New York Echoes 2

by Warren Adler

  She turned her face away, not wishing him to see her contempt. She could not summon up the strength to reply.

  “If you don’t take this offer, you will regret it for the rest of your life. I know how you must feel. Sara, I dread the future without you. But if you love me, truly love me, you will understand. Can you imagine how terrible I feel in making such an offer? I hate myself for it, but I know it is the only logical solution. I cannot go on like this. Is it better for us simply to part and leave it at that or for me to make such an offer, if only to give me, selfishly I admit, peace of mind?”

  Finally she found her voice.

  “So I’m to be bought off, am I? This is what it’s all about. Money. You won’t leave your comfortable life because of money and you think that money will make me happy. I am insulted, Glen. I reject your offer out of hand. I am appalled that you could sink so low.”

  “I knew this would be your initial reaction, darling. I’m stuck in a terrible place. Who could possibly understand what I am going through? Think of me as a victim. Think of this money as hush money. Think of it as a payoff for what will certainly be the greatest moments of my life. Think of it, too, as a means of escape for you, a chance to live a normal life without lies and lonely nights. I know. I know. I am trying to buy off my pain. It is my last chance for comfort and peace of mind.”

  She watched him make his plea and felt herself calming. She knew he was taking an even greater risk. A loan from a bank was certainly something that couldn’t be kept hidden for long, especially since it had to be paid back. It would be hard to justify a payback schedule that he could meet, even though he made a handsome salary at the firm. Still, she could not react at that moment.

  “Just think about it, darling. This is hard. I know it’s the right course for you.”

  When the offer was made, they were still in bed. He rose, kissed her on the forehead, got dressed, and left for the office. She did not appear that day, which filled him with anxiety and dire thoughts. Nor did she answer her phone. He knew that he had given her a real blow and terrible thoughts went through his mind. He imagined flight, disappearance, even suicide. Especially suicide. Just deserts, he thought, for his selfishness and his cowardice.

  As the day wore on he grew more and more panicked. Toward the end of the day he feigned illness, rescheduled all his appointments, and rushed to her apartment.

  “Gone,” the doorman said.

  “Gone?”

  He opened a drawer at the reception desk and handed Glen a sealed envelope.

  “Left this for you.”

  He hadn’t given the doorman his correct name and when he was handed the envelope he noted gratefully that there was no name on the envelope. There seemed to be an expectation of a tip, as if money was required to keep the matter quiet between them. He handed the doorman a twenty-dollar bill, took the envelope and walked down the street to a Starbucks where he ordered a latté, then found an empty seat at a corner table.

  For a long time, he looked at the unopened envelope while he concocted dire scenarios. Was this a suicide note? Had she mailed a letter to Anne informing her of the entire affair? Had she written to his law partners confessing their involvement and threatening a sexual harassment suit, a common occurrence these days? Was she planning some terrible circumstance that would impact negatively on his life?

  He let the coffee concoction slide tastelessly down his throat, once again confronting his cowardice and lack of character. Time passed as he looked at the envelope, touched it, slid his thumb along its edges, sniffed at it for any sign of perfume, as if the scent would offer an optimistic preview of what the letter contained. No smell was evident.

  He felt devastated and empty, but mostly fearful that the letter contained something ominous. Had she fled, really fled? Of one thing he was certain, this had to be the end of it. Surely a bad ending. When he had revealed his idea he thought he had been more than magnanimous, wildly and extravagantly generous. He was taking a giant risk. Worse, he had forged Anne’s name and worked out a repayment plan directing all correspondence to come to his office.

  The debt would require the use of his 401(k) from which he would release periodic payments. He had even concocted a fallback plan in case Anne found out about what he had done. He would tell her he had gambled in stocks and lost heavily. He would be contrite, beg her forgiveness, admit his folly, surrender to her mercy. After all, he had become an expert in dissimulation, a master of lies.

  If only she hadn’t confessed the whole affair to Anne. In that case he would be scot free. She would have left of her own volition, cut the strings, her memories of their affair spoiled by his crass action to buy her off. Thankfully, she had taken strict precautions and had not become pregnant. But suppose she had. A new thought intruded. The old cliché, the tired plot point of a thousand novels, plays, and movies. Would her letter suddenly reveal that new twist and provide yet more fodder for his guilt? A film of sweat broke out on his body. Perspiration soaked his shirt.

  In time she would get over the affair, her love for him would fade away, along with his guilt. Never again would he allow himself to get entangled in such a disruptive situation. Never again would he allow himself to “fall” in love. Fall was the operative word.

  He toyed with the idea of not opening the letter, assuming it was, after all, merely a letter of farewell, a dear John, which he roundly deserved. But the idea of a hanging loose end seemed worse than the revelation that would be contained there. Then he concluded that it was his ticket to freedom, the key to his unburdening.

  With shaking fingers he carefully tore the end off the envelope, blew it open and removed the letter. For some reason, he looked around him furtively as if what he was doing was subject to surveillance.

