Grinning insanely, greedily, he was, and had been, ravenous for reason to smile this way; he was not given to outbursts of joy. Instead, he was a typically grim killer who felt a sudden high of giddiness just staring at his creation, born of a nice night's work. He liked what he saw, and what he smelled. Staring back at him through the clear vinyl body-length bag, were two white pupils, the eyes having rolled back in their sockets, the anguished cry left on the lips, and the rubber-chicken posture. The backbone had gone slack, as if the universal joint's hook were jabbed into it instead of the sack tie. The head had tilted like that of a broken doll. Only her hair--although damp and plastered to the head--looked alive in there. But then, hair and nails grew even in the grave--the last to know.

He'd opened the big sack several times before, prolonging the death like a kind of slow, langorous lovemaking. He'd inhale much of the victim's carbon dioxide as it escaped the bag, getting high on it, hallucinating and thereby getting in touch with his inner self and his own demons, the demons that motivated him. He opened the bag again to take in great whiffs of death, perspiration, CO2, and musk: intermingling odors that soaked in a marinade of fear. You tie someone, they begin to sweat and sweat and a kind of animal odor overcomes them. You cut off their oxygen in degrees, deprive their senses, you get an even more pungent odor than mere musk.

Life reduced down to so little, really, a mix of just the right balance of chemicals. Always most fascinating to see it expire, and to mark down the all important details in his ledger. One day his extensive notes would be revered and debated, questioned and studied, admired and accepted. For he was a scientist foremost, involved in scientific methodology and research, the study of the respiratory functions in particular being of great importance. No great mind in all the modern world, or in the history of the world, had ever explained how a man could, for instance, blow hot air or cold air at will. And no one had sufficiently explained the connection between breath and the life of the soul.

There were so many unanswered questions. Questions other great minds had called unanswerable. Unsolvable, hell! He was nearing an answer any day now ... any day. Until that time, the work came first. Someone had to solve the unsolvable. Time was running out for mankind. Time was evaporating along with the protective layers of ozone above the immediate heavens. He meant to save man from himself, or die trying to salvage at least one man's soul--his own, Solomon's soul. He'd seen the reports on the nightly news; he had seen the statistics with his own eyes. It was an overwhelming task, and a dirty job, but somebody had to do it. And you couldn't wait for City Hall or the Red Cross or NASA or ocean explorers. You do and you're as bad as the rest. You had to damned well do it yourself, if you wanted it done right, if you wanted it done at all.

He had to do it.

If he didn't do it, who would?

He was doing the city, the people, and even his victims a great favor; everyone benefited from his scavenging the streets ... in the long run. And those who nobly gave of themselves to the experiments, they might be remembered in time, too, for he kept a ledger of names. Names that were as shining and as important as the names on any war memorial or list of astronauts dead in the line of duty; for these warriors and astronauts were the first to explore in Solomon's domain. The end result to the body might be asphyxiation, but their essence inhaled by him went on astral journey to meet with and be with Solomon, the keeper of their killer's soul. There was poetry and art and science in all of it.

There were other reasons, even more pressing and immediate; and, when he was honest with himself, even more rewarding. He stole their breath away. He inhaled the CO2-filled bag and from it gathered in his mystic power and spoke directly to his own soul, a soul with a name, a king's name: Solomon. A soul meant for great things, great discoveries, wonders the world had presently no notion of.

After the breath of life--or soul--left the body, he would reverently untie the top knot, or in some cases the zipper, to inhale with all his might for that indescribable, unimaginable CO2 high. It almost always put him in touch with his higher self, which was in touch with a higher being, a being that directed his movements. A being without name or face, horns or scepter, but a force so powerful he gave himself over to it each time. He'd read about the force in books on ancient Eastern religious sects. He had studied methods of reaching the force, and he had discovered that the quick route to Solomon was exactly this way: deny another human breath and inhalation, take the resultant "holy air" of the dead, and steal it.

He hefted the industrial strength, heavy-duty, see-through bag off its universal pulley and hook. The body inside was small and curled and shriveled, looking like a child in the womb, quite at peace with its surroundings now. The scrap heap of bone and flesh must be discarded now. He took firm hold of the body, holding it gently, the stiff, cold plastic rustling like leather in the silent walk-in cooler. He'd been so high on his work that he had paid no attention to the fact that his own skin had turned blue. Out the door and he lay his transformed, unhappy burden on the linoleum floor. Taking a jacket to cover the face inside the bag, a wellspring of bitterness erupted deep within. He hated this part, the cleanup and cover-up, so many mechanical motions he must go through robotlike, so many decisions that led to the same problem--a place to dump the remains. With the first several, he'd taken great pains, driving great distances, after having spent days scouting locations like a filmmaker's flunky. He'd located silent and lonely knolls, lakes, and rivers. When he had lived in Blue River, Oregon, this was a simple matter. When he'd lived in Los Angeles, there was the desert. In Chicago, you had to drive literally fifty miles in any given direction to find the smallest space. It had gotten so bad, he had taken to using city dumpsters, seldom-visited viaducts, train passes, sewers, and culverts, and one had gone into Lake Michigan.

