79 Park Avenue

by Harold Robbins

  The door behind her was open and she could see into the kitchen. Her stepfather was seated at the table, watching her. A look of contempt came into her face. He dropped his eyes.

  Still watching him, she slipped the brassiere straps over her arms and fastened it. Then she turned and walked to the door. He looked up again. She stood there silently a moment, then closed the door quickly and finished dressing.

  Peter had finished his bottle. She picked him up gaily and went out into the kitchen. Her stepfather was no longer there.

  Katti put a bowl of cereal on the table and held out her arms for the baby. “He finish the bottle?” she asked.

  Marja nodded. She handed Peter to her mother and sat down. “Oatmeal again?” she asked, staring into the bowl.

  “Oatmeal is good for you,” Katti said. “Eat it.”

  Marja made no move toward the food. She wanted a cigarette. She looked at her mother speculatively, wondering if she dared light one before breakfast. She decided against the idea. “I’m not hungry,” she said.

  Her stepfather had come back into the kitchen. “Isn’t oatmeal good enough for your rich tastes?” he asked clumsily. “Maybe you’d prefer ham and eggs?”

  Marja stared up at him coldly. “To tell the truth,” she said, “I would.”

  “Isn’t that too bad?” he queried sarcastically. He turned to Katti. “I think she’s ashamed because we’re too poor to afford it.”

  Marja’s eyes were wide. “We wouldn’t be if you could tear yourself away from the beer long enough to go to work,” she said blandly.

  Peter held out his hands hopelessly toward his wife. “Respect for her parents she ain’t got,” he said. “Only insults. That what she learns bumming around to all hours of the night?”

  “Respect for my parents I have,” Marja said swiftly. “Not for you.”

  “Marja! Stop!” her mother spoke sharply.

  “Tell him to stop pickin’ on me,” she answered sullenly, picking up her spoon. She tasted the oatmeal. It was dull and flat.

  “Your father is right,” Katti continued. “You should speak to him nicer. He’s only thinking of you—”

  “Crap!” Marja exploded, throwing down her spoon. “The only one he ever thinks about is himself!” She got to her feet. “If he was half a man, he wouldn’t let you be out working all night while he sat around the house in his B.V.D.’s. He’s nothin’ but a leech!”

  Katti moved quickly, her hand a blur against the grey-white walls. The slap echoed resoundingly in the suddenly quiet kitchen.

  Marja’s hand was against her cheek, the red flush spreading quickly around the white fingermarks. There was a strange look of wonder in her eyes. “You hit me,” she said to her mother, a tone of horror in her voice.

  Katti looked at her. She could feel a lump coming into her throat. She realised that this was the first time she had ever slapped her daughter. “To teach you respect for your parents,” she said in a suddenly shaking voice.

  Marja’s eyes seemed to fill, and for a moment Katti thought that her daughter was about to cry. But no tears fell. Instead, a coldness came into them, an icy, chilling calm that told her Marja had grown up and gone away from her.

  “Marja!” she said in an appealing voice and took a step toward her.

  Marja stepped back. “I’m sorry, Mother,” she said softly. It was almost as if she were apologising for striking her mother. “I’m terribly sorry.”

  She turned and went quietly out the kitchen door.

  Katti turned to Peter. She could hear Marja’s steps hurrying down the stairway. She began to cry. “What have I done, Peter? What have I done to my baby?”

  He didn’t move towards her. There was a distant echo of triumph in his voice. “What you should have done long ago, Katti. You did right.”

  She looked at him. “You really think so, Peter?” she asked, lapsing into Polish.

  He nodded his head, a satisfaction deep in his eyes. “Yes.”

  She stared at him. The baby in her arms began to cry. Automatically she began to soothe him. She wanted to believe her husband. She wanted to feel she had been right. But no matter how much she wanted to believe, somewhere deep inside her lurked a preying doubt.

  Chapter Eight

  THE TELEPHONE BEGAN to ring just as Marja came in the door. “I’ll get it, Mr. Rannis,” she called. “It’s for me.”

