The Ballad of West Tenth Street

by Marjorie Kernan

  A pot-bellied stove sat on a brick platform on the back wall, a coal and wood bin on one side, and a rough kitchen counter on the other. A two-ring gas burner sat on top of it. The floor had been insulated below the structure, which sat on posts, then decked over inside with plywood and a layer of thick linoleum of mulberry red. Four kerosene lanterns hung from brackets on the walls. A small pine table sat beside the west window, a sturdy ladder-back chair next to it. An armchair covered in a faded Brunscwig Indienne took up the corner opposite the bed. A tiny porch had been built onto the front, replacing the steps. It had white balustrades and its boards were painted sky blue, as were those beneath its roof. It was made entirely of salvaged parts from nineteenth-century houses. The white paint on the balustrades and railing had been left in a state of nature.

  Next to the shed, between it and the fence, a stack of tools, nails, lumber, and sawhorses sat with boxes containing a tea kettle, sauce pans, jelly jars, muffin tins, a small mirror, coffee cups, plates, soup bowls, mixing bowls, a Staffordshire milk pitcher with a bucolic scene in blue, candlesticks, candles, silverware, cooking implements, pot holders, tea towels, three flashlights, kitchen matches, a set of cast-iron frying pans, a broom, cleaning items, two tin buckets, a plastic washbasin, bath towels, a box of Pears soap, a percolator, balls of twine, a cat litter box, writing paper and envelopes, a needlepoint rug, two faded red quilts, a sewing kit, a pair of men’s slippers in Black Watch tartan, and a complete set of Dickens.

  Behind the pile of stuff was Mrs. D’s triumph, a completely, flagrantly illegal defiance of every city code, a glorious structure known as a two-holer. There had been enough of that damn Frenchwoman’s yellow boards to finish the inside, the door had the traditional crescent moon cut in the top and its roof was hidden from spying neighbors beneath a pergola. In the spring, if said bum hadn’t fried himself to a crisp with the kerosene lanterns, she’d have a wisteria vine planted to train over it.

  21

  Kristen walked determinedly up Greenwich Avenue, headed for the Hollander house. Her thin legs trembled as she shoved Rinaldo’s stroller. The corner of her mouth jerked as she practiced what to say. Oh, hi! I was right here and thought I’d just stop in to say hello….

  She stopped to blow her nose, then shoved the tired Kleenex back in her pocket. She was chaining the stroller to the tree in front of the Hollander’s when she stopped, straightening up to listen. Someone inside the house was playing the piano. And if it was Deen it would cause a certain someone to have a heart attack, because it was a hell-for-leather barroom version of some Mozart variations. As music went, it was pure sacrilege.

  Kristen snuck up the sandstone steps, Rinaldo in her arms. Her sharp nose, reddened by the cold, sniffed, drinking in the implications. She knew it was Deen, knew the way her fingers made notes. Oh boy, this was good—the little brat would never want Paul to know that she took the music he taught her and turned it into crude honkytonk. She waited until the song ended, then rang the buzzer.

  Deen opened the door. “Oh, hi,” she said, not very enthusiastically.

  “Hi, Deen. Your mom at home?”

  “Nope.”

  “Are you going to ask me in?”

  “Sure, I guess.”

  Kristen looked down at Deen, a bright smile on her lips. “So, this is where you live. What a fabulous house!” She peeled off her coat and walked into the living room. “Your mom bought it for like nothing in the eighties, right?”

  “Did you want to see her?” Deen asked, showing some spirit. “Because she won’t be home for a long time. I’ll tell her you came by.”

  “Let’s you and me talk for a minute, Deen,” Kristen said, sitting on the sofa and patting the cushion next to her. Deen crouched miserably on the ottoman nearby.

  “I think we have something we need to get clear, don’t you? Hmm, Deen?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like, what Paul would say if he found out about your other music.”

  Deen didn’t ask how she’d found out, grown-ups just did find stuff out, and she hung her head, worried.

  Children are perpetually being told not to do certain things, and of course are always trying to find out why. They must, if they are going to grow up and learn anything about the world, must always be pushing at the walls that surround them. Even the dullest children experiment with chewing gum, or what happens when you light a certain toy on fire. Imaginative children lead lives riddled with worry, and have many secrets they need to keep.

