Up, Down and Sideways

by Patton, Robert;

  “Jeffrey, listen—it’s precisely because I rarely drink that I appear to be drunk so often. These charges are slander.”

  “File a counter-complaint.”

  “Excellent. Do it.”

  “I’m representing Susan and Gershom. I can’t represent you, too. That’d be unethical.” He hung up.

  I dialed the hospital and asked for Susan’s room. The operator said Mrs. Graulig had checked out this morning. “She died?”

  “She’s been released by special arrangement.”

  “She had a baby last night! What kind of butcher shop are you running over there?”

  “Are you family, sir?”

  “I’m the father! The sperm was mine.”

  She hung up. I dialed Susan at home. No answer. I dialed Carrie’s number, then Timmy’s. No answer. I’d exhausted my list of friends. Dialing several attorneys listed in the yellow pages, I was told by their services to try Monday morning. The rest of the weekend I watched video porn, ate Chinese food, and drank Wild Turkey from a bottle—I’m a traditionalist in all ways, not least in my vices. Still, I’d never before spent a weekend as carefree, as childlike, not even when I was in college.

  20

  “I’m sorry,” Peter Rice said. His call woke me at half past eleven, well into what had been a busy Monday morning for Timmy Donley and subsequently for Peter. Timmy had gone to Peter’s boss with his allegations of insider trading. Peter’s boss summoned Peter in, and together they held a contrite conference call with the bigwigs in Manhattan. Peter sang like a bird of my collusion with him and his mysterious Bluebird Two, the code-named coke dealer who today, I understand, lives in Argentina on the Yankee dollars he washed through the account I managed for Peter. Peter’s phone call to me was a courteous apology for pinning the blame on me—for which, I understand further, he later received gentler treatment under the law. I’ve always considered this unfair. I told officials from the Securities Exchange Commission that I happily would have sung like a bird if only given the chance.

  Immediately, I phoned the new brokerage where I’d arranged, after my tiff with Timmy several days ago, to transfer my stock portfolio. I was told the transfer, due today, had been held up unaccountably. My heart sank. Soon I confirmed that my entire account, worth more than a million bucks, had been frozen. I had eighty dollars in the bank; on my bureau, two tens and a five. I called Nick Bakes at Melina’s Little Bud Shop:

  “The building’s for sale, Nick. Because we’re friends, I’m giving you first crack.”

  “I can’t afford.”

  “Three hundred fifty thousand and it’s yours.”

  “Is not possible.”

  “Don’t lie to me! It’s obscene the money you’re making over there. Three thirty.”

  “Philly—”

  “Three fifteen! Three hundred fifteen thousand. Peanuts.”

  “You take paper?”

  “Cash money.”

  “You should talk to Frank, maybe,” Nick said. “He has the big wallet now.”

  “He came by the shop Friday?” I asked.

  “Him and the Telma woman. And the Cadillac.”

  “Forgive and forget?”

  “I believe yes. He was very okay.”

  “So buy the building together. Like old times.”

  “You kidding me? He’s a maniac.”

  “Make me an offer!” I was desperate. Without cash I couldn’t get a lawyer, my stocks, or my kid. Nick asked what my rents were upstairs, how much were property taxes. He put the phone to his chest and consulted with his partner. She took over:

  “Mr. Halsey? Melina here. How are you? I am fine. We will pay two hundred fifty thousand. Take it or leave it. Thank you.”

  “I’d be losing money!”

  “Twenty percent down right away, for binder. The rest at closing.” Fifty grand up front. It seemed like a million to this sudden pauper. I could use the money to retain an attorney plus buy the BMW I’d ordered. I told Melina yes. She said have the agreement drawn up, they’d sign it tomorrow—my check would be waiting at the flower shop. The story of America: Wherever they hail from, immigrant women are ruthless with the buck.

  I decided to have the Bakeses’ lawyer, Bill Kelly, handle the sale, since he knew the property well. He’d just gotten off the phone with Frank when I called him. Kelly told me, “Frank’s in deep shit and he says ‘cause of you. Something about he can’t get his money—his stockbroker says it’s all hot. You get tips, do ya, Phil? Pass one my way.”

