by Pete Hamill
The car stops on the corner of 14th Street. She looks across the street and sees the whirls and curves and minarets of Aladdin’s Lamp. She blinks. Records it. Then laughs out loud. Who says comic books make things up? She sees the palace as part Aubrey Beardsley, part Prince Valiant on a trip to the Orient, part Cecil B. DeMille. She hears Tony Curtis of the Bronx saying his famous line from some fifties desert flick: Yonda lies da castle of my fodda, da Caliph. If he ever said it.
–I’ll call you when I’m ready, Harry.
–Take ya time, the driver says. I’m goin’ to a diner an’ eat.
Beverly Starr gets out of the car, her back to the High Line. Sees a crowd of about twenty people standing below a platform that must have once been a loading dock. Flashbulbs. Snow-muffled shouts. Stairs, a railing, the platform, then the doors. A black man in an Arabian Nights costume checking invites. Then to her right sees four homeless men in long overcoats and caps. Standing under an overhang from the days when they actually packed meat around here. Way past them in the snow, a guy in a wheelchair. Not moving. Beverly thinks: You can’t make some things up.
She walks cautiously across the glistening cobblestones to the crowd, moves around the edge, starts up the stairs, hears shouts. Hey, lady, lady, look this way. Hey, lady. Smile. Lady, say “bellybutton.” She hears the last word and smiles. Then crosses the platform to the door. Hearing: Hey, lady, what’s your name? The black bouncer smiles at her, and starts to say something, maybe an apology for his silly costume, when one of the double doors opens and a man in a gray suit steps out, smiling.
–Beverly! he says. Beverly Starr. How good of you to come.
Stan Seifert. The advertising guy who asked her to do the painting and invited her here.
He takes her elbow and leads her inside, saying: Your painting is just awesome.
She thinks: Please don’t say “like.”
7:28 p.m. Bobby Fonseca. Aladdin’s Lamp.
He walks four feet into the loud, thumping room, the others behind him, and he wants to turn around. It’s music for shouting, not talking. Tonight, of all nights, is for talking. For us, anyway. Or singing. He looks up the stairs, sees a dark painting on an easel, people pulling coats off suits and dresses, a tall guy smiling in welcome. That must be the benefit. Maybe they’ll let us in. Gotta be quieter than this.
–I’ll go up and check it out, he says to Helen Loomis, who looks pained and lost. She nods. The others are squeezing a path to the bar, all except Barney Weiss. No cameras allowed inside. He’ll take some shots outside, he said, while they find out the deal.
Fonseca goes up the stairs. A white bouncer in an Arabic costume stops him at the top. Built like a safe. Fonseca takes his press card from his jacket pocket, attached to the cheap chain around his neck.
–Press, he says.
–No press yet, the bouncer says. Fonseca thinks he looks like a guy from one of those ultimate-fighting shows.
–We’ll let yiz know, the bouncer says. They got stuff to do first in there. Hit the bar, we’ll find you.
Fonseca turns to go back. He leaves the press card dangling.
8:05 p.m. Sandra Gordon. Her apartment, Manhattan.
She undresses in the bedroom. The lights are out but the drapes are open to the falling snow and the room is filled with a luminous blackness. She sees herself in the mirror. Thinks: My kind of blackness. The same blackness that drew so many white men to me. Including Myles. The blackness of night and all its secret promises. Or so they think. Blackness can be banal too, baby. Ask a black woman.
In the living room, the telephone rings. She pulls on a robe and goes out into the large chilly space. On the fifth ring, the answering machine takes over. Then she hears her friend Janice. Fired five months ago. Self-medicating ever since. Booze and pills. They were supposed to have lunch that day but Sandra called her to cancel, got the machine, left a message. Her voice is clear.
–Hi, Sandra, it’s me. Janice. I just got your message. I was suicidal in the morning, went to the shrink, and she prescribed some goddamned pill. I slept for ten hours. I’m okay, I hope. But hey, there’s some kind of gig in the Meatpacking District. I’m inside now. For the homeless. Lots of dancing and some hot guys. I got an extra ticket, you want to come here. Call me on the cell and I’ll bring the ticket outside to the smoking shed.
She clicks off. Sandra stares at the phone. Thinking: Thank God I didn’t pick it up.
Thank God I can be here alone, while the snow falls silently and sleep comes quick.
8:10 p.m. Ali Watson. Muhlenberg Branch of New York Public Library.
Malachy Devlin pulls up in front of the library. The lights are turned off. Ali opens the door, turns to Malachy.
–She said she’d wait in the Chelsea, right?
–Yeah. I’ll stay here, watch your back.
Ali closes the door and starts across the street in the falling snow. He pauses in the center lane while an empty bus goes by, heading east. A taxi follows the bus. Then he hurries to the entrance. He brushes the snow off his shoulders and slams his hat against his thigh. He goes in.
Against the wall on the left, an old man sits on a banquette with a large black dog at his feet. The dog looks up, but doesn’t growl. At the desk, a fifty-ish black man leans on the counter, reading a newspaper. To Ali’s left, beside a fireplace, is a middle-aged white woman, her large handbag on her lap. Ali goes to her, peeling off his gloves.