  Adults look back and think such fears negligible, but to a child they are real. They are not so much afraid of punishment as being shown, once again, proof of the cruel truth that they are silly, inconsiderate, naughty children, who at this rate may never graduate to that shimmering city called adult freedom.

  So Deen hung her head and mumbled something, while Kristen looked down at her, triumph an ugly gleam in her eyes.

  The front door opened and Sadie rushed in. She threw her cell phone onto a chair, saying: “Miserable piece of shit!” to it, then went to the telephone.

  “Deen, darling, Uncle Brian’s been in an accident. No, no—he’ll be all right, really,” she added, seeing her daughter’s face.

  “Kristen, what’re you doing here? Hang on a sec,” Sadie waved her hand for silence. “Trace, what’s the news?” Sadie listened, saying, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. “Can you book me on the next flight to Heathrow? Really? That’s great. I’ll be ready. Yeah, I’ll tell him.”

  She put the receiver down. “They’re sending a car for me, the flight’s in two hours. Shit!” Sadie rubbed her hand over her eyes. “I have to get this all together quick. Deen, I have to go to London, Brian was on his stupid motorcycle, the bloody idiot. He has some quite serious injuries. He’d put me down as his next of kin, or whatever. Where’s Hames? Oh lord, what’m I going to do about you two? I really need to pack…. Deen, any friends you could stay with?”

  “You know I don’t have any friends, Munster.”

  “Well, yes you do,” Kristen said sweetly. “She could stay with us, Sadie. We’d love to have her.”

  “Oh, well, you sure?” Sadie asked. “At least it’s somewhere. And Hames can stay at the Fieldings, I’ll call Rachel right now.”

  Rachel Fielding agreed and the deal was done. Deen looked at her mother like a person who’d been wrongly sentenced to death might look at the judge. She opened her mouth to protest, then caught a look from Kristen. Better not, the look said.

  Sadie moved toward the stairs. “Oh Christ, I know it’ll be a bit hellish, darling. Still, it’ll be convenient for your lessons. I’ll make it up to you, promise. Meanwhile, I must fly.” With that she ran up the stairs. She knew she was making a mistake, should probably arrange for Deen to stay at the colonel’s, but it was all such a muddle. Brian was much more badly injured than she’d let on and she was desperately worried about him. Perhaps she’d sort it all out by phone in a day or two.

  Kristen looked away, pretending not to understand how grossly she’d been insulted. She buried the thought and smiled stickily at Deen. “Don’t worry, honey,” she said. “Your Uncle Brian’ll be okay and while your mom’s away I’ll be like a substitute mom to you. We’ll have a real nice time.”

  Deen felt anything but reassured. A half hour later Sadie kissed her and got into a black town car.

  Deen packed some clothes in her a knapsack, then followed Kristen through the streets to her lair. She walked several steps behind, dragging her feet, at each step feeling the bite of the shackles. It struck her that the terrible Rinaldo had been noiseless for the first time, as if somehow its mother had willed it to be. As if it were she who told it when to be quiet and when to shriek. She was filled with dread at the idea of living in that squalid hole, with those two crazy people and their offspring.

  I’ve got to get out of here,” she whispered into her cell phone later that evening. “Hames, really, I’ve got to. No, I can’t just take it for a few days, I’m telling you! Sshh, her
e she comes.

  “Hi, it’s me again. I don’t care! You have no idea what it’s like here. She served the most horrible spag bog for dinner. And Paul acted like he’s not sure who I am. And that baby? It screams nonstop when I just look at it. I thought about killing it. Yeah, but I’m under eighteen. What do you mean, they waive that for killing a baby? Okay, I know, yeah I know, it’d make that place Gretchen’s in look like a spa. I won’t. But I have to get out of here. Just somewhere. How do you know? The DHS can’t just…really? Shit, Hames, you have to help me. Oh, fuck, she’s banging on the door.”

  “Deen? Everything all right?” Kristen called through the door. “My, you are a one for cleanliness, you must’ve used up half the hot water in the building. Come on, honey, hop into your bed and I’ll give you a kiss good night.”