  “Dear Glen,” the letter began. “I have decided to accept your offer. I am leaving town as of today. I have sent a letter of resignation to the firm and have packed up and given notice that I will be leaving the apartment. I’m not sure where I am going, probably to the West Coast. As you say, my skills are easily transferable. I will send a note to you at the firm and inform you where you can wire the funds, which I will require to settle up the rent and replace some items that I have left behind. Everything that could be said has been said. Please don’t ever try to contact me. Sara.”

  He read the letter twice. It struck him as a form letter, cold and businesslike. Inexplicably he felt a growing anger. Then he threw the letter in the trash receptacle along with the half-drunk cup of latté. He hoped the guilt was gone, but he wasn’t sure.

  Bad Patch

  Gordon called them the walking wounded, older people clinging to life, hanging on. He would see them, accompanied by their caretakers, mostly black women who would either push them in wheelchairs or amble beside them as they struggled on their walkers, moving along First Avenue for lunch at the Madison Restaurant where Gordon invariably ate, or other eateries nearby.

  Older couples limped along solicitous of each other, or men and women by themselves, intrepid and alone, assisted by canes moved in wary steps along the pavement. He assumed that the reason for so many sightings of these unfortunates was the number of rent-controlled apartments in the area where these people had lived for years and, refusing to be warehoused in nursing homes, had chosen to end their days in quarters that were still affordable.

  Some, he speculated, were being subsidized by their children, who were hoping to keep these comparatively inexpensive and prized apartments after their parents had passed on. Perhaps there was a provision in the strange rental practices of New York that made it possible, but he wasn’t certain. He discovered that he had grown increasingly observant of this phenomenon as he grew older. He was, after all, in his early eighties, still reasonably healthy, still compos mentis, still viable as an independent self-sustaining mobile human being enjoying all the various emoluments that the big city of New York had to offer.


  Many of these unfortunates, Gordon noted, were younger than he, which always brought forth in his thoughts the silent monologue that he should count his blessings and stop complaining about all the minor aches and pains that afflicted his aging carcass. There could be no denying, however, that his generation was passing and mortality was an ever-present reality. Still, the fact was that he was remarkably active and healthy, despite his age. He supposed he should thank his parents for his genes, although his father had died in an automobile accident when he was sixty.

  Gordon still played tennis every Saturday at the Roosevelt Island Tennis Club, taking the aerial tram over the East River and joining the weekly senior round robin of mixed doubles. His usual strategy of high lobs and short angled shots kept him in the running as a sought-after partner and he often was considered the stronger player on his doubles team, even if his partner was years younger.

  After the games, he usually schmoozed with the other players and ladies of uncertain age, some of whom he had bedded with surprising results, thanks to the new drugs that proved remarkably effective in this endeavor. Lately he had reserved his affection for Sylvia Dubrow, a well-preserved widow in her late sixties who lived a few blocks away on Lexington Avenue and still retained an imaginative sexual flair, which was an excellent adjunct to his pharmaceutical assistance.

  He dubbed these episodic trysts with her as his manly validation, a term she enjoyed hearing.

  “Not very seductive, but it does offer happy expectations.”

  Athletic and an inveterate exerciser who kept her figure under control, Sylvia did Pilates, attended yoga classes and was a regular on the Saturday tennis round robin. She had been a schoolteacher and had married an accountant late in life. Consequently, she had no children, which suited Gordon just fine. He had avoided consorting with women who carried the emotional baggage of grandchildren and he detested hearing their ruminations on the exploits of such progeny.

  Gordon had a son who lived in Seattle, who called a couple of times a year and was more or less estranged. His ex-wife, who had died a couple of years ago, had had custody of the boy and, as a result, had somehow dislodged from his psyche any paternal feelings, or so it seemed to Gordon, who prided himself on being able to cope with adversity, of which he had seen a great deal in his life.

  His own apartment was a rent-controlled one-bedroom on 53rd Street, hardly a fashionable building. It was owned by an indifferent estate, which only made repairs when ordered to by the courts. All the appliances and bathroom fixtures were vintage forties and the mildew was growing increasingly noticeable, but Gordon had lived there for thirty years, ever since his divorce, and he had grown accustomed to its eccentricities. Besides, it had one of those old claw-footed bathtubs, which could hold his six-foot frame quite comfortably and was the envy of Sylvia, who would bubble-bathe excessively after their weekly sexual episodes.

  Aside from her sexual adventurism, which was delightfully surprising and effective, Sylvia was one of those women who were persistent and relentless interrogators.

  “You are one nosy lady,” he would admonish her as they lolled in bed in leisurely after-play.

  “Indulge me, Gordon. I am a sponge for knowledge, especially about the men I fornicate with.” She had admitted that she had had an extensive history with men before her late marriage, but had renounced such practices in her widowhood, assuring him that he was her last and one and only lover. “Besides, there is a lot less time consumed by the sexual aspect in this time of life, leaving a lot more time for talk.”

  It surprised him how less guarded he had become in what he laughingly referred to as his dotage. He was amazed at his long-term memory as she probed and questioned, and suddenly he found himself telling his life story as a kind of running memoir, especially about what he referred to as “the bad patch that ruined his life.”

