Oh Pure and Radiant Heart by Lydia Millet (shoe dog free ebook .txt) 📕

coming toward the kitchen area in her bikini and flip-flops.

—It’s in the cooler! yelled Larry, and turned back to his prey. —So David, man, we need you to pretty much keep a lid on the fire and brimstone if you want to stick around here.

—And please, said Oppenheimer, —no touching.

Ben was rinsing the egg off his plate when there was a loud knock on the door. He crossed the room with plate in hand and opened it to two men in uniform, one of whom he recognized from the restaurant. He wondered if he could slam the door but felt frozen, and meanwhile they flashed their badges too quickly for him to read.

—You’re the ones that are following me.

—We apologize for the inconvenience. Is Dr. Fermi in?

Ben was ready to shake his head when Fermi came up behind him and peered out over his shoulder, fully revealed.

—I am Fermi, he said flatly.

—Enrico Fermi, is that correct sir?

—Wait, said Ben. —Show me your badge again before we answer any more questions. Who do you represent?

He leaned in close to read it.

—USAIC Fort Huachuca? What’s that?

—Army Intelligence.

—And what do you want with Fermi?

—We need to take him in for questioning.

—Just a moment, said Ben.

He closed the door on them and reached for the telephone.

The drumming started up before 10 a.m., a solemn and dirgelike thumping in the background. Wind moved the yuccas and the sagebrush and every few minutes a cloud of dust rose and swept through the camp, flapping tents and blowing clothes off the laundry lines.

A few feet away from Ann Tamika was doing jumping jacks. She had cut the legs off her jeans, and now they hung in strips above the knees. She also wore a bikini top that featured the Stars and Stripes. Ann watched her jumping.

—I’m Father Raymond. Would you like to join us at the prayer circle?

It was a gentle, stooped man with a weak chin, a small button nose and a clerical collar, standing a few paces away from them and clutching to his concave chest a Book of Common Prayer and a sheaf of sheet music. His faded baseball cap bore a peace sign.

—What kind of prayer circle? she asked warily, and lifted her metal coffee cup to her mouth for cover.

—We’re not into that, said Larry.

Tamika was breathing hard as she jumped, dreadlock ponytail and breasts flopping. She scissored her legs and raised her arms as she waited for her answer.

—I’ll come, said Ann, shrugging. She had been hunched on a rock for the last half hour listening to the faint drone of Szilard inciting the Peace Camp crowd to join his campaign and staring glassily at Tamika’s movements. She was sore from the deep ridges on the sandstone.

—All are welcome to worship in their own way, said Father Raymond in a near-whisper. —What joins us together is a fervent wish for an end to conflict all over the globe.

—Are you guys gonna sing? asked Tamika, still jumping.

Her flag bikini seemed to stun him: he gazed at it with an expression of wonder.

—We will sing hymns, yes, said Father Raymond. —All are welcome.

Under the gray tarp of the kitchen tent people sat in a circle on blankets and cushions. A couple beat drums with their hands, and a teenage girl half-heartedly shook a tambourine.

—Uh, the tambourine? That’s not really working for you, honey, Clint told her. —No offense. What’s your name?

—Nikki, she said, and let the tambourine rest as Clint sat down beside her and she smiled up at him.

—Big Daddy gonna—whoooo!—show you how to play, said Clint in a hearty voice, leaning in close.

—She’s real shy, said Loni, in a warning tone.

—All right! announced Father Raymond, and smiled beatifically. —I’d like to open our prayer session today with a tribute to Mahatma Gandhi.

—Pervert!

Nikki turned to Clint and punched him in the face.

—I can’t believe you have the gall to come into my clients’ house, said Ted. He strode into the room officiously, suit jacket flapping for all the world, Ben thought, as though he was high-powered. —This is an egregious violation of their civil rights. Ever heard of Posse Comitatus?

—Calm down, sir, said the Army Intelligence man. —We’re here under the authority of HR 3162, Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.

Ted turned to Ben.

—The PATRIOT Act.

The other man smiled hopefully, as though offering up a gift. —He’s not under arrest. We just want to question him in a secure environment.

—You’ve been following us for days and that doesn’t constitute coercion? squeaked Ted. —It’s ridiculous. And you argued in your brief that my clients are dead. Now you’re here asking to take a dead man in for questioning? Here what I’m going to do. I’m going to call a friend of mine at the FBI Field Office in Albuquerque. Find out the Bureau’s position on this.

He picked up his cell phone and dialed.

—That won’t be necessary, hurried the second man. —We will leave.

Ben let them out the front door and as he was closing it behind them the first man turned and whispered, far too close to his face, —But we’ll be back.

—All we are saying, is give peace a chance, sang the prayer group, swaying with arms raised over their heads.

Ann was mouthing the words without emitting a sound and her hands were at her sides, hanging uselessly. She looked over the shoulders of her swaying companions to Szilard, who was pacing with his cell phone beside the bus. On the threshold of the bus Oppenheimer sat smoking, porkpie hat shading his face, shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow. She stepped out from under the shade of the tarp and walked toward the scientists.

A freckled, broad-faced woman stepped in front of her, wearing glasses. She was frumpy in cargo pants and a pair of well-worn leather sandals, but she carried a small, neat laptop slung over her shoulder, and held a sleek microphone.

—I’m an oral historian affiliated with a larger research project, she said.