Hefting the bag out to his van, he could see the beads of perspiration on the woman's boyish face. She had been a homeless tramp and hooker; now she was a true free spirit. At least free to be with and please Solomon, to feed his spirit many times over, perhaps through eternity. The eyes were two dilated, milk-white orbs, the mouth slack, the panting tongue drooped, bone-dry, over her lips and jaw, distended, already bloating with gases that seeped into cell walls.

He stood staring at the silent figure. He preferred seeing it alive, seeing it struggle. Its suffering gave him peace and a strange sense of power like nothing he'd ever felt before. A power indescribable, a godlike power. He enjoyed control and power over other living things, but until now he had no idea who, or what, had put that odd lust into his mind.

With Solomon's spiritual help, he located a viable dumping ground for what he considered trash. It was forty minutes and eighteen miles from where he had stolen the spirit of his victim. It was a dumpster caravan behind a series of closed department stores and businesses. He drove into the alley, casing the area for cops or anyone else standing about. He saw no one. His work was nearly done for tonight. He wished to keep the bag, as they were damned expensive and difficult to get, especially the zipper bags. He now hefted the body from the rear of the van and tore at the zipper, opening the top of the bag. He then hefted her, bag and all, over the lip of the dumpster and watched the weight of the body slide down and away with a bit of urging on. It was like a burial at sea. Except that this sea was made up of plasterboard, two-by-four discards, broken panes, bottles, and debris. He looked down from the top as he rumpled the large vinyl bag into a ball. Her body lay akimbo, like a mannequin in disassembled parts amid the rubbish. The jostling had rolled her eyes back and her pupils stared up at him, the only witnesses to his secret.

His part in the work, he told himself again--while all important--should remain anonymous.

He carried the large and cumbersome bag back to the van. His arms ached painfully from deep within; his legs, too. Stress, he supposed. It was as if something vile was this minute moving fluidly through his bloodstream to every artery, sending out a message of poison and weakness to every muscle. It was understandable, seeing as how it was almost dawn, and in a few hours he'd have to open the shop and spend hours upon hours of unimportant, useless, mindless work, and put off Solomon's work.

Sweat trickled down from his brow, under his arms, and along his thighs from the crotch. It was tough work for a tough man, removing unwanted and useless people in the name of science and spiritual research, in Solomon's name.

He came down from the empty crate he'd placed alongside the dumpster, so he could look in over the top for a final glance at the job he had done. His whole life had been preparation for this. The important experiments. Now he was in earnest; now he had a purpose that anyone could understand, that even he could understand, finally. Finally, he had gotten the message.

Where am I, he wondered when he came out of a semiconscious state, glancing about. He saw the body again. A car whizzed past at the end of the alley, followed by another and another and a police patrol car. He oriented himself, thought about which way he'd come, where he'd entered, and how best to leave unnoticed. Go home for what remained of the night.

He got down from the dumpster and started away, taking in a great whiff of the warm, smelly air of the black alley. A series of stores lined the alley, each with a dumpster or two of its own. He'd chosen poorly, he realized, seeing that next door to the hardware store was a liquor store. Cops routinely cruised liquor stores, front and back. He hurried away, taking himself several doors down before cutting through a T-section of alleyway that went in an entirely different direction. He relocated his delivery truck and started away in it.

He drove out at a glaring neon sign proclaiming an all-night grocery store, and a man with an apron on and a cigarette in his mouth got a fleeting glimpse of him. He turned his face away, and silently cruised off.

He wondered, as he made his way toward home, if he had or had not lowered the lid of the dumpster. No matter, he reasoned. No one would disturb the dead.

The kid had appeared to be perhaps seventeen, eighteen tops. She had gone to a better world, a world where nothing could ever hurt her again, a place of no sensation, and a place where she didn't require oxygen.

In a few minutes he was well clear of the incident and climbing onto the Kennedy Expressway, blaring at someone who refused him easy entry. Then he snapped on his Mendelssohn tape, feeling the great man's music and a sublime euphoria overtake his brain like a rising flood of warmth and incredible power. Once more he had done it. Once more he had saved another soul from the debauchery of this hell called Earth. And he had tasted of the passing of that soul through his own nostrils and lungs. A sense of accomplishment filled him with pride. A sense of mission filled him with the desire to go on, to fulfill himself again, now that he understood what Solomon had been trying for years to tell him.

After all these years, he told himself in the cab as sound poured from his tape, "After all these years, my invisible Solomon begging me to see and understand, and finally, finally I do."

At last, he heard his inner soul tell him, at last you are feeding me.