--There! Stop there!
EMIL'S BBQ. A smiling pig in a clean white apron leans against the Q, brandishing a wicked looking knife. Emil first came here amused at the confluence of names, but he returns for the dark smoky sauce laced with cayenne.
The driver looks at him in the rear view mirror, nods, and pulls into the parking lot. Bits of silica wink like stars in the soft asphalt.
--What can I get for you, sir?
Flat military monotone. Cold eyes, brown like river silt. This driver is new and Emil doesn't like him much. The man is a herring--Emil has tried to engage him in conversation several times, but there has been no response other than the monosyllabic. The Negro makes a good soldier but this one is a lousy chauffeur.
--Stay, stay. I'll go.
He reaches for the door handle, but the driver is too quick. Heat slaps Emil in the face, rising in waves from the asphalt. It is like peering into an oven. Almost immediately, a thin film of perspiration covers his forehead and hands. He slides the cane from his lap and plants it on the pavement. Cut from rough oak, this cane, knotted and polished smooth. His staff. His oaken staff. The ground yields slightly under its tip as he heaves himself to his feet. Shakes off the soldier's hand on his elbow.
--Stay, sit.
Familiar stab of pain from his right hip, not exactly an old friend but always there to remind him that he is no longer young, nor even middle-aged.
A handful of tables sprout like linoleum mushrooms under the harsh fluorescents. A man in greasy coveralls and a long, thick pony tail sits next to the window, tearing strips of flesh from the carcass of a chicken, washing it down with deep pulls from a brown long-necked bottle.
The jukebox is playing a plaintive country song about lost love, redolent with pedal-steel and nasal male harmonies. The vinegary barbecue smell makes Emil's stomach rumble; beneath that, a shadow of pain. To hell with the ulcer, he thinks.
--Can I help you, sir?
He looks at the woman behind the counter for the first time. A sudden, hollow silence descends. The smell of burnt wiring fills his nostrils. His mouth opens but he cannot speak.
It is her. The traitor. Black eyes bruised with loss, set far apart in a moon-shaped face. Rough olive skin. Coarse, dark curls. Thick lips perpetually poised on the brink of a sneer.
--Sir?
Emil backs up until he bumps into the door. He shoulders it open and spills back into the heat. His limo waits, blinding white, parked astride two spaces.
--Are you all right?
--Yes, yes. Take me to the Lab.
Ensconced in the cool dark of the limo, Emil still feels those eyes on him. The years recede like snow under a lit match and he sees her in the Senate chambers--1953? 1954? Six months before the executions. She has no shame.
--No, I am not a Communist. No, of course not. Never. Besides, what do I know of nuclear physics?
Ridiculous, Emil thinks. I am an old fool. He raps on the plexiglass divider.
--Sergeant, back to the barbecue place.
He'll think I'm going senile. Like poor Ronny.
The driver makes a U-turn, threads back through the wide suburban streets.
The man with the pony tail stares rudely, hunched over bones and scraps. The woman behind the counter affixes a nervous smile to her face.
--Can I help you?
--I'm sorry--you look so much like--tell me, please, what is your name?
She hesitates, looks him over, seems to decide that he is odd but not dangerous.
--Jane. Jane Lucent.
--Not Rabinowicz?
That nervous smile again.
--No. Not Rabinowicz.
Emil sighs. She looks remarkably like her. But it's impossible. The traitor had one daughter who committed suicide in an insane asylum before producing any offspring of her own. That branch of the family tree is kindling.
--No, of course not.
Suddenly, his appetite returns. He looks at the menu posted behind the counter, adorned with garish color photographs, platters of food glistening with grease.
--I'll have the ribs.
)
