Knight Life ma-1 Page 3

  The taller one, Chico, stood slowly, disentangling his beard from the snarl of the branches.

  "There he goes," he murmured. "You see him?"

  Groucho nodded and chewed on the remains of a two-day-old stale pretzel. He stood as well, coming just to Chico's shoulder. He wiped his large nose expansively with his shirtsleeve but said nothing. Talking had never been his strong suit. Also, he wasn't so sharp on conscious thought either.

  They were dressed quite similarly, in dark sweatshirts and tattered jeans with holes in the knees. Chico was also wearing battered basketball Keds and a thin windbreaker. In his social strata this alone was enough to qualify him for the best-dressed list.

  Chico said, "Look at him. Like he's got the whole world for his oyster. He must have enough on him to keep us goin' for a few days, at least. Geez, he must be from out of town. C'mon."

  He and his partner, or what there was of him, stepped out of the bushes. Chico looked down and scowled. "Who told you not to wear shoes, you idiot. Geez, aren't your feet cold?"

  Groucho looked at him blankly. "Feet?"

  The two ill-equipped, ill-advised, and generally just plain ill muggers found themselves quickly at a disadvantage. Their intended victim was walking quite quickly, and they felt compelled to remain in the background. The general intention was not to he spotted by the victim until it was too late.

  The reason this didn't work was twofold.

  To begin with, it was almost impossible to sneak up on King Arthur. The warrior's sixth sense he possessed warned him that several bad-intentioned but inept gentlemen were pursuing him, but he made no effort to ward them off. They seemed harmless enough.

  Then there was their own paranoia. They insisted on taking refuge behind trees and shrubbery every time they thought, even for a moment, that they might be detected. These brilliant attempts at camouflage consisted of noisily rustling bushes or tripping over projecting roots. Such endeavors were usually accompanied by colorful profanity and frantic shushing. Arthur smiled but did nothing to discourage them. In a perverse sort of way he was very curious as to how they would react to the events which would shortly transpire.

  At one point Groucho and Chico were almost within striking distance, but almost out of nowhere a police car materialized. It prompted them to dive headlong into the bushes to avoid detection. When the police car drove on past, they emerged cut and bleeding, and Groucho wiped at his nose and asked if they could go home now.

  "That's it," growled Chico. "We're endin' this right now."

  They scuttled ahead but found, much to their chagrin, that they had lost their quarry at the fork in the road. Trusting to his luck, which had not served in good stead for over a decade, Chico pulled his partner to the right and walked as quickly as he could.

  Farther on down the road, Arthur watched from the shadows, and when he saw them coming, stepped back out onto the path. If they had guessed wrong, he'd been prepared to clear his throat loudly to guide them on their way. He began to walk, paused momentarily and cast a glance over his left shoulder. There was the expected crash and curses as the two leaped into the bushes once again. Arthur laughed to himself. He hadn't had this much fun in centuries.

  The road angled down, and within a few more moments Arthur stood at the edge of Central Park Lake. His nostrils flared. He could smell the magic in the air, like a faint aroma after a barbecue. It was a pleasant scent, a familiar one. After all, he had lived with it for more years than any man could rightly expect to live.

  He looked out across the lake and waited. It would be here, he knew. It had to be. All he had to do was wait....

  The stillness of the night air hung over him. Faintly he heard an ambulance siren, or perhaps a police car. Closer, he felt the small animal life all around him. The creatures of the woods had tensed as well. They, too, sensed it.

  Arthur let his breath out slowly and mist filled the air in front of him. It was chilly, rapidly approaching thirty-two degrees-the point at which water freezes.

  Which did nothing to explain why the middle of Central Park Lake was beginning to boil.

  Arthur stared in rapt attention as the water in the center of the lake bubbled, swirled, and undulated, as if a volcano were about to leap forth, spewing lava into the park. Then, somehow, the water folded in on itself, creating a small whirlpool.

