by M. M. Mayle
At three-twenty-two p.m. on Monday, April 6, 1987—he scribbles time and date—Colin Elliot is the lead story on the music channel news-break. The announcer says that after a late-night Manhattan recording session, Elliot was seen by paparazzi offering what appeared to be a controlled substance to Rayce Vaughn, another rock star, described as recently out of rehab and set to embark on a much-heralded comeback tour.
Hoop writes this down as fast as he can while the announcer goes on to say that Elliot took violent exception when an attempt was made to photograph the presumed drug exchange, and in the ensuing melee the photographer was thrown to the pavement outside a downtown recording studio, thereby smashing his face and camera. As the report continues, he learns that Elliot was restrained by stunned security people, remanded to police custody, and has since been released on his own recognizance with a court appearance set for early June.”
Hoop captures nearly every one of these words, then has to let a few go by so he can concentrate on information about the victim.
Sid Kaplan was taken by ambulance to St. Joseph’s Hospital in the West Village, where he’s undergoing treatment for a broken jaw and multiple lacerations. The alleged controlled substance was determined at the scene to be an over-the-counter headache remedy in powder form.
The announcer’s already moved on to another story by the time Hoop gets this all down and underlines the entire entry for further study. He sets aside the composition book and pen and flexes his writing hand a few times. When’s the last time he wrote more than a shopping list, never mind at breakneck speed? He could get overproud of what he’s accomplished just now if he didn’t have a sandwich to eat and thought to give to what this fresh information means.
The victim is automatically an ally for having been roughed up by the rock star, he reasons as he starts in on the sandwich. For being in pursuit of the rock star when this happened—he takes another couple of bites—this guy is automatically of the brotherhood that included Cliff Grant. But that doesn’t have to mean this Sid Kaplan guy has the same perverted mindset as Grant, he tells himself as he wolfs down the rest of the sandwich and licks his fingers. And if the hospital he’s in is anything like that nursing home yesterday, getting in to see him won’t be a problem.
A quick look at his Manhattan map shows that St. Joseph’s Hospital is in the same general neighborhood as Cravings and the Silent Woman Pub, so he can get there on the same subway train he rode last Friday.
He stashes all stray items in the gym bag, takes it and the tool case with him when he leaves. On the way through the lobby, he doesn’t bother scavenging for discarded newspapers; instead, he goes straight for the vending machines outside the main door, pays in his money and comes away with clean fresh copies of every paper available.
FORTY-EIGHT
Midafternoon, April 6, 1987
At the approach to the park-and-ride lot, Hoop changes his mind, brakes hard and peels off in another direction—in the direction of the Union storage facility. If the banged-up photographer is anything at all like Cliff Grant—perverted or not—he’ll want more than the promise of payment, and chances are there’s more than one kind of payment he’ll be willing to accept.
After a quick stop at a Shop Rite market for a box of plastic bags with zipper closings, he goes straight to the self storage unit in Union where he works the locks and shuts himself in before doing anything else.
Without saying a word to Audrey—it’s too soon to get her hopes up—he adds a known amount of cash to the dwindled supply in the tool case. Then he takes great pains not to spill overmuch when he transfers a generous amount of dope from the punctured package into one of the quart-size plastic bags he just bought. He tests the seal on the bag a couple of times before stuffing it in the tool case alongside the cash-money, then puts everything back the way it was.
On the bus into Manhattan, he sits in the back, some distance from the few other passengers on board. The tool case is within easy reach on the seat next to him, and there’s plenty of room to read the newspapers even though they’re not the kind that open wide.
Remembering that the gossip sheets came in extra handy when he leafed through Gibby Lester’s coffee-stained examples on the subway train, he hopes for similar today. But that won’t be the case because the three papers he’s looked at so far have more to say about Aurora Elliot than the rock star, and they all say something bad. He pores over every single tabloid—some for the second time—and her name stands out in every single story about Colin Elliot, and every single mention of her is false and hateful.
