The Puzzle King (6 page)

“My business with him is my business with him,” said Arthur Wade, who wasn’t given to explaining himself to anyone. As he headed toward 262, he heard the
Spazierer
’s footsteps behind him. “Listen, buster,” he said, jabbing a finger in the middle of Arthur Wade’s crisp white linen shirt. “I wouldn’t go knocking on strange doors if I was you.”

Arthur Wade had a practical streak in him that outran his pugnacious one.
This peculiar old fellow could be useful
, he thought, brushing off the spot on his shirt where the
Spazierer
had just poked him. Best to play his cards right. “I’m looking to offer that kid a job,” he said in his raspy voice. “As my apprentice. I run a lithograph shop.” The old man shook his head, as if he were considering the offer for himself. “He’s not home now,” he said. “If you come back at six-thirty, he’ll be here.” He turned around and resumed his shuffling.

At precisely 6:30, Arthur Wade knocked on the door at 262 Eldridge Street, and by 6:32, Simon had agreed to show up the next morning at the Arthur Wade Lithograph Shop on Lexington Avenue and Twenty-ninth Street. For the next fourteen months, Simon spent nearly every moment of his spare time at the shop, sometimes coming home as late as eleven at night. He loved being an apprentice. It meant that someone had chosen him above everyone else. It meant that he could quit his newsboy job and that he got paid to draw. He told Christina that when he studied the word
apprentice
through squinted eyes, it looked to him like
a prince
. “That’s what I feel like,” he’d said. “Imagine, earning ten dollars a week to draw sketches.” He didn’t mention that he also had to make Mr. Wade’s coffee, throw away his garbage at night, and wash up his dried wads of spitting tobacco.

“You are my prince,” Christina had said. She squeezed his arm a little too hard. It was the kind of thing she usually did in public. It made him uncomfortable, how she tried to claim him in physical ways, always grabbing his elbow or ringing her arm through his. She had taken to call him “My Prince” or “the Prince.” Pissboy told him this was a girl he could go all the way with. Simon didn’t doubt it, but something held him back. Maybe it was that boys two or three years older than he was were getting married at eighteen or nineteen, and having babies and pinching pennies just to make ends meet, and it seemed that was how it would always be for them. Or maybe it was the way Christina did fluttery things with her tongue when they kissed that made him think about moths flapping around in his mouth. When they got that close, he could feel her breasts against him like small squishy birds. No, more like mice. He thought about how he would draw the mice with their sharp noses and inquisitive little eyes. Something
was wrong with him. All head. No heart. Why couldn’t he just feel things the way other people did? Why did he always piece together how his feelings would look? Pissboy was right about one thing: He sure was an oddball foreigner.

It was a good thing Arthur Wade kept Simon as busy as he did; there was no time to worry about things like that. Mostly, when Simon came into the office—actually a back room painted dark blue that faced into a sunless courtyard—Arthur Wade would dangle a sheet of paper over his head, holding it as if it were a dead cockroach. Then he’d say something like: “P.U. See if you can turn this piece of crap into money.” Simon’s job was to do preliminary sketches or scripts for Arthur Wade. “Just give me a rough copy, I’ll do the rest,” he’d told Simon. “I’ll throw in twenty-five cents extra for anything you do that our customers end up using.”

Businessmen paid Arthur Wade to design show cards advertising their products. They would write the words they wanted him to illustrate, or depending on the client, they would give him an image and ask him to write the words. “See what you think, Wade,” said one of those customers, Mr. Hofsteder, one afternoon, handing over his copy. “I’m hoping you can do something with it.” Arthur Wade read the wispy script on the page and looked up with a big smile. “Mr. Hofsteder, it is an honor for me to work with you. This will warm the hearts of everyone who reads it.”

Hofsteder was a flat-nosed man with slits of brown eyes that seemed to sink into his raw-boned cheeks. The more Arthur Wade flattered him, the wider Hofsteder’s tobacco-stained smile became. Arthur Wade offered him a cigar then told him a joke whose punch line he whispered. Simon saw him look in his direction
and heard him say something about not wanting to upset the Yid. Simon was sure he misheard, that Arthur Wade must have said that he didn’t want to upset the kid. Mr. Hofsteder’s cheeks flushed as he glanced at Simon, and then he punched Arthur Wade in the arm. “You’re a corker, Wade,” he said. “Have you heard the one about … ?” And there was more whispering.

