The Wrong Kind of Money (27 page)

“Need a light?” the man said. The man's voice sounded familiar, too, but still Noah couldn't attach a name to that middle-aged face.

“Oh, thanks,” Noah said, and the older man lighted Noah's cigarette with a gold Dunhill lighter. That little gesture—the way he flipped the lighter open—also rang a bell, and Noah thought: This is someone I've met before, but who?

“And so now, I suppose, the mantle will fall upon your shoulders,” the man said.

“I beg your pardon?” Noah said.

“You don't recognize me, do you.”

“I feel I should, but no, I'm afraid—”

“It's Cyril.”

“Cyril!” The afternoon was chilly, and now a cloud passed across the sun, and a wind swept up Madison Avenue. “Cyril,” he said again. A gesture was called for, and Noah extended his hand, and the two shook hands.

“It's been a long time.”

“Yes, it has.”

They stood there awkwardly a moment, suddenly shy in each other's presence, their eyes averted. Though it embarrassed Noah not to recognize his brother, it was understandable. He had not seen Cyril in over ten years. Cyril had let his hair grow longer, nearly shoulder length, and now it was silvery, the color of his long lynx coat. He had also taken to wearing a single gold earring in his left earlobe, long before this sort of thing would become a fashion commonplace, and an affectation that Cyril would later abandon. There had been another episode—not as serious as the kidnapping one—and Cyril had finally been banished from the Liebling household by their father. Noah knew about this episode, of course, but no one in the family ever spoke of it. Cyril had been treated as a non-person: out of sight, out of mind.

Cyril had been banished to the West Side because, in those days—the early 1960s—it was felt that people who lived on the West Side could live exactly as they wished. If one wished to live differently from the way normal people lived, one could do it on the West Side. The West Side was like a foreign country, and West Siders never ventured East. Cyril had been provided with a generous living allowance. His father would not have thrown his son out on the street. Still, he had been banished from Grandmont and from 1000 Park Avenue, and that banishment would not end until some time after his father's death, when Hannah came up with the idea of dividing the apartment horizontally and giving Cyril the upper floor.

Because of the difference in their ages—Noah was now twenty-five and Cyril was forty—Noah and his brother had never been close. Still, this meeting with Cyril on the steps of Frank E. Campbell's Funeral Chapel was difficult for Noah, and he stood there mutely, trying to think of something to say. But it was difficult because too much time had passed, there was too much ground to cover, and besides, all that ground had slipped away. He stood there, rocking on the balls of his feet, while the wind whipped up the canyon of the street, carrying with it the smell of coming snow. He felt he should deliver to his brother some sign of affection—a hug, a slap on the back, a soft punch to the shoulder—but the moment for that seemed to have passed. He felt he should say, “Gee, you're looking great!” But in fact, Cyril did not look great. He merely looked strange, and foreign. And he could not simply say, “Well, good-bye!” So he found himself shaking Cyril's hand again and saying, “Cyril. Well!”

“Yes. Well. Well. Indeed.”

“Well.”

“And so now I assume the mantle of the Ingraham Corporation is about to fall upon your shoulders,” Cyril said.

“Yes, I suppose it is.”

“It was supposed to fall on mine, you know. The mantle. But that was years ago.”

“Yes, I know. Would you have wanted it?”

“Oh, yes, I think so, though that's a forlorn hope now. This is supposed to be a disreputable business. And, as you know, I've become quite a disreputable person. I think I'd have been admirably suited to it. I think I'd have done quite well with it.” There was a sudden twinkle in his eye, and the ice seemed finally to be beginning to break. “And what about you, baby brother? Are you ready to assume it? This golden, disreputable mantle?”

“Yes, I think so,” Noah said.

“Only think so? Don't you
know
so? Don't you want it?”

“I guess so,” Noah said. “But I used to think of doing something else.”

“What sort of something else?”

