Ghost Lights by Lydia Millet (classic fiction txt) 📕

outpost of the Belize Defence Force, apparently. The cops and the military, in an ominous conjunction. But maybe the young harelip cadet would be there, take pity on them, and intercede with his superiors on T.’s behalf.

Was there a problem? asked the receptionist, still on the line. “No,” said Hal, “none at all, thanks.” He hung up.

Possibly they would be ill-advised to contact the police after all. Asking for trouble. If T. told Delonn’s brother how the guide had had a heart attack, probably the brother would not bring charges. He wasn’t the suspicious type. And anyway what motive could T. have for murder?

He must have dozed off then, because when he woke up T. was standing over him with light around his thin, nut-brown face. The eyes were a piercing blue. Cleaner, wearing a white collar shirt and gazing down at Hal with what appeared to be compassion, he also seemed sanctified. Beneficent.

But he had omitted to shave, just as Hal feared. The long beard still stuck out stiffly from his chin like a useless appendage. He looked like one of the Hasidim. Or even a saint or Jesus.

Although Jesus was seldom pictured in collar shirts. They had not been popular at the time.

“Sorry,” said the Jesus-T. softly. “I didn’t mean to wake you. You can go back to sleep. I’m taking off for a while.”

Hal sat up, jolted.

“Taking off? Taking off where?”

“Headed to Monkey River Town. With Marlo. Sit down and talk to Delonn’s brother.”

“Good, right,” mumbled Hal, rubbing his eyes. “You’re coming back here after, right?”

“Should be back by sometime around dinner,” said the Jesus-T., nodding. “Don’t wait on me though. Time runs slow in these parts.”

“All right then,” said Hal weakly, and lay back as the Jesus-T. receded. The room door closed softly.

The Jesus-T. left the scent of soap and toothpaste. At least he had used them.

•

A short time later Hal made his way to the hotel restaurant for lunch, himself freshly washed. He was spooning up soup and halfheartedly reading the paper when someone jostled his elbow: a cornboy, probably the Alpha.

Both of them were hovering, shirtless and dripping, in wet shorts. They held fluorescent boogie boards under their arms.

“Hey,” said Hal, wiping his mouth with a napkin.

“Where’s the dead guy?”

“He went to a meeting.”

“You finished?”

“You mean—my lunch? No,” said Hal, mildly astonished. “I just started it.”

“My mother wants to see you.”

“Uh . . .”

“You talk to her. OK? Then we go snorkel.”

The waiter leaned down and removed his soup plate.

“She gets bored. She likes friends. You talk to her.”

“Where’s your father?”

“In the airplane.”

“Im Hubschrauber,” intervened the Beta, shaking his head.

“Yeah, right. A helicopter,” said the Alpha. “He took a helicopter to get to the airplane.”

“Dolphin HH-65A,” nodded the Beta, enunciating perfectly.

“I’ll be happy to talk to her,” said Hal. His club sandwich had come. He took a sip of iced tea. “Right after I eat. OK?”

“We are in front. We are by the ocean.”

“OK,” said Hal. “I’ll come find you. Promise.”

He watched them jog away, picking up a fry and dangling it over the small paper cup of ketchup. Were they actually concerned for their mother? Or was the snorkeling more the point? Or had Gretel sent them? Hal thought not. Their expedition had seemed self-directed. Gretel would have come to talk to him herself, if she wanted to. He might go over to her and then she might not be glad to see him. She might not want to talk to him at all, at least without T. in the mix. Possibly he could tell her T.’s story to cover up the awkwardness.

When he finished he took a chocolate-mint from the dish next to the cash register, popped it in his mouth and made a side trip to the bathroom in the lobby, where he splashed cold water on his face and combed his hair with his fingers. Nothing between them, in a linear sense: no future, no expectation. But still.

And he should call Susan again. Soon.

In the sun his eyes smarted. He had left his sunglasses in the room. He walked through canvas beach chairs, umbrellas, both with white and blue stripes, matching; hammocks were strung between tree trunks, his fellow hotel guests lying on them unmoving, fleshy and naked like human sacrifices. Mostly fat. Or fattish. He saw brown bottles of lotion with palm trees on them, dog-eared paperbacks splayed open on towels. One man had on a Walkman, and a tinny beat issued forth.

Shading his eyes, he looked for the cornboys. They were easy to spot in a crowd, typically.

“Hal!” cried Gretel. She was still excited, apparently, about the nondeath of T. She smiled happily.

She wore an orange and brown sarong below her floral bikini top and looked beautiful, though maybe a little older, he was noticing, or more tired than he had thought previously. Her face was shaded by a straw hat. She held her arms open. He leaned into them. She reminded him, suddenly, of people who mourned celebrities—celebrities they never knew, of course, people who were nothing but symbols to them. Fans at Elvis’s grave, for instance. People swaying with candles, or gathered at monogrammed gates holding armfuls of flowers. He had never understood it. The mourners had not even met the celebrities, never seen anything of them but a constructed public image, yet they wept, they swayed, some did violence to themselves.

Clearly the celebrities were symbols to them, and these symbols carried weight. He knew about symbols and their weight, their mystical eminence and power to enthrall. But that did not explain it. If the famous people were symbols, why did it matter when they died? Symbols went on forever.

Gretel had not known T., did not know Susan. How could she care, really? Her beaming happiness. For all she knew T. was a swine, yet she was visibly rejoicing.

“Tell me how you found your friend!” she exhorted, and pulled him underneath her umbrella. The cornboys were in the water. He plumped down on the canvas beach chair