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

She watched as Ben pushed his way through the crowd, up to the front, past Szilard who was talking about reaching out through the United Nations to all the countries of the world. He took Fermi gently by the arm, leaning in close to whisper in his ear. Fermi nodded and Ben led him toward the street.

She skirted the throng to catch up with them.

—Enrico, are you OK? she asked softly when she reached them, touching his shoulder.

—OK, he said distractedly, but she caught Ben’s eye and he shook his head.

—What were you doing up there?

—The updraft, he mumbled.

—The updraft?

—You just need to rest, said Ben. —I think we’ll get you a hotel room for a couple of nights. It’s so crowded in the bus. Would you like that?

When the other scientists paid them a visit at the hotel that night they were confused.

Ann and Ben had taken a room next door and called Larry, who came with Tamika trotting beside him, ready for the hotel pool with her bikini over her arm.

—He’s not himself, Ben told Oppenheimer, who had requested a meeting in the cocktail lounge where he could smoke. Szilard was coming later. —He’s not here.

—I don’t understand what happened, said Oppenheimer. —Did something happen to him?

—Nothing that we know of, said Ben.

They went up to Fermi’s room together, the two of them with Oppenheimer, along a long dim corridor with a striped carpet in blue and beige and framed prints of flowers on the walls. Ann knocked lightly. For a long time there was no answer, and then she noticed the door was not clicked closed and pushed it open, calling his name.

—Enrico?

Fermi was sitting writing on hotel stationery at the small round table beside the air conditioner, under his window. The window behind him was open to the pool enclosure, a few lights looming tall over the shifting blue of the kidney shape.

—Enrico, said Oppenheimer, and walked ahead to the table while Ann and Ben sat down on the edge of the bed, a few feet back. —What’s happening?

—I’m writing them a letter, said Fermi, and Ann noticed that his face was sallow and he was sweating. At the corners of his mouth were flecks of spit. He wore only a button shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbow, and boxer shorts and his socks.

He was usually fastidious in his neatness, but there were wadded balls of Kleenex on the carpet beside his feet.

—Whom?

—The ones who love the birds.

—You mean bird watchers? asked Oppenheimer softly, and sat down in the chair across from him. —You used to be a birdwatcher. Remember when you knew all the birds in the forest near the mesa?

—They love the birds, said Fermi. —They don’t watch the birds.

—Oh, said Oppenheimer, and nodded slowly.

After a few moments of silence Ben asked quietly, —What does that mean, Enrico?

But Fermi said nothing, only began to whistle between his teeth. Ann knew the tune from somewhere but could not place it.

—Where’s the paper? asked Fermi a few minutes later, impatiently. He had come to the end of the page and there were no blank sheets left.

—I’ll get you some, said Ann, —let me call the front desk.

When the bellhop came with fresh stationery Szilard was behind him, but Fermi had eyes for nothing but the paper, snatching it hungrily.

—What’s the matter with you? asked Szilard abruptly. —Snap out of it! I don’t believe this. You’re full of shit!

—Leo! barked Oppenheimer. —Don’t you dare to speak to him that way!

Fermi ignored them both, sitting down to write again.

—Can I take the pages you’ve already written and maybe put them in an envelope for you? asked Ben.

Fermi nodded absently. Ben picked up the sheets of paper and sat down beside Ann, leaning over her to flick on a bedside lamp.

—It’s in Italian, he said under his breath.

Szilard rummaged in the minibar and pulled out a bag of peanuts.

—I need to talk to you, he said to Oppenheimer, still seated at the table opposite Fermi, gazing out the window.

—And you too, he said to Ben, and the three of them rose and slipped out the door, closing it behind them.

Ann went to sit where Oppenheimer had sat and watched Fermi write, the blank pages secured under one arm for future use. He guarded them jealously.

She could not keep looking at him so she averted her eyes and looked out the window as Oppenheimer had, fleeing from contact. She tried to make out shapes in the dark beyond the room’s reflection. At the far corner of the pool enclosure Tamika sat in a hot tub. Only her head was visible above the water and the hot tub rim, dreadlocks piled high. She looked buried up to her neck. Nearer the water in the main pool moved dancelike, swaying and glittering with new emptiness. On the cement deck early autumn leaves had already fallen, gathered in narrow piles at the base of the white metal fence whose sign bore the words SWIM AT YOUR OWN RISK. Tamika seemed not to mind that it was night, growing cold, already fall.

Beyond her were the lights of other rooms across the way, past the swaying water. Most of the curtains were closed and only thin bars of light slanted out. On the third floor Ann could see a man standing stock-still and staring outward over his balcony, staring in her direction or possibly down at Tamika’s body in the water below. It was only his silhouette and the silhouette was of a big, thick man with no arms. Then he moved and the arms became separate from the body. They seemed to blur as he raised them over his head, as though they were not two arms but many.

Then he pulled the curtains together and disappeared.

She watched this with Fermi very slight on the other side of the table, pen scratching.

The next morning he would not come out of his room, which Kurt the Hut was guarding. They