“I used to think about a career in the social sciences,” Noah said. “But now—”

“My dear fellow, I don't have any idea what the social sciences
are,”
Cyril said. “And please don't tell me. I don't want to
know.
But don't worry. You'll do fine wearing the golden mantle. You'll get married to some nice girl. You'll have children. You'll live at a fine address. And I? Well, let me just say that I bear you no ill. You were always a good boy.”

“Thanks, Cyril.”

“It's too late for me to try to turn back the clock. But, you know, I'll always miss him.”

“Who?”

He nodded toward the chapel door. “The old bastard,” he said. “Our father.”

“Look,” Noah said quickly, “let's get together soon, Cyril. For lunch, or dinner. Or just for a drink. Let's get to know each other better, Cyril. We really need to.”

“I'd like that,” Cyril said with a little smile, and their eyes made contact again, and in that little smile Noah suddenly saw again the Cyril he remembered as a boy.

“In fact—want to go somewhere for a drink right now?”

“Not now,” Cyril said, glancing at his gold Cartier tank watch. “I must be on my way.”

“But let's get together soon, Cyril. Call me.”

“I will,” Cyril said.

They shook hands again and parted, Noah walking east and Cyril turning toward the west.

But, as it turned out, they did not get together soon again. It was not, in fact, until Carol, in an attempt to draw this fractured family together, began having her little family dinners on New Year's Eve at River House.

9

Choices

Why is it that our lives can become polarized about some small, seemingly insignificant event? A call from a stranger, a knock on the door, entering a familiar room unannounced and hearing unfamiliar sounds, a scene of a father vilifying his older son in front of the rest of the family. Or a decision as to whether or not to pack a pair of swimming trunks for a business trip.

At River House now, Noah Liebling, at a crossroads in his life, is faced with this decision.

Noah has always been a careful packer. He is as meticulous about packing as he once was reckless on the wheels of his bike. He considers the swimming trunks he holds in his hand. Ingraham's sales conference, which begins with a kickoff cocktail party tonight, is being held this year in Atlantic City. Atlantic City would not have been Noah's choice as the venue for this annual event. But by tradition, the salesmen are given a choice of a half dozen possible locations, ballots are passed out, and Atlantic City received the majority vote this year. Why? A lot of the salesman, it seems, like to gamble. This should come as a surprise to no one. The distilling industry is a business designed for gamblers. Everything about it is high-risk. This is why, they say, it has become a predominantly Jewish industry.

Back to the swimming trunks—green, with a white stripe down the side and a Polo logo. On the one hand, he thinks with his logical mind, in January it will obviously be too cold for the beach. On the other hand, the hotel where they will all be staying may have a heated indoor pool. A lot of hotels have those things nowadays—the pool, the spa, the health club. A swim would be pleasant at the end of a busy day. Or it may not have a pool. Noah can't remember from the brochure, and the brochure is at the office. Tentatively, he places the trunks on the top of the open suitcase. Swim trunks always go on the top of the suitcase, just as shoes always go on the bottom, followed by socks, underwear, shirts, ties, etc., etc., because that is the order in which everything is unpacked when you get to the hotel. The trunks take up very little room, and they weigh next to nothing, so what the hell?

But then, he thinks, indoor pools are unappetizing places, caustic with the smell of chlorine, and noisy with the screams of splashing children and their endless water games. And there will be no time for swimming or other relaxation, either. He will have too much to do, too many hands to shake, too many faces to try to remember. Thank God for name tags! He removes the trunks and replaces them in his dresser drawer.

But then, Atlantic City is not the sort of place one visits with small children—not anymore. Atlantic City's din is from the grownups at the tables and the slots. The pool, if there is a pool, will be peacefully empty, and he can swim a few laps before bedtime. He puts the trunks back on the top of his suitcase. And yet, if he packs the trunks and ends up never using them, he will feel the same impatience with himself that his mother feels when she has to let the space in front of her go “wasted” when entering a revolving door. Decisions, decisions! He removes the trunks again.

