Smoke and Mirrors

He edged away; lay there in the dark, trying to remember how to sleep, hunting through alternatives in his mind. It was so hot, so stuffy. When they’d lived in Ealing he’d fallen asleep instantly, he was certain.

There was a sharp scream from the garden. Janice stirred and rolled away from him. It had sounded almost human. Foxes can sound like small children in pain—Regan had heard this long ago. Or perhaps it was a cat. Or a night bird of some kind.

Something had died, anyway, in the night. Of that there was no doubt at all.

The next morning one of the traps had been sprung, although when Regan opened it carefully, it proved to be empty. The chocolate bait had been nibbled. He opened the door to the trap once more and replaced it by the wall.

Janice was crying to herself in the lounge. Regan stood beside her; she reached out her hand, and he held it tightly. Her fingers were cold. She was still wearing her nightgown, and she had put on no makeup.

Later she made a phone call.

A package arrived for Regan shortly before noon by Federal Express, containing a dozen floppy disks, each filled with numbers for him to inspect and sort and classify.

He worked at the computer until six, sitting in front of a small metal fan that whirred and rattled and moved the hot air around.

He turned on the radio that evening while he cooked.

“. . . what my book tells everyone. What the liberals don’t want us to know.” The voice was high, nervous, arrogant.

“Yeah. Some of it was, well kinda hard to believe.” The host was encouraging: a deep radio voice, reassuring and easy on the ears.

“Of course it’s hard to believe. It runs against everything they want you to believe. The liberals and the how-mo-sexuals in the media, they don’t let you know the truth.”

“Well, we all know that, friend. We’ll be right back after this song.”

It was a country and western song. Regan kept the radio tuned to the local National Public Radio station; sometimes they broadcast the BBC World Service News. Someone must have retuned it, he supposed, although he couldn’t imagine who.

He took a sharp knife and cut through the chicken breast with care, parting the pink flesh, slicing it into strips all ready to stir-fry, listening to the song.

Somebody’s heart was broken; somebody no longer cared. The song ended. There was a commercial for beer. Then the men began to talk again.

“Thing is, nobody believes it at first. But I got the documents. I got the photographs. You read my book. You’ll see. It’s the unholy alliance, and I do mean unholy, between the so-called pro-choice lobby, the medical community, and how-mo-sexuals. The how-mos need these murders because that’s where they get the little children they use to experiment with to find a cure for AIDS.

“I mean, those liberals talk about Nazi atrocities, but nothing those Nazis did comes in even close to what they’re doing, even as we speak. They take these human fetuses and they graft them onto little mice to create these human–mouse hybrid creatures for their experiments. Then they inject them with AIDS . . .”

Regan found himself thinking of Mengele’s wall of strung eyeballs. Blue eyes and brown eyes and hazel . . .

“Shit!” He’d sliced into his thumb. He pushed it into his mouth, bit down on it to stop the bleeding, ran into the bathroom, and began to hunt for a Band-Aid.

“Remember, I’ll need to be out of the house by ten tomorrow.” Janice was standing behind him. He looked at her blue eyes in the bathroom mirror. She looked calm.

“Fine.” He pulled the Band-Aid onto his thumb, hiding and binding the wound, and turned to face her.

“I saw a cat in the garden today,” she said. “A big gray one. Maybe it’s a stray.”

“Maybe.”

“Did you think any more about getting a pet?”

“Not really. It’d just be something else to worry about. I thought we agreed: no pets.”

She shrugged.

They went back into the kitchen. He poured oil into the frying pan and lit the gas. He dropped the strips of pink flesh into the pan and watched them shrink and discolor and change.

Janice drove herself to the bus station early the next morning. It was a long drive into the city, and she’d be in no condition to drive when she was ready to return. She took five hundred dollars with her, in cash.

Regan checked the traps. Neither of them had been touched. Then he prowled the corridors of the house.

Eventually, he phoned Gwen. The first time he misdialed, his fingers slipping on the buttons of the phone, the long string of digits confusing him. He tried again.

A ringing, then her voice on the line. “Allied Accountancy Associates. Good afternoon.”

“Gwennie? It’s me.”

“Regan? It’s you, isn’t it? I was hoping you’d call eventually. I missed you.” Her voice was distant; transatlantic crackle and hum taking her farther away from him.

“It’s expensive.”

“Any more thoughts about coming back?”

“I don’t know.”

“So how’s wifeykins?”

“Janice is . . . ” He paused. Sighed. “Janice is just fine.”

“I’ve started f**king our new sales director,” said Gwen. “After your time. You don’t know him. You’ve been gone for six months now. I mean, what’s a girl to do?”

It occurred then to Regan that that was what he hated most about women: their practicality. Gwen had always made him use a condom, although he disliked condoms, while she had also used a diaphragm and a spermicide. Regan felt that somewhere in all there a level of spontaneity, of romance, of passion, was lost. He liked sex to be something that just happened, half in his head, half out of it. Something sudden and dirty and powerful.

His forehead began to throb.

“So what’s the weather like out there?” Gwen asked brightly.

“It’s hot,” said Regan.

“Wish it was here. It’s been raining for weeks.”

He said something about it being lovely to hear her voice again. Then he put down the phone.

Regan checked the traps. Still empty.

He wandered into his office and flipped on the TV.

“. . . this is a little one. That’s what fetus means. And one day she’ll grow up to be a big one. She’s got little fingers, little toes—she’s even got little toenails.”

A picture on the screen: red and pulsing and indistinct. It cut to a woman with a huge smile, cuddling a baby.

“Some little ones like her will grow up to be nurses, or teachers, or musicians. One day one of them may even be President.”