I nodded. “He’s perfect,” I said. “Everything’s perfect. Don’t worry now. Just rest and get well.”
Tears gathered in her eyes. “I almost messed things up, didn’t I?” she asked.
I put my face close to her cheek. “You didn’t,” I said. “It was me. You were right. I shouldn’t have gone yesterday.”
She tried to shake her head dissentingly, but it was too much effort for her. She closed her eyes wearily. “No,” she whispered, “it was my fault. I should have known you would come home if something hadn’t kept you. But I kept remembering how I felt the last time you went away and I couldn’t bear the thought of living without you. I had such a feeling about you, Danny.” The tears rolled down her cheeks silently. “That something terrible was going to happen to you—to us—and I would be alone.”
“Forget it; we’ll never be alone again,” I said earnestly. “No matter what happens now, we’ll always have Junior with us.”
Her eyes opened and she looked at me. “Did you see him yet, Danny?” she asked almost shyly. “What’s he like?”
I had caught a quick glimpse of him when I came upstairs with the doctor. He had stopped in front of the nursery and let me peek into the incubator.
Nellie’s eyes were on my face warmly. I could see the faintest tinge of colour coming back into her cheeks. I smiled at her.
“He’s tiny and he’s cute,” I said softly. “Just like his Mamma.”
An excited chatter was coming from the waiting-room as I
returned
to it. My hand was seized enthusiastically the moment I stepped in.
“
Mazeltov
, Danny!” my father was saying, a happy smile on his face. Everybody crowded around me, all talking at once.
My mother-in-law seized my other hand and planted a big wet kiss on my cheek. I grinned happily at her. From somewhere my father had obtained a bottle of whisky. Now we were standing in a small semicircle, the liquor in the paper cups making a small sloshing sound. My father made the toast.
“To your son!” he said, looking at me proudly. “May he ever be happy! And to your wife, may she ever take pleasure in him! And to you, may you ever take pride in him—as I do in you!”
The tears were in my eyes and they weren’t put there by the whisky. I had waited a long time for my father to say that. Maybe I didn’t deserve it, but I wanted to hear the words anyway.
Papa raised his cup again. He turned to Sam. “And to my other son,” he said quietly, “who made an old man see how wrong he’d been and now puts me further in his debt with his blood!”
I was bewildered. “What do you mean, Pa?” I asked.
Papa looked at me. “It was Sam that fought with me and made me realize what I had done. It was he who convinced me of what a fool I had been and made me go to you.”
I stared at Sam. His face was flushing. Papa’s voice in
my ear seemed to be coming from a great distance: “And now he has saved your son’s life with his blood. We both owe him a great deal. Me for bringing you back to me, you for giving your son life.” Papa seemed to laugh a little. “A great deal,” he repeated. “In the old days a man would have to repay in kind. He would have a right to our blood, even to our lives if he should want them.”
I moved closer to Sam, a feeling of gratitude rising in me. My father was still talking.
“Now that you have a son, Danny, you will learn the pain of your deeds. Even those little things you think will bother no one will hurt him, and so hurt you. May you never know the pain I have known, the pain of having your child pay for your errors.”
Papa was right. Maybe I would never pay for what I did, but my son might. I was still staring at Sam. He was smiling at me. Then I remembered.
Somewhere, Fields was waiting for him. And it was I who had made the deal. My mind raced madly. There had to be a way to call him off.
I glanced quickly at the clock on the waiting-room wall. It was after ten. I had to reach Maxie now and cry quits. “I gotta make a call,” I said wildly, and ran out of the waiting-room.
There was a telephone booth in the corridor. I ducked into it and dialled Fields’s number hurriedly. The phone rang several times before anyone answered. It was a woman’s voice.
“Is Maxie Fields there?” I asked harshly.
“He isn’t in,” the tired voice answered. “Who’s calling?”
“Danny Fisher,” I said quickly. “Do you know where he is? I’ve got to find him!”
“Danny!” the voice cried. “Yes, you’ve got to! This is Ronnie. You can’t let him go through with it. Sam was the only friend you ever had! He was the one who made Maxie lay off you when you first came back; Sam swore he’d kill him if he ever laid a hand on you!”
I closed my eyes wearily. “And I thought it was you,” I said.