  “Ruined, Gordon? Come now, you are hardly a ruined man.” She patted his flaccid penis and he felt the flicker of desire.

  “Okay, then,” he acknowledged. “A more accurate description would be revolutionized.” He felt again the pain of that bad patch. Indeed, he thought he had put that to rest.

  “We’ve all had bad patches, Gordon.”

  “Odd, how I still feel the ripples of the wake.”

  “How nautical you are, Gordon.”

  He enjoyed her creative sarcasm and told her so, which only encouraged her. Then he found himself running at the mouth, telling her all about the bad patch.

  “I was fifty,” he began, memory flooding back on a river of bitter bile. “I had worked for Fidelity Insurance for twenty-five years and was on the top rung of the executive suite by then. Good job. House in Huntington, Long Island, traditional wife, son ten years old, a latecomer, but my wife was twelve years younger. Two cars. Vacations in Florida in winter, beaches in summer, the whole nine yards. I was a company man. Then they hired this fellow, Thomas J. Phelan, the name is engraved in my brain. He got it into his head and the board agreed that people over fifty… imagine, over fifty. Hell, that’s practically a teenager in today’s calculus. Anyway they were determined to get rid of everyone over fifty. Phelan’s strategy was to worry them out, torture them until they squealed and quit. You know how they did it. Move them from a three-window office to a broom closet, humiliate them at meetings, drive them mad with useless paperwork, ignore them, and when they complain, promise recompense but do nothing. Oh, Phelan was a clever bastard. He was a true sadist. He showed no mercy, but was relentless in his subtle persecutions. The idea was to make you quit, to harass you until your nervous system broke down and you had to quit or have a breakdown.”

  “I get the picture.”

  “He was one son of a bitch. He just wore us out and the over-fifties started to fade away. I hung on for months. I felt hollowed out. The son of a bitch broke my spirit. It was subtle, but he was effective. The idea was to move you out without legal ramifications. You couldn’t prove that it was deliberate. I was not easy to live with. My wife was sympathetic to my plight, but my home life was beginning to wear thin. I was short-tempered, hard to live with. Every day at work was hell. Phelan reveled in it. He had ice in his veins.”

  “How old was he?”

  “Under forty.”

  “Why didn’t they just pay you off with early retirement or some such?”

  “Bad for the numbers. He wanted to show the board how clever he was. Those who quit got three months’ severance, which he thought was generous. He was ruthless. Hell, jobs for people over fifty didn’t grow on trees. He was, in effect, murdering our career chances. Phelan was a monster. God, I haven’t thought about him for years. I hated that man. Finally, I buckled. Quit cold. Just walked out. The company sent me the three-month check and that was that. My life was ruined by that man.”

  “Revolutionized, Gordon.”

  “Okay, revolutionized. My wife left me, got custody of my son, and I went personally bankrupt, all because of Thomas J. Phelan. Just mentioning his name still gives me heartburn. I wanted to kill him. I dreamed of torturing him, tearing him limb from limb. Sometimes I still do. I have never hated a man more than I hated him. He was my Hitler, the scumbag son-of-a-bitch bastard cocksucker.”

  “My, my. That last epithet I would take as a compliment.”

  Her remark broke the tension of the memory and he laughed, but he could not completely dispel the old hatred.

  “It took a while, but I did recover, at least partially. I drove a cab for a while. I had these alimony payments. It was awful.”

  “They say adversity builds character.”

  His comeback was, to his own surprise, agreement.

  “It does. One does learn to cope. In time I got a sales job and it kept me going.”

  “And here you are,” Sylvia said. “A survivor of all the bad patches with a great bathtub—with a comfortable king-size bed, a great tennis strategy, mobility and all
your marbles and,” she winked, “with help and inspiration, you are a reasonably adequate sexual partner.”

  “Is that a compliment or an insult?” he laughed, poking her playfully in the ribs.

  “There is a lot to say for adequate if it does the job.” She looked about the room, her eyes resting on the window air conditioner. “Like that antique of a device.” She pointed with her chin, “Makes a racket, huffs and puffs and squeaks, but it does the job.” She giggled and kissed him on the cheek.

  “So now I’m an antique.”

  “Antiques have value. And wine grows better with age.”

  He laughed and embraced her, feeling better, memories of Thomas J. Phelan and his bad patch starting to fade from memory.

  Still, he realized, it could never fully disappear. It was always there, locked in his brain cells, reacting to the summons of the old hatred. Weeks later, perhaps longer, he was heading to his daily luncheon at the Madison Restaurant when he noticed one of the walking wounded, a man being led by the hand by a black female caretaker. The man walked haltingly, each step an obviously difficult chore. His face was distorted by a frozen expression and his eyes looked lifeless and glazed. Still, Gordon sensed some vague familiarity as the man was led into the Madison Restaurant and maneuvered into a booth.

  Gordon, seated in a small table facing the booth, studied the man, searching his memory. He watched as the caretaker looked over the menu and gave the order to the young waiter. He had his usual white mushroom omelet and coffee and continued to observe the man, much to the chagrin of the caretaker who offered annoyed glances in answer to his curiosity.