“Precisely. We have a lot of Jim’s papers in our own files. No income tax returns from the forties and fifties, however. So someone else has them.”
“The sleaze vultures picked his corpse pretty clean. I’d say that if you haven’t heard from anyone, the guy that has them is as inefficient as O’Laughlin. The stuff is gathering dust in some scumbag’s office.”
“That’s the way I figure it too.”
Vince nodded. Not once had he asked or even hinted at asking what the dirt was.
“You want me to poke around very gently and find out who might have those tax returns?”
“Very gently. And not a word to anyone. Not even to Peg.”
He rolled his soulful brown eyes. “Especially not to Peg.”
That afternoon, the smell of the hunt in my nostrils, I turned to the new question.
“Do you mind,” I asked Rosemarie, who I found in the darkroom working on the “Parochial School” pictures, “if I have a visit with Dr. Stone?”
She hesitated. “Is something wrong?”
“Not with you. I want to make sure that I’m responding properly.”
Not the whole truth, but only a little lie.
“You are … still, I don’t mind if you talk to her. Maybe it would be a good idea. Don’t expect any answers.”
I did indeed expect an answer, but that was not the point.
“Good, I’ll call her later on this afternoon. Now let’s see about these playground pictures.”
Moira, blissfully sleeping, let us work for a whole hour before she woke up and demanded (if Rosemarie was to be believed) that her Daddy hold her and sing to her.
Irish songs at that.
Afterwards I phoned Dr. Stone.
39
I was angry at my wife. Why had she not told me that Dr. Stone was absolutely gorgeous?
With a wedding band and a large ruby on the third finger of her left hand.
And fully aware of the impact of her tall, blond, Scandinavian beauty on me.
Shrinks weren’t supposed to be beautiful, not that beautiful. On the other hand, maybe she understood from the inside what it was like to be a woman desired by most men and envied by most women.
I must buy Rosemarie a big jewel. Why had I not thought of that before?
“As I’m sure you understand, Mr. O’Malley, I cannot discuss the nature or progress of a patient’s therapy with anyone, not even a spouse.”
“I quite understand, Doctor.”
“I cannot provide you with any prognosis, other than the unnecessary observation that she is an intelligent and determined woman.”
“I quite understand, Doctor.”
“I cannot tell you that the effect of the traumas she has experienced will ever be eliminated from her life.”
“I quite understand, Doctor.”
“I cannot offer you any advice on whether you should consider ending your relationship with her.” Dr. Stone raised an eyebrow, obviously expecting a reaction to that observation.
“I quite understand, Doctor.”
“I cannot promise you that your children will be unaffected either by her past experiences or by her present struggles in treatment.”
“I quite understand, Doctor.”
“In short, Mr. O’Malley”—she frowned, bemused by the little redhead who had found himself such a beautiful wife—“while I am happy to meet you with Mrs. O’Malley’s permission, I’m afraid that as in most other such interviews, I cannot say much that would reassure you.”
“I quite understand, Doctor.”
“If you understand all of these factors, Mr. O’Malley”—she considered the ends of her fingers, trying to remain patient—“then why have you come to see me?”
“I had a different question.”
“And that is?” Both eyebrows went up this time.
“Why has she survived?”
“I beg pardon?”
“Given what she’s been through, I am astonished that she is as healthy and as normal a woman as she is. Sure, she has some serious problems, and, sure, they’ll be with her for the rest of her life in one way or another. But why is she still alive?”
“That is a very interesting question.” Dr. Stone relaxed. “Intellectually and personally too, I would imagine.”
“Baffles you too?” I turned on all my Irish charm.
She actually smiled. “At first, very much so. You always want to distinguish between your patient’s real strengths and her neurotic mechanisms. Actually, there is no great mystery about Rosemarie’s survival.”
“Indeed?”
“The literature on the subject leads us to look for a number of factors, all of which seem to be present in her history—genetically determined strength; a powerful person with whom to identify in early years, in this case her grandmother; deep insights—Rosemarie, as I’m certain you know, has certain mystical traits and experiences.”
So that’s what they were.
“I see.”
“And, perhaps most important, as a result of these other factors, a propensity to seek out and ally with those who can most effectively help one maintain some sort of basic personal integration.”
“In Rosemarie’s case, who would that be?”
She now smiled broadly. “Surely that is evident?”
“’Fraid not.”
“To use her term”—the smile became a grin—“the crazy O’Malleys.”
“Us?”
“At a very young age, Rosemarie intuited where her salvation could be found and clung to it with remarkable tenacity.”
I remember the overheard conversation between Mom and Dad in the apartment on Menard in 1940. They knew even then what was happening.
“I’ll be damned.”
“I rather doubt it, Mr. O’Malley.”
“But she’s saved all of us!” I exploded from my chair and began to pace around the doctor’s office. “All of us!”
“Oh. How interesting. Why don’t you explain what you mean.”
