by Julia Holmes
"Well, for the most part . . ."
"That's all behind you now, Ben. You must look to the future!” Against the far wall of the shop, pale cardboard boxes stood in stacked columns; the tailor pulled a box expertly from the middle stack: “Try this."
"Is there a changing room?"
"I'm not your mother, Son. Just put it on. And give me back your uniform."
Ben turned his back to the tailor and changed quickly. He could smell the cheap black dye of the suit when he opened the box; he saw the pant legs were creased horizontally at the knees, where they had been folded, for years, probably. It was depressing, the cheap black suit, the columns and columns of cardboard boxes filled with cheap black suits, but he supposed it was designed to be depressing: the apparatus of grief. Ben tucked his military cap back into his satchel and turned to face the tailor.
"You see, Ben? Problem solved. It's the clothes that turn boys into soldiers, soldiers into men."
Ben sat in the worn armchair at the front of the shop and sipped tea the tailor had made for him. He watched the butcher at work across the street. The heavy, dusky shapes of meat hung from the ceiling chains, their shadows stock-still along the yellow wall. The butcher hauled a rack of ribs from the glass case; he forced the thin blade between the ribs and sliced them apart.
"They've reassigned the house,” Ben said suddenly. “Another family is living in it. I saw them."
The tailor turned, concerned, “Did they see you?"
"I don't think so,” said Ben. “Then I came here."
"You should have come here first, and I might have prepared you for the shock.” Ben touched the warm side of the porcelain teacup and shrugged apologetically. “And now you've nowhere to go.” The tailor sighed, hesitated. “I know of a Bachelor House—an excellent one. Nine-tenths marry out in the first year. Something like that. I might be able to get you a room, but it won't be easy, Ben."
"I'd be grateful."
"Anything for your mother. I like to think I was a great comfort to her while you were away. She was all alone in that big house. And she was a great comfort to me, of course. Both of us waiting for our sons to come home, something you know nothing about."
Ben opened his mouth to speak.
"This is no time for formalities, Ben. Let's not explore our feelings, shall we? Time is of the essence for a man like yourself, but here you are, still youngish and, in any case, an eminently marriageable man, and I wouldn't worry too much. Nor would I put anything off.
"Listen to me carefully.” The tailor brought over a small wooden chair and sat uncomfortably close to Ben. “Are you listening?"
"I'm listening."
"For the moment, you should make the most of grieving—you'll only have one opportunity in life to grieve for your own mother. Don't cheat yourself. Remember, there is no instinct for comporting oneself around death; grief won't come to you whole and perfectly formed without some work on your part. Your instinct may be to go insane, to hit yourself in the face, to tear out your hair, to cry all the time, to scream at the sky, to run into the river, to blame others, even to attack them in the full fever of grief.” (Ben opened his mouth to speak, but the tailor raised his hand to stop him.) “If the dead man or woman is a close relative, mourning is expected—in all other cases it isn't. If required to mourn"—he pointed at Ben, Ben nodded—"get a black suit, preferably one as dark as night. Done. In speech and attitude, be as inconspicuous as possible. What is grief but a sudden inability to sustain belief in the story that preceded it? I say you're lucky. Only those who have grieved love the world enough. I try to picture the missing sleeping peacefully, like those smooth rocks in the shallows of a clear, cool river, the water soothes them, it soothes them. . . .” The tailor brushed the air in a gentle arc and smiled peacefully. “I like to imagine some birds singing to the water. This may be a comforting thing for you to think about.” The tailor leaned back in his chair and frowned at the view of the butcher's shop through the window. “Did you know that long ago—too long ago for any of us to remember—this entire street was lined with tailor shops? Anyone could stumble in off the street and ask for anything, no matter how ridiculous. No guidance, no rules, no comprehension of the stakes. You're lucky to be living in this day and age, Ben, when good, hard-working people can expect to succeed, when happiness comes to those who deserve it. Do you appreciate how lucky you are?"
"I do,” said Ben.