“No,” she answered; “he’d never listen to me. I came back because Ben got sick and I needed money for him. But it didn’t do any good. He died.”
“Sarah, I’m sorry.”
I don’t know whether she heard me, because the words kept spilling out of her like a flood. She was talking about Sam again—Sam and me. “You can’t let him do anything to Sam, Danny. You musn’t! It was
only Sam who kept him from moving in on your business. He persuaded Lombardi to tell Maxie to lay off because he was taking it over himself, and Maxie couldn’t do anything about it. He was furious. You don’t know how bad he is. You gotta stop him, Danny!”
“I want to, Sarah,” I said fiercely. “Listen to me. Do you have any idea where I can find him?”
“He said something about going out to Brooklyn,” she answered. “He said that Sam would probably show up at your new house tonight.”
I sagged limply in the booth. That meant he was probably waiting for Sam near my house, and when we came back from the hospital he would be ready for him. I stared stupidly at the telephone. There was only one thing I could do now. That was to get home before anyone else.
“Okay, Sarah,” I said slowly, putting the receiver back on the hook. I left the booth and went back into the waiting-room.
I walked up to Sam and tried to keep my voice as casual as I could. “Can I borrow your car for a few minutes, Sam?” I asked, “I promised Nellie I’d bring a few tilings from the house for her, an’ my car is still at the airport.”
“I’ll drive yuh over, kid,” he offered.
“No, no,” I said quickly. “You’re still weak from the blood transfusion. Rest here a little while. I’ll be back in twenty minutes.”
His hand came out of his pocket with a car key. He held it toward me, smiling. “Okay, Champ.”
I looked suddenly into his eyes. He hadn’t called me that in years. I could see the warmth of his smile reach them.
“Everything okay, Champ?” he asked. Only the two of us knew what his words meant. There was a world of meaning in them.
I took his hand. “Everything’s okay,” I answered. His grip tightened on mine and I looked down at our hands. They were clasped together. Funny the way our hands were alike—the same shape, the same kind of fingers. I looked up into his face. His eyes were warm toward me and I loved him. He was everything I ever wanted to be. That had always been the way it was. In everything I did I tried to make myself into him. I smiled slowly as I began to understand. “Thanks, Sam,” I said. “Thanks for everything.” I took the car key from his fingers and started for the door.
My father stopped me. “Drive carefully, Danny,” he admonished me. “We don’t want anything should happen to you now.”
“Nothing will happen, Papa,” I answered. “And if it does, there’ll be no regrets. I’ve had about everything there is to be had in life. I’ll have no complaints, no kicks coming.”
Papa nodded. “Good you should feel like that, Danny,” he said solemnly. “But be careful just the same.”
The powerful motor beneath the hood of the canary-coloured convertible hummed as I headed the car toward home. I was glad I had Sam’s car. It would make it that much easier for me to find Maxie, because Maxie would be looking for the car. I wasn’t worried about him. I would find a way to square him off.
I sped down Linden Boulevard to Kings Highway, then left to Clarendon. At Clarendon I made a right turn and headed toward my street. I glanced in my mirror. A car behind me was blinking its lights. It wanted to pass me. I laughed to myself and pressed my foot down on the accelerator. I was in a hurry too.
The big car responded quickly to my foot and we hurtled through the night. I looked in the mirror again. The other car was creeping up on me. Then I got the idea: Maxie must have tailed Sam out to the hospital.
Slowly the other car crept up alongside me. I glanced out my window. I had been right. Spit’s face was staring at me from the other car. Frantically I waved my hand at him.
Then I saw the chopper resting on the window in Spit’s hand. He was raising it slowly.
“Spit!” I yelled at him. “It’s me! Danny! The whole thing’s off!”
The chopper was still coming up. I yelled at him again: “Spit, yuh crazy bastard! It’s me, Danny!”
I saw him hesitate a second. His head turned toward the back seat of his car and I saw his lips move. I stole a quick look back there, but all I could see was the faint glowing of a cigar. Then he turned back to me and the chopper kept coming up. I remembered Maxie’s words: “There’s no backin’ out now….” It was Maxie in the back seat.
Desperately I stepped on the gas as the chopper began to blaze. I felt a sudden pain tearing me away from the wheel. Desperately I fought the wheel, twisting it in my desire to hold on to it.