As soon as Hofsteder walked out the door, Arthur Wade turned to Simon and said in his wheezy voice, “Now there’s the kind of sucker who’s going to make me a rich man. Here, see what you can whip up out of this little turd.”

“
MY PAPA IS GOING TO BUY ME A PAIR OF STANDARD SCREW FASTENER SHOES. HE SAYS THEY ARE THE BEST IN THE WORLD
.” As Simon stared at the slogan, he could picture the kind of little girl who would wear Standard Screw Fastener Shoes and brag about her papa. She was beautiful, with little pudgy hands that came together in the prayer position and a mouth that was soft and full.

“Here’s a doozy,” said Arthur Wade, late one afternoon. He’d scrawled on a sheet of paper: “Beautiful lady … let us help you keep beautiful … Ellis Stone Beauty Shoppe.” “Make a masterpiece out of that one, Rembrandt.” For this ad, Simon imagined Mrs. O’Mara, ten years younger. He drew a woman with cropped red hair. Her head was thrown back so that her neck and throat, a dusty pink, easily took up a third of the drawing.

Eager for the extra twenty-five cents, Simon would occasionally ask Arthur Wade if any customers had bought any of his drawings. His answer was always the same. “Nah, nothing yet. Those cheap bastards don’t know a good thing when they see it. But don’t worry, one of them will bite soon and then you’ll be rolling in dough.”

Often Arthur Wade would disappear for a couple of hours in the afternoon. By the time he came back with breath smelling like gasoline and eyes glassy and unfocused, Simon would have completed his drawings. Things he could never express in words came pouring out in his images. Drawn from old memories or present yearnings, they had nothing cynical about them. Arthur Wade would hold the drawings out in front of him to view their precise lines and rich colors. He’d spit out a wad of tobacco; often he’d breathe uneasily, making a sipping sound as he inhaled. Sometimes it got so bad he’d have to sit down and double over before he could gulp some air back in his lungs. When he could finally talk again, he’d say the thing he always said: “I don’t hate this.”

Then he would tuck Simon’s pictures in his pocket, taking care not to fold them, and never mention them again.

O
N
S
UNDAYS
, S
IMON
would take a dime from his earnings and walk over to Essex Street with Christina, where they would each buy a pickle from Gus the Pickle Man. All week long, Simon would crave one of Gus’s garlicky pickles. He loved how the crispy sweet-and-sour pickle made the back of his tongue tingle, and best of all, if he bought a pickle at ten o’clock in the morning and sucked and bit at it slowly, he could make it last well into the afternoon. Sometimes there’d be a line in front of the large wooden pickle barrel. But on this morning, a nor’easter was ripping down the coast and there was no line at all. Horses strained against the harsh winds and people walked down the streets with their arms in front of their eyes to shield them from garbage that swirled around them. Gus the Pickle Man stood by his barrel, the captain of his ship, shielded only by the wooden
overhang of the barbershop next door. As soon as he saw Christina and Simon coming, Gus stuck his arm into the scummy brine. He narrowed his eyes and looked into the distance as he searched around the bottom of the barrel for just the right pickle: not too spongy but not too hard. Gus never spoke to his customers, yet he knew his regulars: He knew exactly who liked sweet and who preferred something more peppery. When he finally caught the two he wanted, he wrapped each in a piece of paper and handed them over.

The wind was so strong that it smeared pickle juice across their cheeks. Still, they walked through the rain savoring their Sunday treat. The few people outside acknowledged each other with a wave or nod. Eldridge Street was deserted but for one slight figure bucking against the weather. His white hair blew willy-nilly around his head almost as if someone had shaken loose feathers from a pillow. He wore a black cape, which flapped in the wind, and held a black derby hat under his left arm. As soon as he caught sight of Simon and Christina, he began to wave his other arm in the air. It was the
Spazierer
, gesturing urgently.

“Hello,” he shouted. “Hello Simon Phelps, please wait.” Simon had never spoken with the
Spazierer
, and he was taken aback that he even knew his name. “Simon Phelps,” he yelled again, this time even louder, “I have something to show you that may be of interest.” Because of his bowed legs, the
Spazierer
had a precarious walk and it seemed that only his cane prevented him from tipping over to one side or the other.

