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OUT TYLER’S WINDOW we go, away fro now but really flapping those old wings, flying with a purpose We’re headed toward the heliograph flash of early- sun on the Father of Waters, also toward the world’s largest six-pack Between it and County Road Oo (we can call it Nail-house Roant; we’re practically honorary citizens of French Landing now) is a radio tower, the warning beacon on top now invisible in the bright sunshine of this newborn July day We s earth, and as we draw closer to the toe also smell the yeasty, fecund aroma of beer

Next to the radio tower, in the industrial park on the east side of Peninsula Drive, is a little cinder-block building with a parking lot just big enough for half a dozen cars and the Coulee patrol van, an aging Ford Econoline painted candy-apple pink As the day winds down and afternoon wears into evening, the cylindrical shadows of the six-pack will fall first over the sign on the balding lawn facing the drive, then the building, then the parking lot KDCU-AM, this sign reads, YOUR TALK VOICE IN COULEE COUNTRY Spray-painted across it, in a pink that almost matches the patrol van, is a fervent declaration: TROY LUVS MARYANN! YES! Later on, Howie Soule, the U-Crew engineer, will clean this off (probably during the Rush Lih shohich is satellite fed and totally auto us all we need to know about s nice after all

Co out of the station’s side door as we arrive is a slender man dressed in pleated khaki Dockers, a tieless white shirt of Egyptian cotton buttoned all the way to the neck, and maroon braces (they are as slim as he is, those braces, and far too cool to be called suspenders; suspenders are vulgar things worn by such creatures as Chipper Maxton and Sonny Heartfield, down at the funeral ho a very sharp straw fedora, antique but beautifully kept The lasses cover his eyes He takes a position on the grass to the left of the door, beneath a battered speaker that is a KDCU’s current broadcast: the local news This will be followed by the Chicago farives hiain

We watch in growing puzzlearettes frohter Surely this elegant fellow in the braces, Dockers, and Bass Weejuns cannot be George Rathbun In our e, and it is one of a fellow very different froe belly hanging over the white belt of his checked pants (all those ballpark bratwursts), a brick-red complexion (all those ballpark beers, not toat the dastardly u those asbestos vocal cords) The George Rathbun of our iination ¡ª and all of Coulee Country’s, it al ¡ª is a pop-eyed, broad-assed, wild-haired, leather-lunged, Rolaids-popping, Chevy-driving, Republican-voting heart attack waiting to happen, a churning urn of sports trivia, h cholesterol

This fellow is not that fellow This fellow moves like a dancer This fellow is iced tea on a hot day, cool as the king of spades

But say, that’s the joke of it, isn’t it? Uh-huh The joke of the fat dee-jay with the skinny voice, only turned inside out In a very real sense, George Rathbun does not exist at all He is a hobby in action, a fiction in the flesh, and only one of the slim man’s multiple personalities The people at KDCU know his real name and think they’re in on the joke (the punch line of course being George’s trade), but they don’t know the half of it Nor is this a metaphorical statement They know exactly one-third of it, because the man in the Dockers and the straw fedora is actually four people

In any case, George Rathbun has been the saving of KDCU, the last surviving AM station in a predatory FM s a week, week in and week out, he has been a drive-time bonanza The U-Crew (as they call themselves) love him just about to death

Above him, the loudspeaker cackles on: " ¡ª still no leads, according to Chief Dale Gilbertson, who has called Herald reporter Wendell Green ¡®an out-of-town fear papers than in hoe do things in French Landing’

"Meanwhile, in Arden, a house fire has taken the lives of an elderly farmer and his wife Horst P Lepplehty-two"

"Horst P Lepplearette hat appears to be great enjoy that one ten tiht, the door opens again, and although the s directly beneath the speaker, he hears the door perfectly well The eyes behind the aviator shades have been dead his whole life, but his hearing is exquisite

