In keeping with the latest funerary practices there was a large white board in the lobby of the chapel, mounted with photos showing highlights of the man’s life: a young Warwick in a US Army uniform, Warwick in nautical jacket and cap on his yacht, Warwick with a bevy of blondes at some official dinner, Warwick shaking hands with Nancy Reagan and her astrologer, Warwick raking leaves with a small child in front of a beachfront mansion in Bermuda.
Contrary to her usual habit, Amalie had opted not to wear black, not wanting to be mistaken for a relative. Still, Hannelore seated next to her in the pew pressed her hand as though in consolation. She had been crying. “He was a great man,” she whispered.” Warwick was a major during World War II “but he behaved impeccably.” She blew her nose. “He always showed respect for the German officers like my father. They corresponded after the war. That’s how I came to this job.”
Who wanted to hear about good Nazi fathers? Amalie’s own father, decorated in Italy as an American soldier, never talked about growing up in Germany or how he got to the United States, deflecting all of her inquiries while she was growing up until she stopped asking, good cheer being mandatory at home.
Cheer seemed to prevail at the service too, as the speaker told one amusing anecdote after another. Judging from the happy looks on his grown children’s faces, Warwick must have been one real fun guy or a rotten father. There were tributes from the employees who knew him, including one from the receptionist with the raccoon eyes who spoke of “a friend” who needed an abortion but was unable to pay for it. Warwick came through she said as someone snickered and the comptroller coughed in protest. Ed Fielding stared straight ahead, arms crossed over his chest. He was probably making up anagrams, Amalie thought. She caught Marshall’s eye and he winked at her. The king is dead, long live the king.
The clerks were sitting together, all in black. They would have liked to look at the deceased but the coffin was sealed.
This funeral was so different from Stewart’s. No unseemly emotion here, no rending of clothes, no wailing. Hannelore’s face was contorted from the effort at self-control. Why did they have lilies here, the most deathly flower of all? Amalie took out her handkerchief. She would not give in to mourning now, would not think of Stewart lying in the vast cemetery situated in the no-man’s-land between Brooklyn and Queens. Think of something else. The tenant rally. Pray for good weather and lots of press coverage. Charlie. A hearing to determine his fate. Amalie wanted to tell Ed about it. He had a teenage daughter. He would understand. Watching him now she had the distinct impression that they were breathing in unison. What would he say if he knew she had worked as a porno translator? Your corpse is so ripe. Round breasts like sins which I taste with my language (what a difference a misplaced accent mark can make).
The service over, the clerks took off for Bloomingdales, the next best thing to viewing the body. Hannelore left with Marshall.
“First time I see you in something other than black,” Ed said as they lingered outside of the building. “When you first came to the office I thought of one of those Victorian cutouts.”
“You mean, no substance?” If that’s what Ed meant, he had hit exactly on her own notion of herself, both pre- and post-Stewart, though now Amalie thought she could detect some solid areas in formation.
“You looked as though you were trying to hide.”
He seemed to be wavering about asking what she was going to do now since they didn’t have to return to the office.
“I’m meeting a friend,” she said, to help him out of his uncertainty.
“Well, have fun,” Ed said.
He could have been a little more aggressive, Amalie thought.
Now, sitting with Evan, enjoying the prospect of future trysts, she said, “I’m serious about Vermont.” She explained the relocation plan to Evan.
“Oh, I didn’t even know you were actually really working fulltime.”
“But I told you, Evan. I know I told you. Maybe you weren’t listening.” It bothered her that something as important as her life as a working person was of so little significance to him. Maybe he still thought of her as a faculty wife.
“Forgive me.” Evan took her hand, turned it over and kissed her wrist.
“OK. It’s possible that I didn’t really say much about it.” As soon as she said it, she felt herself falling into that old pattern of taking blame, being in the wrong. No—she had to stop doing it—with everyone.
