was as though we all knew that there had been a mild poison in the food, which was now taking effect, and we knew as well who the poisoner was, and we all knew that we knew. It was that sort of unease; the sort generated by a family on the brink of divorce or a team of researchers at work on a new type of death ray. I felt the frank encouragement of Jewel’s fingertips on my thigh, pressing me to injure a man who was in some measure eagerly anticipating his injury, but her face, like her husband’s and Monsour’s and Levine’s, and, I imagine, like my own, was uncertain and a little pinched.
Fortunately I had the presence of mind to tell the truth. I told them that as a child I had had a reputation for honesty and probity of which I felt miserably undeserving. I said, shame already beginning to mount in my belly, that one summer evening I had gone barefoot down the sidewalk in our deserted neighborhood, set free from the dinner table earlier than anyone else. I had heard a distant lawnmower, a sprinkler, TV gunfire. I had passed the garage of a friend named Mike, who just that day, I knew, had been given a new toy car; the garage door was raised and I could see a card table on which stood some jars of model paint, a half-constructed model bomber, and the new red Matchbox. For no particular reason at all I grabbed a brush and a jar of silver paint and blotted out the windshield and rear window of the toy, threw it to the ground, stepped on it, and then ran home. The horrible part had been afterward, when I returned to Mike’s house to find all the neighborhood children standing around denying that they had been vandals. “Smith didn’t do it,” Mike’s older brother had said. “That’s for sure, anyway.” That night as I got ready for bed I had discovered two streaks of glitter on the sole of my foot.
“You’re making it up,” said Mehmet Monsour, with a mysterious, Nilotic laugh. “Well done.”
“I didn’t believe it,” said Jewel. She stood up from the table and began to clear the rest of the dishes.
“Neither did I,” said Baldwin, and I suddenly found myself free of his unbearable look of kindness.
“What about me?” said Levine.
“I’m so bored!” said Monsour in a cheery voice, as though announcing his intention to take a brisk postprandial swim. He rose from the table and went back to the television.
I was surprised, as I took my leave of Monsour that evening, when he asked me to attend his next Grand Seminar, at a local ice rink, later in the month—so surprised that I consented. Monsour’s interest in me may have irked Jewel; she stopped calling. I guess she had no more real use for me, if she’d ever had any. She did not attend the seminar, and I haven’t seen her for a long time. At the ice rink, for forty-eight hours during which we imitated various animals, fasted, shrieked, and held our water, I began to learn something of the aboriginal connection between anguish and entertainment. The whole thing was a grueling and silly but nonetheless eye-opening experience, and I guess I have to credit Monsour with whatever success I have since found on the stage and even, if this deal with Lucifex Pictures goes through, on the silver screen. I’ve written a screenplay, as a vehicle for myself, based on the heroic life of Werner Heisenberg. I haven’t completely abandoned physics, you see. Of course I know what everyone says about Hollywood, and sometimes it is a little disheartening to think of making my way in a pit of savage vipers, but I have no reason not to consider myself equal to the task. As for Levine, his dissertation caused an uproar in the field after its second chapter was published in JAM . He dropped right into the tenure track at Caltech, with access to a huge laboratory and a twelve-million-dollar Cray computer, and when I went up to Pasadena the other day he told me, with a note of awe and delight in his voice, that the human race is now only a few years away, by most
Fortunately I had the presence of mind to tell the truth. I told them that as a child I had had a reputation for honesty and probity of which I felt miserably undeserving. I said, shame already beginning to mount in my belly, that one summer evening I had gone barefoot down the sidewalk in our deserted neighborhood, set free from the dinner table earlier than anyone else. I had heard a distant lawnmower, a sprinkler, TV gunfire. I had passed the garage of a friend named Mike, who just that day, I knew, had been given a new toy car; the garage door was raised and I could see a card table on which stood some jars of model paint, a half-constructed model bomber, and the new red Matchbox. For no particular reason at all I grabbed a brush and a jar of silver paint and blotted out the windshield and rear window of the toy, threw it to the ground, stepped on it, and then ran home. The horrible part had been afterward, when I returned to Mike’s house to find all the neighborhood children standing around denying that they had been vandals. “Smith didn’t do it,” Mike’s older brother had said. “That’s for sure, anyway.” That night as I got ready for bed I had discovered two streaks of glitter on the sole of my foot.
“You’re making it up,” said Mehmet Monsour, with a mysterious, Nilotic laugh. “Well done.”
“I didn’t believe it,” said Jewel. She stood up from the table and began to clear the rest of the dishes.
“Neither did I,” said Baldwin, and I suddenly found myself free of his unbearable look of kindness.
“What about me?” said Levine.
“I’m so bored!” said Monsour in a cheery voice, as though announcing his intention to take a brisk postprandial swim. He rose from the table and went back to the television.
I was surprised, as I took my leave of Monsour that evening, when he asked me to attend his next Grand Seminar, at a local ice rink, later in the month—so surprised that I consented. Monsour’s interest in me may have irked Jewel; she stopped calling. I guess she had no more real use for me, if she’d ever had any. She did not attend the seminar, and I haven’t seen her for a long time. At the ice rink, for forty-eight hours during which we imitated various animals, fasted, shrieked, and held our water, I began to learn something of the aboriginal connection between anguish and entertainment. The whole thing was a grueling and silly but nonetheless eye-opening experience, and I guess I have to credit Monsour with whatever success I have since found on the stage and even, if this deal with Lucifex Pictures goes through, on the silver screen. I’ve written a screenplay, as a vehicle for myself, based on the heroic life of Werner Heisenberg. I haven’t completely abandoned physics, you see. Of course I know what everyone says about Hollywood, and sometimes it is a little disheartening to think of making my way in a pit of savage vipers, but I have no reason not to consider myself equal to the task. As for Levine, his dissertation caused an uproar in the field after its second chapter was published in JAM . He dropped right into the tenure track at Caltech, with access to a huge laboratory and a twelve-million-dollar Cray computer, and when I went up to Pasadena the other day he told me, with a note of awe and delight in his voice, that the human race is now only a few years away, by most
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