Potboiler

“Now all of a sudden you’ve got a new book out?”

“They’re going to put it out under my real name.”

Pfefferkorn laughed. “At long last.”

“If it sells more than a dozen copies I’ll be surprised.”

“That’s not why you’re writing it.”

“No.”

“Still, from their end, why bother?” Pfefferkorn said. “What do they get out of it?”

“I suppose it’s their way of rewarding me for thirty years of service.”

“Come on. Even I know they don’t think like that.”

“I don’t have any other explanation.”

Pfefferkorn mused. “Better than a gold watch, I guess.”

“A lot better than being thrown off a boat.”

“That depends,” Pfefferkorn said. “Who’s your publisher?”

Bill smiled.

“Let’s say you did do it,” Pfefferkorn said.

“Do what.”

“Uphold your end of the bargain.”

“Knock it off.”

“Theoretically. Let’s say you did. How would they know?”

“They’d know.”

Pfefferkorn looked at him.

“They’re watching,” Bill said.

“Right now?”

Bill nodded.

“Where are they?”

Bill gestured all around. Everywhere.

“So they’ll also know if you don’t do it,” Pfefferkorn said. “And they’ll know if I run.”

“You have to try.”

“What for? They’ll know. They’ll just come after me again, and sooner or later, no matter how careful I am, they’ll catch me. And in the meantime what happens to you?”

Bill said nothing.

“That’s what I thought,” Pfefferkorn said.

There was a long silence.

“Take it,” Pfefferkorn said.

“What.”

“The deal. Take it.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I’d take it, if I were you.”

“No, you wouldn’t.”

“If you don’t take it, we’re both finished.”

“Not necessarily.”

“They’ll find me. You said it yourself. They always do.”

“Not if you listen to me.”

“No calls.”

“Yes.”

“And no books.”

“Yes.”

Pfefferkorn shook his head. “Impossible.”

“It’s very simple. Don’t buy a phone card. Don’t buy books.”

“And I’m telling you, it’s not simple at all. As long as she’s there, it’s impossible.”

Bill said nothing.

“Don’t be stupid,” Pfefferkorn said. “If not you, it’ll be someone else.”

Bill said nothing.

“It’ll be a stranger. I don’t want that.”

Bill said nothing.

“It may as well be on my terms,” Pfefferkorn said. “It may as well achieve something.”

“Please shut up.”

“What’s more important, that you be the one who does it, or just that I’m out of the picture?”

“I’m not having this conversation.”

“It’s an important distinction,” Pfefferkorn said.

Bill said nothing.

“Well, let’s hope it’s the latter.”

“Shut up.”

“I will. Soon. Remember what you said before? In the shed?”

Bill did not answer.

“You said, ‘It’s a rare writer who knows when to shut up.’ That’s me.”

“For crissake,” Bill said, “it’s not a metaphor for life.”

Pfefferkorn took out the letters he carried on him at all times. The pages had taken on the warmth and curve of his thigh. “This one’s for you,” he said, peeling them apart. “You don’t have to read it now.”

“Art—”

“In fact, I’d prefer if you didn’t. This one’s for my daughter. Promise me she’ll get it.”

Bill did not move to take either letter.

“Promise me,” Pfefferkorn said.

“I’m not promising you anything.”

“You owe me a favor.”

“I don’t owe you a thing,” Bill said.

“The hell you don’t.”

The church bell began to toll. It tolled once.

Pfefferkorn flapped the letters. “Promise me she’ll get it.”

The bell tolled a second and a third time.

“You can’t sit here with me forever,” Pfefferkorn said.

The bell tolled four and five. Pfefferkorn leaned over and tucked the letters in Bill’s breast pocket. He dusted himself off and looked back at the town. The bell tolled six, seven, eight. Pfefferkorn looked at the ocean. The bell tolled nine. He stepped toward the water. He felt Bill’s eyes on him. Ten. He stretched his arms. Eleven. He stretched his legs. The bell tolled twelve and he put one foot in.

“Yankel,” Bill said.

Pfefferkorn advanced against the tide. The bell had stopped ringing but its vibrations could still be felt.

“Get back here.”

The water came up to his knees.

“Art.”

The sky was a high blank header. The horizon was a straight line of type. Pfefferkorn smiled back at his friend and called out above the waves.

“It had better be a damned good book,” he said.

Pfefferkorn embraced the sea.

121.

He swam.

From far behind him came shouts and splashes. Eventually the water gave up its resistance and the splashes fell away and the shouts receded and he was alone, swimming. No one could catch him. He swam out past the bend in the shoreline. His lungs burned. His legs stiffened. He swam on past the fishing boats. He swam on until he saw nothing and nobody and then he stopped. He turned onto his back and floated, unmoored, in the limitless sea, letting the current take him.