Body & Soul (21 page)

At the corner they took a left and went up Third Avenue, in the central lane under the elevated.

"You ever tell your momma about me?" Al asked.

"Sure I did."

"That stuff in the dumbwaiter back when you were a little kid. You tell her that?"

"Of course not. I told her about you keeping the piano, and helping me with the shoeshine stuff. Teaching me cards. Like that."

"What did she say?"

"Say? She didn't say anything." Claude was slightly puzzled. "What would she say?"

"Nothing," Al said. "All right then, that's fine."

At Ninety-sixth Street a woman hailed the cab as Al drove by.

"Should we put the flag down?" Claude suggested.

"Why not?" Al reached out and pulled it down. The meter started ticking.

Now they were in East Harlem, the late afternoon streets crowded with people. Men sat on stoops, kids played off-the-point or stickball on the side streets, women hung out the windows, and the air was filled with shouts, snatches of jazz, gospel music, and occasionally the sharp, hot beat of samba. A funky, loose energy suffused the avenues, a kind of social electricity flashing through groups of people clustered at the corners, standing in front of the candy stores, leaning against parked cars, pitching pennies, drinking, talking, laughing.

Al drove toward the East River, past warehouses, past a large excavated area behind a chain-link fence, and pulled up in the shadows under an overpass.

It was a small junkyard. A couple of rusted-out car bodies, a three-legged tub washing machine, piles of old tires, scrap iron, and a small lean-to shed made of wood and nailed-on metal signs. An obese black man sat on a mailbox, staring down at a dismantled automobile generator spread out on the sidewalk before him. He picked up a part and began to scrape it with his fingernail.

Al carried the tire and laid it down next to the generator parts. "Got time for this?"

The fat man got up and went into the shed.

Al and Claude sat down on a salvaged car seat placed up against the side of the shed. Al lighted a cigarette. Overhead, cars sighed on the highway.

The fat man came out with some irons and a large rubber mallet. He examined the tread of the tire, rolling it, and then let it fall. He levered an iron between the steel rim and the tire, broke the bead, and tapped the iron delicately around the circle. He was quick, and worked without any wasted motion.

"So how long she been acting crazy?" Al asked.

"I guess for a while. Hasn't paid the rent for three months. I saw that in a letter she just threw away."

"That ain't good."

"And they taped some kind of notice on the door. She tore it off."

Al smoked in silence and then flipped the butt into the street. The fat man came over with the inner tube and held a section between his hands. "Little slice. Glass, most likely."

"You got hot patch?" Al touched the spot with his finger.

"Don't need no hot patch. Do a cold patch right, it'll be fine." He rubbed the tube on his grimy coveralls and went back to the shed.

"She on relief?" Al asked.

"I don't think so. But I don't know."

"Well shit, man. Don't you ever talk to her?"

Claude picked some stuffing out of the seat. "Not much, I guess. I'm not there."

They sat in silence for some time. The sky over Harlem was turning purple.

"I'm going to school now," Claude said. "I got into this fancy school."

"Is that a fact?"

"I like it."

"Well good, then." Al scratched his chin. "You can hold your own."

The fat man presented the repaired tire. "Fifty cent," he said. Al paid and they got back in the cab, whose engine had been left running.

"Let's go see her," Al said.

Claude was surprised, but said nothing as they rode downtown.

They descended the iron stairs and Claude paused with his key in the lock. "It looks kind of..." He half turned to look up at Al. "I mean inside. It's ah..."

"Open the door."

Claude pushed it open and they entered. In the gloom they saw the stacks of newspapers, boxes of files, and piles of reference books from the library. It was a warren, the paths strewn with old magazines, envelopes, and papers of every kind. The air was musty, as if in a cave. Emma sat at the kitchenette counter, under a single light bulb with a plastic shade like a Dutch collar, scissors gleaming in her hand as she cut up the
Daily News.
She did not raise her eyes until Claude stood right in front of her. He put the key on the counter.

"Al fixed the cab."

