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"Dopey," she said, fluttering over to the map. "It's a bomb map." She pressed a tiny button on the desk below the map and an overhead track light came on, illuminating the map with an eerie green light
As the light glowed stronger, lines on the map began to emerge. Blue lines. Red lines. Dotted lines. And a thick, wobbling stroke from a jungle border of Hispania to Washington, D.C.
"El Presidente had it coated, so that you can't see
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the lines without this special light." She smiled. "He's so smart."
"A real whip," Remo said.
Gloria seated herself on the window sill. "You gonna stay and play with me?"
"No."
"Aw, c'mon," she teased, unfastening the top of her sari and letting the gauzy fabric unravel and flutter in the breeze outside the open window. "Nice jugs, huh?" she asked.
"Good enough for government work," Remo said.
She unravelled more of her sari, until a long stream of fabric floated in the wind like a white river. She stood up on the window sill and lifted her arms to her sides.
"Look, I'm a flag," she squealed, stretching out her arms to grasp the billowing sheath. "I'm an angel! I'm flying! Death to the niggies!" she shouted. "The angel of death is flying! Death to America! Ficky-fick forever."
Then her feet left the floor and she soared downward, down the sheer face of the building, her garment unwinding behind her in brilliant white streamers as she fell naked to the ground below.
Remo shook his head. "Freaking nutcase," he said. "Everybody in this deal is a nutcase."
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CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Barney Daniels sat up in bed, rubbing the sore spot where the intravenous feeding needle had been taken out.
"Just a couple more days, Mr. Daniels," said the black nurse. "Then you'll be out of here. Can't happen too soon, either. If some of our regulars found out we had a white man here, I don't know what'd happen." She smiled at him.
"No," said Barney, shaking himself to life. "Now."
"Now, now . . ." the nurse began.
"Just once," Barney said. "Now. I'm going. Get Doc."
"Doctor Jackson is busy at the-"
"Get him in here." Barney's voice reverberated through the small private room. "Otherwise I'll run out front and tell the whole neighborhood that you're treating white folks. You'll never live it down."
"Just you calm down," the nurse said. "I'll get the doctor."
Jackson was harried and tired looking and Barney realized he could not remember a time when Jackson hadn't been overworked, overtired and underappreciated.
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"What is it now, you honkey pain in the ass?" Jackson said.
"Sit down, Doc."
"C'mon, I'm busy."
Barney sat up and cleared a space on his bed. "Talk to me for a minute. We both need it."
Doc Jackson sat, his knees creaking as he bent them.
"Bad one?" Barney asked.
Jackson nodded. "Bullet wound. Some asshole went on a toot and shot his girlfriend in the face. I thought I could save her." He closed his eyes, the lids weighted by decades of sleepless nights and lost causes.
"Ever hear from your wife?" Barney asked.
"Sure." His grim black face cracked into a semblance of a smile. "When she wants more money."
"Your kid?"
"Ivy League. Majoring in revolution, relevance and hate. I'm not one of her favorite people. What's this all about anyway?"
Barney shifted on the bed. "No reason. I've just been thinking. Wondering how things might have turned out, you know, if Denise-"
"Stop it. Now. All the what if s and what-might-have-beens in the world aren't going to bring her back, no matter how bad you want her."
"I remembered, Doc. I remembered everything." There was such pain on his friend's face that Jackson could not ease it. All he could do was to spend this moment with Barney and listen to him.
"I remembered when things used to be important. Ordinary things, just living. Every day when I'd wake up, I'd be glad that I made it through again. Do you remember?"
"Me?" Jackson thought. "I don't know. I guess
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so. But everybody gets over being young. That's all it is. You get older, you see things differently. You expect less." He shrugged.
"Bullshit," Barney said. "There's not a day goes by that you -you personally, Robert Hanson Jackson-don't wonder what the hell you're doing here."
"Oh, really?" Jackson mocked. "What makes you think you know so much about me?"
"Because we're the same guy. You're black and ugly and I'm white and handsome, but except for that you couldn't tell us apart."
"You natter yourself," Jackson said. "So what's next?"
"I'm going to Hispania. Tonight."