and woodgrain, bypa.s.sing the intercom and the doors. They made no announcements. Quiet as always at the beginning, a conversation overheard in a neighboring room, a meeting of the minds. They began as a rustling but soon he heard three of them clearly. The hum of the turbines was in them and the draw of his breathing and the clatter of the undulating train. His name was not spoken. Each time was different of course, like turning on a radio, but there was no trace of the old familiarity. Instead there was sadness and also a kind of impatience. The end of the world was not discussed, never once made mention of. And yet the voices had no other subject.

Now therefore was the time to make things happen. "Get Up and Get Courtin'" by Jelly Roll Morton. He pulled open the door at the end of the car and stepped out into the hot rush of the tunnel. The shocked air beat against his face and ears. Not long now, Lowboy thought, and the thought helped to calm him. Not much longer now until it happens. Get on up. Get on up. Get on up and get courtin'. When he pulled the next door open he found Emily waiting there with the conductor.

"There you are," said Emily. She looked happy to see him. "I guess we're not supposed to be on this train." you are," said Emily. She looked happy to see him. "I guess we're not supposed to be on this train."

"I guess you're right," said Lowboy.

The conductor was a mediumsized man with two tiny Band-Aids above his right eye. His skin was a deathly shade of grayish pink and the Band-Aids were the same color exactly. Did he do that on purpose, Lowboy wondered. Could he possibly have had them custom-made.

The voices expressed no opinion.

"Why are you on my train?" said the conductor. He was looking at Lowboy with his left eye only. His right eye was looking at Emily.

Lowboy shrugged and hummed the Oscar Mayer theme.

"What's that?"

"n.o.body told me that this was your train."

The conductor grinned. "You thought it was your own d.a.m.n train, I guess."

Lowboy didn't answer.

"Sit down a minute, son. Not next to your girlfriend. Over here." He patted the seat next to him the way the Sikh had done a hundred years before. He wasn't the police or a transit guard either but his uniform was a beautiful midnight blue. It had folds and creases like any other garment but none of its folds or creases cast a shadow. Why was that.

Lowboy nodded and sat down. Next to no time was left. The conductor was sitting spread out on the bench and their elbows and their knees were almost touching.

"You're not supposed to be on this train," said the conductor. "But you knew that already."

Lowboy frowned and made himself as thin as possible.

"City Hall was the last stop," said the conductor, breathing wetly through his open mouth. He blinked and wheezed and clicked his teeth together.

"Where are we going now?" said Emily.

"You're not going no place," said the conductor.

"I mean, like, what's the next stop?"

"City Hall."

"But you said City Hall was the last last stop. Didn't you?" stop. Didn't you?"

The conductor looked at her with both eyes now. "That's what I said."

Emily sat back and sighed. "I guess we really aren't aren't going no place." going no place."

Lowboy laughed and the conductor let out a kind of groan and grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. There was a song by Bootsie White called "Mashed Tapatoes" and for some reason it came into his mind.

"I'm going to hit you," Lowboy shouted. "I'm going to mash your face like a tapato."

"Try it," said the conductor. Emily had been laughing too but now she stopped and stared at both of them. Then she laughed again. The conductor let Lowboy loose and wiped his hands with great dignity on his midnight blue pants and sat looking straight ahead of him at nothing. The train bucked hard to the left and then righted itself and eased into the station with a sound like a dog going to sleep. The same station of course but in reverse. Emily winked at him behind the conductor's back. "Through the looking gla.s.s," she said under her breath.

The conductor got up and pressed his knees together. "You kids get off of this d.a.m.n train," he said. The doors shivered open and they got to their feet and stepped contritely out onto the platform. The conductor stayed where he was with the knuckles of his fist against his forehead. The doormusic sounded and the doors came together and still he made no movement whatsoever.

"I guess we hurt his feelings," Emily said.

"He's a ghost," Lowboy whispered. "He's made out of fiberoptics. I reached into his mouth and shut him off."

She took him by the shoulders then and spun him around to face her. She twirled him in her hands like a baton. "Listen to me, h.e.l.ler. You're beautiful and you make me laugh and I want you to take me to that place that we just saw, but you need to stop saying things like that. They creep me out, okay? And you're not creepy." She nodded at him until he nodded back. "That's right," she said. "You're sweet. You're sweet and you're a genius and you look really good with no clothes on. So shut up about ghosts and fiberoptics." She smiled at him. "I mean it, h.e.l.ler. You should never be allowed to put on pants."

