by Levy, Marc
Sanji raced toward 9th Street, grabbing on to a street sign as he made a dangerous turn, and sprinted to 6th Avenue.
“Wait for me,” he pleaded breathlessly.
Chloe was about to enter the crosswalk, but she turned around. Sanji caught up with her and stood in front of her wheelchair.
“I’m sorry I acted that way in the lobby, but Deepak was there—”
“I waited long enough last night,” Chloe interrupted him. “You’re going to make me late—move out of the way!”
“After you tell me what I did to upset you.”
“Do I seem upset?”
“Frankly, yes.”
“I didn’t ask you for anything. I didn’t expect anything. It was you who— So was it a game? A bet? To see if you could win over a girl in a wheelchair? You have every right to change your mind, but you could have had, if not the class, then at least the courtesy to answer me.”
“I’ve been blamed for a lot of things since yesterday, but this is all news to me.”
“The note I left on the desk for you. Maybe you didn’t read it?”
“When did you leave this note?”
“Last night, so you would find it when you got there. I gave it to Deepak, and he at least is reliable. So don’t try to come up with some elaborate excuse.”
“I would’ve had a hard time reading it, because I was in jail.”
“It just gets better and better! Every time I see you, it’s one surprise after another. Did you run someone over?”
“Very funny! You probably know about the necklace. I’m their prime suspect.”
“Tell me you’re innocent!”
“I wouldn’t go that far, but I’m certainly not guilty. What did your message say?”
“I’m not going to tell you. Now let me through—I’m really going to be late.”
Sanji hailed a taxi. He expertly lifted Chloe out of her wheelchair, put it in the trunk, and sat down next to her.
“The corner of 28th Street and Park Avenue,” he told the driver.
They arrived ten minutes later. Sanji accompanied Chloe to the door of the studio building.
“What did this letter say?” Sanji insisted.
“That I agreed.”
“Agreed with what?”
“With your theory about the end of the world and a little interlude of happiness. You have twenty-four hours to find a way to redeem yourself. Come get me tomorrow at five thirty.”
“Why not tonight?”
“Because I have plans.”
There’s a strange paradox at the beginning of a love story. Full of fear, you hesitate to tell the other person they’re constantly on your mind. You want to give everything, but you hold back. You set happiness aside as if to preserve it. Budding love is both foolish and fragile.
Although he was very late, Sanji arrived at his meeting relatively calm. Sam was used to him being on Mumbai time. But seeing him standing there with his elbows propped on the reception desk, Sanji expected the worst. This morning was certainly turning out to be full of accusations and excuses. But Sam did not reprimand him. In fact, he seemed to be in an excellent mood. He didn’t say a word until they were in the elevator, when he asked Sanji to please press the button.
“Amazing!” Sam exclaimed.
“Very funny,” Sanji replied.
At the end of the day, Sanji went to take over from his uncle. They exchanged a few polite words, and Deepak left to go visit Mr. Rivera.
At the hospital, he hesitated to tell Mr. Rivera about the stolen necklace. But Deepak was a terrible liar, and when his colleague kept asking what was bothering him this time, Deepak told him everything.
“I didn’t even know she had a piece of jewelry worth so much. I’m sure if it hadn’t been a gift from her husband, she would have sold it a long time ago. She’s not exactly rolling in money,” Rivera explained.
“I didn’t know. I don’t get involved in their lives,” Deepak answered absently.
“What are you thinking about?”
“How did someone get in without us seeing? We always stay at our post.”
“Not always.” Rivera sighed.
“And please don’t ask if my nephew had something to do with it, because he didn’t.”
“I wasn’t going to ask you that.”
“I don’t even want you to ask it to yourself.”
“Then who was it, and how did they do it?”
“Which one of us is the detective-novel expert? You should be able to find the guilty party!”
“Let’s proceed methodically,” Rivera suggested in his best gumshoe manner. “The motive is obvious: money. Now, let’s think about how the thief went about it . . .”
Sitting up in bed, Mr. Rivera became lost in thought while Deepak, on his chair, fell into a deep sleep. An hour later, he awoke with a start when he heard his colleague shout: “It was an inside job!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Think about it, for goodness’ sake! If the cops had seen someone on the tapes, they would have already come back with a photo so you could identify the culprit. So no one went in or out, because the thief was already in the building! Since you can vouch for your nephew, it must be—”
“Must be who?”
“Nothing, forget it—I’ve had too many painkillers tonight.”
“What are you talking about? You haven’t taken a single one since I’ve been here.”
“But I’m tired and you are, too.”
Deepak got the message. He grabbed his jacket and left, more disturbed than he had been when he’d gotten there.
The state he found Lali in didn’t do anything to calm his nerves. His wife was sitting at the kitchen table. The table wasn’t set, and she hadn’t made dinner.
“They put my nephew in jail,” she stammered, on the verge of tears.
“They just held him overnight, my love,” Deepak replied, kneeling beside her.
He held Lali in his arms and comforted her with all the tender affection he was capable of.
“They did it to intimidate him,” he added. “They wanted to get a confession, but Sanji didn’t give them one because he’s innocent.”
