Manhattan Lullaby (4 page)

“Uh, dry please.” Maxine smiled and nodded. It didn't really make much difference. She didn't particularly care for sherry, but it sounded cultivated.

He nodded his approval. “Rachel always liked a good dry sherry before dinner. She said it sharpened her appetite. I have a very fine fino, Tio Pepe,” he said by way of an explanation.

“Just sherry would be fine,” replied Maxine.

Solly gave a little smile and returned with a narrow crystal glass filled to the brim with a pale blond liquid. “
Salut
.”

Maxine took the glass and raised it to her lips. She sipped. It had a delicate crisp taste, but it was so dry that it stung the back of her throat. She gave a little cough and it echoed in the huge silence of the house.

Solly returned and stood beside her, a tumbler of something on ice clutched in one liver-spotted hand. Maxine wondered briefly how old he was. And then decided it didn't matter. As you got older you realized that age was just a way of keeping track of events. When I was eighteen I met Harry. When I was twenty-one we got married. When I was forty I knew it was over. When I was forty-five we got divorced. When I was forty-six I started dating men who were old enough to be—

Solly broke into her thoughts. “You're a very quiet woman, Maxine. I like a woman who can appreciate silence. My Rachel could go for hours without saying a word, days.” He cupped her elbow in his hand. “Here, come and sit down on the couch.”

Obediently Maxine sat on the couch. It was white brocade with little blue and gold threads running through it. It had been years since she had had to make small talk and so, for want of something better to say, she admired the fabric.

He seemed pleased. “Rachel picked out the fabric.” Then he gave a big sigh. “But she never got to see it, I'm afraid. It was still out being recovered when …” His voice caught and his eyes misted over. He wiped his index finger below both lids.

“I'm sorry. I didn't mean to …” Maxine fumbled words to express her feelings, found none and took a big gulp of sherry to fill the void. It left a trail of cultivated heat all the way down.

He put his hand, still wet with the tears, on hers. “No, no, it's all right. My psychoanalyst says that I have to confront the situation, to talk about Rachel's … Rachel's … leaving, before I can come to terms with it. I'm really getting much better at confronting her … her … departure.”

Maxine nodded. “I understand,” she said with studied solemnity. But secretly she thought he made it sound like Rachel was some kind of a train about to exit its station. A refrain formed in her mind. “
Pardon me boys, is that the Rachel Berman choo-choo
?” She giggled, realized it had been out loud and excused herself. Then she took another sip of her sherry. Somehow the glass had become half empty. She played with the cuticle on her left index finger. She wondered if maybe she should have stayed home and washed her hair instead.

Her eyes wandered around the room. On every table, shelf and niche there were pictures of an elegant, square-jawed woman with dark center-parted hair. A large oil painting of the same woman, in an old-fashioned wedding dress, occupied the entire breadth of the chimney breast. Rachel may have departed, but she hadn't yet left the house. Maxine suppressed another giggle.

“Would you like to see the house?” Solly broke the silence.

“That would be nice,” replied Maxine, standing and swaying just a little, clutching the now-empty glass.

“Here, let me get you some more sherry.”

“Thank you, but I—” Before she could finish, Solly had taken her glass, refilled it and returned it to her hand. “Drink. It's good for you. I know, I'm a doctor.” He smiled.

Visions of Marcus Welby danced in her head. She took another sip and decided that maybe she could develop a taste for sherry after all.

Solly refilled his own glass and then guided her up the stairs to the second floor. He showed her the den, the guest rooms, the bathrooms and then finally they approached the double doors at the end of the hall.

“This,” he said, flinging open the doors, “was our room.” He moved aside and Maxine politely peered in. It was a very large, very feminine room, almost—she sought around for the right word—old-fashioned.

“Go in, go in,” Solly urged, but she hung back. She didn't want to go into the bedroom he had shared with his wife. She had an overwhelming feeling that Rachel might still be there.

But once more Solly took her by the arm and the next thing she knew she was standing in the middle of their bedroom. She looked around. On the dressing table were Rachel's cosmetics, Rachel's hairbrush, Rachel's perfume bottles, all looking as though she had only just put them down. Maxine supposed that behind the doors to the walk-in closet, Rachel's clothes were still hanging just as she had left them. It was eerie. She shivered.

