The Guardian

by Konvitz, Jeffrey;

  Ben cringed; he just wanted to go to sleep early. But then, Sorrenson had been responsible for the trip, so they probably couldn’t say no.

  “How is everyone?” Ben asked. 68 West Eighty-ninth Street appeared in the distance.

  “Fine!” Sorrenson replied. “Max and Grace Woodbridge were over for dinner last night. He’s started a new business. Plumbing supplies or something like that.”

  “Has Ralph Jenkins returned from Europe?”

  Sorrenson nodded. “Just a few days ago. In fact, I ran into him in the hall and told him that since the two of you would be back today, I would have a get-together in honor of you all. And you know how Ralph Jenkins is!”

  “No. How is he?” Ben asked. He really had no idea what Sorrenson meant. Ralph Jenkins had moved onto their floor three months before, and they’d not had much time to get to know him, since as a board member of the International Society of Antique Critics, he was often in Europe on business.

  “You know,” Sorrenson responded, “just mention a party and he’ll be there.”

  Sorrenson maneuvered the car down the street, pulling up in front of the awning to the twenty-story high-rise, where he’d lived for the past twelve years. The car backfired angrily. He commented on her ill-temper and threatened to take her into the shop.

  As Ben got out of the car, he agreed, “It’s probably minor, but you’re smart not taking a chance.”

  Ben and the doorman hauled their luggage into the elevator, followed by Sorrenson and Faye. The elevator rose and jerked to a halt on the twentieth floor, where they stepped out.

  Sorrenson’s apartment was immediately to the left, and theirs was in the other direction, two doors down the hall. In all, there were eight apartments in the south portion of the building: theirs, Sorrenson’s, Lou Petrosevic’s, Ralph Jenkins’, Mr. and Mrs. Woodbridge’s, Daniel Batille’s, one belonging to two secretaries, and one belonging to an old nun, who never left her apartment.

  Sorrenson and the Burdetts entered the Burdett apartment and walked into the rectangular living room, which extended to an L-shaped dining area that opened onto the kitchen. Ben tipped the doorman, then hauled the luggage down the bedroom hallway as Faye turned on the lights.

  “I don’t believe all the dust!” she said, examining the furniture.

  “What did you expect?” Ben asked. He returned and sat on the sofa. “We’re lucky it’s as clean as it is.”

  Sorrenson agreed, reminding them that if they had allowed him to come in and clean the place, as he’d volunteered to do, they’d have found the place immaculate.

  “I know, John,” Faye said, “but if we let you do all the things you volunteer to do, you’d never have time for yourself.”

  “I don’t need time for myself,” Sorrenson declared, sitting next to Ben.

  Ben tapped his arm. “I won’t tell the other members of the string quartet that you’ve said that.”

  “Tell them what you will. Tell them what you will.”

  As Ben and Sorrenson lit cigars, Faye took the baby into the bedroom, then returned and prepared several cups of coffee, which she brought to the couch. Sorrenson was quick to inform her that he had to leave at one o’clock for a rehearsal.

  “Then you have a half hour,” Faye said. “Just enough time to look at pictures.”

  “You’ve developed pictures already?”

  “Polaroids.”

  By the time they’d poured over the stack of photos that Faye had retrieved from the luggage, it was nearly one. Looking at his watch, Sorrenson jumped to his feet and quickly issued instructions for the evening. “Don’t overdress,” he warned. “It’s just a casual affair. With some tidbits to eat. And some music. Nine o’clock. On the nose. Don’t be late. It wouldn’t do if the guests of honor showed up after all the food was gone.”

  Ben and Faye walked him to the door.

  “Have we ever been late for one of your dinners?” Faye asked.

  “No, but it’s never good to start a precedent.”

  Faye kissed Sorrenson on his wrinkled cheeks and adjusted the cardigan so it sat properly on his shoulders.

  “It’s good to have you back,” Sorrenson said.

  “It’s good to be back,” Ben replied. “Especially when we have friends like you to return to.”

  Sorrenson blushed, then hurried out the door.

