Читать онлайн «Running Dog»

You won't find ordinary people here. Not after dark, on these streets, under the ancient warehouse canopies. Of course you know this. This is the point. It's why you're here, obviously. Wind comes gusting off the river, stirring the powdery air of demolition sites. Derelicts build fires in rusty oil drums near the piers. You see them clustered, wrapped in whatever variety of coat or throwaway sweater or combination of these they've been able to acquire. There are trucks parked near the warehouses, some of them occupied, men smoking in the dimness, waiting for the homosexuals to make their way down from the bars above Canal Street. You lengthen your stride, although not to hurry out of the cold. You like that stiffening wind. You turn a corner and move briefly into it, feeling your thighs take shape against the dress's pleasurably taut weave. Broken glass shines like white mica in the vacant lots. The river has a musky tang tonight.

Eastward now, you see four letters spray-painted on the side of a building. Mongrel scrawl. ANGW. But familiar somehow, burning a hole in time. And it comes back now from a distance of more than twenty years. The visit to Salzburg. The cousins, the games, the museum. Four letters engraved on a ceremonial halberd. Your father's explanation: _Alles nach Gottes Willen_.

Weapons have become godless since then. Weapons have lost their religion. And children have grown up to find they have traveled curious distances. You feel it's imminent now, one more corner to turn, someone there, that silent bargaining that has nothing to do with goods or even services; only what you truly are, night-cruising souls agreeing to each other's terms. A dark elation grows with every step you take.

All according to God's will.