“Of course he’s innocent. This country was a promised land for immigrants like us. We worked like dogs, out of duty and gratitude, and look what they do to us. Foreigners are treated like criminals. If this is the America of today, then I want to go back to India.”
“Come on, Lali, calm down. It won’t last.”
“If an upstanding man like my nephew is arrested by the police, then what will become of us?”
“Just remember you didn’t even know him a few weeks ago.”
“My blood flows in his veins, so if I tell you he’s honest, please just take my word for it!”
“Do I need to mention how your family treated us?”
Lali pushed back her chair and left the kitchen.
“This really isn’t the time to try to get the last word!” she shouted, slamming the bedroom door.
Deepak shrugged his shoulders, opened the refrigerator door, and served himself the previous night’s leftovers, a bowl of curried okra that he ate cold, alone in the kitchen.
That night, it was his turn not to get a wink of sleep. He brooded on dark thoughts. Maybe Lali was right. To wrap up their investigation, the police didn’t need to catch the real criminal; they just had to point the finger at someone, and Sanji would fit the bill.
23
A storm rumbled over the city. The morning rush had been disrupted. Deepak’s lobby looked like Noah’s ark—almost all the owners were stuck there.
Deepak, whose umbrella had been blown inside out by the first assaults of the wind, was getting soaked. Undaunted, he waved his arm madly in the hope of hailing taxicabs. Rain was streaming down his neck, seeping under his uniform coat, and soaking his shirt so thoroughly that it stuck to his back. His uniform had lost all its splendor. When a delivery truck sprayed brackish water onto his pants,
it was not just the weather that was stormy. Dull anger came over Deepak and grew minute by minute. And the police car that pulled up in front of him didn’t make him feel any calmer.
“Missing monsoon season?” the detective asked sardonically as he lowered his window. “Here are the videotapes,” he added, handing him a package. “Be careful, it’s not waterproof. In any case, we didn’t find anything interesting.”
Deepak looked him in the eyes.
“I have information about your investigation.”
The detective turned off the engine. He left his car double-parked and followed Deepak into the lobby where Mrs. Zeldoff, Mrs. Clerc, the Williamses, Mrs. Collins, and Professor Bronstein were waiting for the rain to let up. Some were scrutinizing the black clouds through the iron-and-glass door, while others were busy sending texts and e-mails in an overall atmosphere of nervousness and impatience.
Deepak stood in front of his desk and cleared his throat to get everyone’s attention.
“I stole the necklace.”
Suddenly, no one was thinking about the rain anymore.
“What are you talking about?” the professor said anxiously. “Not you, Deepak, this doesn’t make any sense.”
“No one asked for your opinion—let him speak!” Mrs. Williams cried out.
Deepak divulged all, explaining what had led him to commit such an act. His disappointment, the despair he felt when they had wanted to replace him with a crude machine, his humiliation when they accused him of sabotaging the equipment in question. He had been treated like a nobody, and despite his devotion, the owners for whom he had sacrificed everything had shown how little they thought of him, so why not just help himself? The theft of this necklace wouldn’t bankrupt Mrs. Collins; her insurance would cover it. But what insurance did he have to take care of his aging wife? One year’s salary?
“I should probably express remorse,” he continued. “Maybe I’d get a shorter sentence. But I don’t feel any. I even think I enjoyed paying you back in kind. And when I say ‘in kind,’ I mean as kindly as you repaid me for my services.”
Deepak took off his cap and coat, placed them on the desk in a dignified manner, and held out his wrists to the detective.
Pilguez took out a pair of handcuffs from his pocket but didn’t have the heart to secure Deepak.
“That’s all right. You can put them on before we get to the station,” he said, grabbing Deepak’s arm.
The owners saw the elevator operator disappear into the back of the police car, and they were so shocked that they all came out under the awning to watch the vehicle make its way toward the arch.
When they went back into the lobby, Mrs. Williams was furious.
“Don’t tell me it’s starting all over again, except now we’ll have to climb the stairs during the day!”
Professor Bronstein’s cell phone rang.
“I’m going to get fired if I show up late to the studio—I don’t care if it’s raining, I’ll take the subway if need be, but, please, Dad, tell Deepak to come and get me!” Chloe said.
The professor hung up. Seeing only one way to help his daughter, he addressed his neighbors.
“If there’s still an ounce of compassion left in this building, I need volunteers to help Chloe.”
Mrs. Collins was the first to speak up.
“What just happened right in front of your eyes wasn’t enough for all of you?” she exclaimed. “Come on, get moving, let’s go up!”
Mrs. Collins’s demonstration of authority succeeded in mobilizing the troops. Even the Williamses joined the procession.
Soon Chloe heard a big commotion behind her kitchen door.
As everyone had their own idea of how to get Chloe downstairs, the descent took place in the most chaotic fashion possible. Her father carried her in his arms down to the fifth floor, where Mr. Zeldoff took over. Mrs. Clerc was in charge of carrying the wheelchair with the help of Mrs. Williams, who got her fingers caught in the wheel’s spokes, whereupon Mrs. Collins informed her that she was useless. Mrs. Zeldoff stepped in, a big smile on her face. Awakened by this racket, Mr. Morrison appeared on the landing in his underwear and asked the question no one wanted to answer. What had happened to Deepak?
