Tom O'Bedlam Read online

  I’ve got to go to them, Elszabet thought. April and the others are in no shape to be left wandering around on their own in this riot. And I’ve got to get him away from them too. Before he helps any more of them make the Crossing. Find them a safe place, she thought. And then take Tom and put him somewhere safe too, where he can’t harm anyone and no one can do any harm to him.

  But she made no move to leave the rose garden. Taking so much as a single step seemed impossible.

  “Elszabet?” someone called.

  She turned slowly. Bill Waldstein, flushed-looking, big smears of black mud all over his white clinical jacket.

  “What are you doing out here?” he asked.

  “Watching it. It’s worse even than we imagined it could be.”

  “For Christ’s sake, Elszabet. You look absolutely stupefied, do you know that? Where’s April?”

  Elszabet pointed vaguely toward the middle of the lawn.

  “I left her with you,” Waldstein said. “I was just going over to the infirmary to get a sedative for her. How could you leave her alone? Why did you come out here? What’s the matter with you, Elszabet?”

  She shrugged. “Look at what’s going on.”

  “Come on, snap out of it. We need to round up the patients before they get hurt. And we need to find Tom and seal him away somewhere so he can’t—”

  “Tom?” she said. “Tom’s right over there.”

  Waldstein peered into the dimness. “Jesus, yes. And April’s with him, and Menendez, and Father Christie—” He stared at her. “You’re just letting him waltz away with them like that? You know what he’s likely to do to them?” Suddenly Waldstein looked as berserk as any of the tumbondé people. “I’m going to kill him, Elszabet. He’s brought all this insanity down on us, with plenty more to come. He’s got to be stopped. I’m going to kill him—”

  “Bill, for God’s sake—”

  But Waldstein had already broken into a run. She watched him run across the swampy lawn, fall, scramble to his feet, fall again, scramble up. With agility he sidestepped a group of tumbondé people who were carrying what looked like pipes torn from some building’s heating system, waving them around like baseball bats. He ran up toward Tom, shouting and gesturing. Elszabet saw Tom turn toward Waldstein with a benign smile. She saw Wald-stein leap at Tom and both men go sprawling. Then she saw Alleluia pluck Waldstein free of Tom the way one might pluck an insect from one’s arm, and hurl him at least fifteen or twenty meters through the air, sending him crashing into the trunk of a towering pine.

  Even at this distance, Elszabet plainly heard the sound of the impact as Waldstein struck the tree head first. He dropped without a quiver and lay without moving.

  Dante Corelli came around the side of the gymnasium at a fast jog just at that moment and pulled up next to Elszabet. Elszabet turned to her and said almost in a conversational tone, “That was Bill, did you see? He jumped on Tom and Alleluia simply picked him up and—”

  “Elszabet, we’ve got to get out of here. We’re all going to get trampled to death.”

  “I think Bill must be dead, Dante. I heard the way his head hit the tree—”

  “Dan’s on his way down from GHQ. He’ll be here in a minute and then the three of us are going to run for the woods, do you hear me, Elszabet? Look, there’s a whole new mob charging up the hill right now. You see them coming? Holy Christ, do you see them?”

  Elszabet nodded. Confusions gripped her spirit. She knew she was sinking deeper into that strange paralysis of the will. Simply paying attention to what was happening was an effort. A mob, Dante had said? Where? Yes. Oh, yes. There. They were streaming up out of the central chaos like some unstoppable torrent, overrunning everything in their way. They were heading toward the place where Tom and his little band of followers stood. “Oh, God,” Elszabet murmured. “Tom. Tom!”

  Father Christie went running forward to meet the tumbondé people, waving his arms, crying out to them. Offering a blessing, perhaps. The comfort of the Church in a time of chaos. They swept up and over him and he disappeared beneath their feet. Alleluia was next. She planted herself squarely in the path of the advancing mob and with astonishing energy that seemed almost diabolical began scooping them up and flinging them against the trees, one, five, a dozen of them, tossing them to their deaths, until she too was pulled down and was lost to view.

