A Perfect Wife and Mother

by Peter Israel

  I scream at them: “If anything happens to him because of this, it’s going to cost St. George millions! I will sue you for the rest of time!”

  Then I’m outside, on the front porch. Larry, my father, try to restrain me. I break away from them. Pain tearing at my belly, I still manage to charge the people, men and women, congregated near the foot of the driveway. Cameras, minicams, let them show that on the “Evening News” too: NEGLIGENT MOTHER TURNS SHREW! I tell them Justin’s coming home. I beseech them not to get in the way, threaten them with lawsuits if they try to, criminal charges. “This is my son’s life!” I rage at them. “There can’t be anybody here, don’t you understand? Goddamn you, you’re endangering his life!”

  It works, some. Back inside the house, I see cars dispersing, driving off through the bare trees. Maybe they’ve only gone to park around the corner, but I see no police either. If they’re there, at least they’re hidden from view.

  The waiting is driving everybody nuts. The “experts”—that is, Capriello, Larry too—can’t understand what’s happened. If Harriet’s had Justin all this time, then what about the anonymous calls? Was that a crank after all? And what about all the names Larry gave them, the investigation he set in motion?

  But Justin is in great danger, didn’t she say that?

  Suddenly it’s noon, hours since she called. She did say it would take a while, but did she mean all day?

  I have this terrible flashing premonition that I won’t recognize him. That my own son will be standing in front of me and that I won’t know who he is!

  Where did she call from? The police have no idea. Could it be just another cruel trick? How can I be sure it really was Harriet? Suppose it was just another crank caller, one whose voice sounded approximately the same as hers?

  But it was Harriet, I’m positive of it!

  But suppose something’s happened to them? Why aren’t they here?

  In the kitchen. People talking all around me. I recognize what’s going on. It’s like mourning, I think, a wake, or sitting shiva. All that’s missing are keening women in black.

  The phone rings.

  It’s a little after twelve-thirty. Capriello has already asked me, if she calls again, to try to keep her on the line as long as possible. There’s a sudden hush. It’s as though the ringing sound has silenced the entire planet.

  I pick up, still in the kitchen.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s me again.” Her voice is unsteady this time, but it’s her voice. “I can’t do it the way I said.”

  “Harriet, where are you? For God’s sake, I’m—”

  “I can’t explain now. Listen to me, Georgia. Here’s what you have to do. I won’t repeat it. Do you remember where you took us to lunch that time? The restaurant? It was the week I moved in. You also bought some things for Justin?”

  “Of course I do!” I almost blurt out the name.

  “How long will it take you to get there?”

  “Fifteen, twenty minutes. But—”

  “Come to the restaurant as fast as you can. Right now. He’ll be there. But you have to come alone, Georgia.”

  She hangs up. I hear the disconnect distinctly.

  Almost immediately they’re after me: Where was she calling from? Where does she want me to meet her? What restaurant? Where is it?

  Red-faced Capriello, Larry, even my parents.

  I refuse to tell them.

  But it’s unthinkable that I go by myself! It’s far too dangerous! Suppose she isn’t alone? Suppose it’s a trap of some kind? If not the police, then at least Larry, at least my father!

  “For Christ’s sake,” Larry shouts at me, “he’s my son, too! I’m going with you!”

  I face them all down.

  “I’m going to get him.” Suddenly I’m very calm. “She insists I come alone, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. No one is coming with me, not you, Larry, not anyone. And I’ll tell you this much: If anybody tries to follow me, then I’ll stop. I’ll just stop. And if anything happens to Justin then, you’ll have yourselves to thank for it.”

  They follow me into the front hall, still arguing. I pull free of them. I have my coat on, and, hands trembling, I’m fumbling in my purse to make sure I have the car keys. Then I’m out the front door, gasping, and down the front steps, and somebody is still shouting at me—“Georgia, for God’s sake!”—when I gun the Volvo down the driveway, just missing some people standing in the roadway.

  I hit every damn red light. I honk my horn, take chances, try to blast traffic out of my way, but I already know I’m going to be late from the dashboard clock. I have to dodge through local streets all the way to the interstate, then four or five exits west, then another interminable local avenue to the mall. How could I have told her it was fifteen, twenty minutes? More like twenty-five, half an hour, and once, when I think I spot someone following me in the rearview, I swerve onto side streets, thinking I know a shortcut, but I don’t, and then there’s no one behind me, and I have to U-turn and back the way I came.

  It’s quarter after one when I reach the mall. The parking lots are jammed. It’s the first Saturday after New Year’s, probably they’re giving the whole mall away. There’s no space, at least I can’t spot one, and I panic, and then I’m shouting at myself, “For God’s sake, what are you worried about a ticket for!” I shoot into a handicapped slot nearest the building line, grab my purse, and the hell with the burning sensation in my stomach, I’m running.

  I know the place—The Greenhouse. Lots of plantings. Decent enough as mall food goes, right next to one of the department stores. Always a line waiting to get in. There are two entrances—through the mall and directly from the parking lot. I dash in on my side. But the place is almost empty, how can that be? On a Saturday?

  And God, no Justin, no Harriet! Where are they?

