Wanting Rita (13 page)

He offered his hand: strong, skillful hand of a craftsman. I took it reluctantly, expecting a good punishing crush. He hardly squeezed. “So, you’re Mr. Lincoln,” he said, in a smooth baritone.

“Yeah…Alan. I mean, you can call me Alan.”

“Alan James,” Rita said, standing rigidly, as if expecting a confrontation.

“Okay, Mr. Lincoln,” he said, finally releasing my hand. “I’m Frank.” He indicated toward the squashy looking couch. “Have a seat, Mr. Lincoln, and tell me a little about yourself. Rita hasn’t told us much about you.”

I sat, noticing the mantle above the obvious non-working fireplace, where oval and square framed photographs displayed Rita, young and old. The one that caught my eye was a recent photo of her in a canary yellow bikini, wearing a broad-rimmed red hat, striking a sexy pose against a deep blue sky. Her smile welcomed, her alluring eyes beckoned.

Another photo grabbed my eyes: it sat next to me on the rickety-looking end table. It was a 5 x 7 color photograph framed in gold of a young Frank in a baseball uniform, with his arm around a very young attractive woman. It took seconds for me to realize, with surprise, that it was Mrs. Fitzgerald! What do you know? She
had
been attractive, once! There was a touch of Rita in the cheek bones, in her elegant long neck and in that timid smile. Her raven black hair was long and shimmering. There was none of the present hardness on her face or in her sultry dark eyes. On the contrary, she looked into the camera with friendliness.

Frank turned his severe eyes to Rita. “You gonna sit?”

“I’ll just stand.”

“Sit!” he commanded. “We’re going to be a while.”

Grudgingly, blinking rapidly, Rita eased down next to me, folding her arms. I could still feel the heat of Mrs. Fitzgerald’s disapproving stare. I tried to ignore it.

Frank did not sit. He remained on his feet, taking thorough possession of the moment and the room, pacing and appraising Rita and me with a calculated practiced control. He was loose and uninhibited. The room seemed too small for him; perhaps he required a stage for a one-man show. Though he appeared affable, I sensed a covertness and a quiet discontent.

“Rita says you’re smart,” he said.

“I guess so.”

“Where are you going to college?”

“Harvard.”

“Ah, yes, of course, Hahvahd,” he said, in an exaggerated Boston accent. “I bet you have connections there, don’t you Mr. Lincoln?”

“My uncle knows people there.”

He grinned, but it held secrets. “It’s good to know people, Mr. Lincoln. Why are you going to Hartsfield High School?”

“Why?”

“Yes. With your smarts and your father’s money and connections, why aren’t you attending a private school?”

I folded my hands, humbly, and then shrugged.

Frank stopped, smiling indulgently. “Doesn’t make sense. Bright kid like you going to a public school.”

I felt Rita’s eyes on me.

“My father is a traditionalist,” I said, hoping that would be the end of it. But it wasn’t.

Mrs. Fitzgerald spoke up. “But you did attend a private school for awhile, didn’t you? I’m sure I heard that.”

Sweat rolled down my back. I was going to take off my jacket, but I didn’t want to lose my Cobra edgy look. “Yeah, for a few years. I went to the Hiller Academy in Massachusetts. I transferred to Hartsfield High in the second half of my sophomore year.”

Frank looked at his daughter. “Did you know that?”

“No. Look, Dad, maybe Alan James doesn’t want to talk about this.”

“Sure he does, don’t you, Mr. Lincoln?” he said, then concluded with an encouraging smile that lacked any warmth. “What brought you back home?”

I gave him a slightly offended look. “My mother was ill.”

“Ill…? As in sick?” he said, with a mocking tone.

“Yes, she was sick. My father thought it would help her recovery if I came home and went to school here at Hartsfield High.”

“What was the matter with her?”

“Dad! That’s enough!” Rita protested.

“He doesn’t mind, do you, Mr. Lincoln?”

I sat in a miserable silence.

“Okay, so Mr. Lincoln does mind.”

“You can call me Alan,” I said, with some irritation.

“Are you related to
the
Mr. Lincoln?” he continued.

“Not that I know of.”