  Deen emerged, allowed herself to be pecked on the head, then went to her cubbyhole across the hall, where Kristen had put out a futon. She cried for a while silently into the yellowish, coverless kapok-filled pillow, her tears describing new rings in its stains. The effort of crying and making no sound wore her out eventually, her silent heaves began to mingle with hypnagogic imagery, and at last she fell asleep.

  22

  Brian had been taken to St. Elfreda’s Hospital, on the edge of Richmond Park. Once the park had been a forest, where the kings of England hunted; now the deer that grazed there were nearly tame.

  Brian’s neck was broken, he had multiple broken bones, and an arm so badly scraped it would require grafts. He was braced and pinned into his bed, and doped into a coma while the doctors studied the injuries to his spine.

  The Rutledge Recording Company, Ree’s old label, had arranged for Sadie to be met at Heathrow. The chief himself, Sir Trevor Bagshaw, had offered to perform this courtesy. He’d known Sadie long ago, when he’d been a sound mixer for the company, a lowly technician, unnoticed and unloved as he watched the band, envying their sleek antics.

  As he sat in the back of his Bentley, waiting for his driver to find Sadie, he wondered if she’d recognize him. It had been a long time. He was proud of his beautifully cut hair and his beautifully cut suit, but not quite as proud of his new paunch. He sucked it in, sitting up straighter.

  “Good Christ, Trevor?” Sadie said, getting in. “You’re looking very prosperous.”

  “Sadie, how good to see you again. I sent word you were to be VIP’d through the formalities—I hope that was the case?”

  “Sure, Trev. Some functionary whisked me right past all the proles. Who would’ve guessed it? You having me VIP’d, a loathsome verb I’m unfamiliar with, but is sadly all too clear, this Nazi staff car of yours, bespoke suits, what next? I’m afraid we must be getting terribly old.”

  Trevor nodded to the driver and they moved away from the curb. He longed to be able to think of a way of introducing the subject of his recent knighthood, but was afraid of Sadie’s jibes. He wasn’t at all sure that meeting her had been such a good idea.

  “How’s Brian?” she asked him.

  “Well, there’s hope.” He filled her in on the little he knew, then sighed. “It’s been good for his press though. Interest in Brian’s doings had rather fallen off of late. He’d get a kick out of how much his near death has excited the public. The papers are all over the story.”

  “Always keeping an eye on the residuals, eh Trev?”

  Sarcastic bitch, Trevor thought. Always did think she was above the common herd, prancing around like the queen of bloody Siam with the band, them and their long hair and golden looks.

  Sadie stopped paying attention to old Trev, tuning out his not-so-subtle tootings of his own horn. Looking out the window at the misted, dank winter air, moisture dripping down the noisome brickwork and gloomy evergreens of suburban London, she thought, Plus ça bloody change.…The dankness grew and formed horizontal streaks on the car window. She’d gazed out a thousand such windows, at the endless damp of London winters. It was fitting to return here now, in this season, to the London of memory. But it was not an auspicious time for healing.

  Ree, she thought, you died at this time of year. In the port of Amsterdam. The Dutch, in their thoroughness, had taken you to the hospital, but you were gone. They performed their humanitarian rites over your body, to no avail. Then they wrapped you in a spotless winding-sheet. Your hair still shone, I touched your cheek. They’d washed you, you smelled of chamomile.

  Afterward they offered me a veritable United Nations of grief-women, of every known cult, from starched Catholics to earth-worshipping priestesses. But you were dead, so I had no use for their words.

  She traced a shape, a bird’s head with a long beak, on the window, then rubbed it out. Trevor was still nattering on; she had no idea about what and didn’t care. She hadn’t been called to Ree’s side as he lay dying, no one had.

  Brian was the last of them. Giff had died soon after Ree in what was described as a boating accident, and Evan, the bass player, a few years later, of an overdose as well. The dear old sixties had demanded many sacrifices.

  If Brian lived long enough he might someday be an old man. She tried to picture it. He’d be a bit crooked, and his hair a white brush. His nose would become rather remarkable, a gargoyle’s. But she could picture him hopping about like a gnome, talking about his latest project, a wizened thing with still the remains of the sinew needed to haul ass on a heavy guitar.

