Chapter Four
The twin towers of the World Trade Center were constructed in 1973 and designed by the diminutive architect Minoru Yamasaki and backed by the entrepreneurial financiers Emery Roth and Sons, and managed to wrestle from the Empire State Building the accolade of world’s tallest building, something that the Art Deco monolith had proudly held for the previous forty-two years.
In 1974, the celebrated French trapeze artist Philippe Petit walked on a tightrope stretched between the two towers. After his subsequent arrest he said, “If I see three oranges, I have to juggle; if I see two towers, I have to walk”. During the duration of his incarceration Garnet made approaches to meet with the daring Frenchman, but his attempts at communication were met with a negative response from the N.Y.P.D.. Money could buy him a ticket to most gigs but the downtown custody cells were not open for purchase at any price.
Strangely, Garnet felt a compulsion to try to contact Petit once again a week after the destruction of the Twin Towers in 2001, only to discover that he was now artist-in-residence at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, in Morningside Heights, at the north end of Columbus Avenue, not so many blocks distant from his own Park Avenue apartment, only to be thwarted once again, as the popular artist was out of the country at the time. That did not deter the Press from tracking him down, though, when the demand for sound-bites from anyone that had previously been associated with the two massive structures was at its greatest. Bizarrely, the massive, as yet unfinished Cathedral was to suffer its own personal tragedy in late-2001, when a fire spread from the gift shop to destroy tapestries on the building’s north wall, although when measured against the events of two months earlier it seemed like a fairly insignificant set-back.
Garnet only visited the World Trade Center on one solitary occasion: the Rockefeller name was once again indelibly linked with the twin structures - the towers were even nicknamed David and Nelson after the two Rockefeller brothers - and memories of the old feud between his own family and the oil magnates prevented Garnet from expressing any interest in their new construction. The compulsion to experience the view from the summit, just once, was eventually too great for Garnet, though. His carer at the time - Richard Whitford - now resident at the Hampton Center for Retired Nurses and Care Workers, overlooking Chesapeake Bay, recalled the incident with surprising lucidity and good humour.
I would have been in my early-thirties at the time, actually fairly old for a personal carer, and I had been in Mr. Wendelson’s service for almost a year, that too something of a record, I believe. Mr. Metz* had arrived very early that morning, as I recall, obviously as the result of a pre-arrangement with Mr. Wendelson. Poor Mr. Metz. I do not think that he would have turned up at all, if he had known in advance what the master had planned for that day. The Windows on the World restaurant could have only been open a matter of a couple of weeks at the time - it was 1976 - and was the highest place to enjoy a repast in the whole world at the time, based, as it was, on the 107th floor of One World Trade Center. I remember the morning well because Mr. Wendelson insisted that we walk the whole distance between his apartment and the Twin Towers, practically all the way to the Battery*. It must have been at least fifty blocks before we cut on to Bowery and I lost count of the number of streets we passed. It took the whole morning; Metz walking in his peculiar, loose-limbed fashion, me pushing Mr. Wendelson’s wheelchair, and Mr. Wendelson himself dozing on and off, waking only occasionally to consult his wristwatch and to chart our progress. I began to wonder if he expected me to carry him bodily up the 107 storeys of the tower: if the elevators had chanced to be out of action that day, I would not have put it past him to make such a suggestion. As it happened, though, it was Metz, and not myself, who was to be the victim of the master’s particular sense of humour that day. I often wondered later, why Mr. Metz had ever chosen to settle in New York, it did not seem like a suitable choice of city for him, London, say, would have been far more suitable, Paris even, perhaps Berlin before they started all the recent building work. He was a sensitive man, often unable to articulate his distress, usually instead forced to resort to the medium of mime to convey his emotions. I did not know the scientific name for all of his phobias at the time, but I have looked them up since, and I understand that they are - in alphabetical order – acrophobia*, anablepophobia* and batophobia* with a dash of commonplace vertigo thrown in for good measure. To give him credit, he tried his best to confront his fears, although I think at first he did not realise Mr. Wendelson’s intention, and by the time he was in the elevator, well, frankly, it was too late. I would like to think, not wishing to believe ill of my employer, that Mr. Wendelson may have had in mind the idea that he could cure his companion’s phobias by forcing him to face them head-on, but having previous, and subsequent experience of his innate cruelty, I cannot help but believe that the outcome of that day’s excursion was the result he had secretly hoped for. Our table was booked for 1.00 p.m.: one of the finest in the whole restaurant, affording a panoramic vista northwards. The view was magnificent. It was the first time in my life that I remembered thinking how insignificant the Empire States Building looked: there it was, in mid-Manhattan, but rather than dominating its surroundings, it was merely rubbing shoulders with a group of burgeoning siblings, each looking as though it were prepared to challenge the old man’s authority. The Chrysler, as always, looked spectacular, but so too did all the rest, viewed together as a great ensemble piece through the floor-to-ceiling glass windows: the Rockefeller Center, the American International Building, the old Woolworth Building, each rising like black, isolated, solitary teeth from a great rotting gum. Mr. Wendelson was in his element. He demanded that his chair be wheeled as close to the glass as it was possible to go, so that he could look directly down at the busy streets of the Financial District, swarming with cars and people, far below. Mr. Metz, it was becoming clear, was not so ecstatic. His increasing anxiety took the form of progressively more graphic mimes; initially metaphorical ones - I recall he simulated swimming in the ocean, then feigned surprise, then panic as though he were unable to swim, imitated shouting for help, and then finally mimed sinking beneath the waves, his hands clasped together in a final slithery, aquatic prayer. When these displays were ignored by Mr. Wendelson, who, instead, proceeded to order his first course, and a particularly fine bottle of wine, as I recall, Metz’s performance became more and more dramatic, until he was physically throwing himself around the dining area, clasping at his neck as though he were unable to breathe, and mimicking - very accurately in my opinion - all the stages of a man experiencing a severe fit or seizure, much to the alarm and consternation of neighbouring diners. Only Mr. Wendelson remained unmoved. He held up his hand, imperiously, claiming that it was all an elaborate act, and that it was better to ignore and not encourage such an exhibitionist artist. Finally, it was the maitre d’hotel who was forced to intervene and demand Mr. Metz’s removal from the premises. Mr. Wendelson’s only response, as I remember, was a request to see the dessert menu.
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