"At school sometimes I wasn't," he said. "At school sometimes they put me in a smock."

"A smock? What for?"

"I don't think you want to know that, Emily."

He thought she'd laugh at that but she kept quiet. "It might make you feel good to tell me," she said. "It might make a little room inside your head."

He brought a hand up wonderingly to his skull.

"That's right, h.e.l.ler. You've got it. Right in there."

"How do you know what I look like with no clothes on?"

"Come on, loony. Let's get going." She took five quick steps and turned back like a duelist. "Come on already! I thought you said we didn't have much time."

I never said that, thought Lowboy. Not out loud. But he caught up with her and followed her to the end of the platform. A monitor hung there above an overflowing Dumpster and Emily looked up at it and waved her arms. Its screen was chipped and dust-covered and sheeplike figures moved across it dumbly.

"What are those things?" said Lowboy.

"People." She waved her arms again but nothing happened. "People behind us."

They stood under the monitor and waited. Two of the sheeplike figures drifted closer.

"You're right," said Emily. "They really do."

"Do what?"

"They look as though they're sharing the same face."

Again he had no memory of having spoken. Between the tunnel and the platform was a waist-high aluminum gate, the kind that parents put at the tops of stairs for safety. The mouth of the tunnel smelled sweetly of p.i.s.s. Abandon All Hope Ye. He nodded to Emily and pulled the gate open. Ye Who Enter Here, he said to himself. The voices agreed. The hinges were black with grease and made no sound.

Once they'd pa.s.sed the gate the voices got ambitious. Still a room away but closer now, more plaintive, tapping on the brittle wall between. If he whistled or hummed they dimmed but only slightly. Talking was better. What is there to talk about, he asked himself. There's got to be something. Emily was barely moving now, both hands against the wall, cursing herself in steady mouselike hisses. What was there to say that wouldn't scare her. The seam was wide enough to walk along, not too rough or too slippery, with man-catches every six to seven steps. He couldn't help but think of the last time, of Heather Covington moving effortlessly through the dark, shuffling ahead of him in her Saranwrapped feet. Reaching back to pull him stumbling after. Little baby, she'd said to him. Little dollar bill. Emily had stopped moving altogether and the next 6 train was coming. He tried to step past her but she put out a hand and caught him by the shirt. f.u.c.king Jesus, h.e.l.ler, don't you rush me. Tell me something. Tell me a story. He looked at her and touched her face and wondered. All right, Emily, he said finally. Here it is. They went forward together, tottering like some half-a.s.sembled thing, and he told her what had happened at the school. He couldn't believe that he was telling her and neither could she. Even the voices held their breath and listened.

They put me in a kind of bedroom Emily. Someone else was in it. They took my clothes and my Benson & Hedges 100's and my box of colored pencils and my wallet with the picture of you inside it and they put me in a room with rubber beds. Somebody was wrapped up in a blanket. Who is that I said. They told me to shut up. Big beautiful brownskinned nurses who blew kisses at you while they kicked your a.s.s. What kind of school is this I said. What kind of study. It's summerschool William they said. Take a look outside! I went to the window and saw high cottony clouds and yellow leaves and my own face and sailboats on the river. I saw everything I was supposed to see. I see everything I said to them. That's right sweetheart they said. We can see for miles up here we way up high. The name of this establishment means Pretty View in Spanish. Lucky boy. They blew a kiss at me and shut the door. I don't want to be up high I whispered. I don't want to see everything. I can't. But they were already gone off down the hall.

The person in the blanket never saw me. He stayed wrapped up wheezing and chewing on his lips and shouting to the nurses to let him out of bed to eat their p.u.s.s.ies. Once a day they came into the room in twos and threes and rolled him into the next bed and wiped the rubber sheet down with a sponge. As soon as they touched him he went quiet and sat there showing off his dripping lips and sighing. He had a soft woman's body and he slept bare a.s.sed in his blanket and they dressed him in a smock and called him Baby. When they gave him a fresh blanket he'd smile and laugh at them and p.i.s.s himself. And they'd smile back and take off the smock and bunch it up and wipe his body with it and go outside and shut the door behind them. Someone told me he used to be a policeman.