“If you don’t want to leave the city, there are other options. I’ve got connections in the field. In fact I know the developer who bought your building. John Bovisi. I’m sure he could find something—”
“You never told me you knew him.”
“I’m sure I did but maybe you just weren’t listening…” He smiled, knowing he had scored a point.
“That’s possible,” she said curtly. She knew that she was apt to forget all sorts of things. Just ask Charlie. “Anyway I don’t know why I haven’t gotten a confirmation of the request for a review of the sale from the housing people.”
“I told you. The city bureaucracy loses things all the time. I was telling John about you. He even said he’d like to meet you. He likes to maintain good relations with tenant leaders.”
“Whatever for?” Amalie was beginning to feel very uncomfortable. Was it possible that Evan had mentioned to the developer the loophole she found and her request for a review of the building’s sale? If so, it would be no wonder that she hadn’t heard anything back.
“Since you’re off for the rest of the day, how about coming back to my place? We could improve our tango.” Evan was stroking her hand.
Amalie hesitated. Something was not quite right. If she had this nagging feeling about Evan then the sex would suffer. She was faced with the choice of asking him outright how much he had told the developer, which would be indiscreet to say the least, as well as a conflict of interest on his part, as she saw it—after all, he was her friend, ostensibly helping her out—or of not saying anything at all. Did she really want to know? It would be the end of the friendship. Or was it preferable not to know, as in the case of Stewart having an affair?
“Thanks, Evan. I’ll take a raincheck” (maybe yes, maybe no). “ I need to clear my head.”
With sudden inspiration, she thought, What better place to get a perspective on your life than the George Washington Bridge, especially on a beautiful late summer day?
#
From the subway station in uptown Manhattan, Amalie walked to the pedestrian entrance of the George Washington Bridge.
The river breeze was salty. Not many pedestrians on the bridge today. A man wheeling a bike, a bunch of French tourists struggling with a flapping map. Amalie would wow them with her French, or better yet with a fractured translation: Let me join you in your tomboy…
Below, a cement barge floats serenely down river. How Stewart loved this bridge, this river. “There’s the Tappan Zee Bridge,” he’d say. “Look at the Palisades, the Thousand Steps. It’s as beautiful as the Rhine or the Seine.”
Looking down, Amalie sees the little red lighthouse at the base of the bridge where they’d gone picnicking countless times. You walked on the slippery rocks and picked the wild shallots and dandelion greens. “Who says there’s no nature in New York?” Stewart liked to say.
Amalie also loves the bridge. Loves the first glimpse of it from the highway, coming down from upstate. The lights strung across it in the early evening, the beacon light atop one tower that used to go around every minute until the city decided it was a waste of energy. Every time a heavy truck goes by the cables vibrate. The bridge sways a quarter of an inch as it was designed to do. Charlie was so excited when he walked across it for the first time when he was five years old. “Now sweetheart,” his parents told him, “you’re going to be in two places at once. When you reach the middle you’ll see the sign. Put one foot on this side of the line and the other foot here. Now you’re in New York and in New Jersey at the same time.”
You can smell the sea. The salt wind brings tears to Amalie’s eyes but she keeps walking and reaches the midpoint. From this height you can’t see the debris on the water, the oil spills, the dead fish. A cabin cruiser speeds upriver toward Yonkers, causing a sailboat to tilt dangerously. In spring there are shad poles on the New Jersey side. Stewart and she had once gone to the smokehouse right behind the Edgewater pier. They bought a shad and ate it. No one got sick.
Lowering over the cliffs of the Palisades are the new luxury high-rise condominiums. It’s a long way down to the water from the bridge. Theoretically speaking, Amalie asks herself, who would miss me if I took a flying leap? Charlie would be fine. And Daddy would develop a new sociological theory for which he’d receive accolades from the National Academy of Sciences. Some old friends might think about her with regret. Who else would miss her? There was a faithful babysitter from years ago who continued to send her Christmas cards and admired her for not buying grapes when the California farm workers were trying to unionize.
