Strangers

spiraled lazily through the glow of streetlamps and through the lights of cars moving along the thoroughfare, Jack gradually realized the city had reacquired a fraction of the glitter, glamour, and mystery that it always had for him before he'd gone to Central America but which it had not possessed in ages. It seemed cleaner now than it had been in a long time, and the air was crisper, less polluted.
        Staring around in amazement, he slowly understood that the city had not undergone a metamorphosis during the past few minutes. It was the same city that it had been an hour ago - and yesterday. But when he had come back from Central America, he had been a different man from the one who had gone away, and on returning he had been unable to see anything good in the metropolis or in any other works of the society he hated. Much of the Big Apple's dreariness and degeneration had been merely a reflection of his own blasted, burnt-out, corrupted inner landscape.
        Jack returned to the Camaro, went west to Sixth Avenue, north to Central Park, made a right turn, then another right onto Fifth Avenue again, heading south, not sure where he was going until he reached the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church. Once more, he parked illegally, took cash from the trunk, and went into the church.
        There was no poor-box as in St. Patrick's, but Jack found a young assistant minister in the process of closing the place for the night. From various pockets, Jack produced bundles of ten- and twenty-dollar bills wrapped with rubber bands, and handed them to the startled cleric, claiming to have won a fortune in the casinos of Atlantic City.
        In two stops, he had given away thirty thousand dollars. But that was not even one-tenth of what he had brought back from Connecticut, and those dispensations did not allay his guilt. In fact, his newfound shame was growing stronger by the minute. The bag of money in the trunk was, to him, like the telltale heart buried under the floorboards in the story by Poe, a throbbing annunciator of his guilt, and he was as anxious to be rid of it as Poe's narrator had been anxious to silence the incriminating heartbeat of his dismembered victim.
        Three hundred thirty thousand dollars remained. For some New Yorkers, Christmas was about to come two and a half weeks late.
        
        Elko County, Nevada.
        The summer before last, Dom had stayed in Room 20. He remembered it well because it was the last unit in the motel's L-shaped east wing.
        Ernie Block's curiosity was more compelling than his nyctophobia, so he decided to accompany Faye and Dom to Room 20, where it was hoped that Dom's memories would be stilled by the sight of the familiar walls and furnishings. Ernie walked between Faye and Dom, who held his arms. During the trip along the breezeway, the frigid night wind made Dom glad for his fleece-lined jacket. More concerned about the black night than the chill, Ernie kept his eyes shut for the entire journey.
        Faye went in first, snapping on the lights, closing drapes. Dom followed with Ernie, who opened his eyes only when Faye shut the door.
        Upon entering the room, Dom was filled with apprehension. He walked to the queen-sized bed, stared down at it.
        He tried to remember lying here, drugged and helpless.
        Faye said, "The bedspread's not the same, of course."
        The Polaroid had shown the corner of a floral-patterned spread. The current model was brown- and blue-striped.
        "The bed itself is the same, and all the furniture," Ernie said.
        The padded headboard was upholstered with a coarse brown fabric, slightly snagged and worn. The nightstands were plain two-drawer chests with laminated walnut veneer. The bases of the lamps resembled large hurricane lanterns, black metal with two panes of smoky amber glass in each side; the cloth shades were the same amber hue as the glass in the base. Each lamp had two bulbs: The main one, under the shade, provided most of the light; the second bulb, inside the base, was shaped like a candle flame and gave off a dim flickering glow that imitated a real flame and was used only for its decorative effect, to enhance the illusion of hurricane lanterns.
        Dom remembered every detail of the place now that he was standing in it, and he had the impression that a multitude of ghosts flitted teasingly through the room, staying just at the periphery of his vision. The