Kurtz held her hand in both of his, but all he said was, "Thank you, Pearl." He stepped out of the sweet smells of the new Infiniti and walked through blowing snow to his borrowed Buick.
CHAPTER 29
Using some of the $500 in cash that Arlene had retrieved from the ATMKurtz had promised to pay her back by the end of the monthhe filled the Buick's gas tank for her. He then went into the Texaco convenience store and bought a Bic cigarette lighter, twenty-five feet of clothesline, and four half-liter Cokesthe only drinks which came in glass bottles. Kurtz emptied the Coke and filled the bottles with gasoline, keeping out of sight of the attendant as he did so. He had gone into the restroom, removed his boxer shorts, and torn them into rags. Now he stuffed those rags into the mouths of the gasoline-filled bottles and carefully set the four bottles into the spare-tire niche in the Buick's trunk. He did not have a real plan yet, but he thought that these things might come in handy when and if he visited the Seneca Social Club.
It was definitely colder without underpants.
The snow was trying to become Buffalo's first November snowstorm, but little was sticking to the streets. Kurtz drove down to the Expressway overpass, parked on a side street, and climbed the concrete grade to Pruno's niche. The cold concrete cubicle was empty. Kurtz remembered another place where the old man used to hang out, so he drove to the main switching yard. It was on his way.
Here part of the highway was elevated over twenty rails, and in the slight shelter of the bridge rose a ramshackle city of packing crates, tin roofs, open fires, and a few lanterns. Diesel locomotives growled and clanked in the wide yards a quarter of a mile beyond the squatters' city. What little skyline Buffalo offered rose beyond the railyards. Kurtz walked down the concrete incline and went from shack to shack.
Pruno was playing chess with Soul Dad. Pruno's gaze was unfocusedhe was very high on somethingbut it did not seem to hurt his game. Soul Dad gestured him in. Kurtz had to duck low to get under the two-by-four-girded construction-plastic threshold.
"Joseph," said Soul Dad extending his hand. "It is good to see you again." Kurtz shook the bald black man's
strong hand. Soul Dad was about Pruno's age, but in much better physical shapehe was one of the few homeless whom Kurtz had met who was not an addict or a schizophrenic. Solid, bald, bearded, given to wearing cast-off tweed jackets with a sweater vest over two or three shirts during the winter, Soul Dad had a mellifluous voice, a scholar's wisdom, andKurtz had always thoughtthe saddest eyes on earth.
Pruno looked at him as if Kurtz were an alien life-form that had just teleported into their midst. "Joseph?" The scrawny man looked warmer in the insulated bomber jacket Kurtz had given him. Sophia Farino's gift to the homeless , thought Kurtz, and then smiled when he realized that it had been a gift to the homeless when she'd given it to him.
"Pull up a crate, Joseph," rumbled Soul Dad. "We were just approaching the endgame."
"I'll just watch for a while," said Kurtz.
"Nonsense," said Soul Dad. "This game will go on for another day or so. Would you like some coffee?"
As the older man hunkered over a battered hot-plate in the rear of the shack, Kurtz noticed how powerful Soul Dad's back and shoulders and upper arms were under his thin jacket. Kurtz had no idea where they pirated the electricity for the shack, but the hot-plate worked, and Soul Dad had a refurbished laptop computer in the corner near his sleeping bag. Some form of chaos-driven fractal imageryalmost certainly home-programmedwas acting as a screen saver, adding to the glow of the lantern light in the little space.
Soul Dad and Kurtz sipped coffee while Pruno rocked, closing his eyes occasionally, the better to appreciate some interior light show. Soul Dad asked polite questions about Kurtz's last eleven and a half years, and Kurtz tried to answer with some humor. There must have been some wit in his answers, since Soul Dad's deep laugh was loud enough to bring Pruno out of his reveries.
"Well, to what do we owe the pleasure of this nocturnal visit, Joseph?" Soul Dad asked at last.
Pruno answered for him. "Joseph is tilting against windmills a windmill named Malcolm Kibunte, to be precise."
Soul Dad's thick eyebrows rose. "Malcolm Kibunte is no windmill," he said softly.
"More a murderous sonofabitch," said Kurtz.
Soul Dad nodded. "That and more."
"Satan," said Pruno. "Kibunte is Satan incarnate." Pruno's rheumy eyes tried to focus on Soul Dad. "You're the theologian here. What's the origin of the name 'Satan'? I've forgotten."
"From the Hebrew," said Soul Dad, rooting around in a crate, taking out some bread and fruit. "It means one who opposes, obstructs, or acts as adversary . Thus, 'the Adversary. He moved the chessboard and set some of the food in front of Kurtz. "Take thou also unto thee wheat, and barley, and beans, and lentils, and millet, and fitches, and put them in one vessel, and make thee bread thereof ," he intoned in his resonant growl. "Ezekiel 4:9." He broke the bread in a ceremonial manner and handed a piece to Kurtz.