He was slightly out of breath by the time he caught up with Christina and Simon, and he took a few moments to wipe his face with a handkerchief. Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out a clipping that had been ripped from a newspaper.
“Do you recognize this?” he said to Simon, pointing at an advertisement on the page. Although the image was smudged with raindrops, it was clear enough for Simon to make it out: a little girl with bright blue eyes and long wavy hair holding a bottle of Hall’s Vegetable Sicilian Hair Renewer. The bottle was about one-third the size of the girl, and Simon could read the print on the bottom of the page: “Keeps the scalp healthy. the people’s favorite.” Underneath the advertisement, in a small familiar script, the artist’s name was written: Arthur Wade.

But these were Simon’s words. This was his little girl. Arthur Wade had picked this particular drawing off of Simon’s desk, and in his usual late-afternoon sodden voice had said, “You people can get awfully sentimental, can’t you?” before slipping it into a folder. Now, here it was, reproduced in a newspaper. Arthur Wade had never mentioned that it would be published. Whenever Simon had asked if any of his ads had been sold, Arthur Wade had always given him the same answer about “the cheap bastards.”

“The
New York Telegram
,” said the
Spazierer
. “Yesterday and today. He didn’t tell you, did he?”

“Not yet, sir,” said Simon, convinced that this was just an oversight on Arthur Wade’s part.

“Didn’t get paid an extra cent for this, I’ll bet.”

“Not yet, sir,” he repeated.

“It’s not my business, but I’d watch out if I were you. That man will make a fortune off of you and you’ll never see a penny of it. He assumes that people like us are just grateful for the work. It would never occur to him that you would speak up and claim what is rightfully yours.” Simon recognized the
Spazierer
’s accent as similar to his own.

“Thank you,” said Simon, shoving the newspaper clip into his pocket. “Thank you for showing me this. I’ll see to it, I promise.”

The
Spazierer
reached over and patted Simon’s cheek. His palm was callused and scratchy. “You are a good boy,” he said. “But sometimes being good isn’t good enough.”

As the
Spazierer
ambled off into the rain, Simon became aware that his own breathing was heavy. His arms were frozen and his legs were wobbly. Suddenly, the smell of the garlic made him want to vomit. He threw his half-eaten pickle into the street. “Stinkin’ piece of shitball,” he shouted.

Christina came toward him. “What’s the matter with you?” Her voice was whiny, almost pleading. He didn’t have the words for Christina, much less for himself. If he were to sketch how he felt at that moment, he would show a man with billowing cheeks and a purple face. No, that wasn’t quite right. This anger wasn’t diffuse and purple. It was white and pure and traveled a straight line.

T
HAT NIGHT, AS HE
lay in bed, Simon knew it was pointless to try and figure out what he’d say to Arthur Wade the following day. Now that he was fluent in English, words would pop up unexpectedly in his conversation. If he could see them, he could say them. Words like
skidoo, clapboard
, and
gizmo
were so visual to him, it wasn’t as if he was learning a new language as much as it was verbs, nouns, and adjectives making themselves known to him. When he thought about Arthur Wade and his boozy breath, the image came easily: the man was a stinkin’ piece of shitball if ever there was one.

The following afternoon, Simon showed up at the Arthur Wade Lithograph Shop three hours early. He’d found it impossible to
sit through school that afternoon, and at lunchtime, he told his teacher he was leaving because he was sick with a stomachache. The stomachache was real enough, but it wasn’t because he was sick. His stomach was tied in knots; he could see it clear as day. He just wanted to confront Arthur Wade and be done with it.

Even in midday, the Lexington Avenue office was dark and airless. No sunlight filtered into the courtyard, and even if a sliver or two did make it through, the soot encrusted around the windows would surely have blocked it out. So it seemed to Simon that Arthur Wade was sitting in the darkness when he walked through the door. He saw only his back, his wide shoulders, and the creases in his fleshy neck. His head was bent forward. Simon thought he might be studying his shoes, but then he heard gurgling noises and little whistles. Arthur Wade was sound asleep and snoring.

Later, Simon thought how easy it would have been had he just snuck up behind him and clobbered him over the head with a chair. But in his wildest imagination, he never thought it would come to that. He scraped his heels and banged the door shut. Arthur Wade still didn’t wake up. He walked around and stood in front of him. His mouth was slack and he was drooling down the front of his white linen shirt. Simon was surprisingly thrilled at how repulsive he found the sight of him and let himself wallow in that feeling for a few moments before he tapped him on the shoulder. “Mr. Wade, wake up,” he said. “Wake up, I want to talk to you.”