“Fair enough.” I reached for my checkbook.
“In cash.”
“Cash?”
“Only way.”
I opened my wallet and counted out the twenty one-hundred dollar bills that I had place there before boarding the L that morning.
“I see you came prepared.” He began counting the money. “Pleasure to do business with a man like you.”
I was ushered into an empty office and the blond secretary, with obvious distaste for the effort required, brought in, one by one, six legal-size cardboard file boxes and piled them on the desk. Bob Roache settled comfortably into a chair in the corner of the room.
“I got nothing to do this afternoon, so I may as well keep you company. That way I can assure the court that nothing has been removed.”
“Okay by me. Suit yourself.”
It wasn’t okay at all.
I started with the oldest box—late thirties. Tax returns, commodity sales receipts, canceled notes, copies of deeds: the dry records of a pirate’s bloody life.
Nothing that looked like an envelope of pictures that might be addressed to the police or to one of the papers.
“Nothing in it?” Roache cocked a curious eye.
“I suppose enough material for a couple of novels, if someone knew what it all meant, but no tax returns that seem pertinent.”
“What years are you looking for?”
“Forties, early fifties. This box is earlier, but I want to be systematic.”
I went through the second box more carefully. There were many envelopes, bits of paper, notes on yellow sheets. I looked carefully at each one, fearful of rushing and missing something important.
“Nothing here either.”
He glanced at his watch. “Want to call it a day and come back tomorrow?”
“Not if I can continue now.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
The third box, mostly records from the forties and the fifties, was the one in which I expected to hit pay dirt.
I would, that is, if my theory was correct. On that gray February afternoon with the world thawing outside and a crucial family gathering that night, I began to doubt my theory.
When I had finished a minutely careful examination of box number three, I had even more doubts about it.
Roache had been called out of the office to take a phone call. He didn’t seem particularly upset, reasoning perhaps that what I was looking for was too big to be stuffed into a pocket.
“Not here either.”
“You’d make a good lawyer.” Roache laughed. “You didn’t miss a thing in that box.”
I resolved that if I find something I must hide all reaction to it and hope there was some way I’d get a second chance if Roache’s phone rang again.
“I kind of thought it would be in that box. Right year.”
“Godawful mess, isn’t it?”
The fourth box was the worst mess of all. Papers, folders, notes, bills had been crammed into it, as if someone was rushing to finish a task.
Now I was sure I was wrong. No ice-cream bar today.
Halfway through the box I found the 1952 tax return. Automatically I opened it. Inside was a yellowed lettersize envelope. On it was printed in large block letters: TO BE DELIVERED TO THE EDITOR OF THE CHICAGO AMERICAN SIX MONTHS AFTER MY DEATH.
Cautiously I felt the sides of the envelope. There were thin objects inside. They might well have been photographs.
Struggling to maintain an appearance of indifference and calm, I put the return back in the box, its corner sticking out, and continued my search.
I ached to look up to see if Roache was watching me with special care. If I did I would give the game away.
“Nothing here,” I shoved the box aside. “Maybe our hunches were wrong.”
“No refunds,” he joked.
“None expected.”
I started on the fifth box, forcing myself to be as careful as I had been with the previous boxes. Roache now looked bored out of his mind.
Would the phone never ring? What would I do if he was not distracted?
Try to slip the envelope into my jacket pocket while he was sitting in the room with me?
Pretty risky.
“Well”—I moved the fifth box to the edge of the desk—“last one.”
“Good hunting.” He was examining his fingernails.
Then the blonde appeared again.
“What is it now, Denise?” he snapped.
“The Senator, Mr. Roache.”
“Oh damn it. Excuse me, Charley. Don’t steal anything while I’m out.”
“Fat chance,” I murmured.
At last free to tremble, my fingers shook uncontrollably as I jumped up and began to search frantically in the fourth box, the one with the tax return and the envelope.
I couldn’t find the corner of the return that I had left sticking out.
It wasn’t there. Was I in the wrong box?
Quickly I looked through the others. No turned-up corner in any of them either.
I was badly confused now. Which box had it been? It could have been any of them. I was blowing it.
I took a deep breath, thought of how much I loved my wife, and plunged back into the third box.
I heard Roache’s voice in the corridor.
Then I remembered that the 1952 return had been in the middle of the file in the fourth box. I jammed my hand into it and pulled out a return.
Sure enough. 1952!
He was talking to someone at the door.
I pulled the envelope out, stuffed it into my inside jacket pocket, and then shoved the return into the fifth box, the one I was examining when Roache left the room.
At that very moment he returned.
I commanded my heart to slow down, my nerves to stop.
“No luck yet,” I said easily.
“Hope you didn’t steal anything?”
“Want to search me?”
He laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
If I had not suggested it, he might have insisted.
I continued to work my way through the box. A few minutes later, I pulled out the return.
“I’ll be damned! Wouldn’t you know it would be in the last place you look.”
“It’s always the way. Is it the right one?”
I sat down at the desk and made a pretense of studying the form.