  She pulled the door of the booth closed and picked up the receiver. “Hello.”

  “Marja?” Ross’s voice was thin through the receiver.

  “Yeah,” she answered.

  “Ross,” he said.

  “I know,” she answered.

  “What are you doin’?” he asked.

  “Nothin’,” she answered. “It’s too hot.”

  “Want to go for a ride?” he asked. “We’ll go up Riverside Drive. It’s cool there.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “I’ll pick you right up,” he said quickly. “Wait there for me.”

  “No—” She hesitated. “I gotta go home first an’ change. My dress is soakin’. I’ll meet yuh someplace.”

  “At the garage,” he said. “Eighty-third between Park an’ Lex. Will you be long?”

  “Half-hour,” she said. “So long.”

  “So long,” he answered.

  She heard the click of his phone before she replaced the receiver. She came out of the booth.

  Mr. Rannis was standing there. He looked at her suspiciously. “Who was that?”

  “A friend,” she answered noncommittally. She started toward the door.

  He put out a hand and stopped her. “How about a Milky Way?”

  She shook her head. “No, thanks.” She started to move again, but his hand tightened on her arm.

  “I’m not askin’ for money,” he said.

  She smiled. “Wouldn’t do you no good. I’m flat.” She pulled her arm free. “Besides, I gotta go. My mother is expectin’ me.”

  Reluctantly he watched her go to the door. “Don’t forget, Marja,” he called. “If you want anything, all you gotta do is ask me.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Rannis,” she said as she went out the door. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

  Katti was coming out the door as Marja reached the steps to her house. She stood there watching the sun glint in her daughter’s hair. She waited until Marja was halfway up the stoop before she spoke. “Hello, Mama.”

  “Everything go all right in school today?” Katti asked.

  Marja glanced quickly at her mother. “Yeah,” she answered. “Why shouldn’t it?”

  Katti felt herself thrown on the defensive. “I was just asking,” she answered. She wanted to say she was sorry for what had happened that morning, but she couldn’t make the words come from her lips.

  “Where yuh goin’?” Marja asked.

  “Shopping,” Katti answered. She was lying. But she didn’t want her daughter to know she was going to the clinic for an examination. “What are you doing this afternoon?”

  “I’m goin’ over to a friend’s house to study,” Marja answered. “I just came home to get out of these things. I’m all sweated up.”

  “Be quiet,” Katti said. “The baby’s sleeping. I don’t want you to wake him.”

  “I will,” Marja answered.

  She went upstairs and opened the door softly. The apartment was still. She went into the kitchen and stood in the centre of the room listening. There was no sound. Quietly she walked up the hall to the front room and peeked in.

  Her stepfather was fast asleep in a chair near the open window, his head lolling to one side, the newspaper across his knees. She tiptoed carefully back through the hall and kitchen to her room.

  The baby was sleeping in his crib. Gently she opened the closet door and took out a clean blouse and skirt. She placed them on the bed and, next to them, fresh underclothes. Quickly she slipped out of her blouse and skirt and went back into the kitchen.

  She opened the water faucet to a gentle trickle.
She didn’t want any noise to disturb her stepfather. She shrugged off her brassiere and hung it over the back of a kitchen chair. It took her only a moment to cover the upper half of her body with soap. Another moment to remove the soap with the aid of a wash rag. She then washed her face. Her eyes shut tightly against the soap, she reached for a towel. The rack nearest her was empty. She groped for the next rack.

  She pulled the towel down and rubbed her face vigorously, then under her arms and across her body. She put the towel back on the rack and reached behind her for the brassiere. It wasn’t on the chair.

  She turned, automatically looking at the floor, thinking it might have fallen. Her stepfather’s voice startled her.

  “It did fall, Marja,” he said, holding it towards her. “But I picked it up for you.”

  She stared at him for a moment, surprise showing in her eyes. Then she reached out her hand, taking it from him. “Gee, thanks,” she said sarcastically, holding it in front of her. “It made so much noise falling that it woke you.”

