The Ballad of West Tenth Street

by Marjorie Kernan

  He nodded, looking stricken as Sadie wound her shawl over her shoulders and left.

  Sadie looked longingly at the vodka bottle in her faux loft, then looked resolutely away. She’d been keeping off the booze in the afternoons so she could arrive for her evening visits to Brian sober, then hitting the bottle hard when she came back.

  Rain was falling on the gray waters of the Thames. She stood, looking down at it, too disturbed to do anything but stare, to hold herself fast. She must be able to think of some way of reaching Brian. Instead, inane thoughts crowded her mind, mixed up with Polaroid images, memories of Brian that flashed and shuffled inside her retina. Then the stricken look in the surgeon’s eyes when he realized what he’d said, how she had read in them the truth, that Brian was very likely dying. Ever since reading about the Styx as a child she’d had an image of it, of a twilit, cindery shore by a wide, silent river, beneath a dome of rock. She saw Brian lying on the cinders, strapped on his back into a stretcher, waiting. All the while the vodka bottle burned its image into her back.

  Throwing on a coat, a hat with a floppy brim and dark glasses, she left the room hurriedly. A cab was just dropping someone off at the entrance, she got into it and asked the driver to take her to Harrods. King Harrods’, she used to call it, back when life was all a wheeze.

  She had to take action. Do something to jump-start Brian’s mind, and the only thing she could think of was hitting his senses. She asked the driver to pull up at a Barclays across the street. There she cashed a check from RRC for a thousand quid, asking the teller to give it to her all in new twenties. Feeling more than a little mad, she explained to the girl what she wanted them for—to strew over the bed of a dear friend who wouldn’t wake up from a coma. “Because nothing smells more redolent of life than newly printed pound notes,” she explained.

  Dashing across the street to Harrods, she bought raspberries, a boom box, a stack of CDs, an insanely expensive silk paisley dressing gown in tanager shades from lemon to scarlet for Brian, presents for her children, a velvet scarf that was almost exactly like the one she’d worn until it fell to pieces in the sixties, and a bottle of L’Heur Bleu, the scent she’d always worn, but had forgotten to pack in the rush.

  One of the liveried doormen helped her get all the bags into a taxi, tucking them around her with grave politeness.

  “St Elfreda’s Hospital,” she told the driver. Gawd, it looked like she’d bought half the store. It was going to be hell on her bank balance. Oh, fuck it. Wait, there was something else Brian needed, what was it? Cannabis, he needed some really good sticky bud waved under his nose. If that didn’t make him want to sit up and join the party again, nothing would.

  “Driver, could you stop at that pub, please? I need to pick up a bottle.”

  “They can’t sell no bottles, you got to go to an off-license.”

  “Yes, but you see, I’m engaged in a fight against death itself.”

  “Well then missus, you better find one very good weapon. Go on, I wait for you.”

  Gawd, this is such a nightmare,” Sadie said to Brian. “Why don’t you bloody wake up? Oh, Brian, wake up, won’t you please?” She leaned over to kiss him, they’d taken that plastic thing off his neck and he was far easier to kiss now. She’d doused her own neck in about twenty quids’ worth of L’Heur Bleu, so she hovered over him to give him the full benefit of it.

  “This is boring the holy living shit out of me, you know that, you lying there week after week with nothing interesting to say. Do you know your piss is going out of you in a little tube? How undignified. I have no idea what they’re doing with your other excretions and don’t want to. No,” she said, holding her hand up, “I know you’d love to tell me, but please, spare me that.

  “Jesus, I’m so bored! So bored I can’t even begin to imagine having a lively time again. It’s no good your saying that I’m exaggerating, I simply won’t believe you.

  “In any case, I’ve decided I’m bloody fed up with not having a nip in the evenings, like a normal person, so I brought all the fixings.”

  The bartender at the pub had not just been the sort of person Sadie could talk to, he’d been the sort who liked women like Sadie. Which boomeranged right back to the sort of men she liked. It almost invariably went that way, she found. He’d provided her with a bottle of Stoli, a bag of ice, and two sliced limes, which he’d folded into a paper napkin.