I tried drawing pictures of you when they let me have a pencil but by then I had forgotten how you looked. Don't laugh Emily. Reading was a problem the meds made it hard and also certain words were not as they appeared. Light for example was Girl and Kick was House but Kick was also Bed. Up was Down and Hot was Cold et cetera. The clocks were in degrees instead of hours. I told time from the ice on the East River. I wrote you a letter when they let me have paper in fact I wrote you seven in a row. Do you remember? But they told me you'd already moved away. Also they told me you were thirty eight years old.

Around that time the Temperature Games got started. I was watching the Summer Olympics. A doctor I'd never seen before took me out on a date they told me his last name was Fleisig and his first name was called End Of Days. He took me into a room Emily and taught me a lesson. The room was exactly like the TV lounge without the TV. No boardgames either. There was a table in the middle with a sort of couch built into it and he asked me respectfully to sit or lie down across it and then he put degrees into my body. I know he did Emily I could feel it and also I could see it on the clocks. First just a few but then dozens and then sixty whole degrees in Celsius. Why in Celsius Emily? It was interesting.

How have you been feeling Will? he asked me. I'm fine Doctor but right now I feel just a little hot. Well what do we have you taking now he said. Let's see. Itching powder Doctor I mean Geodon. I see he said. And would you say that's working for you buddy? I suppose so Doctor but right now I feel very hot actually I can't breathe. Well all right then Will I'll tell you what we'll do. Hot flashes are a known side effect of Geodon but I could prescribe some Risperidone for you in addition if you'd like. Risperidone has been known to help matters though it brings with it the slight possibility of obesity which would be a shame as you are such a handsome fellow. What do you say amigo?

Who? I said. You of course said Fleisig. You are the amigo. William Henry h.e.l.ler Esq. Would you like me to modify your regimen? Is that something you might like? I shut my eyes and mouth I didn't answer. Beyond that there's not much I can do he said. The whole world's getting hotter so they say. I opened my eyes and looked at him. The whole world's getting what? Nothing he said he cleared his throat he took the degrees back out he wrote me a Risperidone scrip on a creamcolored ticket. Let's see how this feels amigo mio. Then he called the nurses to come and take me but it was too late by then the miracle had already happened.

The world was in my body and my body was hidden deep inside the world. In its guts Emily. It was the most interesting thing. I could feel it getting hotter even on the coldest days the windows fogging up from the degrees. The miracle was that I could do something actually. The miracle was that I had got this calling. Baby sat up and watched it all happen he couldn't s.h.i.t himself without directions but I could still get up and go down to the TV lounge. I wasn't like Baby that is to say I wasn't like him yet. Now listen up Emily I'll tell you a cla.s.sified secret. The window above the toilet wasn't locked. It was too small to crawl through but there was a ledge outside and sometimes in the winter there was snow. When the feeling came on of Too Many Degrees I'd put s...o...b..a.l.l.s in my hands to make it colder. Like the little steel b.a.l.l.s they sell in Chinatown do you remember? And it did get colder Emily. This past January was The Coldest In Recent Memory I'm quoting from the New York Daily News Daily News.

In October someone started to call me Lowboy. A very sick man with a soft way of talking he used to make believe that he was healthy. You know what a lowboy is? he said. He never looked at me he talked in a sad fancy voice. You ever heard of one? I told him I hadn't and he nodded and made a sad face. A lowboy is a kind of a low chest of drawers he said. Often though not always with cabriole legs. A lowboy is similar to the bottom of a highboy. It is squatter and flatter however. I didn't say anything and after a while he forgot I was there and he started to spit at the nurses. When I saw him the next day I asked him why he called me Lowboy. He stopped and thought it over for a while. A lowboy is a useless thing he said. Not so a highboy.

Then one day the nurses all came in together and the bright lights came on. I pressed my face into the rubber sheets. Baby sat up and held his hands out for the smock but they walked right past him. No one smiled no one whistled. Tsk they said when they got to my bed. Tsk tsk tsk.

Where are you going! Baby said. Look at me. Look at Baby. Pus was running down his cheeks onto the blanket. No one looked. They slid me out of bed like the drawer out of a dresser and put me in my b.u.t.tondown shirt and corduroys. They brushed my hair and cleaned my face for me. They tied my shoes and pinched my cheeks to make them look warmblooded. They tucked in my shirt. Goodbye Baby I said. Take care of my honeys for me. They all laughed. You not leaving us yet Will. They someone to see you. Who is it? I said. They shook their heads all together. Ask me no questions, Robert P. Red-ford. But me no buts.