In another open suitcase is the carousel of color transparencies that Noah will be using when he makes his major presentation to the entire conference on Friday afternoon, just before the wrap-up cocktail party of the week of meetings, along with his notes for the script he is still working on. So far these color slides and the content of the accompanying script are still Top Secret. Only a handful of others in the company knows about them. On the program for the day, the only clue as to the importance of this event is in the words: “Friday, 12:30
P.M
., Luncheon in the Grand Ballroom to be followed by a Major Presentation by Mr. Noah Liebling.”

And, seeing his notes for the script, Noah suddenly realizes that he has almost forgotten to pack another Very Important Thing. This is the President's Message that he is to deliver at the kickoff party tonight. The President's Message, triple-space-typed by Jonesy, Hannah Liebling's secretary, is still on the top of his dresser. He quickly retrieves this and places it on the top of his suitcase, where the swimming trunks were, glancing at the opening words: “In our more than two-hundred-year history …” This is a lie, of course, and Hannah damn well knows it. Their history is not even a hundred years old, but does it really matter? He looks at his watch. It is two-fifteen.

“I've got a car ordered for us both at two-thirty,” Frank Stokes said to him that morning. “If you finish packing in time, drop down to my place for a drink before we head off to the wilds of Atlantic City.”

“Fine,” Noah said.

Frank Stokes is Ingraham's vice president for sales. Frank and Beryl Stokes have the apartment on the floor below the Lieblings', on the same elevator stem. In fact, it was Noah who helped them get into River House, over the objections of some board members who said, “Don't we have enough liquor people in the building? Are you trying to turn River House into the Ingraham Building?” Anyway, there will not be time for that drink now, and Noah is about to snap both cases closed when he realizes he is not alone in the room. He turns and sees her standing in the doorway.

“Going out of town?” she asks him.

“Oh, hi, Mellie,” he says. “Was I talking to myself?” He did not realize that he and Melody were alone in the apartment together.

We should pause here to insert a word or two about the Bennington Plan. Those of you who know about the Bennington Plan can skip this section, but the Bennington Plan accounts for Melody's somewhat awkward position.

When Bennington College for Women was founded in the 1920s, it was something of an anomaly. To begin with, it was never really a college for women. There have always been men at Bennington—not many, but a few—and Bennington was established primarily for young people interested in careers in the arts: drama, dance, music, literature, film- and television-making, and so on.

Part of the Bennington Plan is what is called the Winter Work Period. Every year the school closes for the months of January and February, and during these months students are expected to find work off the campus in their chosen fields. Cynics have pointed out that one of the world's most costly colleges, situated on a hilltop in the mountains of southern Vermont, manages to save a great deal of money in heating bills by closing during the coldest winter months, but that is neither here nor there. In its woodsy setting, laid out to suggest a sprawling New England farm—with dormitories posing as farmhouses and studios disguised as barns—the campus atmosphere is intended to be conducive to artistic endeavor, and in many ways it is. Bennington students take their studies, and the winter work program, very seriously. Otherwise, rules are very few, and loosely enforced, if at all.

Of course, not all Bennington students go to work during the winter work period. Some simply travel, visiting European museums and architectural wonders, taking notes on what they have observed, and this “work” will count for academic credit when they return to the school with the crocuses and daffodils. Some actually find jobs. Anne Liebling, as an art history major and using her mother's museum connections, has found a winter job as a file clerk in the Catalogue Room of the Met. She started work there the first of the year. The pay isn't much, of course, but at least she is working in her field.

Melody, as a drama major, has been less fortunate, as anyone who has tried to work in the theater well knows. To her credit, she has been looking for something—answering casting calls, following the course of Broadway rehearsals, offering to do everything from painting flats for scenery to running out for coffee and doughnuts for the stagehands.

“What I'd like,” Melody has said to Carol, “is to find something in the theater that would pay me enough so I could afford to share an efficiency, or a loft in SoHo.”

“Nonsense,” Carol said. “You can always stay here. We love having you, and there's plenty of room. Don't worry about finding some other place to stay.”