Firestarter

“They’re all a bunch of junkies, the blacks in this city,” the driver said. “Don’t tell me, I’ll tell you.”

Charlie was going to sleep. Andy took off his corduroy jacket, folded it, and slipped it under her head. He had begun to feel a thin hope. If he could play this right, it might work. Lady Luck had sent him what Andy thought of (with no prejudice at all) as a pushover. He was the sort that seemed the easiest to push, right down the line: he was white (Orientals were the toughest, for some reason); he was quite young (old people were nearly impossible) and of medium intelligence (bright people were the easiest pushes, stupid ones harder, and with the mentally retarded it was impossible).

“I’ve changed my mind,” Andy said. “Take us to Albany, please.”

“Where?” The driver stared at him in the rearview mirror. “Man, I can’t take a fare to Albany, you out of your mind?”

Andy pulled his wallet, which contained a single dollar bill. He thanked God that this was not one of those cabs with a bulletproof partition and no way to contact the driver except through a money slot. Open contact always made it easier to push. He had been unable to figure out if that was a psychological thing or not, and right now it was immaterial.

“I’m going to give you a five-hundred-dollar bill,” Andy said quietly, “to take me and my daughter to Albany. Okay?” “Jeee-sus, mister-“Andy stuck the bill into the cabby’s hand, and as the cabby looked down at it, Andy pushed… and pushed hard. For a terrible second he was afraid it wasn’t going to work, that there was simply nothing left, that he had scraped the bottom of the barrel when he had made the driver see the non existent black man in the checkered cap.

Then the feeling came-as always accompanied by that steel dagger of pain. At the same moment, his stomach seemed to take on weight and his bowels locked in sick, griping agony. He put an unsteady hand to his face and wondered if he was going to throw up… or die. For that one moment he wanted to die, as he always did when he overused it-use it, don’t abuse it, the sign-off slogan of some long ago disc jockey echoing sickly in his mind whatever “it” was. If at that very moment someone had slipped a gun into his hand-

Then he looked sideways at Charlie, Charlie sleeping, Charlie trusting him to get them out of this mess as he had all the others, Charlie confident he would be there when she woke up. Yes, all the messes, except it was all the same mess, the same fucking mess, and all they were doing was ru

The feeling passed… but not the headache. The headache would get worse and worse until it was a smashing weight, sending red pain through his head and neck with every pulsebeat. Bright lights would make his eyes water helplessly and send darts of agony into the flesh just behind his eyes. His sinuses would close and he would have to breathe through his mouth. Drill bits in his temples. Small noises magnified, ordinary noises as loud as jackhammers, loud noises insupportable. The headache would worsen until it felt as if his head were being crushed inside an inquisitor’s lovecap. Then it would even off at that level for six hours, or eight, or, maybe ten. This time he didn’t know. He had never pushed it so far when he was so close to drained. For whatever length of time he was in the grip of the headache, he would be next to helpless. Charlie would have to take care of him. God knew she had done it before… but they had been lucky. How many times could you be lucky?

“Gee, mister, I don’t know-”

Which meant he thought it was law trouble.

“The deal only goes as long as you don’t mention it to my little girl,” Andy said. “The last two weeks She’s been with me. Has to be back with her mother tomorrow morning.”

“Visitation rights,” the cabby said. “I know all about it.”

“You see, I was supposed to fly her up.”

“To Albany? Probably Ozark, am I right?”

“Right. Now, the thing is, I’m scared to death of flying. I know how crazy that sounds, but it’s true. Usually I drive her back up, but this time my ex-wife started in on me, and… I don’t know.” In truth Andy didn’t. He had made up the story on the spur of the moment and now it seemed to be leaded straight down a blind alley. Most of it was pure exhaustion.

“So I drop you at the old Albany airport, and as far as Moms knows, you flew, right?”

“Sure.” His head was thudding.

“Also, as far as Moms knows, you’re no plucka-plucka-plucka, am I four-oh?”

“Yes.” Plucka-plucka-plucka? What was that supposed to mean? The pain was getting bad. “Five hundred bucks to skip a plane ride,” the driver mused. “It’s worth it to me,” Andy said, and gave one last little shove. In a very quiet voice, speaking almost into the cabby’s ear, he added, “And it ought to be worth it to you.” “Listen,” the driver said in a dreamy voice. “I ain’t turning down no five hundred dollars.

Don’t tell me, I’ll tell you.”

“Okay,” Andy said, and settled back. The cab driver was satisfied. He wasn’t wondering about Andy’s half-baked story. He wasn’t wondering what a seven-year old girl was doing visiting her father for two weeks in October with school in. He wasn’t wondering about the fact that neither of them had so much as an overnight bag. He wasn’t worried about anything. He had been pushed.

Now Andy would go ahead-and pay the price.

He put a hand on Charlie’s leg. She was fast asleep. They had been on the go all afternoon-ever since Andy got to her school and pulled her out of her second grade class with some half-remembered excuse… grandmother’s very ill… called home… sorry to have to take her in the middle of the day. And beneath all that a great, swelling relief. How he had dreaded looking into Mrs. Mishkin’s room and seeing Charlie’s seat empty, her books stacked neatly inside her desk. No, Mr. McGee… she went with your friends about two hours ago… they had a note from you… wasn’t that all right? Memories of Vicky coming back, the sudden terror of the empty house that day. His crazy chase after Charlie. Because they had had her once before, oh yes.

But Charlie had been there. How close had it been? Had he beaten them by half an hour? Fifteen minutes? Less? He didn’t like to think about it. He had got them a late lunch at Nathan’s and they had spent the rest of the afternoon just going-Andy could admit to himself now that he had been in a state of blind panic-riding subways, buses, but mostly just walking. And now she was worn out.

He spared her a long, loving look. Her hair was shoulder length, perfect blond, and in her sleep she had a calm beauty. She looked so much like Vicky hat it hurt. He closed his own eyes.

In the front seat, the cab driver looked wonderingly at the five-hundred-dollar bill the guy had handed him. He tucked it away in the special belt pocket where he kept all of his tips. He didn’t think it was strange that this fellow in the back had been walking around New York with a little girl and a five-hundred-dollar bill in his pocket. He didn’t wonder how he was going to square this with his dispatcher. All he thought of was how excited his girlfriend, Glyn, was going to be. Glynis kept tell telling him that driving a taxi was a dismal, unexciting job. Well, wait until she saw his dismal, unexciting five-hundred-dollar bill.

In the back seat, Andy sat with his head back and his eyes closed. The headache was coming, coming, as inexorable as a riderless black horse in a funeral cortege. He could hear the hoof beats of that horse in his temples: thud… thud… thud.

On the run. He and Charlie. He was thirty-four years old and until last year he had been an instructor of English at Harrison State College in Ohio. Harrison was a sleepy little college town. Good old Harrison, the very heart of mid-America. Good old Andrew McGee, fine, upstanding young man. Remember the riddle? Why is a farmer the pillar of his community? Because he’s always outstanding in his field.