  She put the bag of ice in a bedpan and fixed herself a drink. “Ahh,” she said, plumping up the pillows on the other bed and sitting back to take a sip. “I should’ve done this ages ago, Brian. What was I thinking? Here, have a whiff of what you’re missing.” She jumped up and waved the glass under his nose.

  Sadie drank and talked to him, recalling old jokes and describing small details of her days that she found amusing. As she got drunk her chatter became more animated and she began imagining his responses, talking back to him as if it were just like one of the many evenings they’d spent together.

  Drunks are not terribly heavy sleepers. Well, they are when they pass out, but as the booze is gradually broken down by their livers their bodies begin to clamor for correctives, for water, fruit juices, aspirin, platters of French fries, and so on, waking them in jolts.

  Sadie woke in the hours before dawn. About to reach an arm out to search for water, she froze. Something was wrong. It took her a minute to figure out where the hell she was, then locate the source of her unease.

  It was a whistling sound, coming from Brian’s bed. Getting up, she went over to look at him. He looked even worse than usual, his face greenish and waxy, as if he were practicing for death. The whistling sound was coming from his lips. Quickly, Sadie scanned the machines he was hooked up to, but everything seemed normal. But she knew in her heart that he was near to giving up, and she could not let him.

  Moving her hands to the top of his head, she willed her fingers to draw out the bad then send an entirely different juju back in. Putting all the force of her will into it, she went into a sort of trance. Later, feeling very tired, she sat by his side and spoke quietly to him.

  “Brian, I couldn’t bear for you to leave me. I’d be so alone. I’d have to start life all over again, and I don’t know if I could. I’ve been turning things over in my mind, taking stock. There’s something I believe you’ve always wanted. I hope I’m not making a complete ass of myself, but Brian, if I’m right and you do want that, we could give it a whirl. We’ve always been so close, much closer than to anyone else. All those years we were all together you and I trained ourselves to never even think about it, which was of course the only way to do it, but possibly I let myself become boxed in by that, stopped looking at you as a man, only saw dear old Brian. Oh, Brian, if you’ll only wake up I promise to try to please you. I love you. Please don’t leave me alone here.”

  Sadie keeled gently over and fell asleep by his side. Outside the window the dawn gradually became a gray London sky and the sparrows cheeped in the streets.

  Just before breakfast the day duty nurse peeked in. She was touched at the sight of Sadie curled up by his side. She stepped in softly, trying not to wake her. She noted with approval that Sadie had not jostled her friend, but had fitted herself in like a mouse in the small bit of available mattress. It was a pretty sight, with her hand holding his. No wait—his was clasped around hers. Disbelieving, she leaned closer to make sure. And look, his color was better too, she was sure of it. That was odd—why was there a great wad of pound notes under his pillow?

  Longing to fly at once to find Mr. Mendelsen, she nevertheless crept out quietly, closing the door behind her, then began to run down the corridor.

  Later, when the surgeon had gone, looking pleased at Brian’s progress, Sadie turned to Brian. “I do hope you’re going to make an effort today,” she said. “Begin at least by opening your eyes. Otherwise I shall be quite put out with you.”

  As she chattered away she prayed mightily that Brian didn’t recall all the details of her semi-drunke
n offer. She did hope he had felt the spirit of it, the love bit, but not the other bits.

  Brian was thinking hard. Hmm, all right then, I think I’ve got it. I’ll hint just enough that I do remember her half-drunken offer. So she’ll know I’m thinking about it. It’ll be a long campaign, because I can’t begin the next phase until I’m really fit again, will need to wait until I’m back in fighting trim. After that I’ll make her wait a goodish while, worrying, do I remember or don’t I? She’ll go through all the stages of embarrassment and remorse, then start to get curious as to why I’m not making eyes at her. I’ll act like I’m really not all that interested, in actual fact. Then, because she’s a woman and vain as hell, she’ll start to get shirty, wonder why I’m not? Start to wonder if she’s not attractive enough anymore. Get right ticked off about it, begin to flash a bit of boob in the morning, fall languorously asleep in front of the fire, brush up against me. Christ, I’d better swear off alcohol during that phase. Then, when she’s worked herself up into a nice state of rage at my indifference, then and only then will I take her to my bed and show her finally and once and for all, what a good man’s love is.