Hoop flings the papers aside; he’d tear them all to shreds if he thought the other bus passengers wouldn’t notice.
Inside the Port Authority terminal, he goes along as though nothing was bothering him. Same on the subway train, where he decides to get off early, at 14th Street, and walk the remaining ten blocks to the hospital. The walk does him good, so when he approaches St. Joseph’s Receiving Hospital and Emergency Center, he’s not as riled as he was thirty minutes ago.
He mixes in with the steady stream of people entering the main door and watches what they do the way he watched the comings and goings yesterday at the nursing home. Following their lead, he goes to the visitor’s desk where he’ll have to sign his name and write down who he wants to visit—something he didn’t have to do yesterday.
Casual-like, he pulls his stiff new Yankees baseball cap low over his eyes and hunches down in his equally stiff new Levi’s jacket, but he needn’t have bothered. When it’s his turn, the woman in charge doesn’t even look up while he writes what’s required; she doesn’t even glance his way when she forks over a clip-on badge and tells him to go to floor seven and follow the green arrows to room number 733.
Nowhere along the way does anyone appear to notice that he’s carrying a tool case. On the off chance someone does, he decides to use the fire stairs.
On the seventh floor, he enters a scene made familiar by yesterday’s exposure to the sick and dying. Every few yards, he passes someone in a wheelchair or leaning on a walker or pushing one of those hat rack things rigged up with bottles and tubing. And just like yesterday, there are no caretakers seeing to any of them, and when he passes the nurses station, no one’s there. In his head, he writes another of those letter-to-the-editor type complaints as he follows the green arrows painted on the wall and counts down the room numbers.
Sid Kaplan is in a room by himself and, unlike yesterday’s patient, very aware he’s being visited by a stranger. You might even say he’s alarmed. And he should be because he’s got something to hide.
The victim’s not near as bad off as was said on the TV report. His jaw shows no sign of being broken when he hollers out a challenge, and the multiple lacerations he’s supposed to have are nothing more than scratches. His nose looks broken, but not recently; he’s missing a couple of teeth along one side, but that doesn’t look like a recent alteration either.
“Hey! I said who the hell are you?” the bedridden faker hollers for the second time and hoists himself up on his elbows.
Hoop retreats a polite step or two, introduces himself by name, and states what brought him here.
Sid Kaplan appears to be paying strict attention and waits his turn before commenting.
“Lemme see if I’m gettin’ this right.” Kaplan squints and clears his throat a couple times. “You come waltzin’ in here right outta the blue and wanna give me twenty-five K toward the permanent ruination of Colin Elliot’s reputation. Even sayin’ that was a remote possibility and not just some loony-tune scheme you’ve cooked up for god-knows-why, I’m guaranteed a hundred times that amount and maybe more, if and when I agree to drop assault charges against Elliot. Why would I wanna jeopardize that chunka change by playin’ along with you?”
Kaplan makes a big show of manipulating the bed into a Barcalounger position as if sitting upright will add strength to his scoff. This gives Hoop a chance to open the tool case and time to think of several answers.
The best answer is based on the message sent when Kaplan made his try at photographing Elliot in the act of doling out drugs—the message that he too was interested in bringing the rock star down—so that’s the answer Hoop gives.
“I hear you, man,” Kaplan says in return, “and I know that’s how it musta looked, but I’m not out to get anybody or ruin ’em or anything like that. It’s not a personal thing. Sure, I latched onto the chance to make an extra buck because Elliot can’t control his temper, but basically I’m just out to sell pictures and the kind that make celebrities look bad’ll always bring higher prices than the vanilla kind. Hey, just take a gander at all the shit that’s resurfaced since Elliot hit the news again.”