“Sure looks that way. … would you put it in a separate envelop so we can find it quickly when we get the court order.”
“Why not?” He took the return. “I’ll have Denise take care of it and bring the boxes back to our storage room. We’ll make a copy of this return first thing Monday morning.” He leered at me. “No extra charge.”
He’d spend the weekend trying to figure out what was in the return that was so important. Well, good luck to him in that.
“I’ll give her a hand.”
Denise and I moved the boxes into a musty, windowless room in which files and folders were crammed in total chaos. She thanked me. With elaborate show, Roache took the envelope in which she had placed the allegedly precious return and locked it in a safe in his office.
“A pleasure to do business with you,” I said cheerfully.
“Same here.”
We would seek the court order and have a clerk at Vince’s office go through the documents carefully to see if there were any more time bombs. I was sure I had the ice-cream bar.
I walked across the street to City Hall, found the men’s room, and inside a toilet stall opened the envelope. I felt the contents to make sure they were photographic paper and then closed the envelope.
Someday, maybe, I would tell Rosemarie the whole story.
I tore the envelope and its contents into tiny pieces and flushed them down the toilet.
Outside on Washington Boulevard, despite the somber February day and the deep slush, I felt like a man reborn.
So long, Jim Clancy, it’s been good to know you.
43
>
My family watched me anxiously as I poured the dessert wine (Neirsteiner Glocke Eiswein), passing Rosemarie’s upturned glass as I always did.
They knew something was up.
We had admired the prints for the new show, devoured Rosemarie’s beef bourguignonne and savored the chocolate cream pie with chocolate sauce.
There remained only the Eiswein and the usual songfest.
I guess my tension gave the game away. Rosemarie was watching me suspiciously.
One more toss of the dice. Hell, I was on a roll.
I raised a Waterford goblet. “I propose a toast to my good wife, who put this show back on the track, despite the fact that, as her daughter… her elder daughter, that is … will tell you, I’ve been crabby because of my work in becoming a doctor. And she will add that I’m not a real doctor like Ted, either. Anyway, to Rosemarie!”
“To Rosie!” they all shouted.
She blushed, pleased and flattered. And temporarily off-guard.
“And to the new engagement ring, not quite on the tenth anniversary of the first one, but still one she’s deserved for the last ten years.”
Rosemarie bashfully held up her right hand, on which the new ruby glittered.
“The Depression must be over at last,” Dad observed with a cheerful wink.
“No interruptions,” I begged.
“Whose charge account is it on?” Jane lifted her glass.
“I’m not sure.” Rosemarie shrugged her shoulders. “I haven’t had the nerve to ask.”
I had bought it for her after leaving Bob Roache’s office with the extra two thousand I had in my hip pocket, just in case.
I confessed to Rosemarie, because she would have figured it out anyway, that I’d thought of the new ring when I saw Dr. Stone’s.
“If you don’t mind”—she kissed me again—“I won’t wear it to her office. It might distract both of us.”
“If you’re all finished with your cheap cracks”—I held the goblet in the air—“to Rosemarie’s new ring and all it represents.”
“Hear! Hear!” Ed Murray shouted.
“Hear! Hear!” Timmy Boylan echoed.
I took a deep breath and glanced at each of the members of my family around the dinner table. Well, here goes. …
“Rosemarie”—I turned the crystal stem carefully in my fingers—“without whom none of the crazy O’Malleys would be as happy as they are!”
“Hear! Hear!” Ted raised his glass.
“Hear! Hear!” they all responded.
“I don’t have to listen to his crap,” she screamed. She bolted from her chair and charged toward the dining room door.
Around the table, everyone stared in astonishment.
The fat was in the fire. I had better think quickly.
“Don’t you dare leave this room, Rosemarie,” I barked at her.
She stopped in the doorway.
“Come back here.”
You win one, you push your luck.
She came back.
“Sit down.”
Sullenly she sat, and prepared to assail us.
“And be quiet.”
She closed her mouth.
“Now listen to us.”
She scowled, a caged leopard being tormented by trainers.
I wondered if anyone would understand what was happening. If they knew what was happening, who would take the lead?
Astonishingly, it was Michael.
“How many times a week do I phone you, Rosie?”
“Two or three,” she grumbled.
“At least.”
“All right, at least.”
“Have you ever given me bad advice?”
“I don’t think so.” She was staring at her hands, white and clenched on the table in front of her.
“Would I be a priest if it were not for you?”
“How do I know?”
“Rosie?”
“Well, maybe not.”
Then the brothers-in-law joined in.
“I’d be a very junior partner in Doctor’s surgery,” Ted said, “if it was not for you. And I remind you that’s an exact quote from your warning.”
“And I’d be a bitter bachelor,” Vince added. “That’s a quote too.”
“Hey,” Timmy joined in, “I’d still be in Ireland if you hadn’t sent this beautiful woman to drag me home.”
We were doing nicely.