–Mrs. McNiff?
–Miss McNiff, she says.
–Nice to meet you. I’m Detective Watson. May I sit down?
–Of course.
She takes a manila envelope from her bag and lays it on the low table before Ali.
–I used gloves when I picked it up, Officer, so it—
–Thank you.
He puts his gloves on again and slides the yellow pad out of the envelope. The top page is blank. He holds it up to the light. And sees indents in the paper. Thinking: You dumb son of a bitch.
–Excuse me, ma’am.
He rises again. The dog’s eyes follow him. The old man doesn’t turn his head. Ali walks to the desk at the rear of the lobby. The night clerk looks up.
–Excuse me, brother, Ali says. Do you have a pencil?
–Sure thing.
The clerk fumbles under the counter, comes up with a yellow Eberhard Faber pencil.
–Thank you, Ali says.
He moves a few feet away and starts lightly rubbing the side of the lead point across the paper. Words emerge. Repeated four times. Like a chant. He shakes his head, turns back to the night clerk, and hands him the pencil.
–Thank you, Ali says.
He walks back to the woman.
–Thank you very much, Miss McNiff. This might be very helpful.
–Hey, you never know.
–Can I help you get home?
–Oh, I live way out in Bay Ridge.
–Wait here, if you can. We’ll have a squad car take you home.
–Oh, that’s okay. Not necessary. This weather, the subway’s faster.
She stands as Ali writes down her name, address, and phone number, away out there in area code 718. He thanks her again and rushes out the hotel door.
8:15 p.m. Beverly Starr. VIP Room, Aladdin’s Lamp.
She thought she’d be gone by now. But here she is in this soundproofed room up a flight of stairs from the main floor. The only evidence of the place outside the door is the physical thumping of a bass line. They had waited for a while to start the night until all the invited guests could arrive in the awful weather. Beverly went up the stairs with them, glancing at her painting of the homeless to the left of the door. Inside, the door finally closed, Stan Seifert had them all take ten seconds to remember a woman he said had done so much for this city and its less fortunate people. Cynthia Harding. Many seemed to know her, and bowed their heads. A few even looked teary. Beverly used the shutters of her eyes to record them. And stood through a politely furious speech by an advocate for the ho
meless. Someone must have warned the speaker: Don’t mention Goldman Sachs or AIG or Lehman Brothers. And Beverly thought: They must be hoping for contributions fueled by guilt.
Then Stan Seifert made one of those eloquent pleas for the homeless fund. He mentioned the homeless men right across the street from where they all were gathered. He reminded the group that there were far more in the outer boroughs. He applauded the gathering for their decency and for braving the fierce weather. They applauded themselves. Seifert gave special thanks to Beverly Starr for the gift of her painting. The crowd clapped with what she chose to believe was enthusiasm. Finally, he reminded them that the result of the silent auction of Beverly’s painting would be announced in fifteen or twenty minutes.
A few people began moving to the door. Those who had made no bid. Each time the door opened they could hear the pounding music. Beverly wanted to leave too, but Seifert said, Please, no, we want a photograph of you with the winner.
So she waits. Looks for great faces. Blinks.
8:20 p.m. Josh Thompson. Across the street from Aladdin’s Lamp.
He’s against a wall, out of the falling snow, looking at the gathering crowd outside Aladdin’s Lamp. Cold. Thinking: That Old Guy was right. Told me to stay away from here. The cobblestones making cars skid and women slip and the goddamned chair go every which way. But I’m an asshole. This ain’t no mosque. It’s a disco or something. Kind of place they’d never let me in.
He has watched the place for an hour, has seen limousines arriving, and chauffeurs holding umbrellas over the heads of the passengers. The long black cars then moving around the corner, to wait for a call when their owners are ready to leave. Watched people bowing. Smiling. Even laughing. He sees guys with cameras. Snow on their shoulders. Thinks: Must be press. He sees guys dressed like characters from old movies about Arabs. Not real Arabs. Not Arabs in Baghdad or Fallujah.
He looks to his left, down to what he knows now is called the High Line. Nobody up there. Snow blowing hard. Like that storm when he was eleven, coming home from school in Norman, the wind lifting him, the snow blinding him, afraid he’d never make it home. Confused and lost. No cars. No houses. Just snow. Howling. He started to cry that afternoon.
Until his father came in the pickup and found him. And he tried to hide his tears.
And Josh was ashamed. Of his fear. Of his panic.
The way he felt after they all got hit. Together in Iraq. The explosion. Two seconds of blinding panic.
And waking up in Germany.
Now thinking: Never woulda happened they didn’t knock down the World Trade Center. Never woulda happened if we didn’t invade Iraq. Never. I’d still have Wendy. The little girl. Maybe a son too. One I’d never let get lost in a blizzard.
Under his poncho, and his blanket, he caresses the MAC-10 with a gloved hand.
Thinking: Wait.
8:31 p.m. Sam Briscoe. His loft.
He keeps searching for a book that will help him sleep. Something he has already read and therefore doesn’t engage that part of his brain that argues. Or won’t demand that he get to the end. What always happens at the end is death.
