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“Where are you?”
“I’m going to be a while longer. I just wanted to tell you I was okay.”
“Oh, Alfred,” she said. “Alfred, please come home.” She was crying.
“I don’t have a home anymore,” I said, and I hung up.
There was somebody else I wanted to call, but it took me a long time to work up the nerve to do it. I got her number from the operator and almost hung up when a guy who sounded like he might be her dad answered the phone. But I didn’t.
“Is Amy there?” I asked.
After what seemed like a couple of years, I heard her twangy voice.
“Who is this?” she asked.
“Me. Alfred. Alfred Kropp.”
“Who?”
“The guy you’re tutoring in math.”
“Oh! The dead-uncle guy,” she said.
“Yeah,” I said. “The dead-uncle guy. Look, I just wanted to say—”
“I knew it wasn’t somebody I know,” she said. “Because you called this number. People I know call me on my cell phone.”
/> “Right,” I said. “Look, the reason I called. I—I don’t think I’ll be at tutoring tomorrow. Or ever. I don’t think I’m coming back.”
There was silence. I said, to break it, “I said I don’t think I’m coming back.”
“I heard you. Look, I know you must be really messed up right now. I know what that’s like. When I was twelve my big brother ran over my dog. I couldn’t get out of bed for a week.”
Why did I think she cared? Why was I thinking anybody cared? My own father hadn’t even cared. I was an accident everybody had to suffer from, like Barry with his sprained wrist.
I said good-bye to Amy Pouchard and started to walk. It was getting dark now, and there were a lot of people about, couples mostly, walking arm in arm, and I watched them as I walked. Something made me turn around at one point and I saw him, the tall guy with the white hair, about half a block down. He was standing by a newspaper rack, pretending to read. I walked to the intersection of Western and Central, turned left, and walked half a block to Ye Olde Coffee House, right next to the old JFG coffee plant.
I went in and ordered a grande with extra cream and sugar, and sat at the long counter against the window, watching the couples pass outside.
Halfway through my grande I saw him sit down at the very end of the bar, next to the bathroom. I picked up my coffee and walked over to sit down next to him.
We drank our coffee in silence for a moment. The end of his nose was red and runny; he had a cold. He pulled out the white handkerchief. It had a design of a horse and rider on it. The rider was a knight carrying a red banner. That clinched it for me.
“How is Mr. Samson?” I asked him.
“Dead.”
I thought about my dream and asked, “When did that happen?”
“Two days ago.”
“Mr. Mogart—he killed him?”
“Do not say that name.” He folded the handkerchief into a perfect square and tucked it back into his breast pocket.
“Who’re you?” I asked.
“Call me Bennacio.”