  “Tom,” Elszabet said quietly. She could no longer see him, or April, or Menendez.

  She heard Dante saying to someone, “It’s like she’s gone out of her mind. She just stands here, watching.”

  “Hey. Elszabet.” It was Dan Robinson. He touched her arm. “We have to get out while we still can, Elszabet. The Center’s in ruins. The mob’s completely out of control. We’ll slip off into the forest and take the rhododendron trail, okay? We should be able to get deep enough in so they won’t bother us there and—”

  “I have to find Tom,” Elszabet said.

  “Tom’s probably dead by now.”

  “Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t. But if he’s alive we have to find him. And find out what he is. There are things we have to know about him, about what he’s doing, don’t you see that? Please, Dan. Do you think I’m crazy? Yes, you do, both of you. I can see that. But I tell you, I’ve got to find Tom. Then we can leave. Not until then. Please try to understand. Please.”

  7

  TOM held the fat woman with one hand and the Mexican man with the other and stood his ground calmly while the crazy people went rushing by. He knew they wouldn’t hurt him. Not now, not while the Crossing was actually under way. He was safe because he was the chosen vehicle of the star people, and surely everyone knew that.

  It was too bad, he thought, losing the priest and the artificial woman. Now they would never have a chance to make the Crossing. But even without them, it would still be possible for him to invoke the power. It was getting easier. With each new one he sent, his strength grew. A great tranquility was on his soul, a sense of the divine righteousness of his mission.

  “Here,” Tom said. “This is the next one that we’ll send.”

  “Double Rainbow,” the Mexican man said. “Yes, he is a good one. We will give him to Maguali-ga.”

  This one was an Indian. Tom realized that right away. He had seen a lot of Indians in his time. This one was a thick-bodied flat-nosed man with dark glossy hair, maybe a Navaho, maybe something else, but certainly an Indian. The Indian was standing with his back to a burning building, hurling clods of mud at the rioters as they ran by and calling out things to them in a language Tom didn’t understand. The Mexican went up to the Indian and said something to him, and the Indian’s eyebrows lifted and he laughed; and the Mexican said something else and the two men clapped each other on the back, and the Indian came striding over to Tom.

  “Where you going to send me?” he asked.

  “The Nine Suns. You will walk with the Sapiil.”

  “Will my fathers be there?”

  “Your new fathers will welcome you into their number,” said Tom.

  “The Sapiil,” said the Indian. “What tribe is that?”

  “Yours,” said Tom. “From this moment on.”

  “You will go to Maguali-ga,” said the Mexican. “You will never know pain again, or sorrow, or the emptiness in the heart. Go with God, friend Nick. It is the happiest moment for you, now.”

  “Stand close around him,” Tom said. “Everybody join hands.”

  “Maguali-ga, Maguali-ga,” the Mexican said. The Indian nodded and smiled. There were tears in the comers of his eyes.

  “Now,” Tom said.

  It was quick, a fast sudden surge and the big man slid easily to the ground and was gone.

  Easier and easier all the time, Tom thought.

  He led the fat woman and the Mexican past a place where a small building had been all broken up into slats, and started to go down toward the center of things, toward the bus that was sitting right in the middle. He thought he might sit on the steps of
the bus and use that as a kind of platform for performing the Crossings. But he had gone only a few steps when a man and a woman came up to him. They looked pale and uneasy, and they were holding hands as if their lives depended on staying together. The woman was small and good-looking, with curling red hair and a pretty face. The man, who was slender and dark, had a bookish look about him.

  The man pointed toward the Indian, who was lying in the mud with the smile of the Crossing on his face. “What did you do to him?”

  “He has gone to Maguali-ga,” Menendez said. “This man, he holds the power of the gods in his hands.”

  The man and the red-haired woman looked at each other.

  The man said, “Is that what happened to the other man, the one in the dormitory?”

  “He went to the Double Kingdom,” Tom said. “I have sent some to Ellullimiilu today also, and some to live with the Eye People. The whole universe is open to us now.”

