Walls had been knocked down or chopped apart until the support beams were all that remained. Floors had been removed so that the ceilings reached to the heavens. They had to. With everything piled inside, ten feet of vertical space wouldn’t do. Neither would twenty.
Glass lanterns mounted on the beams provided an eggy glow. White plastic pipes, sliced in half lengthwise, cut twisting paths through the open air. Bunches of shoes were hung by their laces like wind chimes or mobiles. A green plastic swimming pool filled with water was suspended in the air by tight metal cords. Wooden tables were stacked on top of each other to form pyramids. Bells, each a different size, descended diagonally above the tables. Ropes and pulleys. Record players. Doves in cages. A tepee of paper and wood, sitting on the floor, in the middle of it all.
Every color and shape imaginable was vying for Martin’s attention, but he chose to watch Lane. She lumbered around and over everything in her way until she was standing at the foot of a long steel ladder that leaned against the highest of the pipes. For some reason, Martin had expected her to be more graceful, but there was still something fluid about the way she moved. As she began to climb, her hips swung from side to side and her arms and legs made large swooping movements and attacked each rung. Her awkward, swaying confidence reminded him of twisted fronds of kelp floating on the ocean.
When she reached the top of the ladder, she stopped for a moment to catch her breath, then turned the top half of her body around and steadied herself by grabbing the pipe.
“Gentlemen,” she called out. “Are you ready to be dazzled?”
Felix raised his fist and called back, “You betcha!”
“Are you ready to be shocked?” she yelled.
“Why the heck not!” Felix was clearly swept up in the moment. Martin didn’t have a clue what any of this was about, but he nodded and smiled just the same.
“Welcome to the world premiere of Lane Ruez’s brand-new masterpiece. I call it … The Rube!”
With that, she thrust a hand up in the air and grabbed a thin chain that was dangling next to her ear. She gave it a violent yank.
Ropes and pulleys let loose with whines and squeaks, which were followed by a quick smack of darkness. Somehow, all but one of the lanterns had been extinguished.
Martin looked up at the sole lantern that remained lit. It had a small door in its glass shell that eased open. The flame inside grew larger. Then an orb of fire fell through the opening, as if it were a freshly laid egg.
The orb plummeted through the darkness, giving off a wisp of sparks. It landed in the open curve of one of the white plastic pipes. Having been sliced in half, the pipe now served as a track. The orb rolled, slowly at first, along its twisting path. As its momentum built, so did the flames, illuminating more and more of the surroundings. Martin could see that there was a break in the track. Surely a mistake?
When the orb reached the break, it sailed through the air until it struck one of the hanging shoes. Flames shot out from the bottom of the shoe, the sole of which must have been packed with something highly combustible. The thrust of the flames sent the shoe into motion. It kicked forward until it struck another shoe, which was dangling in front of it. That shoe struck another. And so on and so forth. Soon there were pinwheels of spinning, flaming shoes everywhere.
Meanwhile, the orb had fallen into the pool of water and had been extinguished. But from a hole in the toe of another shoe, another flaming orb emerged. This one landed on the pyramid of tables. As it bounced its way down from table to table, it struck the series of bells.
Dong dong, dong dong, dong dong, ding …
Martin recognized the melody. It was a song his father used to hum on especially clear nights.
When the orb reached the bottom of the tables, it spiraled through a giant funnel, landed on another track, slalomed along, and struck a line of spoons in its way. The spoons were attached to the turntables of antique record players, each with an ornate amplifying horn. Records began to spin. Voices, garbled and slow, sang or spoke the following phrases in near perfect succession:
There once was a … noble … white … savage …
… his fate … deemed … grander … than average …
… our box … lost its hope …
… and was filled … with this … dope
… with a brain … quite as … plain … as a cabbage …
The flaming orb then shot off the track and skipped its way along the floor. Its journey ended when it struck the tepee of wood and paper in the middle of the room. A bonfire roared to life.
The heat was intense and immediate. Martin’s eyes dried out as he watched the flames leap up and touch the bottom of the plastic swimming pool. Doves fluttered wildly in cages that hung in a circle around the pool. Wax, which was holding the doors to the cages closed, began to melt and release its grip. The doors swung open. The doves took flight.
The sound of the flapping wings engulfed the space. Attached to the birds’ legs were tiny prisms that took the light from the fire and projected it as rainbows on the walls. The rainbows danced. The flames pummeled the air.
Then, all at once, the bottom of the pool gave out. A mass of water dumped on the bonfire, snuffing it. Smoke and steam raced up from the smoldering wood. The rainbows disappeared and the sound of the wings retreated as the birds found their way to perches.
The dark, smoky room was now silent except for the faint and haunting sound of a staticky record. Martin couldn’t understand the words being sung. It sounded like “Vu or nut rar seevor. Vu or nut rar seevor.” Perhaps it was another language?
Lane stepped through the smoke, holding a record player in her arm. The horn was propped up on her right shoulder, and she was rotating the record counterclockwise with her left hand.
“Get out,” she said plainly.
Felix grabbed Martin by the arm.
“Get out,” she said again.
Martin was frozen. Staring at Lane, listening to the odd sounds from the record player, he was transfixed. Love, whatever that was, might not have felt like this, but this, this was definitely something.
“Out,” she said once more, raising her finger but not her voice.
Felix pulled Martin to the doorway and then out into the cold. The door to Lane’s house slammed, but the lingering smell of smoke served as a reminder of what they had witnessed.
“Holy shmoly, was that a strange one,” Felix said. “Last time she threw canned sardines at us, but it was nowhere near as spectacular as that!”
Martin didn’t respond. He stepped closer to the door and placed a hand on it. It was warm. He wondered if this was all part of the show.
“Time to go,” Felix said, spinning him around. “Lane doesn’t take kindly to loitering.”
Facing the street, Martin saw a splotch of color in the distance. An enormous pink pig with an arched back and a twitching snout was prancing directly at them.
“Oh jeepers!” Felix exclaimed as the pig got closer. “Remington. Of course. Of course this was coming.”
In the pig’s mouth was a small stone statue of a bear balancing on a ball. As soon as the pig reached them, it dropped the statue at Martin’s feet. Martin bent over to pick it up.
There was a message etched onto the ball.
YOU HAVE BEEN SUMMONED