“I wouldn’t be a photographer if she had not edged me into it. Both my sisters’ marriages would have fallen apart if she hadn’t intervened, rather dramatically in fact. My brother wouldn’t be a priest, much less the effective priest he is if Rosemarie had not installed herself as his confidante. My parents would not be as happy as they are today if Rosemarie hadn’t mandated that they be happy. God only knows how much she has helped our nieces and nephews and our friends.”
“Really?” It was hard to tell whether she was actually surprised or only professionally surprised. “And you have told her this often?”
“No … hardly ever.”
“May I ask why not?”
“You know why not.”
“You’d be an interesting patient, Mr. O’Malley. You’d drive me back to my training analyst almost every day. Yes, I know why not, but I want you to say it.”
“Because she doesn’t want to hear it. She’d be furious.”
“You’re afraid of her fury?”
“Sure.”
“With good reason?”
“No. She’s a pushover when I tell her to cut it out.”
“And why doesn’t she want to hear that it’s been a two-way street, that in fact the balance of payments, if we may use a term from one of your professions, is rather more on her side than on the opposite side?
“I should get on the couch?”
“That won’t be necessary. I repeat, why would your wife not want to hear that she’s been a blessing to all the crazy O’Malleys?”
“‘Grace’ is the word Mom uses.”
“An excellent word. Now, why doesn’t she want to hear it?
“Because that would make her more lovable than she wants to admit she is.”
“Marvelous.” Dr. Stone rose from her desk. “Now let me say this to you, Mr. O’Malley: It is of the utmost importance that your wife hear this truth as often and with as much variety and persistence, as possible. She will react negatively at fir
st. You must not permit that to deter you.”
She shook hands with me.
“I thought you had a rule against giving direct advice to family.”
Her grin was almost like Rosemarie’s imp grin.
“I just broke that rule, Mr. O’Malley.”
40
“The news is not good, I’m afraid.” Vince sounded discouraged.
“Okay. Let’s have it.”
“The relevant part of O’Laughlin’s practice seems to have gone to a guy named Bob Roache, in his early forties, who makes Old Joe look like a paragon of integrity. Drinks, gambles, mixes with the Outfit. Lots of women. Doesn’t work hard. Seems to have lots of money. Almost debarred a couple of years ago. An Adlai Stevenson idealist gone sour.”
“He won’t let me look at the stuff.”
“Worse than that. If he finds out you’re looking for something, he’ll search for it too and then sell it to you, for as much as he can get.”
“Should I call him for an appointment?”
“No, don’t do that. It will alert him. Stop in at his office after lunch, about three o’clock, given his hours. He’ll be a little tuned, maybe a lot tuned, and mellow. Offer him some money. Do it discreetly … I know you can do that. Then don’t leave his office until you find what you want. Take it with you.”
“How much money?”
“Two thousand. And in cash.”
“Naturally.”
I hung up and went back to the darkroom. Under Rosemarie’s efficient management the “Parochial School” project was back on schedule.
“Vince,” I said before she could ask. “Minor business.”
“Is he all right?”
“Never sounded happier. He’s got a good wife. Almost as good as mine.”
“Blarney, but I love it. … Now what about this sweet old nun? Bride of Christ?”
We went back to work.
“What did you think of Dr. Stone?” She asked with elaborate casualness.
“You didn’t tell me she was gorgeous.”
“You didn’t ask. Some dish, isn’t she.”
“You bet.”
“Would you like to sleep with her?”
“Who wouldn’t?”
“Well, that’s an honest answer anyway.”
“Impressively competent.”
“I bet she thought you were cute.”
“You ask her.”
Rosemarie giggled. “There’ll be enough material in that question to keep us going for months.”
End of conversation.
I was no more going to tell her about my session with her shrink than she would tell me about hers.
And I was going to approach very carefully my fulfillment of Dr. Stone’s instructions.
The next day I visited Robert Roache’s expensive office suite in the Conway Building. The pretty blond secretary said, with considerable indifference, that he was not expected back that afternoon. Would I care to leave my name?
No I would not. I’d be back again some other day.
41
Rosemarie’s lips were drawn in a tight angry line—a thin jagged pencil mark scratched across her pale face.
“I won’t listen to that crap, Chuck, it’s simply not true.”
“Rosemarie,” I pleaded. “It is true. If you had not prodded me, I never would have become a photographer. Or finished my doctorate either.”
“I’m not a prodder,” she shouted. “Nor a meddling matriarch. I’m not responsible for anyone else’s mistakes besides my own.”
We were sitting in her office, sipping soda water at the end of a February day on which moist snow had piled up on the streets and walks. The kids, all but Moira, were building a snowman on the lawn, one that looked suspiciously like me.
For all my care and preparation I had bungled badly my attempt to tell Rosemarie that she had been grace for me and all the crazy O’Malleys.
She heard me say that a) she had meddled in our lives, and b) she was responsible for our mistakes.
That was not what I said at all, but she would not abandon her interpretation. Routed, I had to find a way to get off the field of battle to return again with another plan of attack.