  Now there were no nearby sounds of forest animals scavenging for the last scraps of food, or faraway sounds of ambulance sirens. All of New York City had shut down, leaving only the noises of the churning water.

  It was then that it emerged from the center of the lake. Arthur's eyes widened, and for one moment he was no longer Arthur Rex. He was Arthur the wondering boy, dazzled and stunned by the wonders that were his to witness.

  At first only its tip was visible, but then it rose, straight, proud, all that was noble and great and wondrous. The tip of the blade pointed toward the moon, as if it would cleave it in two.

  The blade itself gleamed like a beacon in the night. There was no light source for the sword to be reflecting from, for the moon had darted behind a cloud in fear. The sword was glowing from the intensity of its strength and power and knowledge that it was justice incarnate, and that after a slumber of uncounted years its time had again come.

  After the blade broke the surface, the hilt was visible, and holding the sword was a single strong, yet feminine hand, wearing several rings that bore jewels sparkling with the blue-green color of the ocean.

  It was a moment frozen out of time . . . another time ... as the man at the lake's edge watched the entire scene, unmoving but not unmoved.

  Slowly the hand began to glide toward him, bringing its proud burden straight and true. As it neared Arthur, the water receded as more and more of the graceful arm was revealed.

  Within moments the Lady of the Lake stood mere feet away from Arthur, the water reaching the hem of her garment.

  She looked like hell.

  Weeds and crud had ruined her beautiful white dress. Her hair, also filled with crud, hung limply. In her jeweled crown a dead fish had somehow managed to lodge itself to stare glassy-eyed at the world. She pulled another dead fish, plus an orange rind, out of the cleavage of her dress while the man on shore glanced away in mild embarrassment.

  She glared at him for a moment and then, in an attempt to restore some measure of dignity, took a majestic step forward, slipped, and fell flat into the mud.

  Arthur reached down to help her but she waved him off, pulling herself to her feet. Using the sword to balance herself by thrusting it into the silt, she lifted one foot and pulled an empty cigarette pack off the bottom of her shoe* While one hand made vague attempts to wipe off the sludge, with the other she gave the still-gleaming sword to the man on shore.

  "Thank you, lady," he said, and bowed to her.

  She pulled a crushed beer can from the hem of her dress and said two words in a musical voice that would have shamed the sirens of myth.

  "Never again."

  And with that the Lady of the Lake turned and trudged slowly back as the roiling waters reached out to receive her.

  Carefully Arthur examined his sword. They were two old friends, reunited at last. It gleamed in his hand, happy to see him.

  He stepped over to a large, dead tree and swung at a low branch. The branch was as thick as the arms of two men, but the glowing sword passed through it without so much as slowing down. As if startled that it could so easily be severed, the branch hung there for a moment before thudding to the ground.

  He heard the rustling behind him and he spun. Automatically he grabbed the hilt with both hands, holding the sword Excalibur in such a manner as to be both offensive and defensive.

  His eyes glittered in the dimness. "Who?" he called out. "Who is there?"

  But he knew the answer even before they stumbled forward. In the wonderment of it all he had completely forgotten about his two would-be assailants. He was fortunate, he realized, that they were as incompetent as they were. Had t
hey been even mildly formidable, he would have left himself foolishly vulnerable.

  As it was, they stumbled out with eyes like saucers. Chico came right to Arthur's feet and then, to the returned king's surprise, the scruffy skulker dropped to one knee. Groucho looked down at him curiously. Without returning the glance Chico reached to his partner's pants leg and pulled him down also. Groucho's knees crunched slightly as he hit the ground.

  Arthur lowered Excalibur, holding the pommel with one hand and letting the blade rest in his palm. "May I help you?"

  "We swear," said Chico fervently.

  This came as no surprise to Arthur, but he waited with polite curiosity to see if that was the end of the pronouncement. It wasn't.

  "We swear our undying allegiance to the man with the Day-Glo sword and the submersible girlfriend."

