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    The Fury: A Novel
    The Fury: A Novel
    The Fury: A Novel
    Ebook454 pages7 hours

    The Fury: A Novel

    By John Farris

    3.5/5

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    Gillian Bellaver's family is one of the wealthiest in the world. Robin Sandza's father Peter is a government assassin. The two teenagers seem to have nothing in common. Yet they are spiritual twins, possessing a horrifying psychic energy that threatens humanity. While dangerous and fanatical men vie for the secrets of their awesome power, Peter Sandza, using all the ruthless skills of his trade, makes a final desperate effort to save them.

    Exploring with extraordinary skill the myths and legends deeply rooted in the subconscious mind, this novel builds, scene by shocking scene, to a night of chilling horror that surpasses anything you've ever experienced . . .

    First published in 1976 and made into a successful movie written by the author and directed by Brian De Palma in 1978, The Fury is one of the all-time classics of the horror genre.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherChicago Review Press
    Release dateOct 1, 2017
    ISBN9781613737774
    Author

    John Farris

    JOHN FARRIS is the 2002 Horror Writers' Association Lifetime Achievement Award winner and the author of numerous New York Times bestsellers including, The Fury, When Michael Calls, Soon She Will Be Gone, and Phantom Nights. He lives near Atlanta, Georgia.

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    Reviews for The Fury

    3.5/5

    60 ratings10 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I enjoyed listening to this audio book while driving across the southwestern desert. It was interesting enough to keep me from falling asleep but light enough so that I could concentrate on my driving.
    • 4/5
      Joe Barrett has a great voice for audiobooks, a bit raspy. The story is a little bit like an early Stephen King story (which is a good thing). A fun thriller with psychic powers and horror elements. This book is from 1976, and the MP3 CD I received says "2017" as its copyright. So, I think this is a newer recording. I recommend it for King fans and fans of horror in general.
    • 2/5
      I had a hard time getting through this. It felt more like I was reading a screenplay than a book. Interesting premise and I actually liked the ending. I suspect I’d like the movie but the book just wasn’t for me.
    • 4/5
      I really hadn't intended on reading this book this year. In fact, I really hadn't intended on reading this book at all. But having seen it at a book sale for a dime, I figured, why not? I remembered having seen the movie and not being terribly impressed by it…the only thing of note being that some scenes were filmed at Old Chicago, the first (so far as I know) combination indoor amusement park and mall. It was so far ahead of its time it even bombed earlier than it should've. But anyway.

      This book came out during what I call The Great Horror Revival. Not that great horror ever went away, but it was Big Steve who brought it back into the center square with the sudden onslaught of "Carrie", "Salem's Lot", and "The Shining". Never mind their quality…consider the timing. They hit so hard and so fast—and rightly so—that suddenly everybody remembered, gee, horror books can be really cool! The films soon followed, and now everybody wanted to get into the act. Clearly the was some coinage to be had.

      Not that John Farris needed it, of course, or was trying to cash in. No, it was just coincidence, I'm sure, that Farris puts out this book about highly talented PSI kids being chased by a couple of (probably) sinister agencies, one private, one governmental. Oh, and the father of one of them. It's all fairly complex and surprisingly engaging, which—perhaps not surprisingly—was the exact problem the film had…it just didn't grab you at all. Oh, there was plenty of action to be had—it is a Brian DePalma film, after all— but not much in the way of personality. So this is yet another case of, read the book, don't bother with the movie. Or, if you want to see the scenes with Old Chicago because you remember it fondly, by all means watch it; if nothing else it does feature the wonderful Carrie Snodgress, taken, alas, too soon.

      Bottom line: this is a helluva entertaining read. I imagine a lot of the "kids with powers" stories that followed probably drew heavily from this one, as well they should. If only they were as original and well-drawn as this! You won't read it in a day, but you'll want to. Resist that temptation! This is a story to savor. Jamski sez check it out.

