By the light of the moon Read Online Free PDF Page B

fourth, a fifth, counting on repetition to gain
the kid's attention.
    When Shep was in a communicative mood – which was less
often than the frequency of sunrise but not as rare as the periodic
visitation of Halley's comet – he could be so hyperverbal
that you felt as if you were being hosed down with words, and just
listening to him could be exhausting. More reliably, Shep would
pass most of any day without seeming to be aware of Dylan. Like
today. Like here and now. In a puzzle-working passion, all but
oblivious of the motel room, living instead in the shadow of the
Shinto temple half formed on the desk before him, breathing the
freshness of the blossoming cherry trees under a cornflower-blue
Japanese sky, he was half a world removed in just ten feet, too far
away to hear his brother or to see Dylan's red-faced frustration,
his clenched neck muscles, his throbbing temples, his beseeching
eyes.
    They were here together, but each alone.
    The pocketknife waited, point buried in the arm of the chair,
posing as formidable a challenge as the magic sword Excalibur
locked in its sheath of stone. Unfortunately, King Arthur was not
likely to be resurrected and dispatched to Arizona to assist Dylan
with this extraction.
    Unknown stuff currently circulated through his body, and
at any moment sixty points might drop off his IQ, and faceless
killers were coming.
    His travel clock was digital and therefore silent, but he could
hear ticking nonetheless. A treacherous clock, from the sound of
it: counting off the precious seconds in double time.
    Accelerating the pace of resolution, Shep worked the jigsaw
ambidextrously, keeping two pieces in play at all times. His right
hand and his left swooped over and under each other, fluttered
across the pile of loose pieces in the box, flew sparrow-quick to
blue sky or cherry trees, or to unfinished corners of the temple
roof, and back again to the box, as if in a frenzy of
nest-building.
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle,' Shep said.
    Dylan groaned.
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle.'
    If past experience was a reliable guide, Shep would repeat this
bit of nonsense hundreds or even thousands of times, for at least
the next half-hour and perhaps until he fell asleep nearer to dawn
than to midnight.
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle.'
    In less dangerous times – which fortunately included
virtually all of his life to date, until he'd encountered the
lunatic with the syringe – Dylan had occasionally endured
these fits of repetition by playing a rhyming game with whatever
concatenation of meaningless syllables currently obsessed his
brother.
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle.'
    I'd like to eat a noodle , Dylan thought.
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle.'
    And not just one lonely noodle—
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle.'
    But the whole kit and caboodle.
    Bound to a chair, full of stuff, sought by assassins: This was
not the time for rhyme. This was a time for clear thinking. This
was a time for an ingenious plan and effective action. The moment
had come to seize the pocketknife somehow, some way, and to do
amazing, wonderfully clever, knock-your-socks-off things with
it.
    'Doodle-deedle-doodle.'
    Let's bake a noodle strudel.

4
    In his inimitable green and silent way, Fred thanked
Jillian for the plant food that she gave him and for the carefully
measured drink with which she slaked his thirsty roots.
    Secure in his handsome pot, the little guy spread his branches
in the soft glow of the desk lamp. He brought a measure of grace to
a motel room furnished in violently clashing colors that might have
been interpreted as a furious interior designer's loud statement of
rebellion against nature's harmonious palette. In the morning, she
would move him into the bathroom while she showered; he reveled in
the steam.
    'I'm thinking of using a lot more of you in the act,' Jilly
informed him. 'I've cooked up some new bits we can do
together.'
    During her performance, she usually brought Fred onstage for her
final eight minutes, set him on a tall stool, and introduced him