The Prisoner of Vandam Street Read Free Page B

waking up in hell because then, when the real thing comes, you’ll be ready for it. While it was true that Mick Brennan’s Irish-cockney style and rather blunt interpersonal techniques were cloying and somewhat tedious, they were far less maddening than McGovern’s pecking you to death with “Say again?”
    Moving from McGovern to Brennan, I felt, was like traveling up to a higher circle of hell. The next auditory sensation I experienced, however, convinced me beyond any doubt that I had plunged to new depths and was currently residing inside the very bowels of that fiery and terrible place.
    “Kinkstah!!” shouted the familiar rodentlike voice, far too loud and ebullient for the way my mind and body were feeling. “Kinkstah! I’m here, baby! Your favorite Doctor! Doctor Watson, of course!”
    “Ratso,” I said weakly. “Could you turn down your vocal mike?”
    “Sure, Kinkstah! Anything, Kinkstah! I came as soon as Brennan called me. He was in some pub run by a friend of his who kept it open all night because Mick was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Said something was seriously wrong with you resulting from complications brought about by McGovern slipping you a mickey at the Corner Bistro. I knew that couldn’t be it, Kinkstah. What’s really wrong with you, Kinkstah?”
    “Munchausen by proxy. I want to kill all of the Village Irregulars.”
    “That’s technically not the correct definition of munchausen by proxy, Sherlock. In munchausen by proxy, the primary care-giver—I’m your primary care-giver, by the way—”
    “That’s comforting.”
    “—could be a mother, a nurse, a nanny, someone like that. Anyway, the primary care-giver seeks to make the child sick or appear to be sick either physically or emotionally so that the care-giver gets attention or sympathy by extension—”
    “Ah, you’re so insightful, Watson! Only a keen, observant mind like yours would have the insight to realize my malady for what it is—a cry for help. That’s all it is. An attention-getting device. The fact that my temperature’s a hundred and six and that I’m alternately freezing to death or burning alive, and that I’m shitting and pissing and puking and delirious and hallucinating—”
    “Get a grip on yourself, Sherlock. No one’s saying you’re not sick. We all realize you’re sick—”
    “And I realize that you’re sick—”
    “And you’re the one shivering in a hospital bed with a face that looks like a death mask. But don’t worry, Sherlock. We’ll find out what’s wrong with you and have you back on your feet in no time! I just saw the doctor down the hall. He’s coming in to check on you soon.”
    “What does he look like?”
    “A waiter at the Bengali Palace.”
    “Why does every guy from India always come to New York and wind up being a doctor?”
    “Because they couldn’t figure out how to drive a taxi?”
    There were times when a little light banter with Ratso might have amused me, but this was not one of them. Here he was laughing and yapping away, and every time I closed my eyes I saw a pale horse. Or a coffee-colored river. There may have been times in my life when my grasp on mortality was more tenuous, but I couldn’t remember when. This could really be it, I reflected darkly. This was the way the world ends, not with a bang but with Ratso nattering away about the precise definition of munchausen by proxy, or Brennan calling the nurse an ol’ boiler or McGovern a wanker. Where was McGovern, by the way? A little strange, wasn’t it? I no longer believed he’d slipped me a mickey, but I figured he’d at least pop in to see what condition my condition was in. Maybe I was imagining things, but I was beginning to see a troubled, sadly vexed visage lurking just beneath the bright countenance of Ratso’s face. This troubled me too and vexed me not a little. If Ratso was worried, it was no doubt about a quarter past the time for me to be worried because, after