There goes the excursion boat around Manhattan, right on schedule. People are waving up at Amalie from the deck. She waves vigorously with both arms. Hey, look at me! This is my bridge, my river. You’re just tourists. This is all mine, she thinks. The river, the city. They’re just passing through. I’m here to stay—assuming the Indian Point reactor a few miles away doesn’t act up.
She looks up at the condominiums again, lording it over the smaller houses below, an in-your-face view. Those real estate developers are ruthless. To think that Evan Diaz, Stewart’s old friend consorts with such people. Maybe he’s on someone’s payroll for providing information on tenant groups like Amalie’s. A kind of rage sweeps though her, making her breathe hard, pumping up her muscles as though preparing her for battle. The neighbors are counting on her and she doesn’t want to let them down. She’s going to fight for them. They’re my people, she thinks, my family, my community.
If the building goes down, I’ll go down with it. But first, refile that request for a review contesting the legality of the sale. And don’t tell Evan. Charlie had a feeling about him. “Too smooth,” he said. Out of the mouths of babes…
Chapter 8
Just off Route 103 near Bristow, Vermont there is a cemetery dominated by a mausoleum. On the other side of the road is the Biblio Haunt, a bookshop housed in a Victorian mansion. The owner prefers to live in a trailer a few yards away. He owns 1,000 acres which he has leased to Marshall Berger with the proviso that the shop remain on the site. Legend has it that the mansion is haunted.
This is a strange location for an enterprise like Berger MicroPubs. There is no industry, no commerce in the area except for a deserted electrical plant awaiting conversion to nuclear energy—a doomed prospect thanks to fierce resistance by the town that has turned it into a cause célèbre—and a quarry that produces talc. In winter, however, the area is filled with skiers who spend lavishly, renting the A-frame chalets that stand empty the rest of the year, leaving their corkscrews and boxes of pasta, and broken garbage disposals clogged with crushed beer cans.
Only residents who can trace their ancestry back to the 1600s, when Bristow was founded, are considered true Vermonters here. Native-born individuals whose parents came from neighboring states are still considered outsiders. There is a good deal of intermarrying within the poorest families, which results in stunted, knuckleheaded children with pasty faces who throw rocks at cars on the highway. Many of these families live in old cars up in the woods, protecting themselves against incursions by county officials and the sheriff by unleashing their huge dogs when necessary. Townspeople say the wild dogs up there outnumber the people.
The bookshop owner doesn’t mind the dogs straying down the mountain and growling at customers outside the shop. It reinforces the legends about the place. Rufus Crowley (says the flyer near the cash register) was a railroad mogul who built this mansion as a gift for his bride. The day before he was to carry her across the threshold she was found dead with her throat cut—by man or beast, no one knows. Crowley’s statue can be seen across the way at the entrance to the mausoleum. Note the outstretched hand with a flower…Etcetera.
Marshall has known the shop for years. In his halcyon days as litterateur he went out of his way to stop by and browse in the woodpanelled rooms with stained glass windows. Piles of books covered the carpeted stairs and each room was devoted to a different category. The house smelled faintly of mouse droppings and leather covers. He’ll make no changes except possibly to seal up some holes so the bats don’t fly in.
Recently the town defeated a resolution that would have permitted a developer to build a game farm nearby. Local residents were in favor of the plan because it would have created some much-needed jobs. Absentee house owners who came only to ski or summer near the lake opposed it because it would have attracted too many tourists. When Marshall submitted his proposal to the town officials, it was approved by a large majority. Here too jobs would be provided: for construction of a laboratory to develop and print the microfilm, and a technical and clerical staff (since Marshall has no illusions about his staff following him en masse to Vermont); housing would be built with a certain percentage of units to be set aside for lower-income residents. Because construction will take a while to be completed, Marshall plans to house his skeleton staff in a Rutland hotel that is on the verge of bankruptcy.
The relocation experts working with Marshall have suggested a trip to the new location to familiarize employees with the site. Presented as optional, the trip will weed out the faithful from the rest.