  “Frank is crazy.”

  “Well, sure, but he’s some kinda ticked at you.”

  “How ticked?”

  “I cooled him down. We got a meeting tomorrow morning with some brokerage legals. I told Frank let’s hear ‘em out. Nobody has to die, right? Thing is,” he went on, “money’s real important to Frank. It’s like his whole identity.”

  Kelly agreed to bring a sales agreement to Melina’s Little Bud Shop tomorrow afternoon. I hoped to get details from him at that time about Frank’s morning meeting at the brokerage, so I’d know what to expect in my case. I’d steer clear of the brokerage till then, and keep my phone off the hook. With fifty grand in hand by tomorrow, I could hold out for days.

  I dialed Carrie’s apartment. “You’re home,” I said breezily.

  “I’m getting some things. I’m moving back in with Timmy.”

  “Oh. Is that good?”

  “It’s real good. He’s been great.”

  “I’m really sorry about Friday.”

  “I’m not. I have no regrets.”

  “About your car—”

  “The city towed it. When I get an estimate, I’ll expect a check from you.”

  “Sure. Absolutely. So—”

  She hung up.

  “—have you thought about us?”

  I put on a suit and walked to the corner bus stop carrying my empty briefcase. It was midafternoon. I rode the bus until the driver made me get off. I rode another bus. When rush hour came the working people crowded about me as if for warmth. Exhaustion in their faces held a promise of repose. My admiration for these good citizens quickly yielded to envy. I wanted the stability they seemed to possess—the regular hours, a home and family, marigolds in the window box and pet pigeons on the roof. When you idealize what you once dismissed, you know you’re losing grip.

  I ate a fine dinner at a restaurant I’d frequented during my first months of exile. I’d forgotten the sisterly indulgence with which waitresses wait on polite young men dining alone, forgotten how much I savored it. I got back on the bus and rode for another few hours. Me and the driver and two snoring old drunks. Back at my apartment I fell into bed a free man as usual. It was the last really good time I had for years.

  21

  Once cut off from managing my stock portfolio, I lost all interest in financial news, the market reports and business-page columnists that on usual mornings I memorized. I’d burned out on finance, and secretly welcomed my woes as an opportunity to make a career change wherein my skills with money might give way to skills as a people person. Certainly in the coming weeks I would be dealing with people as never before, dealing with lawyers and SEC agents, not in order to profit but to save myself and my son, goals any good Christian would honor. My boom years were over; it was time to entrench and consolidate. They say having a child rearranges a person’s priorities. Federal indictment works also.

  In keeping with my new humanism, I skipped the Times and the Wall Street Journal the next morning and bought a stack of supermarket tabloids. I trace my love of celebrity gossip to that languid morning when over brunch I discovered the range of human experience and foible these tabloids so reassuringly chronicle; indeed, were I not telling this story to you, I would have tried to sell it to them. It was with real contentment that I folded the papers and made my way to Melina’s Little Bud Shop. My problems were nothing compared to the two-headed midget or the anorexic movie star—yet we three (or four) shared kinship as the world’s fa
vored suffering, those privileged to abide and triumph through gross misfortune. I would triumph. My horoscope said so.

  I walked whistling from the bus stop to the flower shop. Inside, the stink of flowers reminded me of a wake, as did the stricken stares of Nick and Melina. At first I thought Nick’s mother had died, but she was in position behind the register, albeit with her own stare less stricken than perplexed. The attorney, Bill Kelly, flipped the “Closed” sign outward on the front door. Turning to me, he said Frank Bakes had killed himself. “Blew his brains out. In the Caddie an hour ago.”

  Melina gave a cry at hearing the news uttered again. I heard old Mrs. Bakes sigh. The vexation on her face bespoke the utter illogic of losing a child. Losing a parent makes sense—we bury our parents and our children bury us, is one definition of a good life. Nick was murmuring in Greek to Melina. She shook her head, her fists pressed to her eyes. He tried to hug her but she drew away. I wanted to tell her that her guilt over Frank’s death was needless. Melina had left him more than a year ago, surely a decent interval. He since had found Thelma, found me. “Suicide is nobody’s fault,” I said.