Frank wandered to the fireplace and leaned against the mantle, examining his daughter’s photographs. “So what do you think of our Rita, Mr. Lincoln?”

I heard Rita sigh.

“…I like Rita.”

He chuckled. “Yeah…She’s become a real beauty, hasn’t she?”

I felt myself sinking deeper into the quicksand of the mushy couch. “Yes.”

Rita stood, glancing at her new gold watch. “Okay, we need to get going. The movie starts soon.”

“Sit down!” Frank barked.

Rita glared at him.

“I’m your father and as long as you live in this house, what I say, goes. Okay, Rita girl? I know you’re all famous now and grown up, but you’re still under this roof. My roof.”

Rita eased down, ignoring him.

He swung his attention back to me. “So what are you going to major in at Harvard, Mr. Lincoln?”

“Pre-Med.”

“Pre-Med,” he repeated distinctively, as if he were reciting Shakespeare. “So you’re going to be a doctor.”

“I hope to.”

“What kind of doctor? What specialty?”

“Not sure. Maybe a surgeon.”

“Good money in that. Is that why you want to be a surgeon, Mr. Lincoln? For the money?”

“Nothing wrong with money,” I said.

There was a noticeable shift from insipidness to bright recognition. He straightened. “You are correct, Mr. Lincoln! So very correct about that! Without money, you’re a damned castaway—an outcast. A sucker. The rich know that, Mr. Lincoln. The rich know all about money and power, and that’s why I always made it one of my goals to meet and greet the rich and the powerful. But, unfortunately, as it turned out, that was a mistake.”

He paused, for effect, as if waiting for his close up. At least I knew now where Rita had gotten her dramatic sense. “You know, of course, that I was in prison?”

I averted his eyes, looking at Rita. She lit up with embarrassment. Mrs. Fitzgerald shifted for the first time, patting her mound of hard hair.

“I heard that, yes.”

“Do you know why?”

“…No…”

“Come on, Mr. Lincoln, a smart boy like you? Surely you’ve heard about the evils of Frank Fitzgerald. This is, after all, Hartsfield, the town of big mouths and ugly gossip.”

“Dad…” Rita said, plaintively. “Don’t do this.”

“Hey, Mr. Lincoln told me about his life. I think it’s only fair that I should tell him about mine. Right, Mr. Lincoln?”

I stole an extra breath. “Sure. Why not?”

“So, you did hear about me, didn’t you?”

I scratched my head. “I heard some things.”

“Some things. Good! Real good! Some things. Well, let me tell you the simple truth: I got shafted, Mr. Lincoln. That’s it. I got to know people. Rich people. Well-off people. Made friends with them, trusted them and, you know what? They shafted me. So I went to prison and they hit the road, free and easy. You see, they had money for lawyers. I had no money. I got the worst fucking lawyer you can imagine. A real loser.

“You got to be careful who you trust in this world, Mr. Lincoln. Or is it whom you trust? Anyway, be real careful about that. Especially when it comes to money. Be extra careful when there’s money involved. I bet your old Papa knows about that. Most certainly he knows all about that, doesn’t he, Mr. Lincoln?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I suppose so.”

“You see, Mr. Lincoln, your father has money—was born into money and had all those wonderful opportunities that money can buy: nice clothes, good food and wine, meeting all the right folks—and that’s so damn important, isn’t it—networking I think they call it today. So along with meeting the right people, your father went and got himself a fine education and now he makes good, honest money. Good for him! I applaud him.”

Rita sat somber, in a hopeless resignation. Mrs. Fitzgerald was on the edge of her seat, thrilled by her husband’s performance.

“And you know what else, Mr. Lincoln? With all that money your father could buy any book he wanted to buy. Any book. Hardcover books, creamy paper, the finest sturdy bindings. First editions.” Frank shook his head in wonder, his eyes bright and bold. “Can you imagine, Mr. Lincoln, how truly wonderful that is?”

“Yes sir. I like books.”

“I just bet you do, young man. I have heard about your father’s fine library. It is a fine library, isn’t it, Mr. Lincoln?”

“Yes sir.”

“Why I bet he has books on pretty much everything—from wine making to politics to horticulture—I mean there’s got to be a vast collection of horticultural books from the look of the flowers and gardens all around that house.”

