by Sally Mandel
Oh God, he thought furiously. She’s into her Supreme Court act.
Barbara dropped the files on his desk with a smack and faced him grimly. “You’re screwing up around here, and that is my business.”
Brian rose now, grateful for the extra three inches of height.
“Look, I’ll leave it at home, all right?”
“That will be fine,” Barbara said quietly. Brian strode toward the door. Suddenly she called out after him.
“Brian … about the Converse girl … hey!”
He didn’t turn back, and when she followed him out of his office a few moments later, his secretary stared at her curiously. Barbara glared back until the girl reddened and started typing with rhythmic enthusiasm. Barbara rapped her fingernails on the desk, a machine-gun exclamation point then marched briskly down the hallway.
Chapter 10
Walter had Sharlie by the elbow, propelling her up the narrow stairs to the crowded dining room on the second floor. A waiter with a heavy tray balanced overhead clattered up the stairs behind them, and Walter flung out an arm, pressing Sharlie and Margaret against the wall.
“Leave it to the Italians. Look at this, kitchen on one floor and dining room on the other.”
Sharlie was silent, but Margaret looked downstairs anxiously, as if she expected a carving knife to come whizzing at them fresh from the hand of a Sicilian busboy.
Brian had chosen Pietro’s for his debut, and Sharlie was prepared for vitriolic remarks from her father. There was inevitably something the matter with any restaurant, and Sharlie had often sat in humiliation while Walter refused the wine. In fact, the wine ritual had always signaled trouble. Sharlie was fully aware of her father’s expertise in selecting the proper vintage. Hadn’t he stormed at Margaret for allowing a new caterer to serve 1972 Lafite at their dinner party for the sheikh and his entourage? Out with his family, however, Walter felt free to expound on the idiocy of spending eighteen dollars on “frog vino” when you could get Blue Nun for six bucks.
Even with the cheap stuff he enjoyed making a ceremony of the first sip, serene under the contemptuous eye of the wine steward. Once last fall he had stormed out of an elegant Park Avenue establishment when the manager protested that refusing Gallo Chablis was like refusing Seven-Up. Sharlie remembered the stares as she and her mother gathered up their handbags and crept out behind him. She prayed that tonight Brian would disappear into the men’s room when the wine list arrived.
Margaret had offered to serve dinner at home tonight, but finally Sharlie opted for the restaurant, figuring they were better off luring Walter out for the first meeting. In his castle the man was formidable, but in the neutral territory of a strange restaurant, perhaps Brian would stand a chance.
They sat over their drinks, waiting, while Walter sighed heavily and Sharlie fidgeted. Margaret glanced sympathetically at her daughter, giving her little nervous smiles of encouragement.
“Will you look at the grease spots on those glasses?” Walter said, and Sharlie heard a faint click as the civil servant cassette slid into the tape slot at the back of her father’s head. There were unlimited topics in this category, aimed, among other things, toward the sanitizing of restaurant dining rooms, the erasure of graffiti on public edifices, the reformation of derelicts. Walter responded to each challenge with fervor, complaining noisily that no one else had a community conscience anymore.
He made a great display of looking at his watch, and Sharlie squirmed. Where was Brian anyway?
Finally he appeared in the doorway, all ruddy-faced from the cold March night, bringing a roomful of fresh air with him just as he had that first evening at Saint Joe’s.
He approached the table, smiling and relaxed. Sharlie thought, my God, he’s not even hurrying. Walter stood up, extending his hand, and smiled a broad grin that was all teeth.
“I don’t suppose you make your courtroom appearances with such casual disregard for time.”
“No, sir,” Brian replied. “Not if I can help it.”
Turning to Margaret to shake her hand, he apologized briefly for the delay, offering no explanation. Then he leaned over and kissed Sharlie squarely, right on the mouth. Holy bananas, thought Sharlie. Daddy is going to take you apart limb from limb.
