It suddenly occurred to Ceinwen that she spent a big chunk of every day dealing with people who refused to act like normal human beings. The elderly, the English. Retailers. “To be sociable?”
Miriam folded her arms. “You can’t be much more than twenty.”
“Twenty-one.”
“I thought so. And yet you keep attempting to, what’s the term, hang out with me. I’ve got more than half a century on you. I’m ancient. I bought a cemetery plot seven years ago.”
“Really? Whereabouts?” Next to Emil, or Jack?
Miriam’s hand flew to her forehead, then dropped. “Ceinwen. Do you realize that most girls your age would not hear that I’m preparing to die and promptly ask me where I plan to get planted?”
Miriam was implying she was weird. She was not weird, any more than she was obsessive. This she wasn’t going to let stand. “I’ve always related well to old—er people.”
“You don’t say,” said Miriam, flatly. “Why?”
The street door opened and a middle-aged woman came in, holding her child by the hand. They moved to let her pass, and despite the extra time the procedure gave, Ceinwen couldn’t come up with anything good. When mother and child had disappeared beyond the first landing she said, trying to sound casual, “They’re interesting.”
“No. They’re not. They eat bland food and check their blood pressure and worry about whether Reagan is going to cut Medicare. They watch CNN and go to bed early.”
“You don’t do any of those things.”
“Oh yes I do,” laughed Miriam. “Don’t you see what I’m saying? Go to a punk-rock club. I’ve been past that one on the Bowery. The famous one.”
“CBGB.”
“Yes!” said Miriam, sounding pleased for the first time. “Go there!”
“I’ve been there,” said Ceinwen, morosely. “I didn’t fit in.” She’d worn a good dress, too.
“All right then, find another place. Have Matthew find another place. Dye your hair a different color. Find a girlfriend your own age. What’s so great about old people?”
“They’ve lived through history.” That was what Granana always said.
“So have we all,” was the crushing response.
“And,” said Ceinwen, trying to salvage something, “they like the same movies I do.”
“I suspect”—Miriam held up a finger—“we have the heart of the matter right there.” Miriam didn’t want to talk to her again. Especially not about movies.
“You’re telling me you’re going upstairs to watch CNN?”
“Nightline. Since you ask.”
Out of patience and with her tact nowhere to be found, she lashed out: “Why the hell do old folks want to watch the news all the time?”
Miriam gave a very slight smile. “It makes us glad we won’t be around much longer.” She turned to go and said, “Maybe some other time.”
“Sure.” It was never going to happen.
Monday morning, she made a list. Talk to Gene at Bangville and see if Lauren ever sold anything. Steve said she didn’t, but maybe he didn’t know. Talk to Steve and see if he knew more about where collectors got things. Both of those ideas involved calling Fred to get the phone numbers, and she better have a good story ready for that. Go back to the library and start working through the Times, to see if Norman Stallings had ever been mentioned.
When she’d finished, she stared at the page for a bit and decided to go to the movies to clear her head. Up to the Thalia for Waterloo Bridge and The Red Shoes. Tragic ballerina double feature: first the prostitute, then the suicide. The Thalia’s floor sloped down, then up. She sat near her favorite spot on the upper slope, a good way down from the inexplicable pillar that blocked the view from some seats. She concentrated on Shearer’s hair; that red had to be natural. Just like Kelly at the Brody.
She had some time before she went over to Matthew’s apartment. She looked down the street and thought, I have enough clothes, I don’t want to look at any more. The Strand is too far away, I’ll go tomorrow. She went into a drugstore and strolled to the L’Oréal shelf. Almost time to touch up her roots. She put her hand on the box and paused. It was just hair. Hair grows. Why not try something different.
When she arrived at Matthew’s place she put her bag on his counter and he pointed to the Duane Reade logo. “Not getting sick, are you?” She pulled the box out of the bag and showed him.
“Light Auburn?” he asked, as though the box said “Turquoise.”