She was sitting in the visitors' lounge with the TV on behind her. She was smoking a Newport with three yellow fingers. Alive With Pleasure. Her hair was longer than it should have been. I wondered was she visiting or staying. You need a haircut I told her. She laughed. I knew you'd say that. Sit down Will. I stared at her. Aren't you happy I came? she said. Aren't you glad to see me?

You told me this was going to be a school I said. A school Violet.

She shook her head then. You were very sick Will. Terribly sick. You know that yourself. She smiled. But we can talk now if you want. Dr. Fleisig says you're very nearly better. I looked around the room for cameras. Dr. Fleisig says. That's right she said. I smiled back at her I gave her my best face. What do you think Violet. Do you think I'm better. I'm not a doctor Will she said. You look. Well. You look like. She stopped talking. What's that? I said. What do I look like Violet? She took her eyes away from me and turned her head. She looked down at the table. Dr. Fleisig puts degrees in me I told her. In my body. She said nothing. Why did you come here I said. She moved her hand to where the ashtray was. Half a cigarette was in it and she picked it up and smoothed it out and looked around for matches. She couldn't find a matchbook anywhere.

Can't you please sit down Will? Just for a minute? Du hast mir so Du hast mir so gefehlt gefehlt- Don't talk to me in that language I informed her. That language doesn't exist. Take me out of here Miss h.e.l.ler you know what it's like yourself sign the papers please and write them out a check. I haven't told on you yet. I haven't. She closed her eyes then. The alternative to this is prison Will. Prison. Is that what you want? I nodded my head Yes. I was in prison once she said. Did you know that? Of course you did. I told you all about it. Do you remember any of the things I told you?

The TV changed colors behind her. I know you can hear me she said. Kindly give me an answer. I remember what you were in prison for I said. I remember that Mom. Do you want me to tell them? She was watching me now. She pushed her lips together. I don't think you want to do that Will she said. If you do that they might not let you come home.

I'll tell you something Violet I shouted. Go get f.u.c.ked. You put me in here. You signed all the papers. Skull & Bones told me that and I saw it in a movie in the lounge. Go to h.e.l.l Violet. No don't cry. Your face is falling off did you know that? Your face is falling off Miss h.e.l.ler. My father is coming to see me tomorrow not some rotten-faced b.i.t.c.h and we're going to watch the Underwater Movies. Not you Miss h.e.l.ler you aren't invited. You're drying up. I never came out of you your face is coming off your bones your body and your spirit are diseased. You disgust me Miss h.e.l.ler. You're a dried out crust of a something you're a museum exhibit you're a dead Egyptian mummy of a cat. Your guts are buried somewhere in a jar. I can't have you here I can't look at you kindly get out of this room. Don't say that to me Will she said. Don't say that. Thanks for coming Violet I shouted. Don't worry about me I have got ideas. Good luck to you Miss h.e.l.ler. I pray to G.o.d every day that you'll get well.

Not long after that the flat time started. It got hotter and hotter I couldn't sit up I couldn't get my body out of bed. Every day the world got flatter like a pancake or a candle on the dashboard of a car. Everything in the world was made of paper. I woke up one night with paper in my mouth and paper stretched across the room and light blue paper on me like a dress. The nurses came in I looked at them I pointed with my finger at my mouth. That's not paper sweetheart they said to me that's medicine. You eat it. I pointed at Baby's bed they said That's not paper Will that's a divider for reasons of privacy. Don't you like privacy? Baby was dying but they didn't tell me that. I pointed at my dress they said That's paper all right sucker that's a bright blue disposable paper smock.

That's how I found out what was going to happen next. I was going to be the new Baby. I liked the old Baby all right but that morning I got elected because the inc.u.mbent was deceased and I lay down comfortably in his bed. I knew how to be Baby I'd had most of the year to practice. Are you listening Emily?

Are you there?

Say something Emily. Say the next thing I say. You had to be the new Baby Will that's just terrible. That's terrible Will I love you very much.