      Oh. One more thing. When you go looking for this book, you should know that it's got a VERY open ending…meaning that there's sequels out there, and "The Fury" is good enough that you're almost certainly going to want to read them as well, so if you're in a bookstore and happen to find all three, by all means, get them. I can't vouch for the quality of the second two (yet, they're certainly on my list now) but based on the original you can hardly go wrong. Mind you, this doesn't apply in all series (see: "Twilight") but Farris knows his stuff and seems a solid bet.
    • 2/5
      I came of age in the 1970s, a fact that many people trying to figure me out seem to find significant. In terms of popular culture, it was a mixed bag. It is the decade that brought us The Shining, Sophie's Choice, and Ragtime, Coppola’s The Godfather and Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run and Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. On the other hand, it was also the decade of leisure suits, Jonathan Livingston Seagull and the Bee Gees. It was a decade trying to recover from the turbulent times that preceded it, rethinking and reassessing all of the beliefs that it had previously clung to. Psychology became a new religion and The Joy of Sex became the Bible for a new generation. I know I am supposed to be reviewing a reprint of The Fury, originally released in 1976, but this book really is a product of the decade that spawned it, hence the preface. It is a conglomeration of science fiction, horror, political intrigue, and parapsychological thriller with shadowy government agents pursuing two teenagers with psychokinetic abilities, intent on turning them into weapons to use against their enemies. The cast includes a professional government assassin, a hot young psychiatrist, a transvestite, and the quintessential evil genius who uses blackmail to manipulate the powerful into funding and supporting MORG, his super-secret government agency. There is also Gillian and Robin, two teenagers linked throughout history, whose destiny to be twins was thwarted by a prenatal accident. Still, they share a psychic link and powers that they are just beginning to understand. Although the plot seems a bit farfetched now, it should be noted that it was written during the age of Watergate when political skullduggery was the norm and J. Edgar Hoover had files on everyone and used them to make the FBI the powerhouse of law enforcement that it was. There was also a level of gratuitous sexual activity that is unusual today. I found it particularly unsettling in that much of it involved children. Bottom line: A lot of great books were written in the 1970s but The Fury will not be one that stays with me. It lacks originality and its flow is a bit on the clunky side. I also found it to be a bit dated. With references to Annie Green Springs Wine, Johnny Bench and Truman Capote, it makes a better tet for students of pop culture than a thriller. The audio version produced by Tantor Audio was ably narrated by Joe Barret. * The review was based on an advanced reading copy obtained at no cost from the publisher in exchange for an unbiased review. While this does take any ‘not worth what I paid for it’ statements out of my review, it otherwise has no impact on the content of my review.FYI: On a 5-point scale I assign stars based on my assessment of what the book needs in the way of improvements:*5 Stars – Nothing at all. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.*4 Stars – It could stand for a few tweaks here and there but it’s pretty good as it is.*3 Stars – A solid C grade. Some serious rewriting would be needed in order for this book to be considered great or memorable.*2 Stars – This book needs a lot of work. A good start would be to change the plot, the character development, the writing style and the ending. *1 Star – The only thing that would improve this book is a good bonfire.
    • 3/5
      I think this book may have been a really new twist on the horror genre when it was first released. However, since that was over 30 years ago- I don't think it has held up well with the test of time. The thrills and chills that it presents are not organized very well. At times I felt it was difficult to follow because characters were abruptly introduced. In current times- there is always the inevitable "twist" for stories that everyone expects and I fell into the trap for this one when of coarse there wasn't anything I could really consider a twist in the plot.There are a few moments throughout the book that were right on par with what makes a good story but those were too few to consider this a great read. The one last thing that bothered me - was that the storyline itself was a bit lackluster- I just never made a connection with any of the characters. I am giving it three stars because it didn't have a tidy "Hollywood Ending" and that always gets a kudos from me.It wasn't a horrible read but I still wouldn't really recommend unless you are into psychological fiction and have little else on your wish-list to read.
    • 4/5
      good solid book, didn't realize it was a series, now I'll have to look for book 2.It dealt with children who have special mental abilities and a government agency that wants to control them as weapons. Takes place in the 1970's. Enjoyed listening to it. Good audio production.
    • 3/5
      This book was before Carrie and Firestarter, and you can tell King "borrowed" from it. There is a research group much like The Shop, looking for people with psychic abilities and will stop at nothing to recruit them. There is a 29 year woman that seduces a 14 year old boy, and an older man is lusting after a 16 year old girl. So.. yeah. The audio cd stoped at part 15 so I didn't get to finish it, but the narrator sounds like Casey Kasem and has a delightful variety of voices.
    • 3/5
      I grabbed this because I read somewhere that Stephen King had liked it. Strangely, I feel like Mr. King borrowed extremely heavily from here and I'm curious as to why? This book is copyrighted 1976, and "Firestarter", King's book that heavily mirrors this, was printed in 1980! Both had TK talented children, chased by a shadow government, assisted by fathers, and even an Native American assassin! Even that final showdown on the pastoral government complex seem much too similar! Sure, the powers are a little different, and definitely the writing styles, but The Shop and MORG seem like exactly the same bad guys! Aside from that, I wasn't that impressed with this book, but I did finish it, so that's something. And I think Uncle Stevie should keep quiet about it in the future...
    • 4/5
      This book was won in the Early Reviewers giveaway. I had wanted to read this since the early 80s but had never gotten around to it. I won this audio version read by Joe Barrett. This was a good book, starts out interesting and builds on characters. This is the story of two psychic teenagers who have a terrible gift and don't know how to use it and the shadow government operatives who want to try and control it. There are some characters I would have loved to see fleshed out a little more, and some characters that are throw away. I was put off by some of the sex scenes and descriptions that seemed gratuitous and unnecessary. Joe Barrett was a delight with his different voices and accents and characterizations. I would like to hear more from him. Fun to listen to.

