Jerry turned off the radio. He was awake now, by God! He wondered if he’d ever dare to sleep now. No matter how hard the CIA guys had tried to bury it, word about the Glomar Explorer was out. Word about Humpty Dumpty, too. Jack Anderson didn’t believe that; he was a thoroughly rational man, rooted in the world as he knew it.

  Outer space? Flying saucers? Aliens in suspended animation? That was crazy stuff, nothing else but. It was to sensible people like Jack Anderson, anyhow.

  What did you do, though, when the crazy stuff turned real? Jerry’s dad had had to deal with that after the United States dropped A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. People took A-bombs and even H-bombs for granted now, but in 1945 they would have seemed straight out of science fiction. And in 1945 science fiction had been way more disreputable than it was now.

  Who’d tipped Anderson off? What would happen to him now, and to his informant? Those were fascinating questions, weren’t they? So was another one that occurred to Jerry. What happens if they think I talked with Anderson? Whatever happened, it wouldn’t be good.

  He wanted to get up and pull back the curtains so he could see if anybody was sneaking around outside. Being a rational man himself, he could see that that wouldn’t help, even if someone was. After a moment, he did it anyhow. Hadn’t he just reminded himself that rationality was overrated?

  If an assassin was out there, Jerry gave him a perfect shot. He didn’t see anybody, and no one fired at him. Logic said nobody was there. How much you listened to logic …

  He let the curtains fall back into place. Nothing would happen right this minute. Maybe nothing would happen at all. He could still hope nothing would. He could hope not, yeah, but he couldn’t make himself believe it anymore. The CIA might not murder someone for talking to a reporter about the K-129. For talking about Humpty Dumpty? That was a whole different business.

  He hadn’t told Jack Anderson about Humpty Dumpty, of course. But, while he knew that, the CIA didn’t. Termination with extreme prejudice. He’d signed on the dotted line. If they condemned him, he had no appeal.

  The condemned man went back to the table and finished grading finals. What were you supposed to do when the world came to pieces around you? You tried to make things as normal as you could.

  Just this side of two in the morning, he put the last exam on the finished pile. He set down the red pen and rubbed his eyes. Then he got to his feet to go to the bathroom and brush his teeth before trying to sleep. He was tired. Sleepy? Sleepy was a different story.

  Full of piss and catnip, the King of Siam intercepted him in the hallway. Why was the human up at such a funny time? Why else but to play with a Siamese? Jerry played a little, halfheartedly, then did what he needed to do.

  Anna snored softly in the dark bedroom. Jerry slid into bed without waking her. That was good; she wouldn’t grumble in the morning. He lay on his back, staring up at the cottage-cheese ceiling he couldn’t really see. After a while, sleep ambushed him the way the imaginary hit man hadn’t.

  * * *

  “I thought you’d sleep late instead of getting up with me,” Anna said, as they ate breakfast together.

  “Yeah, well…” He shrugged. “I’m awake. I’m moving. I’ll turn in my grades, then come home. If I need a nap, I’ll take a nap.”

  “You can do that.” His wife sounded somewhere between jealous and resentful. Even when she got the chance, she couldn’t nap for hell, not unless she was really sick.

  He kissed her hard before they both headed out the door. He didn’t want to let her go. A quickie right then would have been wonderful. He thought so, anyway. She plainly didn’t. He made sure the door was locked before they went down the stairs.

  “See you tonight,” she said.

  “Love you, hon,” he answered. Her car was under the building, his out on the street. He looked back at her once before she got to the stairway down to the parked cars. She didn’t look at him. She was already thinking about the work ahead, or else just running on automatic pilot.

  Up to campus he went, and walked into the department offices as they were opening. When he turned in his grade sheet, the department chair’s administrative assistant exclaimed, “Good Lord! Did you sleep at all last night?” (The department chair herself wasn’t here yet, of course, and probably wouldn’t be for another couple of hours.)

  “Little bit,” Jerry answered, shrugging.

  “Well, you can enjoy the break now, anyway,” the AA said.

  “Thanks, Marcia. See you next quarter.” Jerry didn’t stick around. He’d done what he had to do. Now he could go back to the apartment and do nothing for a while.