“Yes, sir, my mother loves flowers and gardens.”

“And good God love her for it, young man! God love her for that! And your good father must have one of the finest wine cellars for hundreds of miles.”

“I suppose so, sir. I don’t know much about it.”

He threw an accusing finger at me. “Well you should, Mr. Lincoln! Don’t go off to Harvard until you have learned about your father’s wine cellar. That’s disrespectful.”

“Yes, sir,” I said, looking toward the front door.

He started pacing again, lost in thought. “Did you know, Mr. Lincoln, that when I was growing up—right in the same town as your father—my parents did not have the money to buy books? Did you know that?”

“No sir.”

“It’s true. We barely had enough for food. That’s a fact. And I really loved books, Mr. Lincoln. I surely did. You see, I figured that if I read enough books, I’d become a somebody. Maybe not a somebody with a capital S, like your father, but a small s somebody.” He narrowed his eyes on me. “Can you understand that?”

“Yes, sir, I can.”

He paused, twisting up his lips, letting the uncomfortable silence expand. “My father got sick. I had to work. My mother got sick. I had to work. I had to help them. I had to put food on the table, Mr. Lincoln, because that’s the way it was. That was life! Those were the cards given me. You understand?”

“Yes sir.”

“And so I did it. I worked in the factories, sweeping and cleaning toilets; I worked in the hot fields harvesting soybeans and corn; I worked at Monty Baker’s used car lot washing his cars for one dollar an hour and I put food on the table, Mr. Lincoln, and I paid the doctor bills and I even washed your father’s beautiful silver 1992 Cadillac Eldorado. Yes sir, I did that and I put food on the table.” He nodded, rapidly, his face flushed, eyes cold. “I did that, yes, but I couldn’t put myself through college. No. I had to keep working at the factory and take care of my sick mother. That was my duty and I did that.”

He glared at me. “I did that, Mr. Lincoln. And you know what else I did. I bought books. They were paperbacks, but they were the best damn books I could find—the classics—and I read them any chance I got because I was not going to be damned to hell as a low life white trash ignorant boy from Pennsylvania who didn’t know Herman Melville, John Steinbeck or Sinclair Lewis. No sir. I read them all and I started my own library. No way I was just going to borrow books from the Public Library. No sir. I was going to own them. Hold them. Read them as many times as I wanted, when I wanted. I even read Jane Austen. You ever read Jane Austen?”

“No sir.”

“You should! Got to read Jane Austen. Rita can tell you all about Jane Austen. She’s read them all,” he said proudly. “All the great ones and all the classics.”

He shifted his gaze toward his daughter. His eyelids twitched. His voice grew flat and unemotional. “No, not just poor stupid folk who worked the factories. Educated folks. Self-educated, maybe, but educated by the blessings of books. Right Rita girl?”

I saw a quiet turbulence spread across Rita’s discontented face. “Yes… Dad.” She seemed to pitch the labored words to the upper air, like a plea to the gods for mercy.

Frank wiped his glossy forehead, and took a long deep breath. He let the air out slowly, through his nose.

“In the end though, Mr. Lincoln, it gets down to money.” He rubbed his thumb and fingers together, menacingly. “Money, Mr. Lincoln. Money. If I had the cash, I would have finished college. Hey, maybe I would have been a doctor or a lawyer. A teacher maybe. I would have been a good teacher. Inspiring.”

“But I needed a car, Mr. Lincoln! I needed to make house payments! I needed to pay doctors! I needed to buy baby clothes and cribs and food and keep my wife, my sickly wife, Mr. Lincoln, my sickly wife who caught Lyme’s Disease but it wasn’t diagnosed right away, because we didn’t have enough money, Mr. Lincoln, to go to the best doctors!”

He licked his lips and returned to the recliner. He sank down, his hard jaw and good looks accented. He spread his hands and lowered his voice, now a little weary from his performance. “So, Mr. Lincoln, you understand, I’m sure. I am guilty as charged for all my transgressions against society. I am penitent and sick at heart for all that I’ve done.” He leaned toward me, with a pinched, angry face. “I am SOooo sorry.”