I Cannot Get You Close Enough (7 page)

“Haven't we met?” he said. “Didn't we meet last winter at Baden-Baden? No, it was at David Marchman's. In Scotland at a shooting party. You were there with a Mr. Tegea, weren't you? Off to some political do?”

“Zeno Makarios,” she said. “His name is Zeno. He happens to be a very important man. He's the Castro of the Mediterranean. Everyone in the Mediterranean knows him. But I wasn't with him. He was fund-raising.”

“Zeno Makarios. Of course. I'm so bad about names anymore. I used to remember everyone. Well, it's amazing to run into you again. So you are Anna's sister-in-law?”

“I used to be. Daniel and I aren't married now. Don't be embarrassed. I mean, we're here. What are you doing in New York? How do you know Anna?”

“We met through friends. I worship her, don't I, darling?” He turned to me. It was a terrible charade. I wouldn't have believed a moment of it if I had been Sheila and Sheila is suspicious of the truth itself. What did she think of this?

We didn't stop, however. We went bravely on, Adrian and I, with our nutty little drama.

“Adrian keeps things here,” I said. “He came to bring me back a book. Can I get you tea, Adrian? A fresh croissant? Please let me fix you one.”

“Oh, lovely,” he answered. “Delightful. She is always feeding me,” he said to Sheila. “I beg her on my knees to marry me but she will not even answer. So you are over here to visit with the little girl?”

“I don't live with her,” Jessie said. “I live with Dad. We came up here to stay with Aunt Anna because Momma wants to see me. We went shopping last night. We went to Bloomingdale's. We're going back as soon as she leaves.”

“I'll go with you,” Sheila said. “I'll take you shopping.”

“I don't know.” Jessie looked at her hands. “Aunt Anna's going to take me. I guess we'll just go.”

“You don't want me along?”

“I guess you could. If you want to.” Jessie was still looking down. I moved into the room. Sheila stood up.

“Well, that's it,” she said. “You've turned the child against me, Daniel. You and your family. I could have guessed that would happen. I couldn't help it that I left, Jessie. They were driving me crazy. Now they're after you.” She glared at the child. I had forgotten how Sheila operates. How fierce and stupid she can be. So stupid she will work against her own interests. Without the protection of her father who will protect her? Answer, no one, not even herself.

Sheila was glaring at Daniel now. “You and your family will pay for turning this child against me,” she said. “You're a drunk, Daniel, and everyone knows you're a drunk. I have a dozen people who will testify that you're a drunk. You will be away from these crazy people, Jessie, and you will thank me for it when it happens. You'll be glad.” She reached down and tried to kiss her but Jessie pulled away. She reached for Jessie again. I charged into the middle of it. “You bitch,” I said. “You goddamn stupid bitch.” I shoved Sheila out of my way and sat down on the sofa and took Jessie in my arms. Sheila walked to the door. Daniel was walking with her. Jessie was sobbing in my arms.

When she was gone Adrian sat down on the chair by the sofa. “She's right,” he said, “he was called Zeno. Why did she tell me?”

“Because she doesn't know how to protect herself,” I said.

“Speed,” Adrian said. “Dextroamphetamine. I can always spot it.” Daniel came back into the room.

“You can trust Adrian,” I said to Daniel. “Talk to him. I've got to take care of Jessie.” I led her into my bedroom and we lay down upon the bed and I held her and let her cry. When she fell asleep I went back into the living room. “I have to go back to Europe,” I said. “I have to finish this.”

“You don't need to go to Europe,” Daniel said. “It's my problem. I'll go. Or I'll send a detective.”

“No, you have to take her back to Charlotte and keep things normal. I can go. I don't mind. I know what to do now. I have a name.”

“I can't let you go to Europe by yourself again. You're a woman, Anna. You shouldn't travel alone. I'll send Niall with you.”

“I will go,” Adrian put in. “Do you want me along?”

“You have to finish the film. And Daniel has to take care of Jessie and I don't want Niall. It's better if I go alone. I'll let you pay for it, Daniel. If that makes you feel better.”

“It will.”