“Are you cold?” Solly, ever the gentleman, offered her a knitted throw. “Rachel made it.”

Maxine waved it aside. “No, no, I'm fine. Just a little hungry, I suppose,” she said by way of an excuse and took another sip of the sherry.

Solly crossed the bedroom and threw open a door to another, smaller room. “Come and look at this. This was Rachel's sitting room.”

Reluctantly, Maxine crossed the room. Solly flicked on the light switch but nothing happened. “Bulb must be gone,” he apologized. “But I think there's enough light from the window for you to see.”

Maxine glanced inside. What she saw made her scalp tingle. She gasped. “Oh my God!”

Standing on the far side of the room, next to the window, the white lace curtain billowing gently around her long white skirt, was Rachel—and she had no head!

“Who left that damn window open!” cried Solly, leaping across the room to close the window. Maxine clutched the doorframe with one hand and the sherry with the other. Her heart was pounding wildly. She was having trouble breathing.

Solly shut the window and smoothed down the folds of the dress. Then he turned around to see the pale pinched face of Maxine, which was now barely distinguishable from the white molding around the door. “Are you all right?”

“She.… she …” Maxine gestured helplessly at the figure by the window. Solly understood immediately.

“Maybe I should have warned you. That's Rachel's dress form. She used to like to sew. That's her wedding dress. She made it herself, and after she … went away, I put it on the dress form. Just a sentimental old fool, I suppose.”

Maxine took a deep breath. “I'm sorry, it's just that it … she startled me a little. It was silly of me.” She finished lamely, still clutching the doorframe. “I … Could we go back downstairs now?”

“Of course, of course,” said the solicitous Solly.

As Maxine followed him out of the room, she began to recover her composure and her sense of humor. Harry's urban paranoia had obviously been more catching than she had realized. “Rachel's maiden name wasn't Bates by any chance, was it?” she asked.

He turned around. “No, it was Gershwin. Why?”

“No reason, no reason,” said Maxine and proceeded down the hall to the top of the staircase. Solly Berman may have been a catch, but he had no sense of humor.

Once they had returned to the relative normalcy of the living room, Maxine craned her head to catch the scent of cooking. She needed to put a little something in her stomach to keep the sherry company. But all that greeted her was the heavy lemony odor of furniture polish. It evoked memories of something, somewhere, and then she remembered—her uncle Bernie's funeral, when she was twelve. The coffin had been polished heavily with the cloying sweet polish and when she bent over to look at Uncle Bernie for the last time she had had a good whiff of it. Inasmuch as she had adored her uncle Bernie, she had hated the smell of lemons ever since. They always made her think of death. And the way this evening was going, she didn't need any help in that direction.

Solly was talking. “We sat shiva for Rachel right here in this room. I remember it just like—”

But before he could get any further a small brown and black dog came skidding in from the hallway, took a flying leap and landed right on Solly's lap.

“Where have you been, you naughty girl?” he said softly, stroking the tiny head. The dog licked his hand and then looked up into his face, moist brown eyes dancing with pleasure.

“She sleeps like the dead,” said Solly to Maxine.

“In this house, what else?” said Maxine, smiling benignly. He scratched the dog's back. “Probably didn't even hear you ring the bell.”

Maxine reached out and stroked a tan flank. The presence of a living creature was a welcome relief. “It's a Yorkshire terrier, isn't it?” It was one of two breeds—the other being Lassie—that she could recognize on sight, but she sounded like an aficionado all the same. “My daughter-in-law—or at least she will be my daughter-in-law when she marries my son Bradley on Saturday—is in the pet business.

“Rachel and I had a beautiful wedding,” replied Solly, narrowing the conversation again. Then he looked up. “I'm glad you like dogs. My psychoanalyst said that I would benefit from the company of one of these little creatures. You know, to help me deal with my grief and to start relating to other living creatures again, get back into the mainstream of life and put the past behind me.”

“I understand pets can be very therapeutic,” agreed Maxine, glad of the chance to talk about anything other than Rachel. “What's her name?”