The photographer reaches for a stack of newspapers overflowing a bedside chair. Like red flags, he waves these copies of the same papers Hoop left scattered on the bus. “Elliot hasn’t done anything all that sensational lately,” Kaplan says. “Not until this morning, anyway, so the dead wife’s resurrected to spice things up a little. But those of us taking advantage of her sleazoid behavior don’t have nothing personal against her, either. She did pose for them cunt shots, after all.” Kaplan drops the newspapers to the floor and dangles his bare legs off the side of the bed; his toenails are long and yellowish at the ends. “Y’know, that white-trash junkie wife of his’ll still be sellin’ papers long after I’m gone,” he says. “If I really wanted to make a buck, I’d come up with a way to keep that bitch in her coffin. I think Elliot would shell out a freakin’ lot to make that happen.”
Hoop nods enthusiastic agreement as disgust and disappointment go through him like flame racing across a gasoline spill. He moves fast into position, yanking the plastic privacy curtain along with him as both blind and shield.
When he’s finished, he leaves the marketable goods behind without a lot of regret. Gagging the badmouthing malingerer seems only fitting, even though his throat’s cut ear to ear.
Afterward, he’s unhurried about washing up in the little toilet attached to the hospital room and leaving by the way he came. On the main floor, he returns his visitor tag, exits to the street, gets his bearings, and sets off in the direction of the West 4th Street tavern remembered from the last time he did business in the city.
He finds the Silent Woman Pub on the first try and goes in without even glancing in the direction of Gibby Lester’s nasty little shop around the corner, although it might be pleasing to see crime scene tape advertising that Cravings is shut down.
As soon as his eyes adjust to the dim interior of the pub, he takes a seat at the bar, where the main decoration is a sign bragging that over 125 brands of beer are available at all times. He’s half-tempted to poke fun at that brag by ordering Sebewaing, a Michigan brand that hasn’t been brewed in years, and is only remembered because the sturdy Sebewaing beer cases with the pheasant emblem were used as furniture in the house where he grew up.
A bartender puts an end to this mind-scatter and takes his order for a Bud draft and a shot of rye. The whiskey’s gone and the beer’s down by half when a TV hanging from low mock rafters above the bar gets his full attention.
There, on some station other than the music channel, he sees the lawyerwoman plain as day with the rock star crowded in next to her. Maybe a dozen microphones are bunched up in front of the pair, and by the looks of the surroundings, they’re outdoors, on the steps of a big fancy building.
If the TV sound is on at all, Hoop can’t hear it over the noise of the after-work crowd that’s filling up the pub. Asking for special treatment goes against his grain most times. This isn’t one of those times, so he signals the bartender with a ten-dollar bill and buys himself enough increased volume to be tuned in right when the lawyerwoman clears her throat and brings whatever meeting this is to order.
Thank you . . . Thank you, everyone. My name is Laurel Chandler. I am a practicing attorney with the Manhattan law firm of Clark, Sebastian and Associates, but I’m speaking to you today as official biographer for Colin Elliot, the internationally acclaimed star of stage and recording studio. I was recently engaged in that capacity for the purpose of putting to an end the rampant conjecture, gross misrepresentation, and outright fabrication plaguing Mr. Elliot in the aftermath of the 1984 road accident that very nearly claimed his life. In this capacity, I am now compelled to address the subject of Mr. Elliot’s wife, Aurora, who did not survive the accident.
Hoop could use another ten-dollar’s worth of volume, but the bartender’s not in sight, so he just rivets harder on the TV set.
At one time or another, all branches of the media have reported on the late Aurora Elliot’s glaring deficiencies. These deficiencies were an ill-kept secret among those who knew her and eagerly exploited by those who did not, so no one will be surprised to hear me say that Aurora Elliot was flamboyantly derelict to her duties as a wife and mother, and failed miserably as an individual. No one will ever dispute that, as the evidence stands.
The minute this hits him, it’s like the TV picture went from color to black and white and Laurel Chandler’s face went from fair and fine to coarse and ugly.
