Drowned Hopes (25 page)

“That money stinks,” Dortmunder said.

“No money
stinks,
Al,” Tom said.

The little white car crept through the night, twin beams of light across the barren land, bouncing and bucking away from Cronley and its lone aching–headed domiciliary.

“No no no,” a second regular said, “that isn’t what I meant.” So he was apparently the one who’d raised the suggestion in the first place. “What I meant is for the aliens to come
here.
”

A third regular frowned at that. “Aliens come here? When?”

“Now,” the second regular told him. “They’re here already.”

The third regular looked around the joint and saw Kelp trying to attract the attention of Rollo the bartender, who was methodically rinsing seven hundred million glasses and was off in a world of his own. The regular frowned at Kelp, who frowned back. The regular returned to his friends. “I don’t see no aliens,” he said.

“Yuppies,” the second regular told him. “Where’d you think they came from? Earth?”

“
Yuppies?
” The third regular was a massive frowner. “How do you figure
that?
”

“I still say,” said the first regular, “it’s for a zoo.”

“You
need
a zoo,” the second regular told him. “Turn yourself in.” To the third regular he said, “It’s the yuppies, all right. Here they are all of a sudden all over the place, every one of them the same. Can actual adult human beings live indefinitely on ice cream and cookies? No. And did you ever see what they
drink?
”

“Foamy stuff,” the third regular said thoughtfully. “And green stuff. And green foamy stuff.”

“Exactly,” the second regular said. “And you notice their shoes?”

The first regular said, dangerously, “Whadaya mean, turn myself in?”

“Not in here,” Rollo said absently. He seemed to look at Kelp, who waved at him, but apparently Rollo’s eyes were not at the moment linked up with his brain; he went on with his glass–rinsing.

Meanwhile, the second regular had ignored the first regular’s interruption, and was saying, “
All
yuppies, male and female, they all wear those same weird shoes. You know why?”

“Fashion,” the third regular said.

“To a
zoo,
you mean?” demanded the first regular. “Turn myself in at a zoo? Is that what you mean?”

“Fashion?” echoed the second regular. “How can it be fashion to wear a
suit
and at the same time these big clunky weird canvas
sneakers?
How does it work out to be fashion for a woman to put on all kindsa makeup, and fix her hair, and put on a
dress
and earrings and stuff around her neck, and then put on those
sneakers?
”

“So what’s your reading on this?” the third regular asked, as the first regular, zoo partisan, stepped slowly and purposefully off his stool and removed his coat.

“Their feet are different,” the second regular explained. “On accounta they’re aliens. Human feet won’t fit into those shoes.”

The first regular took a nineteenth–century pugilistic stance and said, “Put up your dukes.”

“Not in here,” Rollo said calmly, still washing.

“Rollo?” Kelp said, wagging his fingers, but Rollo still wasn’t switched to ordinary reception.

Meantime, the other regulars were gazing upon the pugilist with surprised interest. “And what,” the second regular asked, “is
this
all about?”

“You say it isn’t a zoo,” the pugilist told him, “you got
me
to answer to. You make cracks about
me
and zoos, we’ll see what happens next.”

“Well, wait a minute,” the third regular said. “You got a zoo theory?”

“I have,” the pugilist told him while maintaining his fists–up, wrists–bent, elbows–cocked stance, one foot in front of the other.

“Well, let it fly,” the third regular invited him. “Everybody gets to say their theory.”

“Naturally,” the second regular said. He’d been gazing at those upraised fists with interest but no particular concern.

The pugilist lowered his fists minimally. “Naturally?”

“Rollo,” said Kelp.

“You got an idea that’s better than yuppies,” the second regular told the pugilist, “let’s have it.”

The ex–pugilist lowered his arms. “It is yuppies,” he said. “Only it’s different.”

The other regulars gave him all their attention.

“Okay,” the zoo man said, looking a little self–conscious at being given the respectful hearing he’d been demanding, “the thing is this: you’re right about those new buildings being spaceships.”

“Thank you,” the second regular said with dignity.

“But they’re like roach motels,” the ex–pugilist said. “They
attract
yuppies. Little tiny rooms, loft beds, no moldings; it’s what they like. See, the aliens, they got these zoos all over the universe, all kindsa creatures, but they never had human beings before, because there weren’t any human beings that could live under zoo conditions. But yuppies do it naturally!”

“Rollo!” insisted Kelp.

“So, what,” asked the third regular, “is
your
reading of the situation?”

“Once all the buildings are completely rented out,” the ex–pugilist told them, “they take off, like ant farms, they deliver yuppies all over the universe to all the different zoos.”

“I don’t buy it,” the second regular said. “I still buy mine. The yuppies
are
the aliens. You can tell by their feet.”

“You know, but wait a minute now,” the third regular said. “Botha these theories end at the same place. And I like the place. At the end, the new buildings and all the yuppies are both
gone.
”

With a surprised look, the second regular said, “That’s true, isn’t it?”