  Perhaps, she thought, I’ll be in time to help him. Because he was the last, it didn’t bear thinking about losing him. She made a vow to do everything she could. It would mean staying here for as long as it takes, a voice in her head said. Well then, I will, she answered.

  The car passed a stand of great elms, the winter morning cupping them in an amphitheater of mist. Their branches were bare, exposing the nests of a colony of rooks, ragged bolls of leaves clogging the tree limbs. A shaft of lemonish light fell from between the clouds and the rooks rose, circling their territory, their cries stamped into her memory: Ra-cah, ra-cah, ra-coah-cah.

  Trevor had cannily let the press know when Sadie would be arriving at St. Elfreda’s, where they thronged the front entrance, cameras ready. As Sadie got out their voices rose in a gabble; theresheis, oi Saids, give us a pose, oi, over here, be a dear and give us a quote, Brian and you getting hitched? Secret love, is it? future Mrs. Brain, eh, show us a bit of leg, got any news of the lad? He wake up yet then? Still carrying a torch for Ree? The kids comin’ to join you, love?

  Sadie was much bigger news in the United Kingdom than in New York. She’d been a bit of a rock princess here, in her youth. She pushed her way through the crowd, kicking a shin where needed, and pushing off a fat reporter who wouldn’t move out of the way. When she reached the top step she turned and gave them a crooked smile, letting them snap away. She’d learned long before that the press was like a caged beast, that you had to be its master, but that if you didn’t toss it some meat once in a while it would devour you.

  Outside Brian’s room the specialist in charge waited for her gravely, a chart in his hand. As Sadie walked toward him down the corridor she began planning. She would play the grieving female, but not Brian’s female. More the widow of the great Ree, chaste and untouched since Ree’s death. The doctor was in his late fifties, she guessed, and she’d use everything in her bag of tricks to get him on her side. Make him win the first tremulous smile from her, all the usual rot.

  As she drew close enough and he put out his hand, she read two things in his face—that he was pleased by her associated fame with the band, and that he was afraid to tell her what he knew. Her left foot came down wrong and she put a hand out to the wall.

  The next thing she knew, she was lying on a hospital bed. A nurse was staring at her, from behind the doctor, who was taking her pulse.

  “Mrs. Hollander, I’m Mr. Mendelsen. Brian’s surgeon. You fainted, probably due to the flight and the stress over your friend’s condition. You’re in the extra bed in Brian’s room. We’ll let you lie here for a bit, shall we? Yes, u
ntil you feel better. Nurse, will you get Mrs. Hollander some orange juice, please?”

  “I’m awfully sorry I fainted,” Sadie said.

  “Well, well. Now, I think you should try to sleep after you’ve had the orange juice. Then later we can talk about Brian’s condition and what you can do to help him.”

  “He’s there?” Sadie said, nodding her head toward a curtain around the other bed.

  “Yes. You mustn’t talk to him just yet, I’ll want to be there when you do, to determine if there are any signs of response, all right? Good, good. Ah, here’s the nurse with the orange juice.”

  As soon as they had gone, Sadie sprang up and slipped through the curtain surrounding Brian’s bed. Geeze, he looked like something the cat had dragged in. He was strapped and trussed into a number of pale plastic armatures, his head surrounded by something like a cross between a helmet and the stand for a Christmas tree. Like a knight in plastic armor, on a plastic tomb.

  “Listen, you cocksucking piece of shit,” she said to him. “What in the bloody hell were you thinking, acting the lad, doing stupid tricks on your motorcycle? For Christ’s sake, Brian. And why the hell didn’t you ever get married, have some weepy, impossibly young bride here, instead of me? You asshole! I had to leave my children with who knows who, rushed off with the oddest assortment of clothes. And Gretchen will be wondering why I don’t visit. It’s a disaster, and it’s all your bloody fault. So you owe me. You get your ass in gear and get us out of this, hear me? Just fucking pull yourself together.”

  Brian’s face grew pinker and he let out a phff of air with his lips.