  The southbound drive was slow. Because he’d gone up so early, he was still in the middle of rush hour on the way down. As he had driving to UCLA, he listened to KNX in hopes of hearing more about what Jack Anderson had had to say.

  Naturally, the news station talked about everything else. And then, when Jerry was almost down to the airport and thinking about sliding over so he could get off the freeway at El Segundo, the newsman said, “RAND Corporation executive Stephen H. Dole was shot and killed outside his Santa Monica home last night a little past eight. Police are investigating the crime as a botched robbery—the killer, perhaps alarmed at the sound of the gunshot, fled without taking anything of value from the victim. No description of a suspect is available.”

  “Oh, sweet fucking Jesus Christ!” Jerry said. He hadn’t wanted to believe these days would really come. But he also didn’t believe Steve Dole had died in a botched robbery: not for a second, he didn’t. Which meant they were bound to be looking for him, too. They wouldn’t give him a big kiss when they found him, either.

  Which meant … He’d thought about what he might do if these days came. Now he had to try to do it. He feared the odds were stacked against him. He had to try just the same. It wasn’t as if he owed the CIA anything anymore.

  Instead of leaving the San Diego at El Segundo, he kept going till Redondo Beach Boulevard, then headed west instead of east. Twenty minutes later, he pulled into the lot in front of the small skyscraper where Tim worked. He’d had lunch around here with his friend a few times; he knew where visitors’ parking was.

  As with the RAND Corporation, you couldn’t just walk through the halls here. He asked the receptionist, “Would you buzz Tim Ishihara and tell him Jerry’s in the lobby, please?”

  “Hold on for one minute,” she said. After she made the call, she told him, “He’ll be right down.”

  “Thanks,” Jerry said.

  Tim came out of the elevator. Jerry had intended to ask him to go back up and retrieve the manila envelope from the safe where he’d stashed it. He turned out not to need to; his friend already had it. Tim held it out to him, saying, “Here you go, man. You show up at this time of day, I figure you’re gonna want this.”

  “You’re a lifesaver!”

  “Am I? Way it looks to me, chances are I’m messing up your life, not saving it.”

  “No.” Jerry shook his head. “With this, I’ve got a chance to fix things. Without it, I’m dead.” He knew how literally he meant that, too.

  By Tim’s expression he had a fair idea himself. “Luck, buddy,” he said. They shook hands. Jerry wanted to hug him, but didn’t. He hurried out to the parking lot instead.

  He didn’t want to go back to his apartment. He did it anyway. He parked across the street from the building, not underneath. If anyone was waiting, he guessed it would be there. If the hit man was already inside his place, he’d made his last mistake, that was all.

  The only one waiting inside had four legs. The King of Siam must not have expected him—the cat acted glad he’d come in. Jerry rubbed his tummy and scratched him under the chin. Then he threw clothes, a Dopp kit, and the envelope he’d got from Tim into the little suitcase he’d carried onto the Glomar Explorer.

  He had his hand on the doorknob when he hesitated. He needed to tell Anna something. If he disappeared without a trace, what would she do? Call the cops, what else? That was the last thing he wanted now. He grabbed a sheet of paper and wrote in large, looping letters: Family emergency up north. (He had cousins in Tacoma. He couldn’t stand them, but he didn’t think she knew that.) Heading that way. Don’t know when I’ll be in touch. Will call when I can. Some private stuff, so don’t tell anybody. Love you a lot. XOXOXO—Me.

  He stuck the note on the kitchen counter, where she couldn’t miss it. Down the stairs he went, and out. Nobody called to him. Nobody shot at him. He stuck the suitcase in the Rambler’s trunk, then slid behind the wheel. When he turned the key, the car started. With a sigh of relief, he drove north.

  At El Segundo, he turned right. He kept looking in the rearview mirror. As far as he could tell, no one was following him. He took El Segundo east to the Harbor Freeway and got on, heading north.

  XV

  At the four-level interchange, he drove east on the San Bernardino Freeway. He hadn’t gone very far before noticing he was low on gas. He got off the freeway at Atlantic, in East L.A. Boyle Heights, his father would have called it, but nobody much younger than his dad said that. In those days, this part of town had been Jewish and Japanese and Mexican. It was mostly Mexican now.