After that the school spread out flatter and wider it was probably the widest thing on earth. The ceiling came and brushed against my face it wasn't painful but it was difficult to watch. Things kept on moving. The nurses for example. But how did they keep from sliding into each other Emily how did they keep from tearing themselves up. I had creases in my body I was afraid to touch water my stomach was full of confetti. People TVs gurneys sliding around like microbes in a dish. The big white microscope with the big blue eye behind it. Are you still listening Emily I saw one doctor Dr. d.i.c.k-worth they called him or was that a joke he was ripped across the middle like a postcard. Dr. c.o.c.ksnot I said to him if you're looking for your bottom half it went under the bed. No I prefer not to accept my meds at this time there's no room in my neck and my stomach is full of confetti. I mean to say Yes thank you very much for these delicious caplets. Indebted you Dr. Franks & Beans may I please have another. Paper pills paper medledgers paper scrips. My bed like an envelope with a letter inside it a love letter sprinkled lightly with perfume. Eau de Bedpan someone called it. I could have mailed myself to you Emily but you'd have returned me to sender. No? If no then another question did you read the letter carefully did you give it your complete attention Emily did you understand it. Have you noticed about the tunnel it's a funny thing it's the one and the only The Tunnel Of Love. Did you understand my letter Emily are you listening at all. I hear you listening I hear you breathing I don't have to ask are you flat or dried up or alive. I'm in love Emily! Could you help me a little. Could you help me by taking your clothes off and spreading your legs.

I'm sorry I did that," said Violet. They'd been riding in silence for a half-dozen blocks and she couldn't have stood it for an instant longer. If he'd been angry at her she'd have minded it less: he'd been angry before. But there was nothing resentful or sullen about his reluctance to look at her or to speak. He's frightened of me, she thought with a kind of sick wonder. He's asking himself what I might do next. She put her hand on his shoulder and apologized again.

"I'm sorry, Detective. I really thought those two girls-"

"No need to say anything, Miss h.e.l.ler." The gentleness in his voice surprised her. "I wish you'd stood back when you spotted them and let me do my job, but you were excited. I can understand that."

She watched him for a time before she spoke. "I wasn't sure you'd catch them. You seemed hurt."

"You're right. I wasn't steady on my feet." A car pulled out in front of them and he tapped the brake. "Not to mention that I'd lost them once already."

She didn't know what to say to that so she kept quiet. The sick feeling was gradually receding. He hadn't looked at her yet but that would come.

"How are you feeling now, Detective? Any better?"

"Much better, Miss h.e.l.ler. Thanks for asking."

"You're sure about that? You won't pa.s.s out and drive us off a pier?"

He smiled. "Not on your life. I love this car too much."

"And you're not angry with me?"

"I'm driving you to your apartment, aren't I?"

She blushed at that but he was looking past her. "Maybe you shouldn't, Detective. Maybe you should keep on-"

"I've got people in the stations, I've put the traffic police on notice, I've got a bulletin out with both of the children's descriptions. There's not much else I can do, to be honest, until the next sighting comes in." He smiled again, this time seemingly to himself. "Believe it or not, driving around aimlessly takes up a lot of my day."

"Driving hysterical mothers around aimlessly, you mean."

"You're not hysterical, Miss h.e.l.ler." He squinted calmly at the car in front of them. "Not anymore, at least. And we're not driving around aimlessly. I'm taking you home."

The rush of grat.i.tude she felt was so strong that she was tempted to take his hand from the wheel and kiss it. I have to do something, she thought, breathing in stutters like a twelve-year-old girl. I have to do something with this feeling.

"There's something else," she said before she could stop herself. "It's about Will."

He looked at her now. "What is it?"

She fussed with her seatbelt to buy herself time. "I didn't tell you earlier because I didn't think-" She hesitated. "I didn't think you'd try to understand me."

She felt the car lose momentum as he watched her. "I'm trying to understand you now, Miss h.e.l.ler."

It took her most of the next block to decide where to start. "Now that Will's with Emily-now that she's run off with him, I mean- I want to tell you about his ideas on the subject."

The car slowed even further. "What subject is that?"

Already she found that she could barely answer. "The subject of girls."

"Of s.e.x, you mean."

"I'm not so sure that you could call it that." She cleared her throat. "Will never cared about girls-not the way most boys do. Not as far as I could tell. He didn't seem to think of them as different." Why am I so inarticulate, she thought. Why am I so prudish.

"Different how?" said Lateef.

"He could see the differences between people, like any other child-he could see that you and I aren't alike, for example-" She hesitated again, afraid to give offense, but Lateef only nodded. "He could see that much, but he didn't seem to be able to put people into groups. He just saw the people themselves, I mean. The individual people. Does that make any sense?"

"I suppose so," Lateef said. He sounded uncertain.