“Change of pace,” she said. He was reading the back of the box. “Besides, I’ve got redhead-type skin. I even get freckles sometimes.”
“It says here,” he said, “that if you put this over blonde you’ll get Bright Light Auburn. You want bright red hair?”
“I’m young and it’s good to experiment, don’t you think?”
“I think I like it the way it is,” he said, and slipped the box back into the bag.
He didn’t ask about where she’d gone the night she stood him up, and despite his expectant looks over dinner, she didn’t offer. He was trying to teach her to play chess. Or, rather, she already knew how to play chess; Matthew was trying to teach her how not to be terrible at it. Some way into their first game she shifted her castle. He contemplated the board for a moment, then said, “Are you sure you want to do that?”
Uh-oh. “That means I shouldn’t?” He was looking at the piece as though it had insulted him. She said, “If I don’t move it, your pawn is going to take it.” More silence. “I don’t want you to take my castle. It’s my favorite.”
That got his eyes on her. “It’s called a rook. Why is it your favorite?”
“It’s the prettiest one.”
“See here, Greta Garbo. Sentiment has no place in chess. Look, I’ll show you. Now I move my bishop. And then you get your knight out of the way, because you like those too—no, don’t deny it—and then what happens?” She looked hard at the board. “What have you left open now?”
“My rook,” she said. Rook, not castle. I can do this.
“Sod your rook. Look again.”
She got it. “My queen.”
“Correct.” He put the pieces back, including her rook. “Try again. I’m giving you this one.”
This game wasn’t nearly as reasonable as he’d made it out to be. “How the hell am I supposed to know what’s going to happen two or three moves out?”
“You’re supposed to conjecture. It’s strategy.” She didn’t have the slightest idea what she should do now. She glared at her queen, who was forcing her to sacrifice her pretty rook, and she heard Matthew say, “It’s not a bad way to approach life in general, you know. Trying to think ahead.”
Tuesday, after a second look at her list of ways to figure out the Reifsnyder question, she went to the Strand. She was halfway to the movie section when she stopped to reconsider, and a leather-clad, shaven-head kid with a backpack almost collided with her as he stalked to the “Sell Your Books” desk. She shifted out of the way, then walked to the “review copies” table. Twenty minutes later she walked out with a half-price copy of Money, by some English writer named Martin Amis. She’d spotted the paperback on Matthew’s desk and taken a look, because the cover had film rolls on it. Matthew said she shouldn’t borrow Money unless she understood that it was definitely not her kind of movie the characters were making. She started it that night and had to underline the slang she didn’t know, so she would remember to ask when he got back.
Wednesday morning she went down to the bodega and bought a Voice. She spent lunch hour looking at the Help Wanted ads. If she wanted to take the Waterloo Bridge career path she was all set. The other ads, the legitimate ones—what did “front office appearance” mean? She didn’t know, but she suspected she didn’t have it. And why did so many places want a degree? Did she need college to answer the phones at a magazine?
Thursday, the day after Matthew left, she realized as she drank her coffee that she didn’t want to go to the library. She didn�
�t want to pore through a movie book or try to call anyone. She didn’t want to do anything.
She’d told Jim and Matthew that she wanted to make sure Mysteries survived for the sake of the people who made it. She said she wanted to bring back a bit of Emil for Miriam. It wasn’t true, or at least it was only partly true. She wanted to see the movie. But how could she know if it was any good? What was so special about this film, when you got right down to it? No one knew anymore if it had been something great, or “quite dreadful,” in the words of Lucile Pierrepoint. Even Miriam said she wasn’t sure. No one knew if Emil had talent, or if he was just another German with a bad attitude. And a drinking problem. Don’t forget that.
She took her notes and stacked them neatly on top of her bookshelf. She spent Monday and Tuesday reading Money. It was funny, and mean, but it was also extremely strange to name a main character John Self, and have her thinking for a couple of hundred pages that this was obviously a self-portrait, and then have the writer put himself in the book, with his own name. Martin Amis, right there. She made some more notes in the margins.