  No sign of them!

  I see food, dishes, on all the tables, but few people.

  I bump among the tables, the potted plants. Then I see a crowd at the mall-side entrance—God Almighty—and as I run toward them, I distinctly hear someone say, “Jesus, somebody just snatched a kid.”

  I clap my hand to my mouth. There’s some woman in the middle of the crowd, young, very tall. She’s holding on to a stack of something—What are they? Menus? Is she the hostess? But she’s talking to some kind of guard. He’s black, in uniform, and he’s got a walkie-talkie up near his mouth.

  What happened? Where’s Justin?

  Oh my God, suddenly I can’t breathe. I feel the whole mall tilting up at me. I think I’m going to faint, suffocate. I push forward blindly. I hear her voice, the tall woman—“But it all happened so fast!”—irritating southern accent, and there’s something else, something about a shooting on the second level, and somewhere, beyond them in the mall, there’s an organ playing Bach, one of those horrible Preludes with the crashing discordant chords.

  “WHAT HAPPENED? WHERE IS HE? WHERE’S MY SON?”

  I hear myself screaming. Somehow I’ve got the hostess by the sleeve. I almost knock her down. Her damn menus go flying and her eyes pop, huge. I’m shaking her crazily. “Goddamn it! I’m Justin Coffey’s mother! Where is he?”

  But arms grab me from behind. I flail at the woman, screaming. People are trying to pry me loose, and I’m lifted off the ground. I scream again, kick out, drag the hostess with me. I won’t let go, can’t let go! He’s my son, goddamn it, he’s my son! My mind is roaring inside, and at the same time I can hear somebody shouting, more than one, “Hey, is that the woman? The one on television? The Coffey kid’s mother? Hey, was that the Coffey kid just now?”

  Yes, I answer hysterically, yes, goddamn it! but I start to lose my grip, the mall is lifting dizzily again, I can’t stop it, tilting, lights, careening lights and people staring at me with their mouths agog. Gasping for breath, I lose my balance. Arms are pinioning me. Then a terrific rush of blood, and everything scrambles.

  I learn about it mostly from my father. He an
d Larry have come to get me. I’ve been waiting for them in the mall security office, my head down, weeping inconsolably. I won’t talk, can’t, can’t answer the questions. I cling to his little cap for dear life.

  I never did faint. Apparently, or so I’m told now, the Greenhouse hostess did try to tell me what had happened, that some man had carried Justin off, but I’ve no recollection of it. Apparently I went crazy. I tried to scratch her eyes out, and when the security guard intervened, I clawed him instead.

  No recollection there either.

  Not that it matters anymore.

  I was ten minutes late, no more, maybe less. Nobody is sure. Not that that matters either: I was late.

  This is what they say happened: The young woman and the boy—Harriet and Justin—came into the restaurant a little before one o’clock, maybe ten till one. The hostess seated them. She—Harriet—was wearing a navy-blue parka, Justin some sports outfit, orange and black, with a matching cap. Harriet ordered food for both of them. They were served. Then, a few minutes later—at one o’clock or a little after—Harriet got up from the table alone and walked out of the restaurant into the mall. The hostess remembered noticing her leave, thinking it a little peculiar, but she was too busy to pay much attention.

  But a few minutes later, the boy—Justin Coffey—came out of the restaurant in tears. He was crying his head off, the hostess said. She talked to him, trying to find out what was wrong, but she couldn’t understand what he was saying. He kept pointing, jabbing the air. She thought he was looking for the young woman.

  She hesitated, trying to figure out what to do. Then suddenly this man came up to them, out of nowhere. He was tall, well-dressed, maybe fifty, a long leather coat with a fur collar, tweed cap. He took the boy by the arm and told the hostess that it was okay, he was the boy’s uncle, and where had the young lady gone who’d been with him?

  She didn’t know, the hostess answered. She’d left a few minutes before, had gone off into the mall somewhere.

  She remembered the man craning his head, as though searching the crowds. Then she realized that the little boy was trying to free himself, pulling away from the man’s hand and shouting something, she couldn’t hear what. Before she could react—“It all happened so fast!”—the man bent down, swooped the boy up into his arms, and simply walked away, walking fast, then breaking into a run, the boy struggling against him. She saw his cap fly off, but by the time she started to run after them herself, shouting for help, it was too late. There were too many people. She found one of the security guards instead. He put out an alarm.

  Too late.

  They “sealed off” the mall, whatever that meant, but found no trace of them other than Justin’s cap, or what they think was Justin’s cap.

  They’ve showed me the cap—did I say that already?

  It’s Pittsburgh Steelers. I’ve never seen it before. But it’s all I have.

  There’s another, confused part to the story. Just after the man in the leather coat took Justin, there are witnesses who claim they saw Harriet on the upper level. She got into a fight with some people who were blocking her way. She had a small gun in her hand, used it to knock someone down, and she was screaming abusively, and then she ran off, waving the gun at anybody who tried to stop her.

  They didn’t find Harriet, either. They’ve found no trace of her.

  But they say they’ve got a pretty good description of the man in the leather coat. They think he had at least one accomplice, in addition to Harriet.