    Book preview

    The Fury - John Farris

    One

    Lately many of the girls Gillian went to school with seemed to be going through some sort of morbid crisis or startling personality change. Most had already turned fifteen, with Gillian the laggard in her class; she wouldn’t be fifteen until the fourth of February, half way through the school year. Anne Wardrop, the poor klutz, had suffered a bona fide nervous breakdown precipitated by a really terrifying laughing jag during the Verdi Requiem at St. Bartholomew’s. Gillian shuddered when she heard the details, but Anne had been through three stepfathers and a change of analyst every few months for the past two years, and everybody knew she was bound to come unwrapped. On the other hand, Carol Dommerick, she of the bright blue stare and whispering shyness, had discovered sex and was carrying on a precocious affair with a twenty-three-year-old seminarian at General Theological. After four and a half months of acute anxiety Bo Crutcher’s parents had traced their daughter to Mexico and retrieved her from a hovel by the sea, strung-out, yellow as a pumpkin and full of pinworms: Bo wouldn’t be returning to Bordendale this year. Sue Noyes, who had always cared a great deal about how she looked, now had to be sternly re minded to bathe and use a toothbrush, and she was letting the strong dark hair run wild over her body. Then there was Wendy Van Alexia—horse bum and free spirit—who had taken a running dive into the existentialist philosophers and the more cheerless 19th-century Scandinavian playwrights. Wendy didn’t smile often any more, and Gillian missed that smile.

    Bright girls, rich girls, privileged children of New York, a city that has too much of everything and is hard on tender psyches—was it the pressures of the city itself or the insupportable neuroses of their parents that was getting so many good girls down? Gillian, who had always lived on an indescribably expensive plot of ground known as Sutton Mews, loved city life, and she also knew some pretty disturbed kids who lived in Plandome and Pound Ridge. But it seemed obvious that in the city the process of natural selection was harsher, accelerated.

    Gillian’s father, an amateur anthropologist, had expounded on the lack of ritual, the coming-of-age rites that scarcely exist in an industrial society (except as spontaneous and frequently destructive variations on archetypal forms). In tribal cultures, regardless of the complexity of the environment, it is ritual that provides an orderly and firm sense of transition from adolescence to puberty. There is wonder in it, he said, and dignity, and a sense of fulfillment. One has lived up to the expectations of the group. One is accepted. It was quite a lot for Avery Bellaver to say, even when you got him started on a Favorite Topic.

    "But in the so-called advanced civilizations, where taboo is breaking down and family groups are fragmented, acceptance and approval are concentrated in highly structured peer groups where the rules are constantly changing, dictated by fashion, by the, ah, soul-destroying perversities of our merchandisers. Except in the case of the orthodox religious among us, there are no guidelines for the young. Communication is faulty, expectations blurred. Eccentric standards of maturity are imposed on ten-year-olds by irresponsible media and disenfranchised adults. The demands change so capriciously it doesn’t astonish me to see very young school children standing on street corners with bulging satchels and utter blankness in their eyes, as if they are about to scream. What do they want? What do I do now? There are those few, I suspect, for whom it doesn’t matter, children who have the inherited stamina and self-focusing qualities necessary to survive. For the many the failure to be informed of their status is excruciating. Eventually emotional seams give way and our shamans appear unequal to the task of integrating the frail and the fallen into what is, essentially, a societal madhouse."

    He blinked and was pleased with himself, but then he looked warily at his daughter.

    You’re not cracking up, are you?

    Gillian was so surprised she had to laugh, which hurt his feelings. To make up for it she kissed him lightly and quickly, with a blush of sympathy and love for this aging, lonely man who could be so astute about the human condition and so totally unable to cope with the few demands that life made on him.

    I’m fine, but some of my friends aren’t.

    Oh, yes. So many new faces around here. That delicate and lovely child who trembles sometimes, all over, for no apparent reason. You handle them all well. You’re good to them. You listen.

    Larue was the girl who trembled. She had arrived from California in October, stunned as a refugee, and Gillian immediately took her into protective custody. Larue was dismayed by the snarling city, allergic to every breath of air she took. She was accustomed to a three-hundred-acre ranch near Santa Barbara and blissful Malibu summers.

    Her father was a film director, down on his luck and trying to revive his career with a Broadway musical. As a director he had the instincts of Torquemada, and he wasn’t all that much fun around the house, either. Larue’s mother was an actress who worked regularly in Italian co-productions on far-flung locations, a situation Gillian certainly knew by heart. The move would have been trauma enough for Larue, but the half-brother to whom she was devoted had been killed hang-gliding in the Rocky Mountains that summer. Larue had witnessed his speedy, clipped-wing collision with solid rock; thus the occasional spell of the shakes and the long-lost glaze in her eyes when she thought of him. Gillian wanted to take Larue to Acapulco with the family over Christmas, but for some dim reason Larue’s father hadn’t approved.