Ed grinned cheerfully, the South Side joker even in times of stress. “Hell, Rosie, you found me a wife; maybe she is too refined for the South Side, but I couldn’t have done much better myself.”
“You didn’t save our marriage, Rosie.” Dad was smiling broadly. “You just made it better than we ever thought it could be.”
Peg and Jane were both crying.
Jane tried to speak and broke down completely
“Making you part of the family,” Peg sobbed, “was the best thing that ever happened to us. Oh, Rosie, you dear, sweet goof, why try to deny what is so obvious. We all needed you. We still do.”
“I’d be dead.” Cordelia Murray was dry-eyed, but so sad that her face would break your heart. “I mean that, Rosie, dead.”
“Mom?” I asked. “We haven’t heard the final word yet.”
“Well, dear”—she sighed—“I don’t know what all the fuss is about. We loved you, Rosemarie, from the very beginning because you were so sweet and good and lovable. And then you loved us back. And it’s worked out wonderfully.”
The only dry eyes at the table were my wife’s.
She glared around the room, humiliated and enraged.
Christopher, I prayed, if your good spirit is near, help her.
Then my Rosemarie’s lips began to twitch and her eyes began to sparkle. In the end she would be saved by her inability to resist the temptation to a comic line.
“Well, regardless”—she waved her hand in a zany slice at the air—“who else would take care of the crazy O’Malleys?”
Epilogue
“Chuck? Jack Kennedy. We met at the McCarthy hearings, if you remember.”
“I remember, Mr. President.”
It wasn’t someone imitating the President, though he did sound like one of the comedians who imitated him. I had told very few people that I’d met him seven years before.
“Good. The reason I’m calling is that we’re having a dinner at the White House in honor of some of the country’s scholars and artists and I wonder if you’d—”
“Take some pictures? I’d be glad to.”
He laughed. “No, that wasn’t what I had in mind, though that would be fine. I want you to be one of the guests.”
“Thank you, Mr. President.” I felt very foolish. “I’d be delighted.”
Typically, I had tried to think of excuses for not going.
“And Mrs. O’Malley too.”
“I’ll ask her, Mr. President.”
“Good, good. I’ve enjoyed your books very much, particularly the ones on Germany.”
“Thank you, Mr. President.”
“Is Mrs. O’Malley as beautiful as she is in the books?”
“Even more beautiful, Mr. President.”
“Great. I’ll be looking forward to seeing you again and meeting her.”
“I’ll ask her to come, Mr. President.”
Would she come if I told her she was invited?
Is the Pope Catholic?
Jack Kennedy was reputed to be a womanizer. But the invitation for Rosemarie did not sound like womanizing was on the President’s mind. Admiration, rather.
I walked back down the stairs to the darkroom where Rosemarie was experimenting with color prints.
She still saw Dr. Stone, though now only once a week or so.
“Who was on the phone, husband mine?”
“The President.”
“The president of what?” She pulled off the protective gloves she wore when working with chemicals.
“Of the United States.”
She laughed, “We s
ound like one of those comedy acts. Who was it really?”
“It really was Jack Kennedy. He wanted to invite you to dinner. He said I could come too.”
“I can’t!” she wailed.
“Why not?” So maybe the Pope wasn’t Catholic.
“I have nothing to wear.”
No worry about the papacy. “I imagine you can find something simple and inexpensive in time. White, please.”
“What else!”
Some of the distinguished artists and writers and scholars had handsome wives (only a few women were invited in those days on their own credentials). Some did not My Rosemarie, in the fullness of her glory as she approached thirty with serenity, was easily the most beautiful woman in the White House that night.
When she was asked what she “did,” she invariably replied “Mother” and held up five fingers.
I would add, “She’s my assistant and agent and boss and she sings with a chamber group.”
She would throw back her head and laugh.
Later on in our marriage this act would not do at all.
A tall black-haired Irishman took us aside as we came into the East Room.
“Pat Moynihan, Labor Department. The President would like to talk to you briefly afterwards, if you don’t mind,” he bowed with infinite Edwardian courtesy to Rosemarie, “Mrs. O’Malley.”
I would learn later that he too was married to a dark-haired, pale-skinned Irish wife and understood the protocols.
“Certainly.” Rosemarie bowed back, playing the Queen/Empress role to the hilt.
I decided that I wasn’t really needed at the dinner.
“You’re the most beautiful woman here,” I told her.
“Shush,” she whispered back, flushed with pleasure, I would add.
“Best breasts.”
“Charles, please!” The marine band began to play again. “Now stop ogling and dance with me. That’s ‘The Tennessee Waltz.’”
“I know what it is.”
Not true.
The glitter and the glamour of the night reminded me of Handel or Johann Strauss: music, laughter, clinking glasses, handsome men, beautiful women, sparkling conversation, bright gowns, glowing china and silver—surely an imperial capital.
Then I decided that certainly not in the London of the early Georges and probably not in the Vienna of Franz Joseph had there been so much style and elegance. This was the empire.
“What thinking, husband mine?”
A Christmas Wedding Page 40