But Brian and Walter sat down, and Walter’s stiff grin sat on his face, frozen there by shock. Sharlie gazed at her father, trying to pretend that his presence held no special significance—just some beefy stranger whose solid, emotionless expression reminded her of specimens on display at the Museum of Natural History. Stuffed mogul: Observe the beady, humorless eyes; the square face; and the small, ungenerous ears.
But the iced grin began to fade, and both Sharlie and Margaret noted with alarm the menacing shift of Walter’s shoulders and a slight bulging of the muscles in his neck. Sharlie looked at Brian, her eyes fastening on him for comfort. How could he sit there so nonchalantly with his menu as if there were nothing else to think about but his empty stomach? Even Brian’s monumental appetite must wither in the presence of such a man as Walter Converse.
When she was a little girl out to eat with her parents, Sharlie had gradually established a pattern of defensive techniques to sustain her through the ordeal. First she’d try to guess which course would provoke the collision between her father and the management. Next she’d turn her attention to the diners at nearby tables, manufacturing fantastic tales about them and their relationships. Loners and grim, silent couples challenged her imagination, and for them she invented implausibly happy outcomes for what appeared to be empty lives.
But tonight she wondered for the first time what other people might speculate about her own table. Middle-aged couple, quite comfortably wealthy (note woman’s designer dress, man’s initialed shirt), daughter in twenties (colorless young woman, obviously nervous, fidgeting with her napkin), and beautiful young man—not a brother to the young woman, see how she looks at him so hungrily. Her suitor? What could he possibly see in her? Must be the family jewels.
Sharlie glanced at the solid-looking woman regarding her placidly from a nearby table, jaws grinding away in relentless rhythm, a ruminating hippopotamus, then looked down at the mangled wreckage of the napkin that lay in her lap and decided that even a hippo would notice she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Twenty-six years old, she thought disgustedly, and here I sit, paralyzed with terror, waiting for Daddy to chop my man into neat, bite-sized morsels to consume with the antipasto. She watched enviously as Margaret sipped her Chianti. Must be nice to get pleasantly soused.
At this point she became aware of two opposing forces hovering on either side of her like uninvited guests. To the right, Parental Intimidation, an immense, dark, amorphous mass, who spilled over his imaginary chair onto Sharlie’s lap, chilling her hands, and whose towering head inspected Brian menacingly, searching for some dire character flaw. The creature plucked at her sweater, pointing triumphantly at Brian’s sloppily knotted tie. Sharlie twisted uneasily in her seat, protesting internally to the malignant shadow, What do I need you for when Daddy’s here? And on her left, Young Love floated just above her shoulder, delicate and filmy as smoke. It curled itself in an aureole around Brian’s head, whispering, This young god is yours. Just reach out and grab.…
Ill-behaved, these guest-ghosts, vying for her attention, tugging at her sleeves all through the appetizers. She tried to ignore them, but soon she was imagining Young Love wrapping its silken cloud around the bulging throat of Parental Intimidation, then pulling hard, harder, mercilessly.…
Walter harrumphed suddenly, and Sharlie glanced at him as he picked at his stuffed mushrooms. Searching for a trace of imported Neapolitan cockroach, no doubt, she thought. She felt Brian watching her, and turning to look at him, she saw the amusement in his eyes and made a surreptitious face at him. The phantom ghosts disintegrated and fell to the floor like soot.
They got through the first two courses without incident. Margaret and Brian dis
cussed the advantages of growing up in the country, and Sharlie smiled as a hint of southern drawl crept into her mother’s speech. Well, thought Sharlie, Mother’s found for the defense. Easy victory. But the contest lies with His Honor, glowering away over there as if he just ate something rancid. She noticed suddenly that her father’s face appeared decidedly reptilian. He sat, half crouched, chewing and watching Brian and Margaret with suspicious little eyes. A bullfrog on a lily pad, assessing his prospective dessert—Brian, of course. Brian, the beautiful Callosamia promethea. Without warning, the long, pointed tongue will flash, whipping around Brian’s waist, snapping him inside, his unpolished shoes kicking feebly before disappearing forever between the gaping, dank jaws.