She shifted her gaze. "Al," she said without expression. At times now she talked in a flat, toneless voice, almost as if she were speaking without volition. Other times she yelled, or talked at a tremendous clip like a speeded-up movie. "Yeah, Al," she said. "Okay."

The slim man nodded, watching her.

"I've been very, very busy." She put down the scissors.

"Unh-huh." He pulled up a stool and sat opposite her, forearms resting on the counter, hands folded.

"It's hard to straighten it out," she said. "You have to look at everything. Most of it is lies, a whole lot of different kinds of lies they put out, but if you stick at it, you begin to see the patterns. People don't understand."

"I understand," Al said.

"Most people don't care."

"That's a fact," he said. "They don't."

A peculiar silence held. Claude felt an absence of tension as Al and his mother sat there like two old people on a park bench, who might say something or might not. There was a sense of everything moving slowly, an odd peacefulness in the air.

"The cab runs fine," Al said.

"They put me on suspension a while back. A frame-up. Just politics. Politics and lies."

"Claude tells me you stopped working."

She looked at the boy, and once again Claude had the strange feeling that she didn't really see him. "He sure can play. You ever hear him play?"

"Yes, ma'am. I have."

"Call me Emma."

"All right."

"He's got it," she said. "They're helping him because they know that."

"Yeah, well, he's still gonna need his momma."

Claude flushed.

Emma gave the faintest smile and shook her head. The boy didn't know how to read the gesture. It could be denial, but also bemused acceptance. He glanced at Al, whose eyes did not move from the woman's face. "You in trouble," Al said.

She remained motionless, staring down at the counter.

After a long time Al said, "How you going to make your way, Emma?"

The question hung there. Claude was astonished at the whole situation—at Al's directness, his mother's silence, the way in which these two strangers acted as if they'd known each other for years. He felt like a child. At the same time he was so curious he actually held his breath.

He saw her tears, falling from her motionless head to the counter. His astonishment gave way to something like nonbelief as he saw her reach out and place her hands over Al's. She still did not look up. Now he could see a faint trembling in her shoulders.

"Claude," Al said, "your momma and me gonna have a little talk. Why don't you go down to the corner and get yourself a Coke for a while? Okay with you?"

Stunned beyond speech, Claude simply nodded, and after a moment moved away, across the room and out the door.

T
HE PUERTO RICAN MAID,
whose name was Isidra, carried the large tray bearing the tea service and placed it on the low table in front of Catherine on the couch.

"Where's the cinnamon toast?" Catherine asked. "I expressly ordered cinnamon toast."

Isidra gave a small shrug.

"Well?" Catherine's voice was sharp.

"I don't know this toast." She spoke reluctantly, her ordinarily pretty face fixed in sullenness.

Claude, sitting on the floor on the opposite side, broke in without thinking. "It doesn't matter." He looked over at Peter, also on the floor, at the end of the table, for support.

"Mmm," said Peter, his head wobbling.

Catherine glared down at Claude. "Stay out of this. You're a guest. You're
barely
a guest." She turned to Isidra, who stood stolidly, staring at the mantelpiece. "Well then, bring us some biscuits. The British kind in the long brown box."

Isidra left.

"Insolence," Catherine said, raising the teapot. "Nothing but insolence. She wouldn't dare if Dewman were here." With slow, almost studied movements, she served Peter, Claude, and then herself. She sat back on the couch and took a small, thoughtful sip. She wore a simple white cotton blouse with half sleeves and a dark plaid skirt. Claude
could not take his eyes off her—the smooth porcelain perfection of her forearms, the faint touch of rose in her cheeks (from anger?), the hair so black it seemed wet, and above all the dark eyes. He could not tell—could never tell—if she was aware of how intently he studied her. For more than half a year he had waited in vain for the slightest sign of recognition.

"I'm going to give a soirée," she announced.

Peter slurped his tea. "What's that?"

"An evening of light entertainment. Some music. A brief dramatic interlude on stage. A
tableau vivant.
You and Rawlings will start it off."

"I told you I'm quitting," Peter said. "I don't want to play anymore. It's boring."

"Just this once. For me." She sipped again, shifting her glance to Claude over the rim of her cup. "Do you think he should give up the violin?"