  Faye tossed Ben out shortly after Sorrenson had left and told him not to return until six. Then she unpacked, secure in the knowledge that she’d get far more done with him gone, than if he were prowling the apartment.

  She gathered a pile of laundry to take to the laundry room later, then spent about an hour putting everything away and another hour cleaning. That accomplished, she took the baby and left the apartment, returning forty-five minutes later with a shopping cart crammed with groceries.

  As she pushed into the building, Joe Biroc walked out of the supply room.

  “Mrs. Burdett!” he cried, the remnants of a Slavic accent still detectable.

  Faye smiled. “Joe!”

  They embraced.

  “And Joey, my little Joey.”

  Biroc grabbed the child and wrestled him in his arms.

  “Can you come up and have coffee?” Faye asked.

  Biroc looked at his watch. “I go on at five. But if you can throw on some instant, I have a few minutes.”

  “It’s as good as done.”

  When they entered the apartment, Biroc sat down in an armchair with the baby and waited, while Faye hurried about the kitchen. He was a huge man, almost six-foot-five, with massive shoulders, giant hands, and large sinuous muscles. Joey looked almost nonexistent in his arms.

  “Well, Joe, what’s new?” Faye asked, as she returned from the kitchen with two filled cups.

  “There’s not much to speak of,” he began, “except my daughter had a baby.”

  “A grandchild? How wonderful!”

  He nodded somewhat apologetically, reticent about introducing his private life to the tenants of the building.

  “Oh, Joe, I’m so happy for you. Is it the first?”

  “Of course. Do I look so old that I’d have more than one?”

  They both laughed.

  “His name if Todd. Todd Melincek. That’s a nice name, isn’t it?”

  “That’s a splendid name. In fact, Ben and I were considering it for Joey. Joey was almost a Todd.”

  “Is that so?”

  Faye nodded. “Where does your daughter live?”

  “Long Island.”

  “Does her husband work in town?”

  “No. He has a plant near their house. He manufactures ladies’ sweaters.”

  “Ladies’ sweaters? That’s a terrific business, Joe. If all the women in the country were like me, your son-in-law would be a millionaire, if he isn’t already, that is.”

  “He has a way to go,” Biroc admitted. “But even if he never gets rich, that wouldn’t matter. He treats my daughter well. That’s what’s important.”

  “I couldn’t agree with you more.”

  Biroc smiled and sipped the coffee.

  “You know, I almost forgot,” Faye announced suddenly. She jumped to her feet and raced to the bedroom. “We brought you something.”

  Biroc protested and warned that he had to go downstairs to start his shift. Faye was back in the room before he could leave.

  “Ben and I couldn’t resist…you’ve been so incredibly kind.”

  She held out a wrapped package. He took it and rattled it next to his ear.

  “It doesn’t tick.”

  “Open it!”

  He pulled off the wrapping. Inside was a wooden box about ten inches long. He lifted the top.

  “You shouldn’t have,” he said, as he eased a hand carved pipe out of its setting.

  “We
know how much you like pipes and this was the prettiest one we’d ever seen.”

  Biroc placed the stem in his mouth, then shook his head, put the pipe back in its case, and hugged her. “I will put it at the head of my desk, so it will always be in sight.”

  Moments later, Biroc left the apartment. Smiling, Faye locked the door and returned to the kitchen to put away the groceries, pleased that Biroc had enjoyed the present.

  Ben came in at six o’clock. He stopped in the lobby to talk to Biroc, then rode up to the twentieth floor and knocked on Max Woodbridge’s door.

  Grace Woodbridge, a petite, gray-haired woman of fifty, incurably addicted to patterned blouses and long hemlines, answered. “Ben,” she cried, holding a pan of steaming cornbread in her hands. “Max, it’s Ben.”

  Max Woodbridge emerged from the den. “Ben, my boy,” he said, approaching the door, “good to have you back.”

  Ben smiled. “I just want to say hello and thank you for watering the plants.”

  “Don’t even mention it,” Grace protested. “It was our pleasure. And besides, Faye has already thanked us. So enough. Here. Come in. Sit. Have some cornbread. You like cornbread, don’t you?”