  “Send us to the Nine Suns!” the woman said.

  “Lacy…” the man said.

  “No, listen to me, Barry. This is real, I know it. They join hands and he sends you. You see the smiles on those faces? The spirit went out of him, you saw that. Where did it go? I bet it went to Maguali-ga.”

  “The man’s dead, Lacy.”

  “The man has left his body behind. Listen, we stay here any longer, we’ll get trampled to death anyway. You see how they’re pulling the place apart since they saw the Senhor get killed? Let’s do it, Barry. You said you had faith, that you had seen the truth. Well, here’s the truth. Here’s our moment, Barry. The Senhor had it upside down, that’s all. The gods aren’t coming to Earth, you see? We’re supposed to go to them. And here’s the man to send us.”

  “Come,” Tom said. “Now.”

  “Barry?” the woman said.

  The man looked stunned. He was afraid, untrusting. He blinked, he shook his head, he stared around. To help him, Tom sent him a vision, just the edge of one, the nine glorious suns in full blaze. The man drew in his breath sharply and pressed both his hands against his mouth and hunched his shoulders up, and then he seemed to relax. The woman said his name again and put her hand on his arm, and after a moment he nodded. “All right,” he said quietly. “Yes. Why the hell not? This is what we were all looking for, wasn’t it?” To Tom he said, “Where are we going to go?”

  “The Sapiil kingdom,” Tom said. “The empire of the Nine Suns.”

  “To Maguali-ga,” said Menendez.

  Tom reached for the hands of the fat woman and the Mexican. He rocked back and forth on his heels a moment.

  “Now,” he said.

  Both at once, this time. He took the energy from the fat woman and the Mexican and passed it through himself and sent the man and the woman to the Sapiil. The ease of it surprised him. He had never done that before, two at the same time.

  The man and the red-haired woman slid to the ground and lay face up, smiling the wonderful Crossing-smile. Tom knelt and lightly touched their cheeks. That was a beautiful smile, that smile. He envied them, walking now among the Sapiil under those nine glorious suns. While he was still here slopping around in the mud. But that was all right, Tom thought. He had his tasks to do first.

  He started down the hill again. All about him were people screaming and shouting and waving their arms hysterically in the air. “Peace to you all,” Tom said. “It is the Time of the Crossing, today, and everything is going well.” But the people came rushing past, confused and angry. For a moment Tom was swept up in the confusion, jostled and buffeted, and when he was in the clear again he could no longer see the fat woman or the Mexican. Well, he would find them again sooner or later, he told himself. They knew he was heading toward the bus, and they would go there to wait for him, because they were his assistants in bringing about the Crossing, they were part of the great event that was unfolding here today in the rain and the mud and the chaos.

  Someone caught him by the arm, held him, stopped him.

  “Tom.”

  “Charley? You still here?”

  “I told you. I was waiting for you. Now come on with me. We got the van still sitting out there in the forest, in the clearing. You got to get yourself away from here.”

  “Not now, Charley. Don’t you understand that the Crossing is going on?”

  “The Crossing?”

  “Six, eight people have set out on the journey already. There will be many more. I feel the strength rising in me, Charley. This is the day I was born for.”

  “Tom—”

  “You go to the van and wait for me there,” Tom said. “I’ll come to you in a little while and help you make your Crossing, as soon as I can find my people, my helpers. You’ll be on the Green World an hour from now, I promise you that. Away from all this craziness, away from all this noise.”

  “Man, you don’t understand. People are getting killed here. There are trampled bodies all over the place. Come on with me, man. It isn’t safe for you here. You don’t know how to look after yourself. I don’t want to see anything happen to you, Tom, you know? You and me, we’ve traveled a long way together, and—I don’t know, I just feel I ought to look after you.” Charley took Tom’s arm again and pulled gently. Tom felt the warmth of this man’s soul, this scratcher, this wandering killer. He smiled. But he could not leave, not now. He peeled Charley’s hand from his arm. Charley scowled and shook his head, and started to say something else.

