Authors: Elyse Douglas
I cleared my throat, shrinking in height.
“Are you there, Alan James?”
“Yes.”
“Are you afraid to meet my father?”
I was. “No, of course not.”
“So…?”
“Yeah. I got it. What time’s good?”
“Seven.”
She hung up.
After I hung up, I moped down to the kitchen, utterly depressed. Before she’d left for the movies with her girlfriend from church, Mom had prepared a plate of left-overs for me: meatloaf, mashed potatoes, brussel sprouts and apple sauce. I ate alone, picking and shoving food from one side of the plate to the other. I built a little mashed potato hut, and then destroyed it with a single violent slap of my fork.
Dad wandered in, dressed in his black cardigan sweater, white shirt and blue perfectly creased pants. He held a book entitled
Masks of the Universe
, by Edward Harrison. It was my book, written by a physicist about man’s search for meaning in the universe.
“I didn’t know you liked reading that stuff,” I said.
“Physics has always interested me. The dance of atoms and waves.” Dad opened the bookmarked page and began to read.
We cannot predict actualities, only their probabilities, and an element of chance is thus involved. And yet the phantom world of becoming itself is deterministic and free of all caprice.
Dad closed the book. “I don’t understand all of it, but I find it stimulating. It’s an interesting change from reading about Thomas Jefferson’s demons in
A Portrait of a Restless Mind
. Jefferson would have loved the new universe theories, I think.”
Dad could see I was preoccupied. “Did Rita Fitzgerald stand you up?” he asked.
“No,” I said, snappily. “Something came up.”
“Came up, eh? Well, I’m sure she can find lots to come up with.”
I angrily pushed my plate aside. Dad was pleased with his clever joke. I would have stormed out, but I had a question—a burning question to which I knew he’d have the answer. One of the natural “perks” of managing money for the poor and rich alike was the “necessary and professional” gossip about the neighbors next door.
“Dad…. What do you know about Rita’s father?”
He turned the question over in his mind. “Not much. Sent to prison for armed robbery and forgery, I think I read somewhere, or heard from a client.”
“Held up a bank?”
His right bushy eyebrow lifted, like Spock’s on
Star Trek
. “Yes… a bank, maybe more than one bank.”
“Have you ever seen him?”
Dad took off his glasses, pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and polished the lenses. “Oh yes, years ago. Nice looking and very personable, as I recall. Used to work in one of the factories. Layton’s Factory, if memory serves. Carl Layton Sr. had been a client then. Anyway, I’d see Frank Fitzgerald sometimes. But that’s been, oh, at least 15 or 16 years ago.”
“Why would you remember him out of all the others?”
“Yes, why? Good question, Alan. Because infamy stimulates memory.” Dad took on his look of the solid expert, as if everything he was about to say was to be held in the strictest of confidence and was of vital importance. He was a financial man—and all his clients expected this confident authority of manner, his carefully selected words and the austere gleam in those very dark eyes. He eased down in the chair next to me, an earnest statue with a professorial delivery.
“He played softball for the factory team. He was quite good. A star player. He was a big man and a homerun hitter. Sometimes, on a nice summer night, your mother and I would get a baby-sitter for you and Judy and we’d go out to the softball game. It was good business to be seen by the owners and the factory workers in those days—to be supporting their team, even though I didn’t give a damn who won or lost. I hated the game, and still do, but it had to be done. Our business was expanding. Then it was just my brother, Robert, my first cousin, Ed, and I. We took turns. I was so happy when we lost that account.”
“Why did you lose it?”
“Well…in those days, there was a son, I won’t mention names, but a vice president of the company, who was using the company funds as his own personal piggy bank. I found the discrepancy and discretely brought it to the attention of Mr. Layton Sr. and to the chief financial officer.”
“They didn’t know?”
My father lowered his lids to half mast. “Let’s just say they were in the process of searching for a solution and had tried to cook the books so I wouldn’t find the problem. But I did. Of course I did. It was a matter of pride and ethics. Well, they thanked me, politely, for my earnest and conscientious work and said they’d be in touch. That evening they called and discharged us.”