  He smiled slowly, ignoring her tone of voice. “Your mother used to look like that back in the Old Country when we were young.”

  “How would you know?” she asked snidely. “She never even knew you were alive then.” She started to walk around him, but he stepped in front of her.

  He reached out his hand and caught her arm. “Marja, why do you act so mean to me?”

  She stared up into his face, her eyes blank. “I don’t mean to, Uncle Peter,” she said. “It’s just that I can’t stand seeing you around the house.”

  He misunderstood her sarcasm completely. “If I got a job?” he asked almost pleadingly. “Then would you be nice to me?”

  A calculating glint came into her eyes. “I might,” she said.

  “Then we could be friends again?” He pulled her toward him and clumsily tried to kiss her.

  She turned her face so that his kiss landed awkwardly on her cheek, and she slipped out of his grasp. At her door she turned and looked at him. “Maybe,” she said.

  The door closed behind her. He could feel the pulses throbbing in his temples. The little bitch. Someday he would show her what she could do with her teasing. He turned to the icebox for another can of beer.

  Katti sat on the row of benches between two other women and stoically waited her turn for examination. It wouldn’t take long now. There was only one other woman before her.

  In the corner of the room the young nurse at the reception desk stared down at the cards in front of her. After a while all the strange-sounding names came off your tongue as easily as Smith and Jones. When that happened, you knew you were a veteran.

  An intern stopped at the desk and whispered to her. She nodded and picked up the next two cards. “Mrs. Martino, booth four, please. Mrs. Ritchik, booth five.”

  Katti and the woman next to her got up at the same time. They smiled at each other in sudden kinship. Katti followed her to the desk.

  The woman took the card the nurse gave her, went into a booth, and pulled the curtain closed behind her.

  Katti spoke to the nurse. “Mrs. Ritchik,” she said.

  The nurse looked at her without curiosity and handed her a card. “First visit?” she asked.

  Katti shook her head. “No, I was here before. When my Peter was born.”

  The nurse shook her head impatiently. These people were so dumb. “I mean this time.”

  Katti hesitated. “Yes.”

  The nurse reached under the desk and found a short, wide-lipped bottle. “Make a sample,” she said, “and give it to the doctor when he comes in to see you.”

  Katti took the bottle and walked down the aisle past the crowded benches and went into the booth with the number 5 over the door. She pulled the curtain shut.

  Methodically she undressed and prepared herself for the doctor. At last everything was ready and she took the cotton sheet from the hook and draped it around her. She sat down on the little stool in the corner and waited for him to arrive.

  A few minutes later there was a light tap on the outside of the booth and a student nurse came in. She was carrying a pad. “Mrs. Peter Ritchik?”

  Katti nodded.

  Then followed the list of questions without which the clinic couldn’t operate. It took the nurse only about five minutes because Katti had all the answers ready for her. She remembered the form from the last time she had been here.

  The nurse tore the top sheet from her pad and put it in a clip hung just inside the door. She left the booth and a moment later was back with another sheet of paper, which she affixed to the clip. Then she smiled at Katti. “The doctor will be with you in a minute.”

  “Thank you,” Katti said. She sat down stoically to wait. It generally was at least fifteen minutes before the doctor came.

  This time it was closer to a half-hour before the curtain lifted and the doctor came in, followed by his retinue of two interns. He took the chart down from the wall and looked at it briefly, then at her. “Mrs. Ritchik?”

  She nodded. “Yes, doctor.”

  “I’m Dr. Block,” he said. “How long have you been pregnant?”

  She shrugged her shoulders. “A month, maybe two.”

  He repressed an expression of distaste. These people were so careless in their habits. “Get up on the table and we’ll see,” he said curtly.

  Silently she climbed onto the small examination table and put her feet in the stirrups. The small yellow bulb in the ceiling over her head shone into her eyes. She blinked.

  His voice seemed to float over her. “Take a deep breath.”

