"Kind my ass," said the man in the pale suit. "I've got a job for you, Shadow."
A roar of engines. The little plane jerked forward, pushing Shadow back into his seat. Then they were airborne, and the airport lights were falling away below them. Shadow looked at the man in the seat next to him.
His hair was a reddish gray; his beard, little more than stubble, was grayish red. A craggy, square face with pale gray eyes. The suit looked expensive, and was the color of melted vanilla ice cream. His tie was dark gray silk, and the tie pin was a tree, worked in silver: trunk, branches, and deep roots.
He held his glass of Jack Daniel's as they took off, and did not spill a drop.
"Aren't you going to ask me what kind of job?" he asked.
"How do you know who I am?"
The man chuckled. "Oh, it's the easiest thing in the world to know what people call themselves. A little thought, a little luck, a little memory. Ask me what kind of job."
"No," said Shadow. The attendant brought him another glass of beer, and he sipped at it.
"Why not?"
"I'm going home. I've got a job waiting for me there. I don't want any other job."
The man's craggy smile did not change, outwardly, but now he seemed, actually, amused. "You don't have a job waiting for you at home," he said. "You have nothing waiting for you there. Meanwhile, I am offering you a perfectly legal job-good money, limited security, remarkable fringe benefits. Hell, if you live that long, I could throw in a pension plan. You think maybe you'd like one of them?"
Shadow said, "You must have seen my name on the side of my bag."
The man said nothing.
"Whoever you are," said Shadow, "you couldn't have known I was going to be on this plane. I didn't know I was going to be on this plane, and if my plane hadn't been diverted to St. Louis, I wouldn't have been. My guess is you're a practical joker. Maybe you're hustling something. But I think maybe we'll have a better time if we end this conversation here."
The man shrugged.
Shadow picked up the in-flight magazine. The little plane jerked and bumped through the sky, making it harder to concentrate. The words floated through his mind like soap bubbles, there as he read them, gone completely a moment later.
The man sat quietly in the seat beside him, sipping his Jack Daniel's. His eyes were closed.
Shadow read the list of in-flight music channels available on transatlantic flights, and then he was looking at the map of the world with red lines on it that showed where the airline flew. Then he had finished reading the magazine, and, reluctantly, he closed the cover and slipped it into the pocket.
The man opened his eyes. There was something strange about his eyes, Shadow thought. One of them was a darker gray than the other. He looked at Shadow. "By the way," he said, "I was sorry to hear about your wife, Shadow. A great loss."
Shadow nearly hit the man, then. Instead he took a deep breath. ("Like I said, don't piss off those bitches in airports," said Johnnie Larch, in the back of his mind, "or they'll haul your sorry ass back here before you can spit.") He counted to five.
"So was I," he said.
The man shook his head. "If it could but have been any other way," he said, and sighed.
"She died in a car crash," said Shadow. "There are worse ways to die."
The man shook his head, slowly. For a moment it seemed to Shadow as if the man was insubstantial; as if the plane had suddenly become more real, while his neighbor had become less so.
"Shadow," he said. "It's not a joke. It's not a trick. I can pay you better than any other job you find will pay you. You're an ex-con. There won't be a long line of people elbowing each other out of the way to hire you."
"Mister whoever-the-fuck you are," said Shadow, just loud enough to be heard over the din of the engines, "there isn't enough money in the world."
The grin got bigger. Shadow found himself remembering a PBS show about chimpanzees. The show claimed that when apes and chimps smile it's only to bare their teeth in a grimace of hate or aggression or terror. When a chimp grins, it's a threat.
"Work for me. There may be a little risk, of course, but if you survive you can have whatever your heart desires. You could be the next king of America. Now," said the man, "who else is going to pay you that well? Hmm?"
"Who are you?" asked Shadow.
"Ah, yes. The age of information-young lady, could you pour me another glass of Jack Daniel's? Easy on the ice-not, of course, that there has ever been any other kind of age. Information and knowledge: two currencies that have never gone out of style."
"I said, who are you?"
"Let's see. Well, seeing that today certainly is my day-why don't you call me Wednesday? Mister Wednesday. Although given the weather, it might as well be Thursday, eh?"
"What's your real name?"
"Work for me long enough and well enough," said the man in the pale suit, "and I may even tell you that. There. Job offer. Think about it. No one expects you to say yes immediately, not knowing whether you're leaping into a piranha tank or a pit of bears. Take your time." He closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat.
"I don't think so," said Shadow. "I don't like you. I don't want to work with you."
"Like I say," said the man, without opening his eyes, "don't rush into it. Take your time."