“In those days, life was so much simplah,” said Margaret, sighing girlishly. Brian nodded at her, then reached out casually and took Sharlie’s hand. Walter glared at their entwined fingers as if they were a pile of worms the chef was trying to pass off as spaghetti. Sharlie tried to slip her hand away, but Brian gripped it hard. She looked at him in surprise as he returned Walter’s gaze.
“A lawyer, eh?” Walter said suddenly, the deep voice startling after his long, wary silence. Brian nodded. “I hear you specialize in bleeding hearts.” Brian smiled pleasantly, but said nothing.
Undaunted, Walter poured the last of the wine for Margaret, Brian, and himself, then took two swallows from his glass. The silence seemed intolerable to Sharlie, and her eyes pleaded with Brian to say something. Anything. Finally Walter aimed his gaze at Brian again and said, “What about this legislation letting the gay boys into city government?”
“It’ll be close.”
“You think the fags’ll win?”
“I hope so.”
Walter glared into Brian’s unwavering eyes. “You think it’s just dandy for homosexuals to teach in the public school system?”
“I don’t think the public school system is dandy for anybody,” Brian said. He sat comfortably, his shoulders relaxed against the back of his chair, but Sharlie recognized the tension along his jaw. He never once took his eyes off her father, and she knew he was thinking, Enjoy yourself now, because one of these days, I’m going to get your ass.
Walter signaled to the waiter and listened impatiently to a translation of zuppa inglese. Finally Brian said, “Think you can scare up a piece of apple pie with a scoop of vanilla?”
The waiter looked pained and said he’d see what he could do. Walter called after the stiff retreating back.
“Make that two, will you?”
Sharlie gave Brian’s foot a quick rap under the table. On the phone with him this afternoon, she’d agonized about Walter’s restaurant behavior. No matter how elegant the cuisine, her father inevitably ordered apple pie for dessert. Walter’s mutilation of foreign languages was legendary, and Sharlie suspected his mastery of the phrase à la mode made him feel dashingly continental.
Brian ignored the kick and said to Walter, “I understand you’ve met my boss.”
Walter said, “Way back in the days when she was Barbara Krumberg.”
“Kahanian,” said Brian evenly.
“Yeah,” said Walter. “Whatever. Very bright girl, but she’s got a few wires loose.” He looked at Brian for a response, but getting none, he continued. “She could be the first lady mayor of New York. I told her that myself.”
“She’d make a good one.”
Walter snorted. “Jesus Christ, we’ve got freaks up to our asses around here as it is. With that wild woman at the helm, they’d be air-dropping them in from the West Coast.”
He stopped for breath, and Margaret remarked, “You’re mixing your military metaphors, dear. Helm is naval.…”
Walter’s eyes didn’t waver from Brian’s. “Why doesn’t she try Los Angeles? California’s got the greatest collection of loonies and misfits per square foot. She ought to win by a landslide.”
He draped an arm over the back of his chair. Sharlie caught a glimpse of the damp stain at his armpit. Her fingers were beginning to ache from the pressure of Brian’s grip, but she said lightly, “Well, Daddy, pretty soon the whole state’s going to slide right into the Pacific Ocean.”
Walter muttered dubiously, “No loss as far as I’m concerned.”
“But what about San Clemente?” asked Margaret “Isn’t that somewhere—”
“Oh, Christ, Margaret. Sometimes you astound me.”
“Well …” she began defensively, her eyes starting to water. “You sound so negative about California, and I know there are places out there … why, you adore Palm Springs.”
To Sharlie, Walter’s voice seemed a little sad. “It’s all right, Margaret. I wasn’t being literal.”
Margaret said, “Oh,” and looked down, embarrassed. There was a short silence while she collected herself enough to smile at Brian again. The southern drawl was no longer in evidence.
“Tell me, Brian,” she said with effort. “You don’t find it uncomfortable working for a woman?”
Oh, no, thought Sharlie, but Brian’s response was thoughtful and courteous.
“She’s never made an issue of it. I don’t think her being a woman has ever gotten in the way.”
“That’s because she doesn’t really qualify as one,” Walter remarked.