  Jerry filled the Rambler at a Chevron station, muttering at paying sixty-two cents (well, actually 61.9) a gallon. Next to the station, a barber pole snaked its way to infinity. Eyeing its endless spiral, he had an idea. He didn’t like it, but he didn’t like anything about what he was doing. He asked the man who’d pumped his gas, “Can I park over there at the edge of your lot while I get my hair cut?”

  “Sí, Señor. go ahead,” the fellow answered.

  Two of the three barbers in the shop looked Hispanic, too. The third guy was black, his head shiny and shaved like Yul Brynner’s. Jerry didn’t have to wait; they waved him to the middle chair. “What can I do for you today?” the black man asked.

  “Can you cut my hair just kinda regular, know what I mean?” Jerry said. “I’ve got a job interview tomorrow.”

  “Sure can. Want me to shave your beard, too? Extra three bucks.”

  “Do it.” Jerry knew he sounded bitter and disgusted, the way he should have. He felt bitter and disgusted, too. But if he wasn’t going to be easily recognized from here on out, he couldn’t fool around.

  Forty-five minutes later, the barber waved to the mirror and said, “What do you think?”

  “Christ! I just graduated from high school!” Jerry exclaimed. The black man laughed. Jerry felt his newly naked chin. It seemed smoother than he remembered after shaving himself. The barber’s straight razor was sharp.

  He paid the tab (and it wasn’t Shave and a haircut—five cents, worse luck) and went out to his car. Heading back toward the freeway, he drove past a liquor store. In front of the place sat a dirty white Corvair of about the same vintage as the Rambler. A cardboard sign in the car’s window said FOR SALE—$1000 and gave a phone number.

  “All right!” Jerry said. Driving a car the CIA knew about had been one of his biggest worries. If he was driving something else, though …

  Perhaps not coincidentally, the liquor store had a telephone booth by the door. Jerry drove around the corner. He got out of the car, went to the trunk, and loaded up his wallet as unobtrusively as he could—it was that kind of neighborhood. Then he walked back.

  He stepped into the street and stared at the phone number till he had it memorized. As soon as he did, he fed a dime into the pay phone. It gave him a dial tone, which wasn’t guaranteed. He called the number.

  One ring, two …

  “Hello?” The guy on the other end had an accent, but not a heavy one. Jerry’d gone to school with people who talked the same way.

  “Hi,” he said. “I’m in the phone booth by your Corvair. I’m interested.”

  “Oh, yeah? Okay, I can be there in like fifteen minutes. My name’s Rodolfo. Who’re you?”

  “I’m Jerry.” Jerry wished he’d given a false name, but he hadn’t.

  “Okay, Jerry. See you soon.” The line went dead. Jerry hung up. The phone went click-chunk as it finished swallowing his dime. He went into the liquor store and bought a Coke. Sugar and caffeine would help keep him going.

  Rodolfo showed up on a bike, which he chained to a lamp pole. He was about thirty-five, squat and strong looking, his hair retreating at the temples. After they shook hands, Jerry asked, “How many miles? I couldn’t read the odometer through the side window.”

  “Ninety-two thousand—not quite ninety-three,” Rodolfo said. “Still runs pretty good—you wanna drive it a little, see for yourself?”

  “Yeah.” Jerry tried not to think about Unsafe at Any Speed. If he hadn’t done what he needed to do with the Corvair inside a week, he’d probably wind up dead in some way that had nothing to do with the kind of car he was driving.

  Rodolfo unlocked the door and waved for Jerry to get in. He had to move the seat back before he’d fit; he was six or eight inches taller than the man who wanted to sell. Rodolfo slid in from the curb and handed him the key. Before he started the car, he checked the odometer for himself. It said 92,741.6, so Rodolfo’d told the truth about that, anyway.

  He turned the key. Like a VW Bug, the Corvair kept its engine in the rear. It was still noisy. “Air-cooled, you know,” Rodolfo said. “You don’t gotta worry about the radiator boiling over or nothin’.”

  “I remember that, uh-huh.” Jerry had to look to see where the controls were. He didn’t reach for them automatically, the way he did with his own machine. He released the parking brake, put the Corvair in drive, and pulled out onto Atlantic.