    That Monday before Christmas Larue came over to spend the night. The stores were open late and both girls had shopping to do. It was cook’s night off at the Bellavers, so they ate at a Beefsteak Charlie’s on 57th, did Bloomie’s and caught the eight-thirty show at the Trans-Lux. Snow mixed with rain was falling when the movie let out, but it was only a four-block walk to Sutton Mews, which faced the river just south of the Queensboro Bridge. A freighter plowed beneath the bridge in a blaze of running lights, making waves that smelled of the sea. Larue was instantly homesick for the foggy Pacific.

    If you have to live in New York, she said wistfully, this is the place.

    There were three joined, early 19th-century Adam houses on the short stretch of cobbled mews, which had been a Bellaver family enclave since the 1850s. The mews was reached through an arched gateway off Sutton Square, and it was protected by a six-man private police force. Gillian lived in the sunny brick corner house. Twelve ample rooms, a staff of seven, most of them day workers. Next door was Grandmother Min’s house, but for most of the year only the houseman was in residence. The third and largest house belonged to Gillian’s cousin Wade, who like most of the Bellaver men was in the banking and investment business. They toiled in discreet offices and peopled boardrooms across the land, tending the family’s money like so many lettuce ranchers. The family was Anglicized French, its fortune solidly based: land grants in millions of acres dating from the time of James II, the value of the land enhanced a hundredfold by fossil fuels.

    Two years ago, when Gillian’s father had turned up alive and well on one of the Lesser Sunda Islands after being missing for three weeks, Time magazine reported that Avery Bellaver’s personal worth was in the neighborhood of two hundred and seventy million dollars. It was news to Gillian, and not very interesting news; but she was ecstatic to see in print that the least-known member of a mighty clan has made lasting contributions to the science of anthropology. Now there was something to be proud of.

    It turned out to be one of those really great evenings that just fall into place without any planning. After the girls changed into around-the-house clothes—sweaters and old Levi’s with wraps and patches of vinyl tape—Gillian coaxed her father from the depths of his ground-floor library. Avery was self-taught and proficient on piano and bass. Larue played both classical and jazz guitar. Gillian was eclectic: harp, flute and stride piano, which she had picked up from one of the musicians who was a fixture at her mother’s parties. They worked on Fats and Willie the Lion and some contemporary swinging lines until after midnight, then cooled out with an hour of recorded Shearing. The girls went to bed too exhausted to gossip, and were asleep in two minutes.

    And, in the morning when Gillian woke up, her mother was home, which qualified as an event.

    Gillian guessed that she had slept hard, which was a recent problem. Dreamless, muscle-clenching sleep that often left her groggy for minutes after opening her eyes, feeling as played-out as if she’d spent the night climbing mountains. A tepid needle shower usually restored her to the level of brisk efficiency, which mimed her mother’s natural vitality. But this morning she had a dull headache and swollen glands in her neck, and she felt too wan to strip and go through the usual bracing routine. Anyway, there was no school and no pressing business before noon, and Laure was still sound asleep in the other bed, a pillow placed to block the sun. Gillian got up and put on her Indian mocs, drew the drapes together and went to the bathroom.

    Sitting on the John she felt a little dizzy, and the headache wasn’t going away. She seldom needed medicine of any kind, so there was nothing in reserve in her own bathroom. But a couple of painkillers seemed like a good idea. She walked upstairs to her parents’ floor and chewed up four of the orange-flavored baby aspirin which Katharine Bellaver stored behind twenty kinds of natural vitamins.

    Avery had departed early for the Museum of Pan American Culture which he had founded, and which was preparing the definitive exhibit on Toltec mythology. But Gillian heard Katharine thumping around her atelier and went up the winding iron stair to say hello.

    Her mother had come in around 3 A.M. from Washington; it was now a little after seven and here she was in a leotard serenely doing the Plow. Katharine was forty-five, as long-legged as Gillian but not as tall. She was bronze-tan, with auburn hair worn in a full springy cascade of choice curls; on the girlish side but she could still get away with it. Her teeth were so good they looked unused, as if she’d been raised intravenously.

    Gillian coughed glumly and looked around the studio where Katharine worked at her photography. It was one of her favorite rooms in a house she loved: vastly overblown celebrity faces looking back at her from eggshell walls, the pungent darkroom airs, the way the incoming sun joined floor and walls in brilliant geometry. Sitting here, warmed on a winter’s morning, was like sitting in the shallows of an equatorial sea.

