Dreaming of Babylon. Richard Brautigan

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       Bela Lugosi

      I walked back down Columbus Avenue, eating my sandwich and headed toward the morgue. I had remembered another place where I might get some bullets. It was a long shot but everything I did these days was a long shot, starting off when I woke up in the morning. The odds were 50–1 against me taking my morning piss without getting half a bladder on my foot, if you know what I mean.

      I had a friend who worked at the morgue. He kept a gun in his desk. I thought it was sort of strange when I first got to know the guy. I mean, what in the hell do you need a gun for in a place filled with dead bodies? The chances are very slim that Bela Lugosi and some of his friends, like Igor, are going to break into the place and make off with some stiffs to bring back to life.

      One day I asked my friend about the gun.

      He didn’t say anything for a few minutes.

      He was really thinking about it.

      “They brought in this dead ax murderer,” he said, finally. “Who’d been shot by the police after beheading all the participants of a card game that he held every Friday night for twenty years in his basement. He was running around in the street waving his ax when the police pumped eight bullets into him. When the police brought him in here, he sure looked dead to me, but it didn’t quite work out that way. I was putting him in the cooler when suddenly he sat up and tried to chop my head off with his hand. He still thought he had an ax in it. I hit him over the head with an autopsy pan and that quieted him down. He was really dead by the time the police got here after I called them.

      “That caused an embarrassing situation because they didn’t believe me. They thought I’d had a drink or two and imagined the whole thing.

      “‘No,’ I said. ‘You guys brought somebody in here who wasn’t dead. I mean, this son-of-a-bitch was still kicking.’

      “Then your friend Rink who was with them said, ‘Peg-leg, let me ask you a question.’

      “‘Sure,’ I said.

      “‘And I want you to answer this question as truthfully as you can. OK?’

      “‘OK,’ I said. ‘Shoot.’

      “‘Do you see a lot of bullet holes in this bastard?’

      “‘Yeah,’ I said.

      “‘Is he dead now?’

      “We were all standing around the body. He had so many bullet holes in him that it was ridiculous.

      “‘Yeah,’ I said.

      “‘Are you sure he’s dead?’

      “‘Positive,’ I said.

      “‘Positive?’ Rink said.

      “‘Positive,’ I said.

      “‘Then forget about it,’ he said.

      “‘You don’t believe me?’ I said.

      “‘We believe you,’ he said. ‘But don’t tell anybody else. I wouldn’t even tell your wife.’

      “‘I’m not married,’ I said.

      “‘Even a better reason not to.’

      “Then they left.

      “They all took a good long look at me before they left. I got the message but still that son-of-a-bitch had been alive, so I didn’t want to take any more chances with all the dead murderers, bank robbers and maniacs that come in here. You never know when they’re not dead, when they’re just playacting or unconscious or something and they might suddenly attack you, so I got the gun I keep here in the desk. I’m prepared now. The next time: BANG!”

      That’s where I’d borrow the bullets I needed.

      I’d get them from my friend Peg-leg who works at the morgue and keeps a gun around to shoot dead people.