  Then the crazy mob came swirling back in their direction and Charley was borne away, carried off by the tide of humanity like a twig on the breast of a raging river.

  Tom stepped out of their way and let them go thundering past. But he saw it was impossible to get to the bus now. Things were too wild, down there in the middle of the lawn.

  He thought he saw the fat woman off toward one side, and went off in her direction. But as he was clambering over the tumbled boards of some shattered little cabin he lost his footing on the slippery wood and slid downward into the shambles of planks and joists. For the moment he was stuck, his leg jammed deep down into it. There was a stirring in front of him and someone began to crawl out from the pile of wood.

  Stidge, it was.

  The red-haired man’s eyes opened wide at the sight of Tom. “What the fuck. It’s the looney. Hello, looney, you fucking trouble-maker. How come Charley’s not right there holding your hand?”

  “He was here. He got swept away by the mob.”

  “That’s too goddamn bad, isn’t it?” Stidge said.

  He laughed. He reached into his tattered jacket and drew out his spike. His eyes were gleaming like marbles by moonlight. He poked the tip of the spike against Tom’s breastbone, hard, once, twice, three times, a sharp painful jab each time. “Hey,” Stidge said. “Got you where I want you, looney. Charley beat me up once on account of you, you remember? That first day, out in the Valley, when you came drifting in? He kicked the shit out of me because I laid a hand on you. I never forgot that. And then there were other times later, when I got in trouble on account of you, when Charley talked to me like I was nothing but a piece of crap. You know?”

  “Put the spike away, Stidge. Help me get loose, will you?” He pushed at the timbers pinning his leg. “Poor Tom’s foot is stuck. Poor Tom.”

  “Poor Tom, yeah. Poor fucking Tom.”

  “It’s the day of the Crossing, Stidge. I’ve got work to do. I have to find my helpers and send people where they’re meant to go.”

  “I’ll send you where you were meant to go,” Stidge said, and flicked the stud on the spike to turn on the power. “Just like I did to that crazy jig on the bus back there. For once I got you and no Charley around, and—”

  “No,” Tom said, as Stidge drew the spike back and jammed it toward Tom’s chest.

  He brought his hand up fast and seized Stidge’s wrist, holding it steady for a moment, summoning all his strength to keep that deadly little strip of metal from touching him. He trembled against Stidge and for a long instant they struggled in
stalemate. Then Stidge began forcing his arm forward, slowly, slowly, bringing the tip of the spike closer to Tom’s chest. It took all that Tom had to hold that thing away from him. Stidge was pushing it closer and closer. Tom was shivering. Fiery pain shot up and down his arm and into his chest. He looked into Stidge’s hard glaring eyes, right up against his own.

  And Tom picked up Stidge’s soul and hurled it to Luiiliimeli.

  He did it easily, smoothly, like skipping a stone across a pond. He did it all by himself, because he had to do it and his helpers were nowhere in sight. There was just no effort in it at all. He simply focused his energies and gathered the force and lifted Stidge’s soul and threw it toward the heavens. Stidge stared at him in astonishment. Then the surprise went from his face and the Crossing-smile appeared, and the spike dropped from Stidge’s dead hand, and he slumped down onto the pile of timbers.

  Tom huddled over him, amazed, shaken, trembling, feeling sick to his stomach.

  I did it all by myself, he thought.

  It was just like killing him, he thought. I picked him up and threw him.

  I never killed anybody before, he thought.

  Then he thought, No, no, Stidge isn’t dead, Stidge is on Luiiliimeli now, in the city of Meliluiilii under the great blue star Ellullimiilu. They have him and they’ll heal him of all the sickness in his soul. It wasn’t a killing any more than the other Crossings were. The only difference is that I did it all myself, that’s all. And if I hadn’t, he would have killed me sure as anything with that spike, and then there would be no more Crossings for anyone.

  You understand that, Stidge? I didn’t kill you, Stidge. I did you the biggest favor of your life.

  Tom felt himself starting to calm down some. The queasiness left him. He probed at the scattered timbers, trying to get his foot free.