The Dead Author
“So that’s it. I guess I’m asking for your help. Just this once. I need a guide. Anyway, thanks, g’night. I mean, amen.”
The next morning, I awoke to find a dishevelled and confused-looking man at the foot of my bed. He was sat on the stool that I kept there to dump my overalls on at night, or rather, he was sat atop the overalls on the stool; it wasn’t the sort of place a person would choose to sit. He was gazing around the room with the kind of look I’d seen fish give the glass of their tank.
“How did you get in here?”
He looked about him as if he were surrounded by flies, and then sat still for a while, ignoring me. I kept quiet, to give myself enough time to wake up. But I didn’t wake up, and he saw that I was looking at him.
“Huh?”
“I said, what the hell are you doing here?”
“I am not really sure. Are you William Shakespeare, sir?”
“I am not, sir.”
“Oh. You look somewhat like him. I’d made it quite clear, I… are you sure–”
“And I take it that you are not Mr. Whitman?”
The gentleman smiled, relieved, and took his battered old hat in his hands.
“Yessir, that’s me.”
“Mr. Walt Whitman?”
“Nossir, Hen Whitman, born West Hill, Kansas, been all over.”
I bunched the sheets in my fists, and let out a cough. These things happen all the time, I told myself. Easy mistake to make. I felt the intruder’s hand gingerly touch my toe.
“So, you mean to say that your family name isn’t Shakespeare?”
“I’m called Mudd, for Christ’s sake.”
“Oh. Then I s’pose, wherever we are, I’d better go home.”
I supposed he was right, so after I’d got dressed, I took him down to the station. Some rabbits had got onto the track. It’d be a while till the next one. We walked into the bar and I told him I’d buy him a drink to say sorry for the bother. That seemed about right to him. He found a table, and took a pen from his hat and began scrawling on a napkin. I waited at the bar, and I saw all the people waiting for trains to take them places, and I wondered how many drinks I would need to stand to make it seem right to me.