    Katharine was a pretty good photo-journalist; originally she got work and magazine space because she was fabulously well-connected, but that was years ago and she had two volumes of photo essays behind her to prove she wasn’t a dilettante. She had an excellent working knowledge of modern art, owned a gallery on Madison and a gallery in the Hamptons that made money, was a partner in a documentary film company and had published two short stories which Truman Capote, the grande dame of American letters, had described as magical.

    Katharine segued from the Plow into something else that looked excruciating, and smiled at Gillian.

    You didn’t get accreditation for the Teheran Conference, Gillian said without thinking, and was sorry. It wasn’t the time for prescience.

    Katharine’s smile turned a little sour.

    "You are uncanny this morning."

    I remember you told me it was going to be a tough nut to crack.

    Oh, well, it isn’t that much of a problem. The Shah will be in Switzerland this weekend. So Duff will mention me to Binnie and Binnie will mention me to his Imperial Majesty and I’ll be in, and screw the goddam protocol. She moved slightly and something popped, causing her to wince in surprise. Do you feel Christmasy yet? I don’t feel very Christmasy this year.

    Gillian’s nose was leaking, so she nuzzled it unobtrusively against the sleeve of her robe, which had to go into the laundry anyway.

    Aren’t you well? Katharine asked.

    I feel okay.

    Your eye is really turning in this morning.

    Thanks for telling me. It was the one thing Gillian hated about herself, the slightly inward left eye that other people found charming and no distraction in a beautiful face. She’d been turning down modeling jobs since she was twelve. Well, so Katharine had scored, and they were even for now. Why it always had to be like this she didn’t know. They certainly liked each other. Probably they loved each other. But they cohabitated badly, really nothing to be done about it. Gillian had too quick a tongue and her mother’s obsessive sense of competition was wearing. Maybe it was something as simple as Katharine’s fear that Gillian knew more about her love life than Gillian could possibly know.

    Want to join me? Rhythmic breathing is the key to——

    Gillian pressed her nose against her sleeve again.

    I’m not dressed.

    Who’s watching?

    Who indeed, but Gillian was just coming into her shape and her style and she had a natural sensitivity about her body, about the last bit of baby fat and the burgeoning breasts with nipples that overwhelmed them like the noses on the faces of baby seals. She excused herself and went back to her own room.

    Larue was waking up with little groans of pleasure. Gillian made room for herself on her bed beside Mr. Rudolph and Sulky Sue the house cats and explored the glands under her jaw with her fingertips. Pressure hurt. She wondered if she was about to come down with something.

    You talk in your sleep, Larue said.

    I do?

    Loud enough to wake me up. It must have been three or four o’clock. It was still dark out, but it wasn’t raining. I could see you in the light from the street. You were sitting up in bed with your eyes wide open. I thought you were talking to me, but when I said something you acted like you didn’t hear. You went right on talking to somebody else. A boy, I think.

    What’d I say?

    I couldn’t catch a lot of it. You asked him if he was happy. You wanted to know—if they were treating him all right. Then you didn’t say anything for a long time. You didn’t move. You just—stared. You started to cry.

    God, how weird! Then what?

    You tried to get out of bed, but you were as uncoordinated as a baby. You said, ‘No, no, don’t let them do that!’ Then I guess the dream was over. You just collapsed and rolled over and pulled the covers up around your head. I had to go to the bathroom, and when I came back you were totally zonked. Do you know what you were dreaming about?

    I never remember my dreams.

    I don’t either, just the bad ones. Larue yawned. What are we going to do today?

    Well, I have flute at one, and after that—we could go ice skating?

    Okay, Larue said.

    Two

    The Trailways bus from Newark left Peter Sandza in Atlantic City at a quarter past six in the morning. He had an hour’s wait for the feeder-line bus that would take him on down to Royal Beach. The snack bar in the bus terminal wasn’t open yet, so he walked three blocks, bucking the gritty salt wind off the Atlantic, and had coffee and buttered toast in the coffee shop of a hotel that looked, as most of the city looked by winter light, long-dead and archaeological.

    Several rugged old men were bragging about their morning plunge into the frigid breakers. Tanya Tucker on the radio. I believe the South is gonna rise again. Breakfast cost Peter forty cents, so he was down to a little more than three dollars. He had his return ticket already. The coffee made his stomach hurt, a warning which he had managed to ignore for quite a while.

    Palmistry."

    There was also part of a poster in a display case, the glass shattered by storm or vandals. You’ve read about his fantastic powers! Now let Raym ie tell you wh re holds!!

    Eight thirty-seven. Peter drank milk this time, in a place on the main drag where the two waitresses were dying of boredom. Peter’s waitress had pink hair and freckles turning dark as soot on her aging mug.

    Kind of a quiet place.

