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

Ben thought fleetingly back to Ann and Oppenheimer, facing the same way on the bed, each neatly bent with their knees up, at rest and in peace. Still, it might be an illusion of innocence: they might have faced each other earlier. There might be more.

Then he thought no, and dismissed it. He knew he was right, despite the appearance of them, together and alone.

He tried to count sheep, but was troubled by the resistance of his mind to sleep, how it dwelled on a hazy vision of the young Szilard trotting into an Old West town with pistols on his hips, holding a rose and riding on a rat.

—Fermi’s family won’t let me dig up his body for a DNA test, announced Szilard petulantly at dinner.

A cleanup crew had come and gone and Larry and Tamika had taken Fermi out to see an Italian art-house movie. He had resisted until they wore him down with their enthusiasm. The movie was billed as the story of a gay, sunlit family picnic in Sardinia with powerful emotional undercurrents, and promised to feature coquettish yet earthy women in peasant skirts.

Szilard and Oppenheimer had politely declined.

—You actually called up one of Enrico Fermi’s descendants and asked him if you could dig up the poor guy’s body? asked Ben, astonished.

—Several, said Szilard.

—You’re so obnoxious, said Ben.

—I didn’t tell them who I was, of course, said Szilard. —I said I was a researcher at U. Chicago doing a longitudinal study of rates of cancer death among nuclear industry professionals.

—You’re kidding me. And they believed you had to dig up their grandfather’s body for that, said Ben flatly.

—They certainly appeared to, said Szilard.

—I have to insist, Leo, said Oppenheimer. —You should steer clear of relatives even under a pretense. I thought we decided that.

—This was important, said Szilard. —I made an exception. Anyway the effort failed. Since you and I were both cremated there is literally no other way to establish our identity through forensic pathology.

—That’s rough, said Ben.

—Unless, of course, we break the law, said Szilard. —We could dig up the body ourselves. I found out where it is.

—You kill me, said Ben.

—If the point is to establish credibility, Leo, said Oppenheimer, —we can’t do it by grave-robbing, can we.

—I have it all worked it, said Szilard. —We can establish our legal authority post facto, through the court system if necessary. After all, no one has a clearer right to dispose of a corpse than the dead man himself. When we prove Fermi is the dead man, we’ll also prove he had the right to perform his own exhumation.

—Not much of a lawyer, are you, said Ben.

—That’s far-fetched, said Oppenheimer. —As far as my own involvement goes, at this time, Leo, I’d have to give you a firm no.

Szilard, irritated, scooped a second helping of scalloped potatoes out of the serving bowl.

—I’ll put it on the back burner for now, he said grudgingly, —but I think you’ll want to reconsider in time.

—No doubt, said Oppenheimer.

—Anyway, said Szilard to Ann a few minutes later, trapping her as she made her way into the bathroom for a jacuzzi, clad only in a towel, —I forgot to tell you: we talked about it and we’re ready to go back. We have several appointments in the United States. I have to meet with my attorneys.

—Your attorneys?

—Your attorneys? echoed Ben, pulling up as he passed them in the hallway. —What, has the government decided to prosecute you on that B&E charge?

—The government is not suing me, said Szilard haughtily. —I’m suing them.

—You’re what?

—If they refuse to release our records under the Freedom of Information Act.

—Your records? asked Ann.

—Our personnel files and fingerprints. They will establish our identities.

—You’re telling me you hired a lawyer to get your fingerprints? asked Ben.

—Initially I hired him to file a Freedom of Information Act request. The DOD had a deadline. But it’s coming up. If they fail to meet it, that’s when we’ll sue. I say we because Oppie and Fermi are now working with me.

—I see, said Ann.

—Once we have the prints, of course, we will be able to go public.

—Go public? asked Ann.

—With the campaign, said Szilard impatiently, and turned around to head toward his room.

—What campaign?

—Global disarmament.

They stared at his retreating back.

—Excuse me, Leo, said Ben. —Where’d you get the money for a lawyer?

—At first I wrote a bad check, confessed Szilard over his shoulder. —Before we left, when I originally hired him. His retainer. But just when it bounced and he was going to quit I was able to get money from Larry. We wired it. No problem.

—No problem, huh, repeated Ben.

—Here I thought you were flat broke this whole time! said Ann. —I didn’t know you even had a checkbook!

—Strictly speaking, of course, I don’t have one per se.

He opened the door to his bedroom.

—Then whose, uh—checkbook—?

—We’ll talk later! called Szilard, with a hasty, furtive glance at Ben, and closed his bedroom door.

—I’m going to kill him.

—This is what they were talking about, said Ann. —The men who tried to interrogate Fermi. Doesn’t he care?

—Are you joking? Szilard loved being stalked. It made him feel important.

Ben changed their ticket dates in a hurry, eager to put them on the first flight out. They took the Narita Express early in the morning. Larry had left them a note on the table: See you later!

Making her way down the aisle of the airplane with her shoulder bag held in front of her, almost tripping over a scissor-legged Barbie doll on the floor, Ann thought she recognized a man from the birthday party as she passed him seated: the food activist from Belgium. He had helped burn down a McDonald’s in France, it was said. She wondered whether she should say hello, but did not remember his name.

—Ben! she hissed as they went past. —A guy from the party was sitting back there, did you see him? The one who threw the Molotov cocktail at the Ronald McDonald statue. What’s his name again?

—Adalbert,