  King Arthur gave a little nod of his head. "Thank you. That's very kind."

  There was a long pause, and then Arthur said, "Is that it?"

  Chico looked up at him as if Arthur were a drooling idiot. "We're waiting for you to knight us."

  Arthur suppressed a cough. "When hell freezes over," he said.

  Chico gave this some thought. Finally he nodded. "All right," he said agreeably. "We'll wait.

  Won't we?" He nudged Groucho in the ribs.

  Groucho stared at him forlornly. "My feet are cold," he sniffled.

  They left the park together, their feet crunching on the gravel of the path beneath their feet.

  Chaptre the Fourth

  The young woman stepped out of the shower, now refreshed and prepared to face the new day that was shining so nauseat-ingly through the bathroom window. It was the bathroom's only source of illumination, the fluorescents having burnt out some time ago. There had been no money to buy new ones.

  She ran the towel over her slim body, rubbing it briskly across her back. Here in the womblike security of the bathroom, the day didn't seem quite so bad. She had just done the shower breast examination that she always dreaded, and was pleased to have found no lump in evidence. So she had her health, knock wood. And even better, she had a job interview this morning.

  She wrapped the light blue terry-cloth towel around her body, and another towel around her strawberry-blond hair. She kept it short and manageable enough that drying it took only a few minutes. She was not one for wasting a lot of time on external frivolities.

  She wrinkled her nose at herself in the mirror. She hated her face because it was perfect.

  The nose was just right. The eyes were just the right space apart, the eyebrows just the right thickness. Her cheekbones were not too high or defined. Her skin displayed no mars or blemishes. She was, on the whole, very attractive, as far as most people were concerned.

  But she did not agree. She longed for some distinguishing feature to 24

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  give her face the character she felt it lacked. All the truly elegant women, she believed, had some feature you could hang a description on. A majestic profile caused by highly arched eyebrows, or a nose that was a tad too long-that was what she wanted.

  She had even gone to a plastic surgeon once. He had laughed at her. Laughed! He told her that his patients would kill for looks like hers. He'd advised against unnecessary surgery, and told her to go home for a week or so and think it over. She had never gotten the nerve to go back.

  She padded quietly into the living room which doubled as an office. She found him-her boyfriend-as she knew she would. He was slumped over his typewriter, his head resting comfortably on the keyboard of the battered Smith-Corona manual. She ran her fingers through his greasy black hair and whispered, "Hon? Honey, go to bed. You really should go to bed."

  He grunted as he stood, balancing himself against the table. His eyes did not open as she took him firmly by the shoulder and steered him toward the bed. He passed an open window and snarled, and she noticed with distress that he was developing a most unhealthy pallor.

  "Hon, have you considered trying to get outside a bit more?" she said carefully. She was treading on tricky ground -the last time she'd broached such a subject, he had construed it as a criticism of him, and worse, an implication that he should get a job. "How can I get a job?" he'd screamed at the time. "I have my work!" He had then gone into a silent tantrum that lasted three days. It had been three very peaceful days for her.

  This time he barely uttered a reply before collapsing onto the couch. It wasn't the bed, but she decided to leave him there. It wasn't worth the aggravation somehow, and besides, she had to get to the interview.

  She had to get the job. She just had to. If for no other reason than that, within two days, the employment agencies would no longer be able to get in touch with her. The phone company would be disconnecting them then.

  She let the towel drop to the ground as she looked at the small assortment of clothes that hung in her closet. She heard a stirring in the living room, and for one moment fantasized that he was waking up. That he would come into the room, see 26

  her standing there as she was, naked, her hair wet, her body slim and supple. That he would take her in his arms and make wild, intense love to her.

  He snorted and turned over on the couch.

  She hoped against hope there would be further noise, but there wasn't. So she allowed herself the luxury of sitting down on the threadbare bedspread and sobbing for five minutes.