"Good.” The butcher stepped out into the street and lit a cigarette, blinking in the strong sun. Ben and the tailor watched him from the window. “You're a good boy, Ben. It's honorable, at least, to engage one's father's enemies. Look at you—taking up arms against the Enemy, when so many of your brothers will raise a fist only to defend their own happiness."
Ben smiled noncommittally.
"The butcher's son—there's a perfect example of what I'm talking about. He stole another man's suit last summer, right off his living body. The police caught him, of course, swung him for the crowds.” Ben glanced across the street; the butcher shuffled back into his empty shop, started halving and quartering the racks of ribs.
The tailor leaned toward Ben. “What have you got in terms of cash?"
Ben reached into his satchel and handed the tailor a folded stack of bills. “Only this,” he said. The tailor weighed the money unhappily in his hand before pocketing it.
"How quickly can you make a new bachelor's suit?” asked Ben.
"I can't make you a new suit. It's out of the question."
"But everything in the house is gone, including my father's suits. I have nowhere else to start but here."
"You have a suit. I just gave you a suit, Ben. The ingratitude of bachelors in this day and age never ceases to amaze me."
Ben glanced down at his new black jacket, more of a bottomless gray in the light of the window. “And I'm grateful for it—thank you. But I'll need to buy a pale suit, in addition."
"Impossible. I'll have to put all the money you gave me toward paying your bills at the Bachelor House."
"I'll get more money."
"How do you plan to do that? You've got nothing to sell, and you can't work until you're married."
"Couldn't I owe you the money? I'll pay you back once I'm married, have a job."
"No."
"For my mother,” pleaded Ben, hating himself.
"But it's for you, isn't it? Not for her, so let's not confuse matters. If I made a suit for every bachelor who begged me, Ben, I'd soon be out of business and living in a little room by the train station and cursing my ‘fate,'? said the tailor, raising his fat fingers to indicate quotation marks around the word. “Give up my life, so you can have what you want? As I said, it's out of the question."
Ben stood and stretched. He should think strategically. Always better not to push old men. The tailor returned to his worktable; Ben investigated the tailor's dummy in the front window of the shop. The dummy was wearing a classic bachelor's suit, the sleeves pinned behind its back. A hat had been laid over the neck, giving the dummy the look of a commanding officer deep in thought, his chin against his chest, his hands clasped peacefully behind his back, as he paced some ridge over a smoky, blue-gray field of battle. “Beautiful suit,” Ben said. “They can't make them like this any longer, can they?"
"But we most certainly can still make them like that, and do.” The tailor stared into the pool of fabric, pressed a scrap of fabric against the back of his neck to soak up his sweat. “It's already getting hot as hell."
"I have an idea,” said Ben. “Could I use this suit? Rather than asking for a new one.” He smoothed his hand across the fine pale fabric.
"No. It belongs to someone else."
Ben saw that years of shop dust had accumulated on the brim of the hat. “But if he isn't coming back for it?"
"But he is coming back, Ben. He is coming back, and he will need his suit."
The tailor turned his back to Ben, began petulantly re-arranging the scraps of cloth on the ta
ble.
"I'm sorry,” said Ben. He stared dumbly at the back of the old man but was paralyzed by uncertainty. He might easily make things worse while intending to make them better. The tailor's son had been missing in action for as long as Ben could remember—twenty-five years, at least. Finally, the tailor turned and pointed at him. “The black suit is more important, Ben, for those observing you are unlikely to read the subtler signs of grief. Is it artificial? Of course it is. But how else will you communicate your feelings, Ben, when conversation in this city is so dishonest and exhausting."
* * * *
Meeks
I made my rounds first thing in the morning so that I wouldn't miss Bedge, who sometimes came to the bench early. I had a serious matter to take up with him, something that couldn't be postponed. I hurried around the perimeter of the park, checking the fence, shaking the park gates to test hinges and locks, and then cut back down through the center, taking note of the condition of the statues and monuments, giving special attention to the statue of Captain Meeks—the father of our world (and my namesake). I was in a hurry, but once or twice I found myself standing, still as a statue, in a clearing or under a tree, mesmerized by the blue bud of summer: the river mist warming like wool under the first sun, the ants and beetles commuting along their branches, the worms boring silently through the new green leaves. The garbagemen were already up and trawling the park, and I felt their dead eyes slide over me as I stood stock-still in the sun.