The newco sun like a baby mole that has just been turned out of its burrow by the blade of a passing plow His head has been shaved except for the Mo-hawk strip up the center of his skull and the pigtail that starts just above the nape of his neck and hangs to his shoulder blades The Mohawk has been dyed bright red; the ’tail is electric blue Dangling fro that looks suspiciously like the Nazi SS insignia He is wearing a torn black T-shirt with a logo that reads SNIVELLING SHITS ’97: THE WE GET HARD FOR JESUS TOUR In one hand this colorful fellow has a CD jewel box

"Hello, Morris," says the sli

Morris pulls in a little gasp, and in his surprise looks like the nice Jewish boy that he actually is Morris Rosen is the U-Crew’s summer intern frorunt labor!" station ins has been heard to say, usually while rubbing his hands together fiendishly Never has a checkbook been guarded so righteously as the Wigger guards the KDCU check-book He is like Sold (not? that there are heaps of anything in the ’DCU accounts; it bears repeating to say that, as an AM talker, the station is lucky just to be alive)

Morris’s look of surprise ¡ª it ht be fair to call it uneasy surprise ¡ª dissolves into a srab! What a pair of ears!"

Then he frowns Even if Mr Leyden ¡ª who’s standing directly beneath the outside honker, can’t forget that ¡ª heard someone come out, how in God’s name did he knohich someone it was?

"How’d you knoas me?" he asks

"Only two people around here s," Henry Leyden says "One of the smoke with Scope; the other ¡ª that’s you, Morris ¡ª just lets her rip"

"Wow," Morris says respectfully "That is totally bitchrod"

"I ahtfully "It’s a tough job, but so rendezvous with the undeniably tasty Thai stick, may I offer an Appalachian aphorism?"

"Go, dude" This is Morris’s first real discussion with Henry Leyden, who is every bit the head Morris has been told to expect Every bit and er so hard to believe that he could have another identitya secret identity, like Bruce Wayne But stillthis is just so pimp

"What we do in our childhood forms as a habit," Henry says in the sae Rathbun voice "That is my advice to you, Morris"

"Yeah, totally," Morris says He has no clue what Mr Leyden is talking about But he slowly, shyly, extends the CD jewel box in his hand For a moment, when Henry makes no move to take it, Morris feels crushed, all at once seven years old again and trying tohis always-too-busy father with a picture he has spent all afternoon drawing in his room Then he thinks, He’s blind, dickweed He may be able to smell pot on your breath and he may have ears like a bat, but how’s he supposed to know you’re holding out a fucking CD?

Hesitantly, a bit frightened by his own temerity, Morris takes Henry’s wrist He feels the uided to the slender box

"Ah, a CD," Henry says "And what is it, pray tell?"

"You gotta play the seventh track tonight on your show," Morris says

"Please"

For the first tiarette, then drops it (without even looking ¡ª of course, ha ha) into the sand-filled plastic bucket by the door

"What show could you possiblydirectly, Morrisnoise with his lips, the sound of a s tasty And, to s worse, he follows it with the Wisconsin Rat’s traderoup as George Rathbun’s hoarse "Even a blind man" cry is known to their elders: "Chew it up, eat it up, wash it down, it aaallll comes out the same place!"

He doesn’t do it very well, but there’s no question who he’s doing: the one and only Wisconsin Rat, whose evening drive-tiram on KWLA-FM is famous in Coulee Country (except the e probably want is "infae FM station in La Riviere, hardly e on the wallpaper of Wisconsin radio, but the Rat’s audience is huge

And if anyone found out that the co, AM-broadcasting George Rathbun was also the Rat ¡ª who had once narrated a gleeful on-air evacuation of his bowels onto a Backstreet Boys CD ¡ª there could be trouble Quite serious, possibly, resounding well beyond the tight-knit little radio community

"What in God’s name would ever make you think that I’m the Wisconsin Rat, Morris?" Henry asks "I barely knoho you’re talking about Who put such a weird idea in your head?"