“Rosemarie, would you please listen to me carefully?”
“I have listened, damn it, and I’m saying you’re wrong and I don’t want to hear anymore of it.”
“You have not listened. I did not say you were responsible for anyone else’s mistakes and I did not say you were a meddling matriarch.”
“You said I was a matriarch!” she scowled at me.
“Not today.”
“Well, you’ve said it before and you’re thinking it now.”
“I said you were a matriarch like my mother is.”
“That’s silly. I’m as different from her as night is from day.”
You see what happened? The subject became my words instead of her grace. A neurotic response indeed, but a remarkably ingenious one. Today I was not going to win.
“What I’m trying to say is—”
“I KNOW what you’re trying to say and I don’t want to hear it. Now don’t bother me with it anymore. I have to call the kids in and get supper ready.”
“Rosemarie—”
“You invade my privacy”—she jumped out of her chair—“by talking to my shrink. Then you come back and try to play shrink for me yourself. Well, you’re no damn good at it. Don’t ever try it again.”
She sailed triumphantly out of the room.
I had fallen flat on my face.
Or perhaps on another part of my anatomy. Bayonets fixed, the redcoats marched across the broad green field under a clear sky. Their cannons boomed behind them, producing puffs of white smoke. My ragtag peasant battle line had only spades and pikes and an occasional rusty musket. And my 50 caliber machine gun. Tim and Jenny were there, Cordelia and Ed, Peg and Vince, all dressed in Irish peasant clothes. When the advancing battle line was only fifty feet away, I opened fire. They kept coming. My bullets were blanks! They stormed into us! Somehow I changed the scene, reloaded my weapon and opened fire again. The redcoats turned and ran. I continued to mow them down. Then I saw Rosemarie on the ground, a lance protruding from her chest.
“Rosemarie!” I shouted.
I sat up in bed, uncertain as to what was real and what was not.
“Chucky,” she said sleepily, “are you having another one of your nightmares?”
“Are you all right?”
“Sure,” she raised her right hand feebly to wave me away. “Just sleepy. It was only a dream.”
“Sorry,” I said, now wide awake.
“It’s okay. Try to get some sleep. Tomorrow is a big day.”
It sure is, I thought.
42
Bob Roache did not intend to permit me to search the Clancy files unwatched.
Why hadn’t I expected that?
I finally found him in his office on the Friday afternoon before the family and a few guests were coming to dinner, allegedly to see the final shots for the “Parochial School” exhibit.
A man in his early forties with thinning brown hair, bloodshot eyes, and an expanding belly, Roache looked far too seedy for his tailor-made gray suit and his plush office. He did not seem particularly happy to see me, but was not antagonistic either. He may have had three or four drinks at lunch, but he was also watching me shrewdly, searching hungrily for the main chance.
A crook, but a clever crook.
“I suppose the boxes are around here someplace.” Bob Roache affected to be bored. “I don’t know that we have time to hunt for them right now.”
“It’s just some income tax returns that we need to settle a few questions about inheritance taxes. Old Jim Clancy had his fingers in a lot of pies.”
“So I hear,” Roache murmured. “So I hear. Why didn’t Ed Murray call me?”
“I thought it would be easier this way. You can phone Ed and verify who I am and the nature of the problem.”
“
Oh, I’m sure that won’t be necessary, Charley.” He grinned crookedly. “Your face is familiar enough.”
It was essential that I get at those papers now. If I left his offices without them, he’d search in them all night and find what I thought was there.
“I can’t understand how there was so much confusion after O’Laughlin’s death.”
“Mostly because there was a lot of confusion all during his life,” Roache said, yawning. “He liked it that way. Easier to cover his tracks. When they were closing up his firm, they practically gave the stuff away. I only glanced through it.”
“I see.”
I wanted to break the cheap shanty Irish bastard’s neck.
“I don’t mind turning the whole packet over to you, but I think I should probably have a court order.” He fiddled with the big sapphire on his right hand. “Just to be on the safe side.”
“I’m sure we could get it and we will, but if I could glance through the files to make sure that what we’re looking for is in them. Then we can ask the court to expedite the matter.”
I was reciting almost verbatim the careful scenario in which Vince had rehearsed me.
“Well, there’s the matter of our expenses in storing and protecting these materials for several years.” He yawned again. “Office space in this part of the Loop has gone through the roof the last couple of years.”
“I can understand that.”
“You’d be willing to pay for our services in storing your father-in-law’s records?” His eyes glinted.
“Within reason, surely.”
“Would five thousand be reasonable?”
Just like that.
“That’s a lot of money, Bob.”
He shrugged indifferently. “I’m sure there’s a lot of money involved in Jim Clancy’s estate. Otherwise you wouldn’t be so eager for his records.”
“That’s true,” I admitted. “I could go a thousand dollars.”
“Two and it’s done. You can search them today and we’ll deliver the whole stack as soon as you get the court order.”
A Christmas Wedding Page 39