Thursday night she came home and was walking toward her room when Talmadge intoned, “Doesn’t she remind you of somebody? Somebody we used to know?”
“Vaguely. Such a long time ago, very long ago and far away, and we were all so young and innocent.” Jim had the back of his hand to his forehead.
“I’ve got it, that little blonde we used to live with. Such a sweet young thing. Whatever became of her?”
They were standing next to each other, like a vaudeville act. “My dear, didn’t you hear?” said Jim. “She became involved with”—a big pause, then a stage whisper—“a foreigner.”
“No! Please tell me—he wasn’t—he couldn’t be—English, could he?”
“He was. And what happened, it breaks the heart. He imprisoned her in the Tower. And that’s where she must live, to this day. She has to stand by the case and when the royal family wants to wear something, she says ‘May I help you?’”
“OH MY GOD.”
“And that’s not the worst of it. They’re forcing her to help them with the costume Crown Jewels.”
“Do you two bozos want to see a movie?” interjected Ceinwen. “Like, in a theater?”
Talmadge came up close and pointed at her, like Bela Lugosi. “From … what … year?”
“This year, silly. Let’s see what’s playing.”
Jim staggered. “Who are you? What have you done with Ceinwen?”
She wasn’t going to see Freddie Krueger, she couldn’t go that far. But she wasn’t going to see Radio Days, either, even though she liked Woody Allen. It was set in the 1940s, and when Ceinwen wanted the 1940s on film, she went straight to the source. She talked them into Angel Heart, which wasn’t that hard; Jim confessed to having a thing for Mickey Rourke. Angel Heart, it turned out, was set in the 1950s, but at least she’d tried. She attempted to argue them into liking it, though she hadn’t much liked it herself. They were all in bed by 1:00 a.m.
When the phone began to ring, she tried to look at the clock, but knocked it over. She made her way into the living room as she heard Matthew’s voice on the machine saying, “Ceinwen, are you there?”
She picked up the receiver. “Matthew?” The overhead light blazed on. Talmadge was wearing boxers and a T-shirt and scowling at her.
“I’m terribly sorry,” Matthew was saying, “did I wake you?”
“Oh please, you know you did.” She’d been so miserable all week, and suddenly she knew that all she’d needed was his accent, his voice. Not just Talmadge imitating it.
“Tell him,” announced Talmadge, “he can’t be much of a mathematician if he can’t add up the time difference from the West Coast. Shit, even I can do that.”
“Is that Talmadge?”
“Yes, he’s just going back to bed. Give me a minute.”
She waved good-night. Talmadge began to slouch out of the room and paused at the entrance. “Light on, or off?”
“Off, please.”
“Kinky.” He switched it off and when he was safely back behind his screens, she pulled the phone into her room, slid down to the bed and put her mouth close to the receiver. “What on earth were you thinking? Poor Talmadge.”
“I was thinking you might want to know what the weather was like today here in southern California.”
He called to flirt? The timing was weird, but he must miss her, too. She played along. “I’m assuming it was sunny.”
“Correct. Sunny. About 24—that’s 75 in your money, I suppose. Low humidity, no clouds. And I had the morning off.”
“I’m happy for you, sugar,” she drawled.
“Are you, honey. Perhaps you’d like to know how I spent my one morning’s holiday in warm, sunny, dry Los Angeles.”
She yawned. “I hope you wore sunblock.”
“Oddly enough, there is very little direct sunlight in the archives of the L.A. Times.”
“Matthew!” She cringed at how loud that came out and went to shut the door. “You were looking up something?”
“Yes.”
“Something for me?” It was a second chance at Christmas.
“Yes again.”
He wanted her to ask, and he had more patience than she did. “Who, what?”
“Norman Stallings.”
She fell flat on her back with a bounce, and spoke without caring what was in her voice. “You’re wonderful. Did you find anything?”
“I did. I’m so wonderful, I even made a copy.”
“He’s alive?”