“Rachel,” said Solly, and hearing its name the little dog licked his hand again.

Solly looked at his watch. “Dinner should be just about ready.” He stood up. “Bring your glass. We can finish our drinks in the kitchen. Come on, Rachel.”

Maxine followed him and Rachel junior toward the back of the house and the kitchen, glad of any activity that would take her away from the ubiquitous gaze of the Rachel in the living room.

“I hope you like lemon sole,” said Solly.

“Love it,” replied Maxine, a frozen smile stretching her lips wider than necessary. She swallowed hard. It would have to be
lemon
sole.

“Good. It's—”

Maxine interrupted. “I know. Don't tell me—you were about to say it was one of Rachel's favorites.”

Solly turned and smiled. “No, Rachel couldn't stand lemon sole. It's one of
my
favorites.”

“Oh.” Maxine felt more than a little foolish then. Maybe she was overreacting. The man had to mourn his wife, after all. She was just being overly critical and overly sensitive. It must be the sherry.

“How long has Rachel been … gone?” She asked in atonement.

“Seven years,” replied Solly, his back to her as he dished the sole onto the plates. “But it seems like yesterday.”

“More like today,” muttered Maxine.

Solly put the plates on the table. “You don't mind if we eat in here, do you? It's so much more intimate and less formal than the dining room.”

Maxine shook her head. “No, this is fine.” There were probably pictures of Rachel in the dining room.

Solly pulled out her chair and she sat down. Then he pulled out the chair at the head of the table and, picking up the Yorkshire terrier, he placed her in the seat. “You don't mind, do you? This was Rachel's chair.”

Resignedly, Maxine shook her head. “Mind? Why should I mind?”

Then he took the chair opposite her. “Dig in, as they say,” he said, lifting his knife and fork.

Maxine took a bite. It wasn't too bad. At least the fish overpowered the lemon instead of the other way around.

“You know,” said Solly, “originally I had thought of having Rachel freeze-dried.”

Maxine swallowed a lump of fish and, unable to hide the incredulous tone in her voice, said the obvious. “You mean like coffee?”

“More or less.” Solly smiled. “I knew you would understand.” He shrugged. “But they wouldn't let me do it. It was too experimental at the time. They didn't know how long she would last.”

“She's doing pretty well as it is,” said Maxine, who couldn't stop herself at this point.

But Solly, whose mind was busy roaming around in the past, didn't hear what she said. “So I prepared Rachel's body myself, right here on this very table. It was such a moving experience. I can't tell you how much closer it brought me to her, to share that last act of intimacy with her.”

Maxine sat for a moment, a morsel of sole poised halfway to her mouth, fumes of lemon and specters of death assaulting her. She waited for the implications to sink in. They did. And suddenly all that dry sherry began to feel very wet in her throat.

Her fork clattered to the plate. “Will you excuse me, please,” she said and dashed out into the hallway in search of a bathroom, or failing that, a large potted plant.

An hour later she was home, in bed, her address book clutched firmly in one hand and a red marker in the other. She drew a double line through “Berman, Dr. Solly S.” And next to the name she added one word—“Psycho.”

Chapter Four

Luba, whose name had been Marianne when she had lived in Albany, wore Reeboks and cheered on her high-school football team, had hit Bloomingdale's first, then Barney's, Macy's and finally a couple of counter-culture shops in the Village. The Bête Boîte and Deva Station, which sold army surplus, vintage clothing and discounted Norma Kamali, though not necessarily in that order. By the time she reached Tribeca, another trendy toponym for the wedge of land in the Triangle Below Canal Street, it was dark. But she walked along, happily swinging her shopping bags, impervious to the solitary thunk-thunk of the heels of her army boots on the sidewalk or the desultory and deserted state of the streets.

A block later, when she turned the corner onto Thomas Street, between the black huddle of buildings that was her destination, she caught a glimpse of a narrow rectangle of sky. The new moon was rising, lounging on its back in the navy blue night like a piece of celestial costume jewelry with a broken pin. Luba reached into her pocket. She had no money, but she turned over the American Express card and made a wish, although it was a little redundant because her wish had already been granted earlier that afternoon. Then she went inside to tell Paulie the good news.