“Spaceship buildings,” agreed the ex–pugilist, “fulla yuppies,
gone.
”

This idea was so pleasing to everyone that conversation stopped briefly so they could all contemplate this future world — soon, Lord — when the yuppies and their warrens would all be away in some other corner of the universe.

Kelp took the opportunity of this silence to say, very loudly, “Well, Rollo, looka this! You got a customer here!”

Rollo lifted his head at that, at last, but then he looked past Kelp toward the door, saying, “Well, if it isn’t the beer and salt.”

“No, I’m the —” Kelp started, but was interrupted by a voice saying, “Hey, there, Andy, whadaya say?”

Kelp turned to see Stan Murch, a stocky open–faced guy with carrot–colored hair who’d just come in. Approaching the bar, waving amiably at Rollo, Stan said, “Don’t tell
me
the Williamsburg Bridge is open.”

“I wasn’t,” Kelp said.

Rollo brought a freshly rinsed glass full of beer to Stan, took a saltshaker from the back bar, and plunked it down beside the beer, saying, “The rent is paid now, all right. The beer and salt is here.”

Stan didn’t seem to mind this badinage, if that’s what it was. “A little salt in the beer,” he explained, “gives you the head right back, when it goes flat.”

“Most people,” Rollo told him, “finish their beer
before
it goes flat. Then they have another.”

“I’m a driver,” Stan said. “I gotta watch my intake.”

“Uh–huh,” said Rollo. At long last, he looked at Kelp and said, “The other bourbon’s in back already. I gave him your glass.”

“A nice clean glass, I bet,” Kelp said.

“Uh–huh,” said Rollo.

Stan picked up his beer and his salt, and he and Kelp walked together down the bar, past the regulars, who were now discussing whether the alien yuppies had come to earth
for
tofu or had they brought it with them. Along the way, Stan said, “The Williamsburg Bridge is a
menace.
The reason I’m late, I hadda come to Manhattan
twice.
”

As they went back past the end of the bar and down the hall past the two doors marked with dog silhouettes labeled
POINTERS
and
SETTERS
and past the phone booth with the string dangling from the quarter slot, Kelp said, “Twice? You forget something?”

“I forgot the Williamsburg Bridge,” Stan told him. “I came over the Manhattan Bridge — sensible, right?”

“Sure.”

“Could
not
get north in Manhattan,” Stan said, “not with the mess around the Williamsburg. So I went
south,
over the Brooklyn Bridge back to Brooklyn, took the BQE to the Midtown Tunnel, and that’s how come I’m here at all.”

“Quick thinking,” Kelp said, and opened the green door at the end of the hall.

“It’s what I do,” Stan said. “Drive.”

They went through the doorway together into a small square room with a concrete floor. Beer and liquor cases stacked to the ceiling all around hid the walls, leaving only a small open space in the middle. In that space stood a battered old round table with a stained green felt top. Half a dozen chairs were placed around this table, and the only light came from one bare bulb with a round tin reflector hanging low over the table on a long black wire.

Seated at this table were Dortmunder and Tom and Tiny, who was just saying, “Turns out he was right. His head
was
too wide to fit through the bars. Not all the way through.”

“Hee–hee,” said Tom.

“I wasn’t talking to you,” Tiny said.

Tiny and Tom considered each other. Dortmunder looked over at the doorway with the expression of a man hoping for an urgent phone call to take him away from here. “
There
you guys are,” he said. “You’re late.”

“Don’t ask,” Kelp told him.

“Williamsburg Bridge,” said Stan.

“Well, come on in,” Dortmunder said, “and let’s get to it. Stan Murch, you know Tiny.”

“Sure,” Stan said. “How you doin, Tiny?”

“Keepin fit.”

“And this,” Dortmunder said reluctantly, “is Tom Jimson. He’s the source of the job.”

“Hiya,” Stan said.

“The thirty–thousand–dollar driver,” Tom said, and did his chuckle noise.

Stan looked pleasantly at Dortmunder. “Am I supposed to get that?”

“No.”

“Good.”

Kelp and Stan took chairs at the table, Kelp sitting next to Dortmunder, who had in front of him two glasses — one of them sparkly clean — and a muddy bottle with a label reading
AMSTERDAM LIQUOR STORE BOURBON
— “
OUR OWN BRAND.
” Kelp took the bottle and the clean glass and poured himself a restorative.

Meantime, Stan was saying, “So you’ve got something, huh, John? And you need a driver.”

“This time,” Dortmunder said, “we’re gonna do it right.”

Stan looked alert. “This time?”

“It’s kind of an ongoing story we’ve got here,” Dortmunder told him.

Kelp put his glass down, smacked his lips, and said to Stan, “It’s trains again.”

“Let’s do it from the beginning, okay, Andy?” Dortmunder said.

“Sure,” Kelp said.

Stan sprinkled a little salt into his beer and looked around, expectant.