  Bill Kelly gave the suggestion of a smirk. He sidled up to me and whispered, “Frankie got snared in your little racket. They told us at the meeting this morning that at the very least he was gonna lose all his money. His broker, Donley, blames you.”

  “Frank knew the risks.”

  “He didn’t know shit.”

  “He’d have to be pretty thick—”

  “He was thick. That’s the point.”

  “What’s your point?”

  “Hey, I didn’t say nothin’ to these folks, if that’s your worry. No use to spread the hurt more.”

  “I appreciate that.” In fact, Kelly’s secrecy in my behalf made me feel worse, feel responsible. I was responsible, but I preferred to keep that between me and my face in the mirror.

  “Of course,” he said, “your price for this building just went down. You were asking two fifty? You’ll take two hundred.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “If I tell ‘em about your thing with Frankie, there’ll be no deal at all.”

  “I’ll get another buyer.”

  “How soon? There’s a posse after you.”

  “You heard that this morning?”

  “You’re the talk of the brokerage. I believe they mentioned penalties being three times profits.” He eyed me. “Ouch.”

  I was stuck. For $200,000 I’d be selling at a huge loss, but I had no alternative. “Do I still get my binder?”

  “Fifty K, up front. Check’s all made.”

  “Can these people get it together to sign? I mean, I don’t want to be crass here …”

  “Ask ‘em.”

  “No,” Nick snapped in answer to my question. “The property is bloody today. We will not buy.”

  “Not for two hundred thousand?”

  Melina said, “Not today, and never.”

  “It’s a real bargain,” I began, but Mrs. Bakes senior interrupted in Greek aimed at Nick and Melina, then in English aimed at me:

  “Yes to buy, Philly! I can cry for Frank next tousand years. We have a deal to make you today.” She gestured sharply. “Melina! Nikos! Sign the paper!” The old girl had come through for me. I was touched.

  I laid the bank check in my briefcase—I’d get the balance when they secured a mortgage. I shook hands with Nick and Melina, giving them my condolences. I bowed in gratitude to Mrs. Bakes. The lawyer walked me to the door. “You were a real angel today,” I complimented him.

  “Wait’ll you see my bill.”

  “Good luck. I expect to declare bankruptcy by then,” which took the grin off his face. “Just kidding,” I said, hopefully.

  Rich again, I treated myself to a taxi and went to my bank to deposit the money. At the window, my teller mentioned that a man was here asking about my account. I ducked instinctively. An investigator-type was perusing a computer printout on the branch manager’s desk. I snuck out fast with my check in my fist. To deposit it would have been to donate it to the United States Treasury, going against everything I believe in.

  I know when to surrender, and I know how to surrender. The biblical precedent supported my inclination to face my father as a penniless prodigal rather than as one who cravenly clings to his last few thousand dollars. Money in itself means little to me—it’s to buy things with, nothing more. I determined to unload all my assets ere I returned to the cradle of Stalls Associates. I considered burning the check. I considered blowing it at the race track. Ultimately, I endorsed it over to the United Jewish Appeal, New York City, and mailed it from the Providence train station. The gesture struck me as witty and ironic. Even so, I don’t regret it.

  On the train ride to Boston, I fell asleep with my duffel bag and briefcase on the overhead rack. I woke to find both had been stolen. I had to laugh. Even as a nonbeliever I knew the Lord was testing me.

  I’d never been entirely out of touch with Stalls Associates. Over the years I’d received office financial statements and the minutes of quarterly trustee meetings. Recently I’d been notified of the next meeting—scheduled for tomorrow, as it happened. Though it would be cowardly to appear there unannounced (leaping into the breach to meet a quick bullet), I hoped it might smack of the cool audacity bureaucrats tend to respect.

  I got a hotel room on a credit card near the offices of Stalls Associates. I couldn’t sleep. I thought about my child somewhere—I didn’t know his name. I thought about my father—his name I knew too well. I thought about Frank Bakes. How strange it was to have caused his death when I could barely recall what he looked like.