“Find some sherry,” Adrian said. “There's a bottle here somewhere that I bought last week. Let's have a glass of sherry.”

In the afternoon we went back to Bloomingdale's and bought the blazer and two skirts and a turtleneck sweater and a hat and gloves and a muff and a short beige coat and new pajamas and a robe. We bought a silk scarf for them to take to my mother. Then we went to the Russian Tea Room and had dinner.

On Sunday we went to the concert. The music was flawless, as human life decidedly is not, and Jessie and I cried during the second movement. Afterward they packed up and I rode out to the airport with them in a limousine and put them on the plane. Then I went home and called the International desk of American Airlines and made my plans to return to Europe.

To spur me on, in case I needed spurring, Daniel called Monday afternoon from Charlotte with more bad news. “She's here,” he said. “Sheila's in Charlotte. She's out at her mother's. Donna Morrow called this morning and said she was looking for a house.”

“Why would she buy a house? Her father owns half of north Charlotte. Why doesn't she move into one of his empty apartment complexes he cut down all the oak trees to build?”

“She wants to be in this neighborhood. Donna called at breakfast to ask if I care if she sells her one.”

“What did you say?”

“I thanked her for calling.”

“Good old Donna, the last honest real estate dealer. Well, Sheila's back in Charlotte. Shit.”

“What am I going to do about it?”

“Nothing. You can't do anything. Get Jessie to a shrink. That's my best advice, which I know you will not take. I don't know. I don't know what to tell you to do.”

“It isn't your problem. I just wanted to fill you in.”

“It is my problem. Mine as much as yours. I'm leaving for London on Wednesday. I'll come there as soon as I get back. Just hold the fort until then. Has she worn the plaid skirts and the turtleneck?”

“She wore them to school today. Thank you, Sister, thanks for doing this for me.”

“It's for myself. Okay, I'm hanging up.”

“Love you, Sister.”

“Love you too.”

I hung up and stood by the window looking down on the roofs of East Seventy-second Street. Well, Sheila was in Charlotte and that was that. Fuck Sheila coming home to fuck Jessie up and fuck the meanness of unloved rich girls with scrawny hearts and tiny fucked-up spirits and where are my assassins when I need them. I was in a terrible mood and went off to meet Adrian for lunch to talk about it. “She's so shrewd,” I said. “Why are mean people so goddamn shrewd and obvious and dangerous?”

“Evil is always arrogant. It believes it is right. Heisenberg taught us that.”

“I have always watched this with Sheila. It fascinates me. You can see what she is up to and you still can't stop her. It makes perfect sense, you see. She goes home to Charlotte, makes up with her folks, sets up housekeeping, starts going to church, does some good works with Big Ed's money. Then she starts inviting Jessie over for chats, then to spend the night, then weekends, then trips. How will Daniel say no? If necessary she can have an operation on her foot, just for old times sake, or get sick. Make Jessie feel guilty, make Jessie cry, pull out her old operated-on foot, stumble and fall, real or symbolically. Let Jessie help her. Take Jessie shopping, buy Jessie clothes, buy Jessie a new horse, buy Jessie a fur coat, give Jessie some jewelry. Get Jessie to testify in court that she likes her mother as much as she does her father. Take Jessie off, fuck Jessie up, break Daniel's heart, break my heart.”

“Do have some more wine,” Adrian said. “It does set you off, doesn't it.”

Two days later I left for London.

3

I got on the plane and flew to London. Mic met me at Heathrow. She is my British agent, a beautiful and deeply intelligent woman. We had a drink and then several more and talked about our love lives or lack of them and then had to eat sandwiches in the pub because we had let all the decent restaurants close. I slept most of the next day, then went to my British publishers to see my editor, then slept the second day also. On the third day I rang up David Marchman and made an appointment to see him. What a glorious man he turned out to be. An officer of Lloyds of London and a champion of the environment unexcelled in enthusiasm. You left him reeling with figures and dire warnings and urgencies. He belongs to and supports every environmental organization in the world, whales, porpoises, trees, rivers, lakes, air, land and sea. He has spent a fortune and gone to work to make another one to lend to his causes. A tall man with curly blond hair and big violet eyes, excitement coming out of every pore. He put Zeno's name through his computers and came out with a printout of innuendos and vague assessments. Nothing very damning, a sort of international floater. As I read down the list of Zeno Makarios's activities I kept thinking I couldn't have invented a better companion for Sheila. A joiner who never did anything for the organizations he joined, an actor, in other words. A perfect Sheila counterpart. The one thing that did stand out, that would surely be useful, especially in North Carolina, was that Zeno was a member of AKEL, the communist party of Cyprus. That would do it. I could have just taken the computer printout David handed me and flown on back home.