Claude hesitated, wondering if it was some kind of test question. He was perfectly prepared to lie to give her the answer she wanted, but he couldn't tell what she wanted. "Well, why do it if he doesn't like it?"

Isidra entered with a plate of biscuits. She put them on the tray and withdrew.

Catherine picked up a biscuit. "If he stops, you won't get to come here anymore." She took a neat bite.

"Oh yes he will," Peter said. "I'
ll
invite him."

Claude had in fact agonized over this very point. He'd done everything he could think of to keep Peter amused, bringing in little pieces (a la Weisfeld years ago), pop tunes, snippets of jazz, and folk music, but the boy seemed unable to get any pleasure out of it. He approached everything perfunctorily. "Turkey in the Straw," "How Much Is That Doggie in the Window?," "Clair de Lune," and "Bolero" were all ground out with listless accuracy. As Claude grew more fond of the precocious boy, he began to feel guilty at the way he was using him. As well, it wasn't often that Catherine so much as said hello. She seemed constantly preoccupied, her whole manner suggesting that higher, more important, more adult matters had a previous claim on her time and attention.

"So," she said, "five minutes of music to set the mood. Rawlings will pick something."

"And what is the mood?" Claude asked.

An infinitesimal crumb clung to her bottom lip. As Claude stared, his body quickened. He felt a tingling sensation and blood roared in his ears. He imagined taking her lip gently between his teeth, picking off the crumb with the tip of his tongue, feeling the heat of her head on his face, inhaling her scent—all of this in a split second so powerful it made him dizzy. "The mood," she said, catching the bit of biscuit with her own red tongue, fast as a snake, freezing his heart, "should be wistful. Simple. Elemental. Almost sad. It will introduce the myth of Daphne and Apollo. I'll need your help onstage, but don't worry, you won't have any lines."

"I don't want to," said Peter.

"I know. But you have to."

"When?"

"They're giving a dinner party."

Claude, emerging from his fantasy, heard only the last part of this. He wondered at her confidence, because Mrs. Fisk had been ill for some weeks, confined to her bedroom. White-uniformed nurses were on round-the-clock duty, and once the doctor himself had walked through the living room during a session. Peter had explained that his mother had retreated like this, for weeks at a time, for as long as he could remember.

"What's wrong with her?" Claude had asked.

"First it was TB. We couldn't go into that part of the house, and the nurses wore masks. Now it's because she's delicate." The way Peter had said "delicate" made it clear he was repeating it without understanding it, the way he did with music. "I don't remember the TB very well. I was little then."

Sipping his tea, Claude got an idea. "What about a trio? Piano, violin, and flute?" He would be in charge of the rehearsals, of course, and the thought of having that small bit of dominion over her was thrilling. He would be gentle, but firm.

She glanced at him, alert, for all the world as if she'd read his mind. "I'll consider it," she said crisply.

Weisfeld and Ivan sat on opposite sides of the counter, next to the harmonica case, while Claude waited on a customer up front.

"So tell me," Weisfeld asked quietly, "how's it going with him over there?"

"I would say extremely well. He's getting high marks in everything, apparently. He seems to have read a great deal."

"I mean with the other boys. The social part of it."

Ivan frowned for a moment, thinking. "He's a bit standoffish. What's the American word? A loner. But people respect that. Some of them seem slightly awed, in fact."

"He doesn't tell me much about it," Weisfeld said.

"Oh, it's fine. Really."

"What about this urchin business? He mentioned it back at the beginning. He wanted to know what the word meant, and I had to drag it out of him where he'd heard it."

"Well, that's what they call the tough kids around First and Second avenues." Ivan gave a quick, rueful, apologetic smile. "The school is quite old. Something that just hung on, I suppose. Remnant of the nineteenth century."

"They don't ... they wouldn't ..." Weisfeld's voice trailed off.

"No, no," Ivan said quickly. "Absolutely not. I mean to say, of course he's a bit exotic to most of them, but he's awfully clever, and they see that. And then there's the music. He almost never does it, but all he has to do is sit down and play, and suddenly twenty people are there listening."