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"If God is worried about me, why doesn't He just hit me with a bolt of
lightning?"
"They say he works in mysterious ways. Maybe he's softening you up first." She
grinned. Her eyes were mostly pupil. I understood why women used to put
belladonna drops in their eyes. She looked achingly beautiful.
"Or maybe," she suggested, "the reactions to you are taking place through a
network of consciousness."
What she said didn't make much sense, but I was still stoned enough that her
words carried a profound impact. I sensed that something important was trying
to get through. I answered with appropriate awe.
"Huh?"
She leaned forward, suddenly emphatic.
"People such as those monks are acting on feelings that don't come from within
them. They're operating on emotions impinging on them from outside-from a
worldwide reaction to our activities."
It was as if she'd stuck another hypo of junk into me. I felt a swelling tide
of alarm flow over me. This was true. I was really supposed to assassinate
God! And there were forces out to stop me.
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And then I realized what was happening.
"What're you up to, Blondie? You're laying a program on me as thick as the one
Beathan tried."
She stared with those black saucers for a moment, then said, "Everything will
seem more important right now. Don't pay any attention to it. We've got work
to do."
"What do you mean `we,' girlfriend?"
She stood to lean over me. "Do you think that after what happened to me I
don't have a grudge?" She looked as though she'd volunteer to pull the trigger
on Number One all by herself. "This sort of thing has gone on long enough.
It's all gone on too long."
"I work alone."
"Have it your way. The offer's there. What's that on your fingers?"
I didn't want to know. I raised my hand and saw grey gunk under a few nails.
Memories flashed back. My stomach tried to beat the high jump record. I
pressed up under my solar plexus to lift my diaphragm off the lurching organ.
The sick feeling passed.
It was a technique I used a lot in my occupation.
A corner of my light blue hospital robe served to wipe the particles of dead
flesh from beneath my fingernails. "Leftovers," I muttered.
She wasn't distracted. "I can help you on this. I want to help you. I know
someone who can straighten you out on a few things about what god is."
I relented. "Do I have time to put on something less drafty?"
She showered and changed her outfit to a skintight peacock-blue Danskin top
and a ruffled turquoise dress. After taking my measurements in a giggly stoned
manner, she hopped into the stolen Porsche to head for Hollywood. She was gone
until well after noon.
I took the opportunity during her absence to look around. After all, even if
she hadn't actually told me to make myself at home, I was certain that such
was her intent.
A quick glance through the medicine cabinet revealed nothing but the usual
assortment of feminine colorants and perfumes. No medicine. Healthy sort.
One room contained an odd collection of metal and crystal sculptures. Copper
and onyx and silver and amethyst glittered under the light from a ceiling
lamp. The curtains were drawn. Bronze and quartz and gold and peridot
scattered colors about.
Her bedroom barely enclosed a king-size bed decorated with an Egyptian motif.
Lots of silk-screened papyrus leaves and scarabs. Stylized cobras. Very sexy.
I cut my tour short since I didn't know how long she would be out. I spent the
next hour waiting for her, looking through her library. Real books, not
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plaques. Only a few of them were fiction. A good number concerned religions
around the world and in antiquity. She owned books on history, mathematics,
physics. The usual computer manuals were stuck here and there. All in all, a
good balance.
Ann returned a few minutes after I'd settled onto the living-room couch. She
tossed a navy blue pinstripe business suit my way.
I held it up. A lovely wool blend, not like the reflective stuff I usually
wore to merge with the crowd. It fit in with the current style-wide lapels and
shoulders, baggy pants with cuffs. Nostalgia for a time even I didn't
remember.
A light yellow oxford cloth shirt and a navy-hued silk tie with nearly
invisible maroon polka dots completed the outfit.
"Tasteful," I said, draping the wardrobe over my arm.
"Don't forget these." She pulled a pair of black wingtips out of a box and
handed them to me along with a pair of black socks.
"Over the calf," I said with appreciation. "You know all the tricks of the
trade."
She smiled. "You didn't strike me as the baggy-socks type. And I'm the one
with the garters." She pointed to the already-familiar bathroom. "Would you
like a shower?"
"I suppose I should, if we're calling on the country's top atheist."
Theodore Golding lived in Hollywood near his Philosophical Forum on the
Foundations of Theology. The Forum was located on Larchmont, right next to
Thucydides, a bookstore that he also owned. He must have had money to situate
his esoteric businesses near the Wilshire Country Club. I was determined not
to be impressed.
Ann pulled the Porsche up to a modest house on the four hundred block of Van
Ness.
"That's Golding's home. Feel well enough to go in?"
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