On the next floor down, Mrs. Williams took great pleasure in proclaiming that her suspicions had proven true; Deepak had confessed.
And Chloe didn’t wait to reach the second floor to express her indignation.
“Impossible!” she shouted. “How could you let him do something like that—aren’t you ashamed of yourselves?”
On the ground floor, Mr. Williams placed Chloe back in her wheelchair. A heavy silence filled the lobby.
“She’s right,” said Mrs. Collins. “We should be ashamed. Who among us could believe for one second that Deepak is a thief? Our suspicions wounded his pride, and so he confessed.”
“Or he did it to protect his nephew,” Mrs. Williams whispered.
But after a series of scathing looks from her fellow owners, she quickly lost interest in making this argument.
“That’s settled, then,” Chloe continued. “Since we all agree, it’s up to us to get him out of this. Meeting tonight at six p.m. on the ninth floor. And someone should inform Mr. Groomlat. We’re in this mess because of him. And, Mr. Morrison, please try to put some pants on before then.”
No one dared challenge Chloe’s claim to the first taxi that came by.
At noon, Sanji got a text message that ruined his afternoon.
Can’t see you tonight. Let’s say tomorrow.
xoxo Chloe
Arriving at 12 5th Avenue early for once, he was astonished to find the lobby empty and worried when he didn’t see his uncle. His worry only increased when he realized that the elevator was on the ground floor and the front door wasn’t bolted. He rushed to the basement, checked the storeroom, called Deepak several times, and dashed up to the ninth floor.
Mr. Bronstein opened the door, and he could hear voices in the living room.
“Is my uncle with you?” Sanji asked, panting.
“Wait a moment, please, it would be better if she explains the situation,” the professor replied.
Chloe appeared in the hallway a few moments later.
She told him what had happened that morning. Before Sanji had time to react, she assured him that no one doubted Deepak’s innocence or why he felt he needed to make such a confession. They had come up with a plan to get him out of trouble.
“He’s going to spend the night in jail? But he’ll never recover from that!”
Chloe took Sanji’s hand.
“I hope this doesn’t come off as arrogant, but I believe I know him better than you do, or at least I’ve known him for longer. This was Deepak’s way of expressing and venting his anger. Just before you got here, we told the police that he was innocent and that we had found the guilty party.”
“Who the hell is it—I’ll wring their neck!”
“It’s a bit more complicated than that.”
“I have to let my aunt know. When her husband doesn’t come home, she’ll be worried sick.”
“I already took care of it. You should be with her. When I called her a little while ago to see how she was doing, she was on her way to the police station.”
Behind Chloe, Mrs. Zeldoff poked her head into the hallway.
“I thought I heard your voice. You’re here just in time—I was about to leave. Please take me to the third floor.”
Sanji gave her a dirty look and left without answering.
Chloe followed him onto the landing.
“Will you be okay?”
“They don’t deserve him!”
“They realize that now. When everything is back to normal, I’d love to have dinner with you.”
Sanji gave her a half-hearted smile and left.
Lali was waiting on a bench inside the police station. The desk officer had told her ten times that she wasn’t allowed to stay there, and, ten times, she had calmly replied that
, in that case, he could throw her in a cell so she could be with her husband. Eventually, he gave up on enforcing the rules. After all, if she wanted to spend the night there, it made no difference to him.
Sanji sat down next to her and put his arm around her shoulders.
“They’ll let him out tomorrow morning, I promise.”
“You’re a policeman now?”
“I was worried when I didn’t find him in the lobby, so I went up to see Chloe, and she told me what happened.”
“You don’t call her ‘Miss Chloe’ anymore?”
“The owners had a meeting in her apartment. They have a plan—I don’t know what it is, but they seem confident.”
“I’m sick and tired of hearing about those people!” Lali said sharply.
“Did you bring him clothes?” Sanji asked, seeing a small suitcase at his aunt’s feet.
“For him and for me, too, along with all our savings to pay his bail. I even brought our passports.”
“What do you need your passport for?”
“To leave! As soon as he gets out. I want to go back to India. I warned him that, after they were finished with you, they’d come after us.”
“They didn’t go after anyone. Deepak turned himself in. But his confession isn’t believable. Let me take you home—this is no place for . . .”
“Go ahead and say it: for a woman of my age?”
“For my aunt.”
Lali placed her hands on her nephew’s cheeks and looked him straight in the eye.
“I’ve never slept without my husband . . . do you understand?”
So Sanji spent the night on the bench, watching over her.
At dawn, the desk officer went over to the coffee machine, punched it twice to turn it on, and brought them two coffees.
At seven a.m., Detective Pilguez entered the station, stopped in front of Sanji, nodded to Lali, and disappeared into his office.
At nine a.m., he returned to escort both of them into a little room and asked them to wait. For Sanji, the room brought back bad memories.
The door opened again shortly afterward, and Deepak took his wife in his arms.
“You should go home now, ma’am,” instructed Pilguez.