Invisible man

            Then from down the hall I could hear Mary singing, her voice clear and untroubled, though she sang a troubled song. It was the "Back Water Blues." I lay listening as the sound flowed to and around me, bringing me a calm sense of my indebtedness. When it faded I got up and put on my coat. Perhaps it was not too late. I would find a telephone and call him; then he could tell me exactly what he wanted and I could make a sensible decision.

            Mary heard me this time. "Boy, when you come home?" she said, sticking her head out of the kitchen. "I didn't even hear you."

            "I came in a short while ago," I said. "You were busy so I didn't bother you."

            "Then where you going so soon, ain't you going to eat supper?"

            "Yes, Mary," I said, "but I've got to go out now. I forgot to take care of some business."

            "Shucks! What kind of business you got on a cold night like this?" she said.

            "Oh, I don't know, I might have a surprise for you."

            "Won't nothing surprise me," she said. "And you hurry on back here and git something hot in your stomach."

            Going through the cold seeking a telephone booth I realized that I had committed myself to bring her some kind of surprise, and as I walked I became mildly enthusiastic. It was, after all, a job that promised to exercise my talent for public speaking, and if the pay was anything at all it would be more than I had now. At least I could pay Mary something of what I owed her. And she might receive some satisfaction that her prediction had proved correct.

            I seemed to be haunted by cabbage fumes; the little luncheonette in which I found the telephone was reeking.

            Brother Jack didn't sound at all surprised upon receiving my call.

            "I'd like some information about --"

            "Get here as quickly as you can, we're leaving shortly," he said, giving me a Lenox Avenue address and hanging up before I could finish my request.

            I went out into the cold, annoyed both by his lack of surprise and by the short, clipped manner in which he'd spoken, but I started out, taking my own time. It wasn't far, and just as I reached the corner of Lenox a car pulled up and I saw several men inside, Jack among them, smiling.

            "Get in," he said. "We can talk where we're going. It's a party; you might like it."

            "But I'm not dressed," I said. "I'll call you tomorrow --"

            "Dressed?" he chuckled. "You're all right, get in."

            I got in beside him and the driver, noticing that there were three men in the back. Then the car moved off.

            No one spoke. Brother Jack seemed to sink immediately into deep thought. The others looked out into the night. It was as though we were mere chance passengers in a subway car. I felt uneasy, wondering where we were going, but decided to say nothing. The car shot swiftly over the slush.

            Looking out at the passing night I wondered what kind of men they were. Certainly they didn't act as though they were heading for a very sociable evening. I was hungry and I wouldn't get back in time for supper. Well, maybe it would be worth it, both to Mary and to me. At least I wouldn't have to eat that cabbage!

            For a moment the car paused for the traffic light, then we were circling swiftly through long stretches of snow-covered landscape lighted here and there by street lamps and the nervously stabbing beams of passing cars: We were flashing through Central Park, now completely transformed by the snow. It was as though we had plunged suddenly into mid-country peace, yet I knew that here, somewhere close by in the night, there was a zoo with its dangerous animals. The lions and tigers in heated cages, the bears asleep, the snakes coiled tightly underground. And there was also the reservoir of dark water, all covered by snow and by night, by snow-fall and by night-fall, buried beneath black and white, gray mist and gray silence. Then past the driver's head I could see a wall of buildings looming beyond the windshield. The car nosed slowly into traffic, dropped swiftly down a hill.

            We stopped before an expensive-looking building in a strange part of the city. I could see the word Chthonian on the storm awning stretched above the walk as I got out with the others and went swiftly toward a lobby lighted by dim bulbs set behind frosted glass, going past the uniformed doorman with an uncanny sense of familiarity; feeling now, as we entered a soundproof elevator and shot away at a mile a minute, that I had been through it all before. Then we were stopping with a gentle bounce and I was uncertain whether we had gone up or down. Brother Jack guided me down the hall to a door on which I saw a bronze door-knocker in the shape of a large-eyed owl. Now he hesitated a moment, his head thrust forward as though listening, then his hand covered the owl from view, producing instead of the knock which I expected, an icy peal of clear chimes. Shortly the door swung partly open, revealing a smartly dressed woman, whose hard, handsome face broke into smiles.

            "Come in, Brothers," she said, her exotic perfume filling the foyer.