“Discharged you! Why!?”
Dad chuckled. “But that was fine with us, Alan. Just fine. We understood perfectly. We had even expected it.”
“Well, I don’t get that,” I said, leaning toward him.
“That’s how business works, son. The following week, they called to advise us that they had recommended our firm to a rather large retail company in Pittsburg. The son was eventually sent away. Because of that referral, we were paid handsomely for our discretion. You see, son, that retail company is now one of our largest clients, and they’re expanding to Europe and the Far East. We actually made more from them than we ever would have made from that little factory.”
“How does this tie in with Rita’s father?”
His brow knitted as he slipped his glasses back on. “Yes, Rita’s father. Well, Mr. Frank Fitzgerald was very good friends with the greedy son. It seems that they were, as they say, thick as thieves. When the son left town, so did Frank. I surmise that Frank was paid off by Mr. Layton Sr. to keep quiet about his knowledge of Junior’s many indiscretions and misdemeanors. So Frank vanished. A couple of years later, Frank was sent to prison for bank robbery. One would assume that he got used to the good life or, perhaps, he wasn’t quite as clever as his friend; or perhaps he had been set up in some way. I don’t know. I never had the inclination to follow-up with it.”
“What happened to the son?”
“The son… He seems to be involved in a number of shady deals, but manages not to get caught. He is clever. As I said, perhaps Frank is not so clever.”
Dad stood. “After Frank left, the factory team had a string of disappointing seasons. Frank Fitzgerald, it seems, was both an inspiration and a driving force.”
My father started to leave, but I had a final question. “What about Rita’s mother?”
He didn’t turn to face me. “A poor soul, Alan. A very unfortunate and poor soul. She kept her job at the factory when Frank left, but struggled because of some kind of illness. She finally had to quit. Thanks to Rita’s sudden rise to small town fame, her mother got that job at the drugstore as cashier, and I believe she makes out pretty well.”
Dad waited, lowering his head, as if remembering more. He faced me. “The woman’s sister has money and I believe that’s how they’ve kept going all these years, keeping up the payments on the house and the little bit of land. Otherwise, God only knows what would have happened to them. I understand that Rita is making some good money now, modeling. I hope she saves it. Bad times are always chasing good. That money should come in handy for them now. Very handy indeed. Maybe you should suggest she make an appointment to come and see me. It couldn’t hurt. It couldn’t hurt at all.”
Chapter Seven
I drove in an uneasy darkness toward Marion Street, where Rita and her family were waiting for me. Or were they? Maybe they’d fled. I hoped so. Surely her father had more interesting things to do than hang around the house and wait for me. He must have old friends to see and old stories to tell. Knowing Rita, she probably hadn’t even mentioned me to him. Maybe I’d pull up to the curb and she’d break from the house, slip into the car and tell me that the whole thing was a joke.
That morning, I was sure Rita would call with an excuse, and I’d hung around the house most of the day in case she did. But the call never came, and so I prepared for the date with a fidgety fussiness that finally irritated me. I’d combed my hair six different ways before deciding to return to my usual and most effective style: stiff and sturdy, like thousands of little black soldiers standing at attention. I showered twice, once in the morning with Dad’s sandalwood soap, and once in late afternoon with Mom’s oatmeal soap. I trimmed my nose hairs, already becoming a problem and a curiosity, and clipped my jagged toenails, the natural predators of my socks.
I dressed in tight black denim pants, a pale blue shirt and black cowboy boots: they added an inch to my height. I selected the lightweight and stylish black cotton and rayon jacket that conferred on me the appearance of someone who meant business, like Stallone in the movie
Cobra
. It was tight at the waist and full in the shoulders.
