Another Eden (31 page)

"Have you seen him?" she asked helplessly.

"Not yet." He kept to himself what he had seen. "They must have gone back, Sara."

"But we have to look."

"Yes." He took her hand, and they began to walk against what was left of the still-fleeing crowd.

She saw the carnage before he did. On its side in front of the Park Avenue Oyster Palace, the lathered horses standing still in the dangling reins, exhausted. Five men hunkered behind it, hands braced on the edge of the roof that touched the pavement. On the count of three they all heaved, and the heavy carnage rose up on two wheels, teetered, and dropped onto the other two, bouncing gently. Sara dropped Alex's hand and ran.

"Stand back, lady, there's somebody in there," warned a policeman in uniform, reaching for her. She eluded him, crying out, "Michael!"

Another policeman was yanking the door open. Michael looked out, white-faced, huddled on the floor between the seats. "Mummy?" He scrambled down unassisted and ran to her. Sara dropped to her knees in the street, unable to speak. His high-speed impact nearly knocked her over; she hugged him back fiercely and they both burst into tears. Alex stood beside them and watched their sobbing, swaying, wordless embrace.

"There's somebody else in here. Big guy. Somebody give me a hand."

Sara lifted her head, blinking to see past the tears as Alex and two other policemen returned to the carnage. Michael choked out, "It's Dad, he's really sick, I don't know what's wrong with him," just as the men lifted Ben from the carriage and laid him on the pavement beside the door. Sara stood up slowly, still holding Michael's hand. They walked together to the still, prostrate figure on the ground and knelt beside him.

"This your husband, ma'am?" She nodded. The policeman said no more, but over Sara's shoulder he gave Alex a quick, bleak shake of the head.

"Daddy?" Michael faltered, touching his father's arm gingerly. Ben's face was the color of beeswax. "Tasha jumped out and ran away, Mum, but Dad said not to move, we were better off in the carnage."

"Sara?"

She looked down at Ben. He was sweating now, but still white as paper, pressing one hand to his chest. She covered his hand with hers and leaned over him.

"I wasn't going far," he said in a wheezy gasp, blinking up at her. "Wouldn't've kept him so long this time, either." She couldn't answer. "Sorry about Tasha. Jeez, that was…" He shook his head once. Finally he muttered, "Stupid."

"You have to rest, Ben. Save your strength."

He made a weak gesture of impatience with his free hand; for a second the old belligerence gleamed in his black eyes. But he was strong enough only to whisper. "Money problems coming."

"It's all right."

"Big problems. Might have to sell stuff, but you'll be all right."

"Don't talk, Ben."

"Maybe not a millionaire, but still rich as hell." His laugh turned into a desperate gasp for breath.

Sara looked up. The nearest policeman said, "There's a wagon on the way, ma'am."

Ben subsided, exhausted, face gray and clammy. Michael, weeping beside Sara, touched his father's hand with one finger just for a second, then jerked away, afraid. Sara leaned close to Ben and whispered in his ear. His eyes flickered open, but they were glassy now. She squeezed his hand and whispered again.

Ben took a slow, shuddering breath and fixed his gaze on his son. "Michael."

"Sir?"

He opened his lips, but only air came out. Sara stopped breathing, clutching his arm with all ten fingers. "Michael," he tried again.

Sir?

"Something I never told you." Now his breath was a grotesque rattle deep in his throat and his lips were blue. "Yes, sir?" Michael quavered through his tears. Ben finally said it. "Love you. Always have." Michael's pinched face was transformed. "Really, Dad? Really?"

But Ben didn't answer; his lashes fluttered once more before his eyes rolled slowly back into his head and his stertorous breathing ceased. He didn't hear Michael say, "I love you too, Dad." He didn't hear anything else at all.

"Mrs. Wiggs? Are you home?" Alex put his head in the door his landlady always left ajar in defiance of constant warnings from friends and tenants that anyone could walk right in and steal everything she owned, and peered inside the cluttered parlor. Plenty of furniture, knicknacks, gewgaws and bric-a-brac, but no landlady.

"Alexander?" came a call from beyond the beaded curtain between parlor and kitchen. "Yes, ma'am."

A moment later Mrs. Wiggs bustled out, drying her hands on her apron. Her big, pink-faced smile collapsed when she saw the suitcase on the floor by the door. "I'll swan, you're really doing it," she said tragically, fat shoulders slumping. "Lighting out on a train on Christmas Eve. I swear, I don't believe you've got the sense God gave a flea."

"You're probably right. But my ticket says December 24, 6:37
p.m.,
so I guess I've got to go."