  “Love it. But I just grabbed something at the deli.”

  “Just a little piece?”

  “Bring it to Sorenson’s.”

  “I baked it for Sorrenson.”

  Max Woodbridge smiled, ran his hands through his rapidly thinning hair, then tightened the belt of his robe and shuffled his feet on the rug. “You sure we can’t get you anything?”

  “Not a thing. Like I said, this is just a hello and a thank you.”

  “All right, but if you change your mind, you know where to find us.”

  “Of course. At Sorrenson’s. Nine o’clock. On the nose.”

  “Good old Sorrenson,” Max Woodbridge said, laughing.

  “Yep…good old Sorrenson!”

  Ben found Faye asleep on the living-room couch, her feet draped over the back. Next to her was a half-empty glass of wine.

  He picked her up and carried her to the bedroom, laid her on the bed, then walked back into the hall, grabbed his haversack, and pulled out the crucifix. Deciding not to throw it away after all, he opened a desk drawer and shoved it under a stack of papers.

  Returning to the bedroom, he took off his shirt, threw it over the dressing table, kissed the baby, who was asleep in his crib, then lay down next to Faye and fell asleep.

  3

  Ralph Jenkins was lecturing the guests on one matter of trivia or another when John Sorrenson opened his apartment door and ushered Ben and Faye into the room.

  “You’re half an hour late,” Sorrenson scolded.

  “I’m sorry,” said Faye, “but Ben and I took a nap and we slept through the alarm.”

  Sorrenson shook his head.

  What did you expect?” Jenkins asked, glancing at Sorrenson, while adjusting his thick bifocals. “They just return from a two-week cruise and you want them to explode with energy?”

  “Yeah, John,” Max Woodbridge joined “they want to be late, they can be late.”

  “But you know…”

  “Know nothing!” Grace Woodbridge declared, interrupting.

  Sorrenson shook his head, fiddled with his tie, and laughed, admitting defeat. He was wearing an odd-colored suit, and if Ben’s eyesight was correct, one brown and one black shoe. But that was John Sorrenson, the musician, the refugee from a rummage sale, whose appearance was made all the more striking whenever he was near the impeccably dressed Ralph Jenkins.

  “Some wine?” Daniel Batille suggested, holding two bottles high in the air.

  “White,” Faye said. “For both of us?” Ben nodded. “Two whites.”

  Batille, who was working his way through graduate law school by tending bar, filled the glasses.

  “Wine and music,” Sorrenson declared, marching to the phonograph.

  “Something mellow,” one of the two secretaries suggested.

  “I got just the thing.” Sorrenson placed an old forty-five on the turntable and set the arm. “Vintage Sinatra!”

  “Who’s Sinatra?” the other secretary asked, deadpan.

  Everyone laughed, offered toasts, moved around the living room…incredibly cluttered with knick-knacks, relics from garage sales, and mismatched wooden furniture…and laughed some more.

  “You’re just been in Europe, haven’t you, Ralph?” Ben asked, after Batille had doled out another round of drinks and the record had ground to conclusion.

  “Yes. On a business trip.” Jenkins, who was just past sixty, had a formal manner of speaking and a slight hint of an accent that Ben could never place and even though Jenkins claimed to have been born in the cantons of Bavaria, the accent had always seemed curiously non-Aryan. “My colleagues and I started out in England and ended up in Istanbul. We were looking for artifacts from the Bourbon period, but weren’t able to find anything of interest. However, we did uncover some leads, and next month, when I return to Europe, I’m going to pursue them.”

  “Then it wasn’t a total disappointment?”

  “Not at all, even if just for the opportunity to travel and develop new friendships.”

  Ben smiled. “Well…traveling must agree with you, Ralph. You look good. Rested.”

  “And so do you. But you know, it’s good to be home. And besides, I’m going to be unusually busy this stay, writing an article for the Ladies’ Home Journal and starting a book on antiques.” He smiled. “How’s your novel coming?”

  “The dregs.”

