Two-Thousand-Pound Goldfish Read Online Free Page B

like The Revenge of the Snails. I refused to be slimed to death, remember? I have my principles. Anyway, what does this goldfish do, swallow people?”
    “Ingests them.”
    “Ah, and somebody says, ‘No, no, it can’t be. No goldfish can weigh two thousand pounds. Why, a goldfish that big could ingest …’ ‘Go ahead and finish, Chief. Could ingest …’ ” She paused and looked at Warren, waiting.
    “Two sewer workers,” he supplied.
    “This goldfish has ingested two sewer workers? I love it. Can I have a part in the movie?”
    He nodded.
    “How about this. I come into the sewer. I am pursued by a mugger and I hide behind a pipe. The mugger spots me and starts for me. Suddenly he sees a look of horror come over my face. He thinks, naturally, that I am horrified because of him, but actually it is because I see an enormous, giant goldfish rising out of the water behind him. I scream, ‘Look out behind you!’ He says, ‘Lady, that is the oldest trick in the book,’ and at that moment—” Pepper broke off. “What’s wrong? Aren’t you interested? I was just getting into my role.”
    “Nothing’s wrong,” he said.
    “You can tell me.”
    “It’s nothing!”
    Aunt Pepper waited. She knew that when Warren claimed nothing was wrong, he usually broke down on his own and told what the trouble was. “Well.” He looked up at his aunt. “What’s wrong is that I think Weezie knows where Mom is.”
    “Did she tell you that?”
    “Weezie talked to Mom on the phone.”
    “Did she tell you that ?”
    “No, but I know it’s true. Everybody probably knows where Mom is but me.”
    “I don’t know where your mom is, and I don’t think Weezie does either.” She sat down at the table across from Warren. She glanced at the door to the living room and lowered her voice.
    “All right, you might as well know this. Once a month—on the first Monday at seven o’clock—your mom calls the phone booth in front of the library. Or that’s when she’s supposed to call. One of us, Weezie or me, goes there and waits. Sometimes she calls and sometimes she doesn’t. It’s her way of keeping in touch.”
    He sat up straighter. “How long has this been going on?”
    “In the past three years your mom has called maybe six or seven times. She asks about you and Grandma and Weezie, and that’s it. We never talk about where she is or what she’s doing.”
    “I want to talk to her.”
    “Honey, your mom has broken the law.”
    “I know that, but—”
    “Once you’ve broken the law, it stays broken It’s like smashing that glass right there. And afterward you can be sorry for what you did, and you can live like a saint, but that doesn’t wipe out what you did.”
    “I know that!”
    “Look at Abbie Hoffman. He’s been living in some town in New York, a model citizen. He served on local committees. A governor commended him for some special service. But none of that wiped out the fact that he broke the law.”
    “I don’t want to hear about him.”
    “I’m telling you so you can understand why your mom can’t come home and be a mom and why you can’t call her and visit her. Your mom has broken the law, and she’s got two choices. She can live in hiding, or she can go to prison.”
    “That doesn’t mean I can’t talk to her like you do. Maybe if I talked to her, I could go see her. Maybe I could—”
    There was a noise in the doorway. Warren looked up to see his grandmother.
    “Mom, we’re talking about Saffee,” Pepper said in a gentle voice.
    “I don’t know any Saffee,” his grandmother answered and, turning away, went back and sat heavily on the old sofa.

“It’s got to be destroyed. We can’t have a two-thousand-pound fish swimming under our city.”
    “I agree. Our sewer must be made safe for mankind.”
    W ARREN WAS STANDING AT the window, watching for his sister to return. His grandmother was in the living room in front of the television set. Usually his grandmother turned on the TV