Mrs. Wiggs clucked her tongue, a loud, sharp sound connoting powerful disdain. "And of course nobody's ever
changed
a ticket to a more sensible day before. They never
heard
of that at the train station."

Alex smiled and shrugged but kept quiet, experience having taught him he was no match for his landlady's sarcasm.

She jerked her head at the suitcase. "That all you're carrying?"

"I sent everything else ahead."

"Hmph. You couldn't stuff enough
underwear
in that little bag for four days."

He grinned. "Quit griping and be nice to me. I want to remember you smiling, not scowling." To his astonishment, Mrs. Wiggs's eyes suddenly welled with tears.

His dismay was nothing compared to hers. She scoured her cheeks roughly and stuck out a damp, raw-boned hand for him to shake. "Well, go if you're going."

He squeezed her hand gently between both of his. "I'll write when I get settled, to let you know my address."

"If you want to."

"Will you write back?"

"Maybe."

"It's been a good five years. I'll never have another landlady like you."

"That's a safe bet."

He arched a brow. "Admit it—you're going to miss me."

"Hah. I wish you'd left two months ago when you said you were going to. Could've doubled the rent and now I'd be a rich woman." Alex's smile grew fixed. He might as well have left two months ago, considering the way things had turned out. "Least you've got a job to go to now. I guess that's something," she said grudgingly.

"I guess it is, if I want to keep eating food and sleeping indoors." In truth, he was excited about his new job. Thanks to Professor Stern—again—he'd been invited to bid on and had won a contract to design the new foreign language students' union on the Berkeley campus. His brain was buzzing with ideas and he was impatient to start work; he even had plans to hire an assistant draftsman—McKie & Associates' first associate. The commission he would earn was modest by Draper and Snow's standards, but considering that he was almost broke, he'd have taken even less.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a flat oblong box. "Merry Christmas," he said, handing it to his landlady.

"My law, what've you gone and done?" Her scowl deepened; she took hold of the box as if it might contain spiders.  "Do I have to open it now?"

"Unless you want to hurt my feelings."

"Hmph." She lifted the lid and stared down at the buttery-soft yellow cashmere scarf he'd bought her. She was silent for so long, he decided she hated it. He was sure of it when she finally looked up, eyes swimming again, and said, "Well, that beats' all."

"You can take it back. I got it at Buckley's, I'm sure they'll—"

"Oh, hush up." She went to one of the cluttered tables the parlor was full of, this one covered with a pile of brightly wrapped packages. She picked out a square box covered in red foil, brought it back, and shoved it into his hands. "Here. Merry Christmas yourself."

"Do I have to open it now?"

Mrs. Wiggs' smiles were rare and worth waiting for. "Unless you want a kick in the shins."

Chuckling, he opened his present. "Well, well," he said softly. "Great minds."

"Like it?"

He lifted the yellow knitted scarf out of the box and draped it around his neck. "I love it."

"I was halfway done making it when it hit me that you won't have any use for it out there. Too hot."

"No, you're wrong, San Francisco's got perfect scarf-wearing weather. Really," he insisted when she looked skeptical. "It's cold as a witch's left tit about half the time."

"Go on with you!" She cuffed him on the shoulder, pretending his language shocked her—an old game they'd been playing for years. "Thank you very much. I'll think of you whenever I wear it."

"Oh, pshaw."

He put his arms around her soft, stout body and hugged her. "I don't know anybody but you who says 'pshaw,' " he told her, inhaling her unique vanilla scent. "Never even knew how to pronounce it till I met you."

She pushed him away, fumbling in her apron pocket for her handkerchief "Well, go on, then. Six-thirty, didn't you say? Better hurry up so you can sit on a train with a bunch of strangers on Christmas Eve." She blew her nose and glared at him.

"Take care of yourself."

"Oh, sure."

He backed out the door, feeling like crying with her. "I'll write to you."

She flapped her hand. Her nose was bright red.

"Bye, Mrs. Wiggs."

"Go
on
."

He sent her a last grim smile. He was halfway to the front door when she called to him. "Ma'am?"

"You build beautiful buildings out there, Alexander, you hear me?"

He grinned, but his nod was solemn. "Yes, ma'am. That's what I hope to do."

Mrs. Wiggs waved and then disappeared through her door. She left it ajar.

