The Waste Lands (Page 43)

“That sounds pretty good, actually. These are for . . . uh, for my little brother. It’s his birthday next week.”

Calvin Tower used his thumb to flip his glasses down onto his nose and had a closer look at Jake. “Really? You look like an only child to me. An only child if I ever saw one, enjoying a day of French leave as Mistress May trembles in her green gown just outside the bosky dell of June.” “Come again?”

“Never mind. Spring always puts me in a William Cowper-ish mood. People are weird but interesting, Tex—am I right?”

“I guess so,” Jake said cautiously. He couldn’t decide if he liked this odd man or not.

One of the counter-browsers spun on his stool. He was holding a cup of coffee in one hand and a bartered paperback copy of The Plague in the other. “Quit pulling the kid’s chain and sell him the books, Cal,” he said. “We’ve still got time to finish this game of chess before the end of the world, if you hurry up.” “Hurry is antithetical to my nature,” Cal said, hut he opened Charlie the Choo-Choo and peered at the price pencilled on the flyleaf. “A fairly common book, but this copy’s in unusually fine condition. Little kids usually rack the hell out of the ones they like. I should get twelve dollars for it—” “Goddam thief,” the man who was reading The Plague said, and the other browser laughed. Calvin Tower paid no notice.

“—but I can’t bear to dock you that much on a day like this. Seven bucks and it’s yours. Plus tax, of course. The riddle book you can have for free. Consider it my gift to a boy wise enough to saddle up and light out for the territories on the last real day of spring.”

Jake dug out his wallet and opened it anxiously, afraid he had left the house with only three or four dollars. He was in luck, however. He had a five and three ones. He held the money out to Tower, who folded the bills casually into one pocket and made change out of the other. “Don’t hurry off, Jake. Now that you’re here, come on over to the counter and have a cup of coffee. Your eyes will widen with amazement as I cut Aaron Deepneau’s spavined old Kiev Defense to ribbons.” “Don’t you wish,” said the man who was reading The Plague—Aaron Deepneau, presumably.

“I’d like to, but I can’t. I … there’s someplace I have to be.” “Okay. As long as it’s not back to school.” Jake grinned. “No—not school. That way lies madness.” Tower laughed out loud and flipped his glasses up to the top of his head again. “Not bad! Not bad at all! Maybe the younger generation isn’t going to hell after all, Aaron—what do you think?”

“Oh, they’re going to hell, all right,” Aaron said. “This boy’s just an exception to the rule. Maybe.”

“Don’t mind that cynical old fart,” Calvin Tower said. “Motor on, O Hyperborean Wanderer. I wish I were ten or eleven again, with a beautiful day like this ahead of me.”

“Thanks for the books,” Jake said.

“No problem. That’s what we’re here for. Come on back sometime.” “I’d like to.”

“Well, you know where we are.”

Yes, Jake thought. Now if I only knew where I am.

HE STOPPED JUST OUTSIDE the bookstore and flipped open the riddle book again, this time to page one, where there was a short uncredited introduction. “Riddles are perhaps the oldest of all the games people still play today,” it began. “The gods and goddesses of Greek myth teased each other with riddles, and they were employed as teaching tools in ancient Rome. The Bible contains several good riddles. One of the most famous of these was told by Samson on the day he was married to Delilah:

‘Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness!’ “He asked this riddle of several young men who attended his wedding, confident that they wouldn’t be able to guess the answer. The young men, however,’ got Delilah aside and she whispered the answer to them. Samson was furious, and had the young men put to death for cheating—in the old days, you see, riddles were taken much more seriously than they are today! “By the way, the answer to Samson’s riddle—and all the other rid-dles in this book—can be found in the section at the back. We only ask that you give each puzzler a fair chance before you peek!”

Jake turned to the back of the book, somehow knowing what he would find even before he got there. Beyond the page marked ANSWERS there was nothing but a few torn fragments and the back cover. The section had been ripped out. He stood there for a moment, thinking. Then, on an impulse that didn’t really feel like an impulse at all, Jake walked back inside The Manhattan Restaurant of the Mind.

Calvin Tower looked up from the chessboard. “Change your mind about that cup of coffee, O Hyperborean Wanderer?”

“No. I wanted to ask you if you know the answer to a riddle.” “Fire away,” Tower invited, and moved a pawn. “Samson told it. The strong guy in the Bible? It goes like this—” ” ‘Out of the eater came forth meat,’ ” said Aaron Deepneau, swing-ing around again to look at Jake, ” ‘and out of the strong came forth sweetness.’ That the one?”

“Yeah, it is,” Jake said. “How’d you know—” “Oh, I’ve been around the block a time or two. Listen to this.” He threw his head back and sang in a full, melodious voice: ” ‘Samson and a lion got in attack,

And Samson climbed up on the lion’s back. Well, you’ve read about lion killin men with their paws, But Samson put his hands round the lion’s jaws! He rode that lion ’til the beast fell dead, And the bees made honey in the lion’s head.’” Aaron winked and then laughed at Jake’s surprised expression. “That answer your question, friend?”