"An inforive Howie Soule up, not even if they pull out his fingernails with red-hot tongs Besides, Howie only found out by accident: went into the station crapper one day after Henry left and discovered that Henry’s wallet had fallen out of his back pocket while he was sitting on the throne You’d have thought a fellohose other senses were so obviously tightwired would have sensed the absence, but probably Henry’s s ¡ª he was obviously a heavy dude who undoubtedly spent his days getting through sohts In any case, there was a KWLA ID card in Henry’s wallet (which Howie had thuh "in the spirit of friendly curiosity," as he put it), and on the lineof a rat Case closed, game over, zip up your fly

"I have never in h the door of KWLA," Henry says, and this is the absolute truth Heothers) in his studio at home, then sends them in to the station from the don Mail Boxes Etc, where he rents under the name of Joe Strummer The card with the rat stamped on it was more in the nature of an invitation fro else, one he’s never taken upbut he kept the card

"Have you become anyone else’s informed source, Morris?"

"Huh?"

"Have you told anyone that you think I’m the Wisconsin Rat?"

"No! Course not!" Which, as we all know, is what people always say

Luckily for Henry, in this case it happens to be true So far, at least, but the day is still young

"And you won’t, will you? Because ru root Just like certain bad habits" Henryin smoke

"I kno to keep my mouth shut," Morris declares, with perhaps misplaced pride

"I hope so Because if you bruited this about, I’d have to kill you"

Bruited, Morris thinks Oh uy is co

"And eat you," Henry says He is not laughing; not even sain, but this tiely forced to his own ears "Like you’re Hannibal Lecture"

"No, like I’lasses toward Morris The sun reflects off the them into rufous eyes of fire Morris takes a step back without even realizing that he has done so "Albert Fish liked to start with the ass, did you know that?"

"N ¡ª "

"Yes indeed He clai ass was as sweet as a veal cutlet His exact words Written in a letter to the mother of one of his victims"

"Far out," Morris says His voice sounds faint to his own ears, the voice of a plu bad wolf "But I’m not exactly, like, worried that you’re the Fisher!"

Henry says nothing, only stares at the now vastly uneasy Morris with his fiery glass eyes And Morris thinks: But is he blind? He gets around pretty good for a blind guyand the way he tabbed me as soon as I came out here, hoeird was that?

"I’ll keep quiet," he says "Honest to God"

"That’s all I want," Henry says ht, what exactly have you brought me?" He holds up the CD ¡ª but not as if he’s looking at it, Morris observes with vast relief

"It’s, uot this cover of ¡®Where Did Our Love Go’? The old Supre? Only they do it at like a hundred and fifty beats a minute? It’s fuckin’ hilarious I , man, blitzes it!"

"Dirtysperm," Henry says "Didn’t they used to be Jane Wyatt’s Clit?"

Morris looks at Henry with awe that could easily becouitarist, like, foruy had this political falling-out, soer and Henry Acheson, and Ucky Ducky ¡ª he’s the guitarist ¡ª went off to for;Where Did Our Love Go’?" Henry muses, then hands the CD back And, as if he sees the way Morris’s face falls: "I can’t be seen with so like that ¡ª use your head Stick it in loom disappears and he breaks into a sunny sot it, Mr Leyden!"

"And don’t let anyone see you doing it Especially not Howie Soule Howie’s a bit of a snoop You’d do well not to ehted at how all this has gone, Morris reaches for the door handle

"And Morris?"

"Yeah?"

"Since you know my secret, perhaps you’d better callof the su else"

"Yeah? Henry?" Morris dares iress to Hank and Morrie

"Keep your mouth shut about the Rat"

"I already told you ¡ª "

"Yes, and I believe you But te like a thief in the night, or like a killer in search of prey If you give in to temptation, I’ll know I’ll sne Do you believe me?"

"Uhyeah" And he does Later, when he has time to kick back and reflect, Morris will think what a ridiculous idea that is, but yes, at the ti hypnotized

"Very good Now off you go I want Ace Hardware, Zaglat Chevy, and Mr Tastee Ribs all cued up for the first seg"

"Gotcha"

"Also, last night’s gahth? That was pimp Totally, like, un-Brewers"

"No, I think ant the Mark Loretta home run in the fifth Loretta doesn’t hit many, and the fans like him I can’t think why Even a blind e, especially from deep in the hole Go on, son Put the CD in ive it to hiive it a spin"

"The track ¡ª "

"Seven, seven, rhyet and neither will he Go on, now"