Koan

Mill pans the indices for gold. “One ’roid or two?” plays in her mind like a strain from a musical. Couple of street paranoids, it says. “’Zat one ’noid or two?” she rehearses. “When ’noids talk, money listens.”

One male ape to another: “Is that a butt or a breastplate through the trees?”

The phone rings: Carlisle.

“What is O-I-D?” Mill says.

“Oxford Indiana Dictionary,” he says.

“The suffix is from Greek,” Mill says, “and means ‘like, resembling, or related to’ from eidos: form or shape.”

“Original Issue Discount,” he says, “or H-O-T.”

“What’s H-O-T?” she says.

“You,” he says. “It’s Hell on Taxes.”

“A porn koan,” she says.

“Hah!” he says.

The goose escapes the glass.