  30

  A carved figure of a cow, made of stone, sat rather disconsolately on a table in the living room of the house on West Tenth Street.

  It was many hundreds of years old and had been made by a man who carved temple figures for a living, a master carver who had turned the reddish, fine-grained piece of stone in his hands to study what form lay inside it. He had felt it to be a she-cow. He saw how she sat, her legs folded under her, her left hind leg tucked beneath her stomach. She had a gentle, gazing face, and around her neck she wore a garland with a bell on it.

  It was lonely. Where had its latest owner and her children gone? It worried a bit, in its stone head, that they might never come home. Then it would be sent off again to another place. It was inevitable that it would go to many places in its time, this was to be accepted, for being made of stone it had, and probably would continue to outlive, its owners, who were made of flesh.

  But some places were far better than others. There was that time it had lain in a heap of rubble for ever so long, for instance. And that very nasty man who’d used it for a doorstop, those had been exceptionally dull days. There was no use in complaining about it, of course, but it much preferred a bit of liveliness around it, some talk and dancing even.

  It liked its present situation very much. Its latest owner had always been exceptionally kind to it, and the house was filled with music of a very superior sort. The woman even talked to it from time to time; it had been a long while since anyone had been so civil. And her children had petted it, enriching its skin with the oils from their fingers. The woman had even seemed to have a certain reverence for it, had always placed it carefully among her other things, according it a respect it most certainly had not known during that spell it spent in a dark, untidy curio shop in Hammersmith, where she’d found it.

  So it worried, as a mantle of dust grew on its back. It knew from experience that as the layer of dust grew, so also did the probability of change.

  It sighed. Well, there was nothing to be done about it. It would try to be good and not cry, as a hand reached out for it, to wrap it in paper, then shut it into a box.

  Brenda unlocked the kitchen door and hung up her coat. A huff came from her lips, leaking from her soul. “Liall, you get out your schoolwork and sit quiet at the table there to do it, now,” she said. “Later maybe, you can go to the park.”

  Muttering to herself, she got out her arsenal of cleaning supplies. Mutter, mutter. Only the mouse that lived under the dishwasher could make out her words, and even then with no very great precision. She seemed to be complaining about cleaning some big empty house that no one hardly set foot in. The mouse felt sympathetic to these thoughts—it was perfectly understandable that the vacuum-woman should feel irate. In fact, he quite agreed with her—why dust and polish this great barn of a place where no one dropped crumbs or left packets of food lying about?

  When she’d gone, Liall and the mouse shared the silence that wrapped itself around them. The boy put his mind to his schoolbook, then a gust of April wind rattled the area door in its frame, causing them both to look up hopefully, then go back to what they were doing, for there was no one at the door.

  The fifth time the door rattled, Liall put his hands over his ears. He’d figured out that it was the gusty wind making that sound, but each time felt disappointed that it wasn’t one of the Hollanders. Each time he’d feel a heart-jump of hope, so he did the only sensible thing, he tried to blot it out. The mouse, a more instinctual creature when it came to sounds, had long since given it up as a bad job, and fallen into a disgruntled sleep.

  Kristen had become fixated on finding Deen. She patrolled the area around the Hollanders’ block, hoping to waylay the girl. She was determined to have a mother-daughter talk with her. You see, Kristen knew that she herself was a good and caring girl, and only wished to straighten a few things out with Deen. It was important that she do it before Sadie returned though, for the girl might tattle all sorts of nonsense about her to her mother if she didn’t. Though she kept an eye out for that blond woman, Mrs. de something. She didn’t want to cross her path again, risk another chewing out.