    Oh, listen, it’s gory death in the winter! It’ll be death in the summer too if the Army engineers can’t do something about the beach. Worse here than it is down around Cape May. One more good blow will do the trick. Having anything to eat? The jelly doughnuts are fresh this morning.

    No, thanks.

    First time in Royal Beach?

    I came down hoping to find someone. But I guess he’s long gone.

    If he’s got good sense he is. You used to have to walk almost two hundred yards to get to the water. I’m not lying! That beach was as neat as a pin when I was a little girl, not all gobbed up with tar from the tankers. When the oceans go, what happens to mankind? That’s the question we should be asking ourselves. Personal friend?

    Excuse me?

    The one you said you were looking for.

    He’s someone I heard about. His name is Raymond Dunwoodie.

    The waitress looked a little more closely at him.

    "Oh, yeh. People still do come looking for Raymond. ‘Psychic miracle worker.’ I wouldn’t have figured you were the type to fall for that old wheeze."

    Just curiosity. I thought there might be a piece in it. I’m a freelance writer.

    She seemed to look too long at the frayed collar of his shirt.

    Had any success at it?

    Peter smiled, inviting sympathy.

    Not lately.

    Well—I don’t think there’s much to Raymond. Gypsy fortune-tellers are dime a dozen in the resorts. Raymond was just selling the same old snake oil. A little more successful at it than most. But those investigators called his bluff——

    What investigators?

    Oh, you know, the kind of people who are always poking around in haunted houses and exposing mediums—they got interested in Raymond when the newspapers started writing him up. Four, maybe five years ago. So Raymond went up to New York or Boston or someplace and they tested him with all kinds of machines. Sure enough, he was just a big blow-hard. A fraud. Came dragging back into town a few months later. He’d taken to drink. His mother tried to get him back on the straight and narrow, but the sheriff locked him up one night after they found him naked in a cow pasture screaming about mind-taps and government conspiracies and I don’t know what. They had to send him up to Ancora for a spell.

    Ancora?

    State hospital. The funny farm.

    Is he there now?

    Oh, no, he calmed down and they let him go. I guess two summers ago he was back on the boardwalk reading palms, but he fell off the wagon again. He’s been on and off ever since. For all I know he’s out at his mother’s place right now…. Hey, Hannah, when’s the last time you saw Ray Dunwoodie?

    Shee, who keeps up with that kook?

    Where does his mother live? Peter asked.

    Out the Bellbrook road. Ground floor’s a bridal shop.

    Can I walk it?

    It’s maybe two miles, two and a quarter. You look like you’ve got stout legs.

    Peter left one of his remaining dollars on the counter.

    Jingle bells.

    Have a merry, the waitress said, beaming at the buck.

    For most of the way the Bellbrook road went parallel to the sound and was lined with dink cottages, boathouses, grocery stores and bait shops with old flies in the empty windows, a marina or two. It all looked tediously temporary, sandfilled, a neglected encampment. Civilization had moved on, and found something a little better. Gulls coasted above an inland dump that burned slow and soured the air.

    When he saw the police car coming toward him Peter suffered a deadly moment of paranoia, cold as the point of a knife at his temple. But he kept walking briskly along, and when the car was near enough he smiled and waved. The officer didn’t wave back; nor did he look Peter over too closely.

    Near where the road ended in the tufted dunes he found the house, a vast salt-cured Victorian, its four stories affording enough elevation for a glimpse eastward of the sea, scintillating, blue as Old Glory. Behind the house the sound formed an inlet ringed by willows thrown together by strong winds, entangled like old mops. Peter walked up a shell drive. Someone wearing a curiously old-fashioned white dress was standing in a parlor window watching him, or so he thought, but when he was nearer the porch he saw that it was a mannequin in a satin-finish wedding gown. Otherwise Mrs. Dunwoodie didn’t advertise her business.

    A woman with a bulbous nose and pins in her mouth answered the bell.

    We’ve been sewing day and night, but it won’t be ready a minute before four-thirty. I thought that was understood. Four-thirty’s the best we can do.

    Mrs. Dunwoodie?

    No. Aren’t you Carolyn Oberdeck’s brother-in-law?

    No.

    What do you want then?

    It’s about Raymond.

    She stared at him, mouth pursed around the pins, then opened the glass storm door.

    "Good God. It’s not like we haven’t been expecting something, but it would have to come on this day of days."

    She took a piece of cardboard from a pocket of her denim apron and began transferring the pins from her mouth to the cardboard, not trying to talk again until she finished. The house was overheated. The long center hall was furnished with two rubber plants. Peter heard a sewing machine somewhere back beyond the stairs.

    I hope you don’t have the wrong idea about who I——

    If it’s bad you better tell me first. I’m the strong one in the family. The least little bit of added tension, and Essie will have a blowout.

