Michael Bishop by Count Geiger's Blues

Author:Count Geiger's Blues [Blues, Count Geiger's]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2012-06-01T20:28:41+00:00

38

Night Thoughts

That was good, Xavier thought. Mikhail’s heartsick. Angry, befuddled, grief-stricken. But we touched… .

In the kitchen, Xavier tested a hypothesis that had just come into his head. From a wooden knife-holder, he took a small dicing knife with a black handle. He scratched the back of his hand with the tip of its blade. There was pain and blood, but not much. On the contrary, the act gave him a rush—like swatting a roach. He set the knife down, touched the slowly seeping blood, and watched as the blood stopped flowing and the scratches immediately healed over, leaving fresh, pink skin where just seconds ago there’d been evidence of a minor violation.

Incredible, Xavier thought. Incredible …

A rapidly healed scratch was nothing compared to three gunshot wounds, which he’d survived without a trip to the emergency room. Well, try something a little more drastic. With the knife, Xavier sliced off the tip of his index finger. Pain and blood again, but, again, nothing unbearable. He picked up the severed finger cap and pushed it against the wound.

I should be faint. I should be sweating… .

When he eased the pressure on his finger, the cap remained in place. Like the scratches, this small mutilation had already begun to heal. He examined his hand. The faint line between the finger and its cap was disappearing as they fused. A miracle? Radiation-induced healing?

In the living room, Xavier sat down to think about what was happening to him. It grew dark outside. Traffic noises subsided. The Mick turned off the light in his room.

Eventually, Xavier realized that like a comicbook hero created by freak exposure to “atomic energy,” he was acquiring “stalwartly powers.” He wasn’t yet capable of (1) outrunning the shot pattern of a 12-gauge shotgun, (2) taking the place of an Oconee Southern diesel engine, or (3) leaping any of the towers in Salonika Plaza. And he knew that he couldn’t fly. Even so, he was no longer—a pulpish phrase occurred to him—“an ordinary mortal.” Consider his recovery from Bowman’s attempt to kill him. Or, flexing his finger, his demonstrations with the knife. Or the high degree of empathy he’d displayed, and felt, trying to comfort Mikhail. Hey, he had actually remped the kid.

Did he need further proof?

Xavier found that he could hold his breath almost indefinitely without gasping for air. If he pushed himself much past a half hour, though, objects in his vision began to go wonky and out-of-focus on him. Blindfolded, Xavier opened his refrigerator and identified the leftovers in plastic buttertubs by touching the tubs and smelling his greasy fingertips. Without using a tea glass as an amplifier, he put his ear to his neighbor’s wall and picked up (1) the scurrying of a solitary silverfish, (2) the faint whine of an ice maker, and (3) the faraway burbling of somebody’s unsettled gut.

Xavier removed his blindfold and turned off every lamp in the apartment. Still, he could see into every cranny by Salonika’s late-night glow. In fact, he

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