  She carried her mission out on the afternoons Paul went out for his mysterious meetings, something about a recording contract was all he’d tell her, screaming at her not to ask any more questions and forbidding her to follow him with all sorts of horrible threats. He hadn’t been at all nice to her lately. He’d even stopped eating the food she cooked so lovingly for him. She knew she wasn’t any fancy three-star chef, but what she cooked was always wholesome. He’d thrown a perfectly good turkey sandwich at the wall the other day, saying it was an abomination against man and God.

  Oh, if only she could catch that brat, where was she? If Deen tried to run from her she’d make sure she got a hold of her hair and make her listen. There were important things she had to tell her, about manners and being grateful to grown-ups who do things for you, and how we women need to stick together. Oh, if only the miserable brat could see how she’d really tried to be a good, caring mother to her, how she’d even liked having some female company around for a change. How if Deen could’ve just stopped being so sullen and looked around her, she would’ve seen that Kristen really cared for her, loved her in fact.

  She was bending over, adjusting Rinaldo’s snowsuit, when a voice said, “I want a word with you.”

  Straightening up, she was dismayed to see that sharp-eyed blonde, the one who’d come banging on the door that night.

  “Let’s have a little chat, shall we?” Mrs. D said, taking Kristen’s arm. “No, I wouldn’t pull away if I were you, I’m quite capable of making life very difficult for you. I’ve thought it all out, you see, and it’s quite a good plan. You might not end up in jail, but you will find yourself in the clutches of the legal system. And in those cases they always send someone around to look into the welfare of any children in the household. Perhaps place them in foster care until the suitability of the parents can be determined. We’ll walk this way, shall we?

  “The weather is nice, isn’t it? One can really feel spring coming on. Now let’s make this as plain as possible. If I catch you anywhere near the Hollander house again, I’ll put my plan into motion. And I promise you, I’ll see it through. I’m known for my efficiency.

  “It might also be helpful if you took a good long look at yourself. You see, locking up little girls and subjecting them to verbal abuse is not a nice thing to do. I might even characterize it as borderline sociopathic behavior. I’ve had a difficult time actually, wondering if I should call in Human Services anyway, to make sure you’re not doing anything to harm your own child. But Deen’s quite a brave girl, did you know that? She insisted that while you might not be the best of mothers, you’d never do any real harm to your baby.

  “Psychiatric help would be in order. Though of cours
e you’ll lie till you’re blue in the face to the counselor. Still, I think it would be best. Here’s my card, have your counselor call me within a week to confirm that you are having regular sessions. I’ll follow up to see that you do continue, be very sure of that. I think a year would be the least one could hope to see some improvement, all right?

  “This is your door, I believe. Good-bye.”

  A figure slunk by the town houses on West Tenth Street, making notes in his crazed mind. His rage-filled eyes were hidden by his hood. He looked up at the lighted windows, knowing that there was warmth and comfort behind them. He whispered his curse upon them. Them that let old bums camp in their gardens. For hadn’t he finally tracked down that fat old bum, followed him, seen with his own eyes, that damn bum letting himself in that garden gate, with his own key?

  Later, in a foul pocket of the undercarriage of the city he screamed up at the sky; “Motherfuckin’ idol worshippers! Greenback fuckers, livin’ in houses the size of a fuckin’ king’s! Roll on piles of money till it brings up blisters. So fine and rich that if they take a shine to some old fat bum that they feed him off plates of gold! Cook up twenty chickens to feed him with, fillin’ the air with chicken juices. All for one solitary, goddamn bum.”

  The Angry One let out a bloodcurdling scream, raising his arms to the sky. “All that food? That they fed him off of plates of gold? I’ll cut it out of his belly! Watch it spill to the ground!”

  Gretchen had been watching changes in herself. She saw first that she loved books again, then nature, looking for hours out the windows at the trees and plants, noticing their leaves growing.