Last Call (Last Call 1)

He had first met the ghost this morning; it had taken the form of popcorn and cigarette butts on the asphalt outside his camper door at dawn, its voice haltingly sounding in his head, and later it had tried, unsuccessfully, to animate a sheet of the Las Vegas Sun. After about ten minutes they had settled on cigar ash as the easiest medium for its physical appearance.

I don't care if my mom's dead, said the voice in Ray-Joe Pogue's head now, just so they don't call me Ollie like Hardy.

Pogue held the door lever and stared uneasily at the churning fat person silhouette-in-ash. "I thought your name was Vaughan."

You can call me that. Or you can call me Bitin Dog. Our bodies were left in the desert. Our name is Legion.

"Like in the Bible, huh?" said Pogue. "But anyway the King is here, at this hospital?"

He is.

Pogue had a gun under his jacket, but he hoped he wouldn't need it. He took the brown plastic bottle out of the pocket of his white sequined denim jacket. "Inderal," he read off the label. "I've known musicians who take this stuff—athletes, too—to keep from getting the shakes and jitters when they have to perform. You sure it'll do, and not just mellow him out?"

He's asthmatic. It'll close his bronchial tubes.

"Asthmatic, right. Okay, you're the doctor."

Your camouflage.

"Don't worry, I didn't forget."

Before stepping out of the truck, Pogue obediently put on his Polaroid sunglasses and took off his shoes to tuck the newly bought water-filled plastic sole-liners inside.

"And I'll walk counterclockwise all the way to him," Pogue told the dim gray ghost as he put his unwieldy shoes back on, "like what you said, a windshield." Last he put on a baseball cap from the Tiara Casino, the logo of which was the best hand in Kansas City Lowball, 7-5-4-3-2 unsuited.

Inside him, said the voice in Pogue's head, there's a—a skinny man waiting to get out.

"Skinny man on deck," agreed Pogue nervously as he opened the truck door and felt the heat.

The ghost became just a pinch of grainy powder in his ear when he stepped through the doors of the hospital, and Pogue had to resist the impulse to scratch it. He hoped none of it had got into his long sideburns, where it would look like dandruff.

The ghost's voice was a buzz now, directing him down this hallway and that—and making him pause frequently to walk in a tight counterclockwise circle on the carpet—and when Pogue pushed open the cafeteria doors the ghost said, There. The man on the left at that table over there.

"Are you sure?" Pogue murmured.

The man on the left, repeated the voice.

Pogue sighed, with both tension and disappointment. He had known that the King might be in any sort of body, but it offended him that this body was so short and round and red-faced and jolly-looking. Damn me, he thought, with a beard he could pass for Santa Claus! And that's a cheap suit.

An abandoned newspaper lay on a table near the three old men, and Pogue sat down and began reading it. The cafeteria smelled like macaroni and cheese. He could simply wait until the King left and then shoot him in the parking lot, but he didn't know if he dared wait for that. The man hadn't glanced at him yet, but Pogue was afraid that if the King were to focus his eyes on him, he would see him, see him, in spite of the fact that Pogue was in effect standing on water, and had neutralized any electromagnetic emanations from his eyes behind the Polaroid lenses, and wore a disguising poker hand on his hat.

In his pocket he broke the cap off the medicine bottle and palmed one of the capsules.

Just shoot him, said the voice in his head.

Out of the corner of his eye Pogue saw the King look up, as though he'd heard the voice. Pogue's face went cold, and he felt a drop of sweat run down his ribs. He watched for any sudden movement at the King's table; if any of the three old men seemed to be going for a gun, Pogue would roll to the floor and draw his own gun. Come up shooting, and worry about getting away afterward.

"Shut—up," he murmured.

No. Shoot him now.

The King pushed back his plastic chair and stood up on ridiculous little bow-legs. He looked around the room, but his gaze swept over Pogue without stopping. Pogue's hand, still palming the capsule, was sweaty on the grip of his gun.

The King said something to his companions, and they got to their feet, too, and the three of them walked to the cafeteria doorway. They stood there, looking up and down the hall.