For a brief second I was blinded; then my vision cleared. The car was rocking crazily on the road in the night. I looked across at Spit. He was grinning at me. I was seized by a terrible anger. A hatred for him and all I had been spilled over into my throat,
warm and hot and sticky like blood. He was raising the chopper again.
I looked past his car to the corner. It was my corner, my street. I could see my house standing there, with a light in the window we had forgotten to turn off when we left. I would be safe if I could get home. I would always be safe there. I knew that.
With all my strength I twisted the wheel toward my street. Maxie’s car was in the way, but I twisted the wheel just the same. I could see Spit’s white face contorted in fright. Sparks blazed from the chopper, but I didn’t feel anything. He’d have to get out of my way or I’d run right through him. I could feel the wheels lock, but I didn’t care. I was going home.
There was a blaze of light and I could feel the car soaring into the air. I drew a deep breath, bracing myself for the crash, but it never came.
Instead I was a kid on a van moving into a new neighbourhood. I could hear the gravel crunching under the wheels. It was daylight, bright daylight, and I couldn’t understand it.
Something had gone wrong. Time had run off its track. My mind wrestled with the thought. It couldn’t be true. Things like this just didn’t happen. I was back at the beginnings of memory.
Then it was gone and I felt the steering wheel shatter. One moment I was looking stupidly at my hands holding on to the remnants of a wheel that was no longer a wheel, and the next moment I was flying crazily into a leering darkness.
Somewhere deep in the silent dark, someone was calling my name. It echoed hollowly, metallically, in my mind, the syllables rolling toward me like the waves in the sea.
“Dan—ny Fish—er. Dan—ny Fish—er.” Over and over again I could hear the voice calling me. Somehow I knew I mustn’t listen to its siren song. I mustn’t listen to its sound. I mustn’t even hear it in my mind. Desperately I fought against it. I pushed hard and closed my mind to its echo. A sudden pain rushed through me and I tensed in the excruciating agony.
The pain grew stronger and stronger, and yet it was not a physical thing that I was feeling. It was a vague disembodied pain that floated through me like the air I used to breathe.
The air I used to breathe. Used to breathe. Why did I think that? The pain filtered into me again and permeated my consciousness, and my question was forgotten. I could hear my voice screaming in the
distance. Its shout of agony was ringing in my ears. Slowly I slipped back towards the darkness again.
“Dan—ny Fish—er, Dan—ny Fish—er.” I could hear the strangely soothing voice again. It was soft and gentle and held within it the promise of rest and peace and relief from agony, and yet I fought against it, with strength I had never used against anything before. Again the voice faded from my mind and the pain returned.
How sweet the taste of pain when all else is gone from your body! How you cling longingly to the agony that binds you to the earth! You breathe the pain as if it were the sweetest air, you drink the pain with all the thirsty fibres of your being. You long for the pain that lets you live.
It was roaring sweet and agonizingly pungent inside me. The pain I loved and held so close to me. I could hear my distant voice screaming in protest against it and I was happy in the feeling. Anxiously I reached for it with my hands, but could not hold it, for once again it slipped from me and I was plunging into the quiet, restful dark.
The voice was very close to me now. I could feel it in my mind as once before I had felt the pain in my body. “Why do you fight me, Danny Fisher?” it asked reproachfully. “I only come to give you rest.”
“I don’t want to rest!” I shouted against it. “I want to live!”
“But to live is to suffer, Danny Fisher.” The voice was deep and warm and rich and comforting. “Surely you must know that by now.”
“Then let me suffer,” I screamed. “I want to live. There are so many things I have to do!”
“What is there for you to do?” the voice asked quietly. “Remember what you said a few short minutes ago? The words you spoke to your father: ‘There’ll be no regrets. I’ve had about everything there is to be had in life. I’ll have no complaints, no kicks coming.’”
“But a man says many things he doesn’t mean,” I cried desperately. “I’ve got to live. Nellie said she couldn’t go on without me. My son needs me.”
The voice was wise and tolerant as time. It echoed hollowly through my mind. “You don’t really believe that, Danny Fisher, do you?” it asked quietly. “For surely you must know that life does not cease to exist in others for any man.”