Move along! I said. As you can see, Brothers, I am alive and well.
I went to the bench and waited. In the distance, the factories hummed with power, chugging white smoke. I heard the low, long morning whistle, and the great windows filled with light, and I tried, in vain for the millionth time, to make sense of the procession of shadows suddenly sweeping across them. Machines? People?
The fruit vendor set up his cart nearby, collapsing the delivery boxes and arranging the fresh fruit, pyramiding the limes . . . the plums, plump and purple-black, flecked with lavender, and the oranges constellated with fine drops of cool water, and the lemons bright and indomitable in the sunlight, and the polished red apples still bristling with dark, sweet leaves. A breeze rushed through the high branches of the park trees. I thought of how pleasant it would be to line the interior of my head with layers of the cool green leaves. I thought of how I loved the healthy green give of the grassy slopes, the sound of the breeze through the grass growing uniformly on the surface of the earth, the warmth emanating from it, the perfect scent of things just broken open. I love this world as I loved my very mother.
The fruit vendor brought me a few warm, soft plums wrapped loosely in some old paper. The day before, the baker had thrown a sugar bun my way. I took it from my coat pocket and halved it carefully, arraying the pieces neatly beside the plums.
That morning, as of yet, nothing had changed for me, so I was content watching the people coming in and out of the park, the people for whom things were under way. Their ships had sailed, and they smiled in the ship's breeze of an amiable open sea, and they smiled at the sights and sounds beyond the ship's rail, and they were people who were launched and it was a pleasure to watch them inhabit their pleasures without embarrassment. Young bachelors were leaning on their elbows along the green, sunny slopes, the young shadows of the trees overlapping in the grass, mild yellow nectars burning on their wicks, young women strolling in and out of lemon-yellow bands of sunlight, while the bachelors lounged in the shade like kings. Newly hatched, innocent and soft and warm, from the hulls of their houses, their heads swimming with dreams about the future: the face of a young man hangs like a pocket watch in his father's fog-choked silver shaving mirror, the face of a young woman hangs like an apple in the yellow haze of her mother's hand mirror. Mystery of mysteries: people alone in their houses. Perhaps it seems wrong for a mere policeman to feel such proprietary love for the society he watches over, but this was my world, as much as anyone's, and a policeman can be forgiven for thinking of his beat as his kingdom and the citizens as his subjects.
Meeks!
I jumped, discombobulating the plums. I arranged them again on the old paper, and Bedge sat beside me on the bench, looking out over the park and the clusters of new bachelors, comparing their suits and whistling after women.
Another summer, another season, Bedge said and sighed with a sort of contented resignation.
Plum? I asked.
Bedge poked one of the ruptured plums I had laid out for him. No, thank you.
Bread? I said, offering him half of the sugar bun.
Um, no. You have it, Meeks.
Are you sure you won't have something? I said and scooped up the old paper so that the plums and bread were floating conveniently right in front of his face. I had counted on my offering to lay the foundation for congenial negotiations.
No, no. Nothing for me, he said. But I've brought something for you. He removed his policeman's cap and said, I'm getting a new hat today—I thought you might like this one.
I need a gun, I said, moving directly, if awkwardly, to what was foremost in my mind.
Absolutely not.
But I am a policeman.
Meeks.
Bedge.
Why do you need a gun?
Why does anyone?
Which is precisely why we don't issue guns left and right, among the people.
I meant: why does any policeman?
Shall I take the hat away, if you don't want it?
No, no, no. I do want it.
Allow me, said Bedge, laying the hat upon my head as if it were a crown and then yanking it down, almost to my ears, with inhuman force. Now you're the very picture of a policeman.
