Louse by David Grand Read Free Book Online

melody, wishing the darkened figure would reveal itself. But the images freeze as I pass a photograph on the wall of a large propeller plane on fire diving down in a spin and a blur over an open meadow. Focused in the foreground, standing shoulder to shoulder, are Poppy and Dr. Barnum. Both of the men are youthful, dressed in flight jackets and khaki pants. Their posture is stiff, their smiles candid. Poppy’s hair is short and well groomed. He is clean shaven, all but for a pencil-thin mustache that hugs his upper lip. His eyes are stern, almost shy. He holds a revolver in his right hand. Dr. Barnum holds the tail of a dead opossum over an open ditch.
    I immediately stop. I stop humming. I stand motionless. The memory fades as quickly and spontaneously as it came.
    Although I don’t remember anything within the memoranda that states I should not be humming, humming a tune like the tune I hum as I am ready to inject Poppy with his pharmaceutical, I do not wish… But now…yes, I do remember. I remember a caveat to an old memo, in which he stated that staff members should know better than to mix forms of behavior appropriate to one particular task with similar forms of behavior associated with a completely different task. It would be performing what he considers an act of free will,
a variation of [his] aesthetic
, which is considered as much a form of defiance as sneaking a peek into the camera.
    I move. I move quickly. I go directly to the safe without trying to show any signs of haste or guilt, anything out of the ordinary. I dial the combination, open the door, walk in, and deposit the box among the hundreds of other boxes exactly like it—all containing butterflies of varying colors.
    There is no need to report my negligence. By now it has undoubtedly been noted. I will be fined accordingly. There is part of me that believes I should report my negligence; however, in no official capacity am I responsible for reporting it. Poppy takes great pride in the accuracy of his surveillance system and all those who work to enforce it. Admission of my guilt, therefore, as ethical as my intention might be, in actuality, may prove to be counterintuitive in producing a more sympathetic conclusion. And so, I can only surmise that silence is the most sensible response. Besides, there is the slightest chance that what I did went unnoticed; or perhaps what I did will be judged with compassion and immediately dismissed. It is impossible to say.
    I exit the study, lock the door, and walk the southern wing. I put the humming in a major key out of my head, I replace it with its proper minor key until all resonance of the impure melody is comfortably forgotten.

6. HOUSE CALL
    When I return to Poppy’s chambers, there is a loud explosion in the distance. The room rocks back and forth. Dr. Barnum is standing before the bed with his hands clasped behind his back. Poppy is no longer conscious. Two male attendants stand against the eastern wall holding three rolls of blueprints each. They look like twins, but aren’t. They are both the same height and width, with boyish features, dark hair, light eyes, and sallow skin. They stand motionless and stare straight ahead.
    Dr. Felonius Barnum is one of the few individuals outside domestic staff that visits Poppy on a regular basis. He is a handsome, elderly man with a trim, rectangular figure. He wears a finely sculpted beard, horn-rimmed glasses, and is always dressed in a nicely pressed pinstripe suit and a pair of glowingly polished, white and black wing tips. Based on the photograph in the study and on the EKG Productions in which Dr. Barnum appeared in his youth, it seems to me that the doctor has aged well. He is still fit and dapper, and though he doesn’t have nearly as smooth a complexion as he did when he was a young man, he barely has a wrinkle that isn’t flattering to his disposition.
    Dr. Barnum usually comes by during the swing shift, between 11:30 P.M.