#
The chartered bus left Union Square early on Saturday morning bound for Bristow, Vermont. By now Hannelore was impatient for the actual move. Marshall had made Bristow sound like another Gstaad in winter. Plenty of skiing. “Special for you,” he said. What greater proof could there be of his affection? He was up there at this very moment awaiting their arrival.
In her excitement Hannelore kept jumping up and strolling up and down the aisle. “Is everyone comfortable? Did you bring jackets? It gets chilly in the mountains. How wonderful to be away from the city, away from those horrid subways.”
“I thought you never take the subway,” Amalie said.
“Of course I don’t. I hear terrible things about them. There is only one trouble with Vermont. It’s hard to find good help there.”
“Certainly robots are scarce,” Ed said. “You might have to settle for people like us.”
Did this mean that Ed was going to move with the company, Amalie wondered.
“We will not force people to move against their will.” Hannelore had been attending briefing sessions with Marshall on how best to handle employees in a relocation. One session had been a psychodrama in which he observed Hannelore pretending to be an ordinary employee. Curious how her portrayals all involved greed, carelessness, and cheating.
It was hoped that seeing the new location would sway some employees who were undecided. For some it would be an opportunity to own a home for the first time, surely their fondest dream. Hannelore could already picture her new house because it looked exactly like her grandparents’ home near the Black Forest. Marshall had promised to buy her a rottweiler.
In her Porsche, she would explore that fascinating American phenomenon, the shopping mall. Pictures from the chamber of commerce showed the nearest one, just off Route 4, built like an underground bunker, a familiar structure. At last Hannelore would have a real community, neighbors who would bring her preserves. She might even join a church. In the city, in her apartment, she could have a heart attack and no one would know. It could take days before someone would say, “How come we haven’t seen the lady from 12B in a while?” In the country neighbors look after one another. It is the code.
Like a chaperone on a school trip, Hannelore went up and down the aisle, her babbling ignored by those reading or trying to catch up on their sleep.
“Shouldn’t we be singing peace songs?” Ed asked, leaning
over Amalie’s shoulder from his seat behind her. “Remember those trips to Washington and Seabrook during Vietnam?”
Well, he knew how old she was anyway. “I didn’t see you,” she said. “I would have remembered you if I had.” How easy it was to flirt, she thought, pleased with herself. “Remember how it rained non-stop at Shoreham?” she reminded Ed. “And the barbed wire in all the restricted areas?”
Just a few days earlier Amalie had been flying over the Pentagon with Hannelore on their way to the Library of Congress. She made the mistake of telling Hannelore that her last trip to Washington had been for a peace demonstration. That had set Hannelore off on the dangers of being caught without defenses. Look what happened to Germany after the war. The Russians came in and took over half the country. And in her town there had been no miraculous recovery. For Amalie, the peace marches had been like excursions, a good excuse to see the latest exhibit at the National Gallery while making it back to the demonstration in plenty of time for the rally. “What matters,” Stewart would say, pointing to the helicopters overhead, “is that we’re counted.”
Outside the Library of Congress, Hannelore hung back. “I have never been in a library,” she mumbled.
Amalie couldn’t believe it. “But you know so much. All about cataloging and OCLC and RILN.”
Hannelore swallowed. “It’s all right. You are with me so I won’t worry.”
Once they were in the bibliographer’s office, she regained her aplomb. A tweedy fellow with an eye patch, he began to shrink visibly into his chair as Hannelore expounded upon her grand scheme of subsuming the Library’s database to the needs of Berger MicroPubs. The man’s one good eye became glazed as she strewed his desk with index cards and spoke of the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules, Two. Both he and Amalie had ceased to follow Hannelore’s spiel. He was looking at Amalie who was admiring the coffered ceiling. Hannelore finally stopped speaking and impounded several manuals and brochures. These would be turned over to Amalie to read, summarize, copy, and file.
Amalie in Orbit Page 9