  It drove like … a car. It didn’t have much pickup, but neither did the Rambler. If it broke down on the way, he’d worry about what to do then. “What you think?” Rodolfo asked when he parked in front of the liquor store again.

  “I’ll buy it,” Jerry said.

  “Bueno! I brung the pink slip with me, in case.” Rodolfo pulled it out of his wallet and unfolded it. Then, suddenly cautious, he added, “You got the money?”

  “You bet.” Jerry took out his wallet, too.

  While he counted greenbacks, Rodolfo filled out his half of the change-of-ownership form at the bottom of the pink slip. He said, “Lemme see your license for a minute.”

  Jerry’d expected that. He gave Rodolfo the grand, waited while he counted it, then pulled out two more fifties and said, “You just did.”

  It fazed Rodolfo not a bit. “Like that, huh? Okay, man, you do your half.” He passed Jerry the pink slip and a pen. Jerry named himself Gerald Smeltzer. A California driver’s license carried a letter and seven digits. He turned the M on his license to an N and added one to each number. The address he put down was just as fictitious.

  He separated it from the rest of the document and handed it to Rodolfo, whose last name, he saw, was Jimenez. “You mail it to the DMV,” he said. “I’m gonna be on the road.”

  “Hope it goes good,” Rodolfo said.

  “Me, too,” Jerry answered. “Glad I saw your car.”

  “Your car now. Me, I’m heading home.” Rodolfo snapped his fingers and dug out his key ring. “Almost forgot—here’s your trunk key, too.”

  “Thanks. I wondered if it was the same as the ignition.” Wouldn’t not having it have been fun? Jerry thought.

  Rodolfo unlocked his bike and pedaled away. Jerry drove the Corvair around the corner. He parked behind his Rambler. He had to remind himself the new car’s trunk was in front. He took his suitcase and the cash out of one car and put them in the other. He had a little tool kit with the tire-changing gear. He used a screwdriver to remove the Rambler’s plates and put them in the Corvair’s trunk, too. He also removed the registration from the glove compartment. Then he locked the car again.

  Eventually, somebody would tow the Rambler away. Eventually, in spite of what he’d done, people would figure out it belonged to him. Eventually, the DMV would realize the info on Rodolfo’s change-of-ownership form was bullshit of the purest ray serene. With luck, those eventuallys would come too late to matter. Without luck, he’d be too deceased to care.

  One more thing to do before he hit the road for real. He checked the Corvair’s oil. He was pleased to find it had plenty. The oil on the dipstick even looked clear and clean. So this might work. “It might,” he muttered.

  He got back on the San Bernardino Freeway, heading east.

  * * *

  A lunch stop in San Bernardino. A stop for gas and a long leak in Blythe: he’d had more coffee with lunch. Over the Colorado. Jerry knew he was in Arizona by the saguaros on the far side of the river. He was careful to keep to the double nickel from then on. Arizona cops had an evil reputation for ticketing cars with out-of-state plates doing anything even slightly illegal. He took no chances.

  By the time he got to Phoenix, night was falling. He laughed at himself for thinking of it that way. He’d never cared for the Glen Campbell song.

  He spotted a neon sign on a tall pole so you could see the big red letters from the interstate: MOTEL. That worked for him. He exited and made for it on whatever this cross street was. The clerk gave him a room key and change from the twenty he passed across the counter.

  Half a block farther down the street was a Denny’s that also sported a tall sign. He ate dinner there. It wasn’t great. It wasn’t terrible. It was food. He figured he’d have breakfast there tomorrow, too.

  The room was, well, a room. The walls were thin; he could hear the TV next door through one of them. He hated that, and turned on his room’s TV in self-defense. He took off his shoes, but fell asleep in the rest of his clothes.

  Next thing he knew, it was 5:07 a.m., Phoenix clock radio standard time. His watch said it was an hour earlier. He changed it; he was on mountain time now, not Pacific. Then he tried to sleep some more, tried and failed. He turned off the television and hopped in the shower to help get himself all the way awake. Then, being without shaving cream, he shaved with lather from the bar of motel soap. Life with a beard was much easier.