  “Oh?”

  “I didn’t do a thing on the cruise.”

  Sorrenson returned from the kitchen with a handful of sandwiches and distributed them, as Ben and Jenkins walked by the living-room windows.

  Jenkins looked down at the street, staring thoughtfully. “What did you think of the construction?”

  Ben looked out. Directly across from 68 West was an enormous excavation surrounded by a wood fence. He’d noticed it earlier, assuming that a new high-rise was under construction. “What are they building?”

  “You don’t know?”

  “No.”

  “I thought I spoke to you about it before you left.”

  “Not a word.”

  Jenkins nodded. “The Archdiocese of New York is building a cathedral.”

  Daniel Batille and Sorrenson joined them.

  “We’re talking about St. Simon’s,” Jenkins said to bring the others up-to-date. “A lot of people in the neighborhood aren’t happy about it.”

  “And I’m one of them,” Sorrenson announced. “I don’t want my view blocked by a goddamn spire.”

  “Is there anything we can do to stop the project?” Ben asked.

  Jenkins shook his head. “I tried to find out before I left for Europe. I contacted the Archdiocese, but that was a waste of time. Then I checked with the city, but the Archdiocese has complied with the existing zoning regulations. I also checked the tax rolls and found that the land had been transferred to the Archdiocese over fifty years ago. And not just the area where the cathedral is being built. But the entire block, both sides, including the land on which this building stands.” He paused, studying the curious reactions. “I also discovered that the Equity Corporation to whom we pay our rent is owned outright by the Archdiocese, too.”

  “The Archdiocese owns the building?” Sorrenson asked.

  “Yes,” Jenkins replied.

  “I don’t like this one bit,” Sorrenson declared.

  “What are you going to do?” Ben asked. “Move out?”

  “I don’t know. I just don’t like the idea.”

  “John,” said Max Woodbridge, “this may be the answer to our salvation. We stay here and take the elevator up when we go!”

  “I don’t find that funny.”
Sorrenson declared.

  There was no doubt in Ben’s mind that Sorrenson’s displeasure was genuine. On the other hand, why should anyone get upset? What did it matter if the Archdiocese owned the building?

  “Maybe that explains our friendly nun,” Batille said.

  “You may be right,” Jenkins agreed, picking up the thread of the suggestion. “It makes sense that a nun would be supported by the church.”

  Grace Woodbridge, who’d been listening, exploded with animation, drawing everyone in the room into the conversation. “I was told she’d been a captive of the Communists during the revolution in Hungary in 1956. She was attached to the Archdiocese in Budapest, but was spending most of her time coordinating anti-Communist riots. After the outbreak of fighting, she was arrested by the KGB and tortured. The Vatican negotiated her release and brought her here. Supposedly she’s still remembered as a martyr in Hungary.” Grace paused, shaking her head. “The KGB damaged her permanently. She’s paralyzed, deaf, dumb, and blind, confined to that seat in the window.”

  “Is that true?” Ben asked.

  Grace shrugged. “I don’t know…that’s what I was told.”

  “Who told you this?” Jenkins asked.

  “A Hungarian refugee named Jan Nagy, who used to live on the fifth floor. He said he’d had contact with the nun, while trying to escape.”

  “That’s interesting,” said Sorrenson, “but I wouldn’t place too much credence in the story.”

  “Why not?”

  “Jan Nagy was a mental patient. A nut. A schizo case. You can’t believe anything he said.”

  Jenkins smiled curiously. “An old nun. Paralyzed. Blind. Deaf. Mute. Sitting at an apartment window. Never moving. Never leaving. With no visitors. No history. No visible way of life. I’m sure in a less enlightened society such a person would have spawned some incredible stories.” He laughed. “Another Count Dracula. Very intriguing.”

  Faye wrapped her arms about her chest and shivered. “Ralph….you’re giving me the creeps.”

  “I’m just fantasizing, Faye. I’m sure she’s just a nice old lady.”

  “A nice old lady?” Sorrenson shook his head. “I doubt it. In fact, we should try to find out exactly who or what she is.”