However . . . one must recognize that Aurora was manifestly unequal to those routine tasks and responsibilities most of us take for granted. One must understand that she was unquestionably handicapped at birth by certain lacks and susceptibilities which left her powerless to control those behaviors and addictions that eventually brought her down. Most of all, one must absolutely agree that hers is a cruel legacy, a sad legacy, and best left buried with her. On that basis alone, I implore all members of the media to think twice about recycling the pitiable actions of a dead woman as a means to a quick buck, or risk obvious comparisons to grave robbers and carrion-eaters.
The lawyerwoman pauses, looks around like she’s smelled something bad and doesn’t know where it’s coming from. Kind of the way he feels, only it’s a bad taste he’s got in his mouth and he knows exactly where it’s coming from. And to make it worse, now the jackassed-fool of a woman is carrying on about the rock star being undeserving of these unfortunate references to his past, and the rock star’s children being unfairly subjected to . . . .
He blanks out the rest. She’s said more than enough to condemn herself.
FORTY-NINE
Early evening, April 6, 1987
She makes the decision to relocate while still on Holbrook Road. By the time Laurel pulls into Old Quarry Court at dusk, she’s already decided where she’ll go and what she’ll carry with her.
The decision to take up temporary residence in the city came fast and easy because she made it without outside influence. If Colin had pressured her to do so with a replay of the garage door–opener inspired argument, his logic would have fallen on deaf ears; if David had pointed out the obvious practicalities of a Manhattan pied-à-terre—temporary or otherwise—she wouldn’t have heard him either. But as inspired by her own sense of logic and practicality, it’s a laudable idea.
Coordinating with the turn into her driveway, she executes the quick up and down of the garage door, heedless of again jarring the electrical plug from the socket. After tonight the loose connection won’t matter—at least not until Easter, when Colin returns to England.
Without removing her coat or even setting down her carryall, she goes straight upstairs to the big walk-in cedar closet with its hatchway into the attic. From the platform just inside the attic door, she selects a pair of large roller bags that are as dated as her ultrasuede coat. These she maneuvers into the master bedroom, where she fills them with essentials and as many business outfits as can be crammed in.
She enters her girlhood bedroom for the first time in weeks, stirring up a flurry of dust bunnies along the way. In the small empty closet there, she turns on the unshaded ceiling light by its pull chain, then removes the loose section of floorboards that conceal her lifelong secret hiding place. Without disturbing the other valuables inside, she removes cash accumulated ever since she became flush enough to set something aside for eme
rgencies. She counts out a little over five thousand dollars in twenties, fifties, and hundreds and stuffs the bills into her coat pockets. After replacing the floorboards, she leaves the little room under the eaves without letting her eyes stray to the spot on the windowsill where the cat used to sun himself or to the alcove where he used to sleep in a cushioned basket until he was ruled an unaffordable luxury. She slams the door on the way out.
In the master bedroom, she takes one last look around and for no particular reason grabs the video of Colin’s award show appearance and zips it into one of the now-bulging bags. She thinks to transfer the loose cash into her carryall and gather up basic toiletries from the bathroom. Somewhere along the line she realizes what a load she has to carry and comes up with the idea of opening other doors that have long been closed.
She has to go all the way to the basement for a hammer. Then she has to determine how much of a barrier she’s up against at the bottom of the backstairs that have been sealed off for close to fifteen years. The door there yields to little more than a sharp tug for having warped out of alignment with the nails supposedly holding it shut—sharp reminder of another door needing her attention once Colin Elliot leaves town and things get back to normal.
The door at the top of the back stairs is in perfect alignment, resisting her initial attempts to pry it open. But once she’s resigned to splintering the doorframe, the door pops open under only a few hammer blows. And now that it’s open, it’s a tossup whether more energy was expended restoring the shortcut to the back hall and the nearby garage than would have been spent hauling the luggage down the front stairs and along the central hallway.