  I don’t care.

  All I can think is, ten minutes, maybe less.

  And I curse them all, the people in my house who tried to stop me from going, wasting precious minutes, and all the people on the roads, driving to nowhere, and Harriet, for luring me there in order to torture me, and the southern hostess—“But it all happened so fast!”—and my own father who’s trying to console me. “Georgie, Georgie, there’s nothing you could have done.”

  I know what he’s really thinking. He’s thinking: Thank God my daughter didn’t get here any sooner. Why? Why? I cry out to him in answer. What difference would it make if something bad had happened to me too?

  I look up at him. He looks so small, old, concerned. I guess he feels helpless too. The sight of him brings on my tears again.

  And my husband. Now he’s got Mission Control going in the mall. There are cops all over the place, crowding into this suffocating room, even a state trooper, the crackling of somebody’s walkie-talkie, and Larry’s working the room.

  I’ve refused to talk to him. I’ve nothing to say to him.

  It is like a punishment, I keep thinking. Except that I don’t know what I’ve done.

  “Come on, Georgie,” my father says, bending over me, “let’s take you home.”

  Part Three

  6 January

  “Good afternoon, Counselor.”

  “Well, well, well. And on a Sunday too! I was wondering if you’d dropped off the face of the earth. Didn’t you get my messages?”

  “There was no reason for us to talk before now.”

  “You might have saved us a lot of trouble if we had, not to say expense. But don’t say I didn’t warn you, Cousin Robert. Before you even met her, I told you she’d lead you a merry chase.”

  “Robert Smith is defunct. I think we would both do well to forget about him.”

  “Do I detect some measure of a threat there?”

  “Let’s get to the business at hand.”

  “Look, my friend, as to what happened yesterday, I only did what I had to do. We have too much at stake, you, Leon, and I. In my judgment, you needed help. It was a purely business decision, nothing personal. If anything, you were the one who let the personal get in the way. Come on, we’ve known each other a long time. Wouldn’t you have done the same thing in my shoes?”

  “I’d like to get to the business at hand.”

  “Good. Have you talked to Leon yet?”

  “Yes.”

  “And he’s explained the plan to you?”

  “Yes. We’re meeting tonight.”

  “And its cost, to each of you, provided we’re successful?”

  “Yes.”

  “And is that acceptable to you? Ten percent off the top?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know—I’ve said this to him too—I could, in good conscience, have demanded more. You of all people will understand that. I trust there are no hard feelings?”

  “I understand.”

  “From your point of view, it’s just an added cost of completing the transaction. Well. What do you think of it?”

  “Think of what?”

  “The plan, of course. Do you think it will work?”

  “I don’t think it’s for me to say. You hold all the cards.”

  “Come, come. Leon hates it, I hate it, you probably do too, but do you have a better idea?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Then let’s get on with it. We all have our roles to play. You should know that I’ve put my clients off till Thursday. I told them we’re not quite ready.”

  “Yes.”

  “Assuming all goes well tomorrow, Thursday should be time sufficient, don’t you think?”

  “Yes.”

  “The filings are ready on both sides. We anticipate no complications at Treasury or anywhere else. We should be able to close in February, March at the outside.”

  “Good.”

  “Is that all you have to say? When you think where we were forty-eight hours ago? Forgive me for asking, but for a man who’s about to make millions, what’s happened to your enthusiasm?”

  “I believe that’s premature. Before tomorrow.”

  “Oh, come on. It’s an added cost of doing business, that’s all. Doesn’t everybody have a price? I’m counting on your powers of persuasion, Leon’s too, and besides, what alternative does he have?”

  “What about Rebecca.”

  “Rebecca? What about her?”

  “Did you f
ind her yesterday?”

  “No. The published reports are true. She took off.”

  “Are they still looking?”

  “After you fired them, I called them off. Why bother? She’s a fugitive from justice, isn’t she? Let the law deal with her. And even if she wanted to, how could she stop us? She doesn’t know anything about this, does she?”

  “No.”

  “Not even who you are, does she? Beyond Robert Smith?”

  “No.”

  “I thought so. And Smith is dead. Who else knows who he is? Or was?”

  “Only you.”

  “Ah. Is that what’s got you so edgy? Really, I won’t even dignify that with a reply. Look, we’re so close to the deal now, let’s not be at each other’s throats. We’ve got the situation under control, that’s the important thing. All right, I’m sorry I offended you. Maybe I shouldn’t have. On the other hand, you should have heard Leon! Look, as far as she’s concerned, I doubt we’ll ever hear from her again. Have you forgotten how you met her? I know her too, remember? She’ll run. She’ll run like a rabbit. Don’t you agree?”

  “For now, yes.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I don’t like loose ends.”

  “Who does? But from a practical point of view, I think we can safely forget about her. And that’s my advice to you: forget about her. I say it as a friend. You know these … well, these relationships … are bound to be short-lived, and, from your point of view, she can be replaced at a moment’s notice. All you have to do is ask. What the Good Lord taketh away, the good Counselor shall always provide. You understand that, don’t you?”

  “Yes. I understand everything.”

  Lawrence Elgin Coffey