Outside in the bitter-cold twilight, it was snowing again. He walked up Tenth Street to Sixth Avenue to look for a cab. If he hadn't already been feeling dejected, the Undercurrent of excitement that ran through the crowd of overcoated pedestrians rushing along the whitening sidewalks would have done the trick. Everyone had somewhere to go, some marvelous, magical destination, and they couldn't get there fast enough. He watched a dozen black hansoms trot by, full of fares, before he wound his new scarf tighter around his neck and set off to walk uptown. He'd intended to stop at Fourteenth Street and find a cab there; but he kept walking, beguiled in spite of himself by the lights twinkling in the little gift stalls stretching the four blocks from Macy's to Siegel-Cooper's. Even the most garish, useless objects looked desirable tonight, cunningly displayed among the snowy evergreens and flickering kerosene lamps. Hawkers called out their last-minute bargains: brass paperweights, tiny Statues of Liberty, handkerchiefs and cheap bracelets and rows of striped peppermint canes. The smell of scorched holly and chestnuts flavored the frosty air. Two Salvation Army soldiers beat a drum and a tamborine on the corner at Twentieth Street, calling on passersby to give to the less fortunate tonight out of the spirit of Christmas.

"Train set for your little boy?"

Alex shook his head at an old man standing behind a long table covered in green baize, waving a feather duster to keep the snow off an elaborate labyrinth of tracks and trains and papier-mâché hills, tiny metal trees and fences, cows and farmers, ducks and dogs.

"Sure? Make a little fellow happy on Christmas morning."

"No, thanks, I haven't got a little boy."

"Bet you know one, though!" the old man called after him.

He kept walking, but at the next corner he stopped, so abruptly the woman behind him smacked into his shoulder. "Excuse me," he muttered, his gaze fixed blindly on the cloud of slow, thick crystals blowing a miniature blizzard in the street lamp's silver halo. To his right was the awning-covered entrance to the Cunningham Hotel. The doorman, splendid in a royal blue uniform with epaulettes, eyed him benignly. "Is there a telephone in the lobby?" Alex heard himself ask.

"Aye, sure." His ruddy Irish face lit up when Alex handed him a dollar bill, just for opening the door. "And a merry Christmas
to you
," he called gratefully as Alex made his way across the red-carpeted lobby to the desk.

The telephone, the clerk told him, was in an alcove behind the potted ferns across the way. A bald gentleman with a drooping white mustache was seated at the little desk, talking into the instrument, and Alex's heart sank. But all at once the man surged to his feet, said, "Okay, so I'll see you at the Hoffman House in ten minutes," hung up, and rushed past him without stopping, murmuring, " 'Scuse me, merry Christmas."

Alex sat down and reached for the still-warm earpiece.

"Number, please?" asked the agree able-sounding woman at central.

"Six-one-four-one."

"Thanks, I'll connect you. Merry Christmas."

"I don't understand you, Sara. You're the least prudish person I know."

"It's got nothing to do with prudery."

"Well, what has it got to do with? You won't explain it. If you would, I might be more sympathetic."

"Lauren, let's not have this conversation any longer." She bit back anything harsher, such as,
Your sympathy wasn't solicited
, even though it trembled on the tip of her tongue, and gestured toward the tea cart. "More coffee?"

"No. All right, I'll shut up."

"Thank you."

"But I still say you're being silly. If you
love
him—"

Sara stood up, walked across the drawing room, and sat down in another, more distant chair.

Lauren made a face and thrust both hands into her short brown hair, pulling it straight up in the air and then letting it fall. Her enormous green eyes flashed an apology. "Can I just say one more thing?"

"I really—"

"Just one, and then not another word."

"It won't—"

"Consider the possibility, Sara—not now but sometime, and don't wait forever—that you're doing this out of
habit."

"What does that mean? No—I don't even want to know. Thank you, that's your one thing, now let's drop the subject. How do you like your new apartment?"

Lauren sent her a dry, knowing look and let the conversation shift. "I love it, of course. You'd know why if you'd come see it."

"I've meant to. I will soon, I promise."

"When?"

"Soon."

"How about tomorrow? No, it's Christmas, I have to go to my mother's. The day after? For lunch. You can bring Michael."

"We'd love to."

"Good!" Her vivacious face slowly sobered. "Tell me something, Sara. The truth. Do you think I'm a bad person?" Sara's lips pulled sideways with impatience. "Why would I think that?"

"Because of the way I'm living."

"The way you're living?" But she knew what Lauren meant. She'd moved out of her parents' house after her return from Paris four weeks ago, and now she lived by herself in a studio in the West Fifties, from which she took great delight in publicly advocating free love and women's suffrage, entertained gentlemen callers unchaperoned, befriended bohemian homosexuals, and painted shockingly large nudes in the Neo-Impressionist style. Lately she talked about giving up Anglicanism and becoming a Buddhist. Sara smiled, feeling suddenly old, almost grandmotherly. "No, I don't think you're a bad person. I think you're having the time of your life." Lauren grinned self-consciously. "But sometimes I worry about you. I worry that you'll get hurt."