    The woman had two or three pairs of glasses in another pocket. She tried on one pair, couldn’t make him out at all and switched to the proper lenses. She frowned at his seediness.

    What was it? she said sharply. Burnt himself up in bed, hey? Or was it one of those packs of ghetto kids, kicked him to death in an alley.

    Mrs.——

    Edge. Roberta P. Edge.

    "Mrs. Edge, I don’t have any news about Raymond, good or bad. I don’t even know him. I’m just trying to find him."

    Good God. Why didn’t you say so? We’re very busy here. We don’t have time for——

    If you could just tell me where I might find——

    Why? she demanded, hands on hips.

    Mrs. Edge, if I could only talk to Raymond’s mother——

    Well, you can’t. She can’t be bothered. She don’t need the added heartache, mister.

    Mrs. Edge, I know a little about what Raymond’s been through. I know why he drinks and I know that the stories he told, stories that got him locked up in a mental institution, are probably true. I believe in Raymond’s powers. I have to find him, talk to him. I need his help.

    She was shaking her head, but deep down she wasn’t tough enough to show him the door.

    Raymond’s long past being of use to anyone, including himself. And that’s the truth.

    But he’s not to blame.

    "I know he isn’t. She listened fiercely to the sewing machine, and fidgeted. You didn’t give your name."

    Peter.

    Peter? That it?

    If you don’t mind.

    "Somehow you’ve got that look. Oh, I’m not talking about the way you’re dressed. Don’t mean a thing, it’s the eyes and the style, how you just keep boring away quiet as you please until you’ve got what you’re after. We’ve had ‘em here, back when they were still interested in Raymond, still keeping watch. And you could be one of ‘em, and maybe it’s some kind of—trap for Raymond, some kind of trouble he’s in we don’t know about. What if I told you right now to get out of here and not ever bother us again?"

    I’d go quietly, Mrs. Edge. I don’t want to cause trouble. I can’t afford any.

    Maybe, she said, maybe—you could be of help to us while you’re he’pin’ yourself. She jerked her head toward the room behind her. Let’s sit in the parlor. Keep your voice down so Essie won’t hear when she stops sewing, and wander out. We have to finish that Oberdeck gown today. We need the cash, mister.

    There were two other gowned mannequins in the six-sided parlor. A plaque on a dusty desk with the legend Complete wedding service. Several dog-eared catalogues. Peter took off his trench coat, noting that in a matter of days one of his elbows would be through the sleeve. Mrs. Edge excused herself and was gone five minutes, long enough to worry him. He kept an eye on the drive for that police car he’d seen earlier. The sewing machine worked at random stitchings.

    When she came back she had tea and a plate of cookies and a Polaroid snapshot with her.

    This was taken the Fourth of July at the Neptune’s Revels Community Barbecue. Here’s Essie and here’s Raymond. You can see how he was off the booze for a while and started to balloon up again.

    Peter studied the fat young man. He knew Raymond was just twenty-six, but he looked middle aged. High round forehead, hair long at the ears, a chipmunky grin. But there was woe beneath the brows and his hands were joined in the manner of someone accustomed to sudden fits of anxiety.

    Mrs. Edge, I know it doesn’t make things any better, but there have been a lot of Raymonds.

    You know that much about it, do you?

    I know enough.

    She drew her own conclusions about his reticence and lightly touched the back of his hand.

    Maybe your stomach’s in knots right now, but those are molasses and date-nut cookies. You take a handful with you when you go, they’re nourishing.

    Where do I look?

    He’s in New York City, or was. That’s the last we heard from him.

    She showed Peter a postcard: the Statue of Liberty. The card was dated shortly after Labor Day. He couldn’t read a word of the brief message. Only the signature was legible.

    Essie and me studied it together and finally made it out, Mrs. Edge said. He was staying at a hotel called the San Marino. But that was September. He probably moved on.

    Down south?

    No. He doesn’t migrate with the other—bums. For reasons of his own he wants to stay close to that place where they half killed him. I think they pay him, why I don’t know. He’s hoping that a miracle will happen, that he’ll get it back. All of his powers.

    How good was he?

    Give Ray some kind of object—ball-point pen, a handkerchief—and if he never laid eyes on the person that owned it he could reel off a life history. I’m telling you, on his good days he was eerie. He could make the rest of the human race feel obsolete. But it was just a natural part of his life. He wanted to be liked, to be needed and help people. But Raymond wasn’t some kind of plaster saint. He has his bad habits and his weaknesses, and they’ve brought him down as we know. There might be one other place you could locate him.

    Where’s that?

    Central Park. Especially sunny days in winter. He liked to sit in the sun and watch the skaters.

    I’ll do my best to find him. And if I do——

    Her red-rimmed seamstress’s eyes filled with tears.