I smiled uncertainly; my hands, having developed a kind of panicked free agency, flew to the sides of my head and tried uselessly to loosen the cap. The hat, I gasped, trying to give a name to my discomfort and confusion. Bedge ignored me.
You and I have a lot in common, Meeks. Considering our differences. Our situations couldn't be farther apart—me the Chief of Police, you the . . . (he seemed to search for the word) . . . rookie. But we share a requirement to be students of life.
Yes, I said, struggling as politely as I could against the efforts of the new hat to separate me from my body.
Bedge said, Do you remember the man in the black jacket?
I forgot the hat immediately. Man in the black jacket? I said. Man in the black jacket!
Bedge didn't answer me at first. He crossed his arms and stared petulantly into the distance. Perhaps he had thought that I would react to this news by nodding sagely and gratefully in my new hat, reflecting philosophically on the name of the ruiner of my life.
Apparently he's back in the city, said Bedge, trying to punish me, I suppose, by skipping over several lines of delectable back and forth that might have transpired between us.
Back in the city? I realized I was right up against Bedge, and I had compressed the plums and bread between us. He looked down at his juice-stained trousers with disgust.
Relax, said Bedge and pushed back me back down the bench to my regular spot. I won't tell you another word, he warned, unless you get a hold of yourself.
He took everything from me, Bedge.
I know the story well, Meeks. And now I'm telling you that the man in the black jacket was spotted in the city this morning by one of my men. Listen to me: If you see him, you must come find me. Do you understand?
Stay here. Find him. Get you.
That's right, said Bedge and patted me on the shoulder as he stood to go.
I looked down at the flattened plums, the stained paper, the golden quarry of the uneaten sugar bun—and I wanted none of it. My mind was busy spooling out the razor wire of an old hatred, coiling it mercilessly around every thought that entered my head, until my head was full of bad blood, and the whole day had gone.
The civil servants were collecting and folding the green-slat park chairs and sewing them together with thick, padlocked chai
ns, and the people were drifting home to peaceful family dinners, to low lights, to quilts and cool, clean sheets and soft pillows, to glasses of refreshing night water. I stayed in the park, of course, having nowhere else to go. I waited for the evening bells to sound. I saw the lights go on in the street cafes. I smelled smoke from the cigarettes of the waiters, who smoked outside in loose ties before the dinner hour.
I made my way to the statue of Captain Meeks. I unlaced my boots and coiled the laces into my coat pockets. I unwrapped my feet and hung the foot cloth over a low branch. I struggled pointlessly with my hat, which seemed to be glued to my head, and then stretched out on my back under the fluttering black leaves . . . the boundless heaven at night. I felt better lying there beneath the Captain, just as my mother always did and once had, when I once wasn't was. I once wasn't was. The phrase swam drowsily through my brain. I could hear the garbagemen, always the last out of the park, making their way toward the gate, stabbing at garbage with their garbage stabbers. The smell of their cheap apple tobacco faded, and then it was just Mother and me again, me on the surface of the earth, her slightly under it, gazing past the tops of the nighttime trees just as we always had, when she would take my hand and speak directly into the vastness of space and say, My son will be the greatest of sons.
* * * *
Ben
In the face of immediate disappointments, a person must take stock of the advantages that remain. He had a room at a reputable Bachelor's House; that was promising. He was lucky to be home in early summer; he was lucky to have the friendship of the tailor. One way or another, he would soon have a fine pale suit: he would devour the ground with long strides, yank apples from leafy branches and bestow them upon women in the park; he would kick the dew from the weeds that lined the streets, and women would drop their cups of tea, their smooth slices of iced lemon cake would topple from their plates and collapse on the grass, and his would be a vector of desirability cutting through the daily rounds of all women everywhere—transactions disastered, paths abandoned, children neglected, as the young women of the city were swept up in the fleet shadow of his apparently oblivious perambulations. But Ben would be long gone, walking on, preoccupied by work on an eternal problem.