“Drove me crazy not being able to remember his name,” David was saying. “When Adrian rang up with it the whole thing came back, you know. The old AKEL, even the other communists stay shy of them. Well, you'll be able to track him down now. Just fly to Istanbul and check with the embassy there. Your sister-in-law couldn't have entered the country without there being a record. They're very careful about all that. I say, are you at all interested in mammals? I got the most astonishing piece of mail this morning from a lab in Australia. Can't wait to show it to someone.” He produced a photograph of the interior of a porpoise's brain, taken with an underwater infrared camera. It was very fuzzy but he seemed to think it was fascinating. I nibbled the plate of cookies he had served with the tea and we went over the photograph with a magnifying glass for the better part of an hour. I decided not to fall in love with him, after all. I decided there was a good chance he took notes while he made love. “I can make you a copy of this to take back to the States,” he said. “Wouldn't surprise me if they don't have one there yet.”

“Oh, yes,” I said. “That would be great.” He disappeared and returned with a copy of the photograph in a manila envelope. Then he asked if I would like to go out to lunch with some people from Greenpeace.

“I think I'd better get on,” I said. “I want to finish this. I want to get some tickets and go on to Istanbul.”

“Of course,” he said. He handed me the envelope. “Good luck with this,” he added. “You wouldn't want a child mixed up with any of these chaps.”

At nine the next morning I was on a plane to Istanbul with five thousand dollars' worth of bribe money in different currencies. Turkish lira and gold coins and British pounds and American dollars. Mic had taken me to her bank and had them supply me with what I needed. Then she took me to the plane.

“Sure you don't want me to go with you?” she said. “I don't like you going off to Turkey alone. Have you been there?”

“No.”

“It's pretty horrid. I should have brought you a tin of crackers to stick in your bag. You may not be able to eat the food.”

“I can stand it for a few days.”

“Call if you need me. If you get sick.”

“That's optimistic.”

“Turkey is not a tourist country, Anna. It is another place, another time.”

She was right about that. Nothing can prepare an American for their first sight of Istanbul. The poverty, the filth, the maimed and crippled beggars. I went first to the embassy to see if they had a record of Sheila's having been there.

It was a holiday. The only person I could find to talk to was a native clerk who shuffled some papers and said there was no way to find a record that long ago. Such things couldn't go through him. I reached in my pocket and brought out a sheaf of lira. “I guess it's a lot of trouble to find old records,” I said. “How much do you think it costs to look for papers, lists of persons who come in and out?” He scratched his head, took half the handful of lira, then disappeared into an anteroom. I waited, watching the sunlight filter down through the dirty cut-glass windows onto the furniture and floors. Dust was everywhere. If this was an American embassy, I wanted my tax money back. In half an hour the clerk reappeared.

“Is there an officer here?” I asked. “Is there an American official in the building?”

“Not now,” the clerk said. “It will be two hundred dollars. Then we can find the record maybe.”

“Maybe?”

“They are looking for it. The girl is looking.” She appeared behind him. A young woman with glasses, also a native. She had a white envelope in her hand. I reached down into my purse and took out two hundred dollars and handed it over.

“You can read,” the man said. “But cannot take this from here. This is confidential information. We are going to do this for you because she is your sister.” He took the envelope from the girl and walked around the counter and closed the door to the hall. “It is a holiday. Religious festival. We are going to leave soon.”

I took the envelope. “I need a pencil and some paper,” I said. “I need to copy this.”