  Then she dressed quickly and quietly, went back into the bathroom, washed the tears from her face as best she could, and let herself out of the apartment. The soft click of the door roused the man sleeping on the couch only briefly.

  She looked up at the small office building on Twenty-eighth and Broadway. The words Camelot Building were stenciled in fading gilt letters on the glass above the entrance. An ironic name, she mused, for Camelot was a place of pageantry and legend. This slightly rundown building was hardly that.

  The guard at the front desk was sixty if he was a day. A cigarette hung from between cracked lips as he said, "Can I help you, miss?"

  She had been looking at the directory on the wall, and turned to him now. "Yes. Pm trying to find the offices of a Mr. Arthur Penn."

  He looked blank for a moment, and she felt her hopes sink. She wasn't even going to get out of the starting gate on this one. Then his face cleared and he said, "Right. New fella.

  Thirteenth floor.''

  "I thought buildings didn't have thirteenth floors."

  The guard shrugged. "Fellow who built this place wasn't a superstitious sort."

  "Oh, really?" The guard looked old enough to have been there when the building was first constructed.

  "Yeah. And he was a lucky fella too. He was fortunate enough to see his work completed."

  He coughed. "Day after, he got hit by a truck. You can go on up."

  "Gee, thanks."

  "Main elevator's out. Better use the freight 'round back."

  The freight elevator was a rickety affair that moved up the shaft with a maximum of screeching and clanking. She felt out of place, neatly pressed and dressed, wearing high-heel shoes and trapped in a huge elevator with metal walls and floor. A dying fluorescent bulb lit the elevator, and she felt as if she

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  were being carted up to her execution.

  When the doors opened on the thirteenth floor, she stepped out gratefully and the elevator bounced up and down like a yo-yo. As it closed behind her with a thud like a guillotine blade descending, she walked out into the main corridor, and what she saw astounded her.

  The offices of Arthur Penn were beautifully put together, but far from modernistic. All the furniture was antiques, solid, dependable pieces everywhere she looked. The walls were paneled in knotty pine. The carpeting was a deep plush in royal blue.

  Her breath taken by the extreme contrast between this office and the rest of the building, she started to wander about until a firm voice called her up short, saying, "Can I help you?'*

  She looked around and saw a fierce-looking receptionist seate
d at a desk, and she wondered how she had missed the receptionist the first time. "Oh, yes, I'm sorry. I have an appointment. An appointment with Mr. Penn."

  The receptionist glanced down at a calendar on the edge of her uncluttered desk and asked, "You're Gwen?"

  Gwen nodded.

  The receptionist seemed slightly mollified by the fact that this person was supposed to be here, but still looked regretful that she was not going to have an opportunity to give someone the heave-ho. She said, "Very well. Take a seat, please. Mr. Penn will be with you shortly."

  "Thank you."

  Gwen sat in an ornately carved chair and looked down at a coffee table next to her, on which several recent news magazines rested. She started to reach for one but then said, "Would you like me to fill out a form or something?"

  "No. That won't be necessary."

  "Oh. But how will the woman in personnel know anything about me?"

  Looking up from the book she was trying to read, the receptionist snorted in annoyance.

  "We don't have a personnel department. Mr. Penn himself will see you and decide either yes or no. All right?"

  "Yes. AH right," said Gwen, feeling completely cowed.

  "Any more questions?"

  "No, ma'am."

  The receptionist went back to her book. What appeared to 28

  be an unspeakably long time passed, and finally Gwen ventured in a small voice, "Nice weather we're having, isn't it?"

  She'd barely gotten the words out when thunder rumbled from outside and rain smacked in huge droplets against the single office window. Gwen glanced heavenward.

  "He will see you now," said the receptionist abruptly.

  "Who will?" said Gwen, but quickly recovered. She stood and said, "Well, thank you. Thank you very much." She smoothed her denim skirt. "You've been very kind."

  "No, I haven't," was the tart response. "I've treated you like garbage."

  "I beg your-"