Brian released Sharlie’s hand suddenly. She noted the tight set of his mouth and thought, Here it comes. She looked down at her hands and prayed that it wouldn’t be too awful.
“You know, Mr. Converse,” Brian said quietly, “a lot of men attack Barbara’s sex because they find her threatening. It’s a nice cheap shot.”
Sharlie held her breath. Walter smiled with forced amiability and began, “Your loyalty …”
But Brian held up his hand to stop him and went on in the same level voice.
“She gets a lot of crank letters, some of which have been traced to prominent members of the legal profession. They’re pretty sick pieces of paper, and I’ll spare you the details. But mostly they’re an expression of protest from sore losers, who find a strong woman too humiliating for their own precarious masculinity.”
He stopped, and the two men stared at each other. Both pairs of eyes icy cold. Sharlie’s heart had stopped beating altogether, and Margaret wore a frantic smile as if to say, Aren’t we all having such a fine time together with such spirited conversation?
Suddenly Walter cleared his throat and said, “I’d say you’re getting decent training.”
Sharlie watched Brian hesitate. After a moment he nodded, acknowledging Walter’s compliment, and said, “I’m lucky.”
Gracious winner, Sharlie thought, I love you.
Over coffee the two men debated recent rulings by the Supreme Court, always on opposite sides of the issue, wary but polite. Sharlie began to feel uncomfortable again, but this time as if she’d gotten on the wrong train and couldn’t reconcile the landscape whizzing by the window with what she knew was supposed to be out there. Uneasily she listened to her father’s questions about Brian’s practice. This respectful person could not possibly be the same father whom she had so long ago learned to regard with fear. Was she going to have to shift her attitude at this late date?
She remembered business associates of Walter’s commenting privately to her on his astute judgment, his uncanny insight, even—remarkably—his tact. She would nod and smile and label the speaker as the kind of person who would definitely buy a used car from Richard Nixon.
Eventually Brian excused himself to go the men’s room. Sharlie and Margaret instinctively looked at Walter, their eyes questioning.
Not meeting their gaze, he said, “Too bad he’s got himself tied up with that crazy female. Okay, she’s a good lawyer. But she’s definitely a dyke.”
Ah, there’s my Dad, thought Sharlie, surprised at her relief.
Outside the restaurant Brian got to the curb first and hailed a cab. He said he would walk home to work off his apple pie, but first held the door open for Sharlie. S
he slid inside, giving him a sickly smile. Margaret hesitated, then held out her hand and murmured how pleased she was to have met him. When she released his fingers and slipped into the taxi beside Sharlie, Brian turned to Walter, hand still extended. Walter brushed past him with a gruff good night, and Brian stuffed his hand into his pocket. The door slammed shut, and he stood at the curb watching the taillights recede, his breath forming an icy cloud around his face. Then he started off toward Third Avenue. His pace quickened gradually until soon he was practically running uptown.
Chapter 11
There was silence inside the cab from the moment the door slammed shut outside Pietro’s. Margaret sat wedged between Sharlie and Walter, Walter’s massive shoulder pressing hard against her. She felt the impulse to leap out of the taxi into the dark street where she could breathe. The remarks about Barbara Kaye, so uncalled for. So humiliating, especially in front of Sharlie’s young man. And why was it that she always made a fool of herself whenever it was most important to make a good impression? When Margaret was a child, her mother had insisted that she take up painting: “All the Mackins are artistic. Of course you can paint, Margaret.” But finally the tutor had gently set aside the little girl’s muddy messes and explained to her disappointed mother that maybe they ought to try again when Margaret seemed a little more coordinated. There had been no more attempts at developing her artistic talents, but often, in Walter’s presence, she remembered the splotchy efforts and wondered if that’s what her brain looked like inside on nights like tonight, her thoughts all smeared and blurry when they came out of her mouth. Which only created more tension and made it all worse. When it didn’t matter, when she was talking to the housekeeper or to Sharlie, well, then she had confidence. Then her thoughts and the words she used to express them felt sharp and clean. Sharlie had even told her once that she was witty.