  She filled her lungs with air and held perfectly still. His touch was light and efficient and was gone in a moment. She started to sit up, but his hand against her shoulder stopped her. She lay quietly waiting.

  He lifted the cotton sheet until it shielded her eyes from the light. His voice came quietly through it. He was talking to the interns.

  “Cæsarian section on last childbirth. Constricted Fallopian tubes. Will need again.”

  The sheet dropped and she sat up. She looked at the doctor questioningly.

  “Why did you become pregnant, Mrs. Ritchik?” he asked. “According to the chart, you were told to be careful, that you would endanger your life if you had another child.”

  She shrugged her shoulders. These men never understood. To them everything was simple.

  The doctor turned away from her and began to wash his hands in a clean basin of water just left there for him by the student nurse. He spoke to her over his shoulder. The words were routine to him. He knew that they would be ignored.

  “Get plenty of sunshine and fresh air and rest. Refrain from cohabitation for at least two months. Eat plenty of nourishing foods, milk, orange juice.” He scribbled a prescription and handed it to her. “Take this, and come in next month.”

  She looked at him. “When will the baby come, Doctor?”

  His eyes were bleak. “Your baby won’t come,” he said cruelly. “We’ll have to take it from you.”

  She kept her face impassive. She had known that before he did. “When, Doctor?” she persisted gently.

  “November or December,” he answered. “We can’t let you carry the full nine months.”

  “Thank you Doctor,” she said quietly.

  The doctor turned and went out, the two interns following him silently. The curtain fell rustling behind them.

  Slowly Katti got off the table and reached for her clothes. It wasn’t so bad. She would be able to work right up to October. The curtain rustled and she held her dress up in front of her.

  It was one of the interns. He smiled at her apologetically. “Excuse me, Mrs. Ritchik,” he said, “but I forgot this.” He reached up and took the urine sample from the shelf.

  “It’s okay,” she said.

  He glanced at her quickly, then smiled again, a shy smile. “Don’t worry, Mrs. Ritchik,” he said. “Everything will be all right.”

  She smiled back at him. “Thank you, Doctor
.”

  The curtain fell and he was gone. Quietly she finished dressing and went outside and paid the nurse the fifty-cent clinic fee. Then she went down the hall to the dispensary and gave them the prescription.

  While she was waiting for the prescription to be filled, she wondered how she would tell Marja. Marja wouldn’t understand. She would only take it as another rebuff and be hurt.

  They called her name and she picked up the prescription. Tablets. She had to take them three times a day. She put them in her pocketbook and went out into the street. Down the block she could see the spires of St. Augustine.

  She decided to stop there and talk to Father Janowicz. He was a very smart man. He would tell her what to do.

  Chapter Nine

  MARJA SAT UP in the grass and hugged her knees, looking across the Hudson River. It was dusk, and lights were coming on like fireflies on the Jersey shores. A slight warm breeze rustled her hair. “I gotta get a job for the summer,” she said suddenly.

  Ross rolled over on his side and looked up at her. “Why?” he asked, smiling.

  “We need the dough,” she answered simply. “My old man loves beer too much to go to work. My mother works nights. There ain’t enough to go round.”

  “What can you do?” he asked curiously. “What kind of a job do you want?”

  “I dunno,” she answered honestly. “I never thought about it before. Maybe clerk in the five-and-ten.”

  He laughed.

  “What’s so funny?” she asked.

  “You don’t get much for that,” he said. “Maybe eight bucks a week.”

  “Eight bucks is eight bucks,” she retorted. “It’s a lot better’n nothin’.”

  He looked at her quizzically. His sister often spoke about going to work, but somehow never got around to it. “You mean it?”

  She nodded.

  He pulled a blade of grass from the ground and chewed it reflectively. In some ways she reminded him of Mike. They were both so serious about money. He had an idea. “Do you dance?” he asked.

  She glanced at him curiously. “Sure,” she said.

  “I mean, good?” he persisted.