Barkley Bohner, Celebrity Philosopher

Chapter 29

Part Three

Four Weeks to Stop the Free Fall

If doors do not open and close, can you hear them opening and closing, anyway?

"Open up, police!" 

I swear, from inside my wretched Ungentrified Harlem hideaway, I heard doors quietly opening and closing outside, but this makes absolutely no sense. Besides, the banging was on MY door. I should be the one opening up. I really need to stop over-thinking this stuff.

I opened the door. Two uniformed police officers stood just outside.

"Dunstar Fobash?"

No sense in trying to pretend I was someone other than who I was pretending to be. "How can I help you?"

It turned out I could help them by accompanying the two of them downtown and not asking questions. No one put cuffs on me. I assumed this meant I was a free man. I also assumed that my life was about to assume a different – and most likely very short – trajectory.

My ancient cell phone rang. The officers allowed me to answer it. "Make sure you leave the door unlocked," I heard Moosh say. "A moving crew is on its way. Don't worry. They won't forget the doily." The phone went dead. I turned to the officers. Time to head out. 

We pulled up at the New Yorker Hotel in midtown. It was late afternoon. I had a sudden funny feeling. We passed through the lobby to the elevators.

"Don't tell me," I said to the officer closest to the elevator panel. "You're going to press 33."

He looked at me as if I had just told him he has a dead cousin with a first name of L who is trying to get in touch with him.

We got out on the thirty-third floor. A uniformed officer was standing guard in front of room 3327. The plaque on the door read, "The Nikola Tesla Room." 

Tesla had stayed here and in what was then a connecting room the last ten years of his life.

One of the officers rapped on the door. A uniformed police sergeant admitted us to a modern room of shoebox dimensions – two twin beds and very little floor. Crime scene people went about their work jammed cheek-by-jowl, some of them standing or kneeling on the beds.

I peered over the nearest bed. Body or chalk outline? I wondered. Body. My second in three weeks. Not good. 

Moosh emerged from the adjoining bathroom, phone in hand, spotted me, and gestured that I push my way through the crowd to get a good look. This meant getting onto the nearest bed on my hands and knees and inching though a forest of calves and thighs. I looked down, then looked back up at Moosh in disbelief. 

Moosh caught the look on my face and gestured that I follow him out the door. He led me down the hall past the elevators to an empty room.

"Tell me what you just saw," he requested. 

I struggled to find the right words, then plain gave up. "I saw Nikola Tesla with a bullet hole in his forehead," I said. 

Moosh started working the gum in his mouth. "It could have been someone dressed up like Nikola Tesla."

"That's the probable assumption."

"That's what I thought you'd say. So what's your improbable assumption?"

"Probably the same as yours."

"Right." The jaw was moving, the scar slithering. "So Tesla materialized from out of the past, back in his old room. Someone knew he was coming. This somehow relates to the Mona Betsy and the reality field and the Secret Betsy's."