“Since you’re basically an optimist, let’s say yes. I found an article from 1984.”
“What did it say?” she demanded, then suddenly felt remorse. “This could get expensive. Do you want to tell me when you get back?”
“I do not. I want to drag you out of bed in the wee hours and force you to listen to the entire story. It’s called revenge. And it’s worth the charges.” She heard some papers rustling. “It’s about Norman’s career as an assistant director. ‘In many far-flung corners of the country there live people whose Hollywood ties go back decades, to a more romantic and glittering time. Their names were never in lights, they never won the Oscars, but they were the people who kept the star machine spinning. One such veteran lives alone in a vast New York apartment, his neighbors passing him every day without realizing the memories he cherishes. His name is Norman Stallings. In the days before sound—’”
“I can’t believe it! It’s him!”
“Since you want to pause here anyway, I have something to say. I know you have a low opinion of the London press. But if you think they’d run this swill in the Guardian …”
“He’s in New York!”
“If he’s alive, yes, probably. The article’s dated—”
“But he must be,” she said, talking over him. “Miriam told me she plays mah-jongg with some old friends uptown. I bet you anything that’s Norman.”
“It’s certainly possible, although it could be—”
“She told me somebody wrote an article about a friend of hers and she didn’t like it. I guess she thought it made him out to be sad or something. This was it. Don’t you think?” No response. “Matthew?”
“Mm. Still here. If you’ll let me finish.”
“I’ll shut up now.”
More rustling. “What was I saying?”
“Swill.”
“Right. Anyway, nothing about Arnheim and very little about silents, but he worked for some of your old friends. Lubitsch, Wellman, someone named Bor-zhayj—”
“That’s Borzage.” Silence again. “I’m sorry. Keep going.”
“Bor-ZAY-gy, then. After I made a copy, I had the bright idea of going up to reception and asking if the reporter still worked there. You wouldn’t think he would be, writing that sort of prose, but he was and they let me see him.”
“Doorstepping,” she said, giddy.
He grunted. “I suppose. I don’t think it counts
if you’re doing it to a reporter. He was friendly enough until I showed him the article and then he put his head in his hands. I thought it must be remorse over all those clichés in one article, but no, he said a few days after it ran ‘some old bat’—that was his phrase—some old bat rang him up and shouted at him for half an hour. Said she was a friend of Norman’s and he should be ashamed of himself, making Norman out to be a pathetic old relic like that. Told him he had no respect for his elders, wanted to know if his mother knew he was out in the streets of New York exploiting people …”
She couldn’t help interrupting again. “Miriam.”
“Most likely, although he didn’t remember the name and he wasn’t sure she bothered to state it. He said ‘Good morning, Los Angeles Times’ and it was off to the races. I asked him how he happened to write this and he said he’d spent a holiday at his uncle’s apartment on Park Avenue up in the seventies and got acquainted with Norman. He was a lowly assistant trying to write features, so he interviewed Norman, and when he returned, they took it. Why, I can’t imagine. You heard the beginning and the whole thing’s like that. ‘In 1932 he met the great Ernst Lubitsch, then and now a byword for sophistication …’”
“Park Avenue. In the seventies. Which Street exactly?”
“Unfortunately, I overplayed my hand, because I asked the same thing and he started to get suspicious and wanted to know why I was asking about this article. I’d introduced myself by saying I was trying to track down an old friend and I repeated that, and he suddenly seemed to think I was working for the lady who’d called him. Refused to say another word. Told me it would be unethical.”
“That’s all right, I can check the phone book.” She turned the clock over. It was past 3:00 a.m.
“In any event, Miriam has her revenge. They promoted him, but he’s reporting on the bond market.” She stared at the door to her bedroom and wondered whether she could grab the Manhattan White Pages from the living room without waking up Talmadge again. “You’re not saying anything. Are we happy?”
“You don’t know how happy. Thank you.” She inhaled and decided there was no point in holding back. “I know you didn’t want to be doing this while you’re working. What made you change your mind?”
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