  Frank blew his brains out in the Cadillac bought with money I’d made him. I tried to imagine the exact effect of his act on the car’s upholstery and brightwork. Did he shoot up or sideways? Lead or hollow point? I was missing the art of it. Frank’s suicide wasn’t a random impulse. Rather, he pointedly blew his brains out in the car of his dreams, wit and irony splattered everywhere. If a man like Frank Bakes could turn his death into a philosophical statement, then perhaps there was hope for me. A person’s lowest moment can be the valley from which he postulates a cloud-obscured pinnacle in the sky, his worst offenses merely the balance to the best he can be, or could have been. The laws of physics, finance, and human endeavor require, I think, such a consistent balance of deed and consequence. Frank gave his life to affirm those laws; gave his life, in a way, for me. I would thank him if I could.

  22

  My father’s secretary, Doris Zuppa, intercepted me outside Stalls Associates’ conference room the next morning, but I forced my way past her. Father, looking up, bid me take a seat at the table, then continued the meeting as if he’d been expecting me.

  My mother had visited me several times during my exile, occasions never pleasant. It had been all I could do not to scream that her husband was a phony, their marriage a loveless farce. I’d kept silent mainly out of vanity; withholding from her the secret of Father’s Jewish past made his hypocrisy seem more contemptible to me, my banishment more heroic. If my relations with Mother had held steady through four years of minimal life support, my relations with Father survived a deeper dormancy. That is, within minutes of our reunion in 1984 they bloomed again into the mutant flower of old.

  I slouched at the opposite end of the conference table as he droned to the trustees of economic forecasts and investment strategies. Distaste informed his every glance at me. Yet I felt at ease, sitting there. I knew he’d make me squirm before I got one dime of assistance, one gratis attorney to finesse me through my difficulties. Yet I had no doubt that after some rote exchange of contrition and censure, he’d help me. As my trustee, he had a fiduciary duty to save my ass. I could sue him if he refused. It pays to know your rights.

  The meeting ended. The trustees, all relatives of mine, filed past me with perfunctory greetings. Father asked Stalls Rayburn, my mother’s uncle and the office’s sage-in-residence, to remain be
hind. The two men sat side by side at the end of the table. Panic suddenly seized me: in that instant I recalled the release I’d signed four years ago, absolving Stalls Associates of all liability in my future affairs. Any aid I received must come from charity and parental kindness. I regretted the birthdays I’d forgotten, the Father’s Days and high holidays. Thinking fast, I bent down to hitch up my socks, giving him a good look at my beginning bald spot. I wanted to show what stress I’d been under and to bond with him, a fellow baldy, as one similarly cursed.

  The first words in four years he said to me were, “What do you need, Philip?”

  “What do I need?” Repeating your interrogator’s question gives you time to think. “What do I need?”

  “I assume you’re here for a reason.”

  “A reason?”

  He looked terrible, was what threw me. More precisely, he looked too good. His complexion had an artificial, orangey hue, as if toasted under a sun lamp. He’d lost weight. The skin on his face seemed shrink-wrapped around his skull. The effect wasn’t so much cadaverous as it was simply not him. Never could the David Halsey I had known wear a tapered double-breasted suit. Never could he have exchanged his L. L. Bean walking shoes for a pair of tasseled loafers, nor faked a suntan or sported a pink necktie. Something severe had befallen him. At once I assumed he’d lost his mind or taken a mistress. If the former, he’d be putty in my hands. If the latter, I thought, he’ll be anxious to atone for his secret transgression; giving succor to the son he detested was one way to do just that. My confidence gained. When he repeated his question, I shot back an answer meant to provoke him, to flush from behind its garish facade the truth of his transformation:

  “What do I need? Lawyers, guns, and money. Hah!” I gave a loony grin. Deal with that, you crazy fuck!

  Father said nothing. Stalls Rayburn cleared his throat. Pushing eighty and a full head of hair—I hated him. “Is that supposed to be funny, Philip?”