By the time I’d pulled out of our driveway, I realized that I’d splashed on too much of Dad’s potent aftershave and I began a steady regimen of sneezing and sniffing. I rolled down my window and drove for a time with most of my head poked out the window, hoping to dissipate the smell. Unfortunately, as I approached the lights of town, Wally Sherman, a trumpet player in the band, passed in his black 1991 Dodge Charger, with his girlfriend, Angela Daysberry, who was glued to his side. They were obviously on their way to the “big” football game, and they were late. If the Hartsfield Vikings won tonight, they’d go to the playoffs in Ohio, and I could have cared less.
Wally laughed, pointed and shouted. “Hey Alan, stick your tongue out, pant a few times and give me a couple of barks. I’ll submit your name to Letterman’s Stupid Pet Tricks!”
I waited until they were well past before I hollered back, “Eat a big one, Wally! You moron!”
At ten minutes to seven, I parked across the street from Rita’s humble, narrow three-story house, where naked trees stood like somber inky shadows. The pitiful porch light flickered erratically from bright to dim, like a code, a warning. To stall for time, I counted the contrast of light to dark: how many long “brights” to short muted dims and vice versa. There was no particular mathematical pattern, except that I did ascertain that the swells of brightness lasted longer than the “fades” to near darkness.
At exactly seven, I left the car and started for the house, walking into the face of a sturdy wind. I climbed the few steps to the creaking porch and ignored the recessed doorbell, thinking it probably didn’t work anyway, and knocked lightly on the door. I heard approaching footsteps. I found a strong stance, feet apart, shoulders back.
The door opened. Rita appeared. “Hello, Alan James.” She was cool but genial. It was difficult to read her face in the eccentric porch light.
“Hello,” I said, much too brightly. My voice cracked.
She stood aside, invited me in to the close hallway, and shut the door behind me. Her long brushed hair was drenched yellow under the overhead light; a shimmer of blazing summer sun on rippling yellow fields. She wore a gold cashmere cardigan sweater, blue silk blouse, chocolate brown corduroy pants and short dark brown heels with studs. Conservative dress for Rita, but whatever she wore she improved and enhanced.
“Did you model that?” I asked, stiffly.
She was distracted and edgy, glancing over her shoulder. “No…No, not this.” She made a vague gesture toward the living room. “Let’s get this thing over with. They’re waiting.”
I gently lifted my shoulders, released the tension, and followed her across the threadbare hall carpet into the square unprosperous living room. I saw heavy brown curtains and worn 60’s style furniture, with swirling patterns of orange and tan. I intuitively felt that despair and cheerlessness had seeped into the very icy blue walls. The light above was lurid; revealing, with unapologetic candor, every crack, scrape and flaw of the room.
The humidity instantly shot up. Damp smudges formed on my back, underarms and forehead. My clothes were heavy from it. My aftershave filled the room like an insult and I saw Rita wipe her nose and sniff.
There they sat, Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald. She with the cold stare of an enemy, and he with the friendly but cunning, shifty eyes of a salesman. Mrs. Fitzgerald wore a royal blue dress and makeup, neither of which helped to thaw her severity. Her hair had a sculptured beauty shop look—as if it had been poured into a mold and baked into a hard gray crust. It accentuated her thin wrinkled neck and her sagging left eye.
Frank Fitzgerald was not what I had expected. He appeared younger than his wife, more vital and certainly more handsome than she was pretty. I didn’t see the match, and the disparity was so stark I stared at them much too long. What in the world had brought them together? He seemed bold and magnetic, a bit sinister; she, worn and frosty, filling a disturbing space.
Frank rose from the frayed brown recliner and seemed to keep rising. He was tall—a least 6’ 2”—but probably more, and most likely in his middle 40’s. The face was angular, a bit hard, though the blueberry twinkling eyes softened it. He had clipped blond hair, thinning, a short ginger beard and a strong chin. He was lean, with an obvious love for weightlifting. Under the black T-shirt were a broad chest, pinched waist and powerful shoulders. They were not only impressive, but intimidating. A four inch tattoo of a threatening saber, on his right thick beam of a forearm, suggested a formidable foe. He wore tight jeans and stood firmly, anchored by large feet in polished black boots.