The Corpse Without a Country Read Online Free PDF Page A

faculty, he wrote poetry. This he took to the Pad, where the local beatniks had their headquarters, and he recited his work to his admirers, at the same time accompanying himself on the dulcimer.
    I said, “I’m sorry.”
    We had reached the ninth floor. The elevator hesitated and then decided to make the plunge and continued on down. I noticed that with each creaking minute, Emily’s complexion had grown muddier. Her eyes began to take on a glazed look, and the pulse in her throat started to jerk like a hooked salmon.
    Suddenly she gave a convulsive gulp, reached over my shoulder, and snapped off the light switch. The elevator went as dark as the inside of a ship’s hold. Her breath had a chugging quality as it went past my ear.
    She said out of the darkness, “Elevators make me schizoid. This is the worst one I’ve ever known. If I can’t see I’m moving, it isn’t quite so bad.”
    I could feel her shoulder against mine. I moved aside to give her neurosis a little maneuvering space. But she moved with me. The back of the cage pressed into my hip. There was no place for me to go. I said in desperation, “What kind of poetry does this Trillian write?”
    “Divine,” she whispered. Her breath was faintly beer-flavored. “Simply divine.” And still whispering, she said, “The quick, sweeping frond/slashes the ugly maw/the bitter blood pouring/upward into waiting nostrils.”
    She sighed.
    I swallowed.
    I wished the damned elevator would stop trying to die at every floor. By counting each major hesitation, I figured we were no farther down than six by now.
    She said, “It’s very pure.”
    “Very,” I agreed.
    She was touching me again, but not with her shoulder this time. She said, “The dark is so frightening.”
    I said, “Relax, Miss Calvin. We’ll be down soon.”
    “Tom calls me Emily,” she said. Her hand located mine and held on. Her palm was damp. The chugging quality of her breathing thickened. “One night, we were in here and the elevator stuck.”
    I said brightly, “You couldn’t be marooned with a nicer guy than Tom.”
    Her anatomy pinned me a little tighter to the wall. “He is nice,” she said, “but so … immature. I like older men, men I can look up to.”
    Her grip on my hand tightened. Somewhere in her past she must have cracked bones for a living. She had fingers like steel clamps. I said, “Well, they say women grow up faster than men.”
    It was an effort to start a conversation. But Emily was through talking. She concentrated on leaning. I shifted but I only made a few inches of gain. She had me surrounded. She said in a faint, husky whisper, “It helps so when I’m not alone.”
    I thought, “One more clank to go and we’ll have it made.”
    The damned elevator gave a convulsive belch and stopped. I had a sudden desire to kick out the wall behind me and skin down the cables.
    The door opened and light came in from the hallway. One of the cleaning women stared in. She giggled. Emily moved away and I got out of there. But she still had her grip on my hand, and she came too.
    I said, “This is the second floor. Let’s walk the rest of the way.”
    The cleaning woman giggled again. I dragged Emily toward the stairs. By the time we reached them, I was running. I didn’t care what Emily might think. All I wanted was the freedom of the open air.

V
    I GOT A SHOCK . By the time I had Emily in my middle-aged heap and got myself beneath the wheel, she had become the formal secretary again. She sat well on her side, almost against the door, folded her hands in her lap firmly, and looked straight ahead.
    I started the motor and waited until the bearings stopped clattering before pulling away from the curb. “Just where is this Pad?”
    “South along the waterfront,” she said. By her tone of voice we might have been strangers.
    I drove down Salmon Way to Front Street and turned south along the docks. Most of the big piers were dark and deserted. A few had ships tied up. Out