    Tell him it’s not the drinking that bothers us. We can put up with that. It’s not knowing where he is or what’s happening to him. That’s what kills us.

    The sewing machine was silent. Roberta! Mrs. Dunwoodie called. "I need a little help if you’re not too busy."

    Mrs. Edge stood up, hastily wrapping cookies in a napkin for Peter.

    Shhh, I guess you’d better go. I don’t want to stir up any hope in Essie. It’s too cruel.

    Peter let himself silently out of the house while Mrs. Edge went back to the sewing room. As he walked down the drive he had to squint to keep the sun from blinding him. It was beautiful here, and it would be beautiful in New York. Fifty-five degrees and not too windy, a day to bring out all the pale city dwellers, perhaps even those who thought they didn’t have all that much to live for any more.

    With a little luck in making connections, he could be in Central Park by three o’clock.

    Three

    Gillian didn’t believe in pampering herself, and she didn’t want to ruin things for Larue, so for most of the day she rationalized her worsening symptoms, which included the swollen throat, aching joints and a slowly simmering fever that dulled her perceptions and made her session with Tynan Wells a catastrophe. If you were serious about the flute and could endure his temper then you took flute from Tynan Wells. But he had dismissed students forever for better readings than Gillian was able to provide on this occasion.

    After a quarter of an hour he expressed his displeasure by leaping up from the piano bench, snatching the score from the stand in front of her (it was his own Sonatina for flute and piano, based on an Emily Dickinson song), ripping the score into numerous pieces and scattering them across the Persian carpet. Following that he stood for five minutes at the windows, glowering, his lower lip stuck out, while Gillian sighed inaudibly and chewed her fingernails.

    "If you are ever to be any good, you must learn the things that are not printed on the score. You have superb technique for one your age, but I’m not looking for polish right now. I could scarcely be less concerned if you are rushed, if you miscalculate notes, if you breathe abominably; but you must never be timid. It is a joyous ostinato! Reveal yourself to me, Gillian. Don’t bore me with mechanical repetition."

    Gillian smiled bravely, but the overpowering sweetness of the roses blooming on the baby grand finally got to her. She excused herself, ran to the powder room and threw up.

    When she came out Tynan was waiting for her; he put a cool hand on her forehead.

    I didn’t realize you were ill. Better go home.

    I’ll be all right, Gillian said, but she didn’t feel any better for having heaved, just emptier.

    Larue was in the library listening on headphones to Alicia de Larrocha. They made their escape and at the corner of 86th Street caught a Fifth Avenue bus going downtown.

    Larue said, All that dark, brooding fury; wow. Is he a good musician?

    Probably the best American flutist, and one of the three best in the world.

    He wants you.

    Does he?

    Can’t you tell?

    No.

    He’ll go all to pieces one of these days, you watch. He’ll fall on his knees in front of you, clutching at your skirt and begging for your love.

    Sooner or later they all do, Gillian said, getting the giggles.

    Would you if he asked?

    I don’t know, do you suppose he’s that hairy all over?

    Larue whooped and leaned closer.

    Speaking of admirers, that bum back there can’t take his eyes off you.

    After a few moments Gillian glanced casually at the back of the bus. The bum had the bench seat to himself. He was sitting squarely in the middle. The hair that grew around his ears and clung to the back of his skull hung shoulder-length and shiny as snakes. For the moment his bald head was nodding as the bus jolted over a stretch of rough pavement. He knees were spread and his hands clutched the cord handle of the tattered Bergdorf shopping bag he’d found in a trash can somewhere. His pants were hiked up to mid-calf and his skin was dead white, which made the small sore on one shin all the more distasteful. All of his clothing looked too big for him, as if he’d suffered a drastic weight loss recently.

    Pathetic, Gillian thought routinely, and at that he looked up quickly, catching her unawares.

    He had one cloudy drunkard’s eye and one dazzling blue eye that shocked her, held her attention. He smiled strangely at Gillian, a fawning, worshiping smile, yet there was nothing lustful about it. He hitched forward slightly in his seat as if he meant to rise and approach her, and still she couldn’t look away. She was caught unawares again, but this time by something she felt rather than saw; it was like being bowled over by a strong cold wave on a beach.

    Gillian jerked her head around and trembled so strongly Larue was aware of it. Larue looked at her, puzzled.

    What’s the matter?

    The damn bus fumes, Gillian explained. There were nearing 68th Street. Could we get off and walk the rest of the way?

    Sure, Larue said.

    The bum got up too, making haste behind them. The bus doors closed on him before he could step down, and he howled in outrage. The doors reopened and the bus discharged him with a flatulent sound.

    Don’t look now, but—— Larue said, taking Gillian’s arm.

    We’ve got a buddy.

    "Do you want to

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