Parts of his conversation with his daughter return. Her words were cool despite her late-night anguish. Nicole was now old enough to console him, the way he had consoled her during her own nights of terrible times.
–Put all of her pictures away, Dad, she said. Wrap them up. Put them in storage. For a year, at least. But don’t leave them where you can see them.
Yes. That was smart. But not tonight. I’m too exhausted.
–Go off somewhere, she said. So your friends can’t call. Where the papers—or worse, television reporters—don’t run follow-ups and ask for your reactions. Go someplace where you once were young. Mexico. Rome. Or better, a place you never visited with Cynthia. Turkey. Ecuador.
She was right, of course. Get out of town. Now. Nothing beats murder at a good address. So they will follow this thing for at least three days. Maybe more.
–And hey: you can come here, Dad. Come to Paris. Stay with us in the guest bedroom. Go to museums. Eat in bistros. Buy books along the river. The weather is cold, but not dismal. And there are no tourists.
Paris.
Briscoe didn’t care much for Nicole’s husband. But he loved his smart, feisty daughter, Nicole. And loved too their wonderful apartment on the Avenue Émile Acollas, with its high trees and wide sidewalks. At the foot of the Champ de Mars. The fifth floor front. The tiny elevator. The entrance hall, with the youthful painting by Lew Forrest of the Seine at dawn. A wedding gift from Cynthia Harding. The three rooms along the balcony, like an elegant railroad flat. Public rooms, they called them. Living room, petit salon, dining room. Each with a door opening to the balcony and a view that included the Eiffel Tower. Like a cornball romantic movie. Or cornball majesty. Didn’t every example of the romantic include death?
He could call the airline now. He could leave tomorrow. Leave the clerical duties to others. Let someone else execute the wishes of the dead. Or put the whole thing off for a month. Paris. Call Mary Blume and Alan Riding and the remaining veterans of the Brigade Rue de Berri of the Paris Herald. Sit together in the Deux Magots. Make remarks. Laugh. Paris. Yes. Then he remembers Nicole’s other words of advice. Go to a place where Cynthia Harding had not shared the bed. Caracas. Istanbul. Maybe—
The phone rings. He hopes it’s not Sandra Gordon. But knows instantly that it’s not. She would never call him at home, after dark. He picks up the phone. Static and word gaps.
–That you, Helen?
–Yeah.
–What’s up?
–I’m in a joint with, uh, some of the gang from the paper and I hate it, and uh, shit, I want to go home.
–So go home, Helen.
–I can’t… I mean, I tried. No cabs in this goddamned snow. Nothing over here… I’m way over near the High Line, Sam. Uh. On Fourteen’ Shtreet. If I try to walk home… I die in a snowdrift, Sam. Christ, I’m a year older than you are, Sam.
Her voice is blurred with drink, exhaustion, age. He can hear mocking laughter behind her. Drunks. The early shift. He can see the snow falling.
–Where are you?
–Fourteen’ Shtreet. Over near the High—
–No. You told me that. The name of the joint.
–The, uh, Ali Baba, something like that… No, no… the Aladdin Lamp. A pretty scary dump.
–They have a bouncer? he says.
–Uh, yeah, I guess.
–You know my rule, Helen. Never go in a joint that needs a bouncer.
He remembers doing a column about the mosque that once stood there. Thirty-odd years ago. When Muslims were a curiosity in New York.
–Can you, uh, come pick me up, Sam? Drop me home, uh, keep going to your house.
Briscoe pauses. He thinks: What the hell, the last act in an endless day. A kind of penance. And this is special: across all the years, Helen Loomis never asked me for anything.
–Sure, Helen. What’s your cell number?
–I don’t have a cell, Sam. I left it somewhere. The paper, I think… This nice girl… Janice. She dialed you for me on her own cell.
–Let me talk to her.
A younger voice gets on.
–Hello? This is Janice.
Briscoe talks quickly.
–Okay, listen, Janice. I’m in SoHo and I’ll try to get a cab. Could you take Helen to the corner of Fourteenth Street and the High Line? Washington Street, I think it is… You know, where those wooden overhangs stick out? Give me fifteen, twenty minutes. I’ll come by cab and hold the cab until she’s in it.
–Uh, I—
–Please, Janice. She’s one of the best journalists this town ever had, and her paper folded today.
Janice says, with annoyed reluctance in her voice: Okay.
He scribbles her cell number and starts dressing. Thinking: Au revoir, Paris. Farewell, Istanbul. I’m heading into a blizzard, to a place with a bouncer.
8:40
p.m. Freddie Wheeler. Aladdin’s Lamp.
On the dance floor, Wheeler thinks, He made me… That kid reporter… That Fonseca. Across the room, past the dancers, past this blond jerk dancing with me like a Gulfport shitkicker… Fonseca… His press card hanging from his neck. The others too. That tall broad from the World. Helen Loomis. Fonseca says something to the guy next to him, turns behind him and talks to another guy… Looking this way… A fucking posse… Is there a back door to this place? I don’t think so… If there is, it’s locked… Keep the crashers out or the check beaters in… Hey, Fonseca, he thinks. I don’t want any trouble, man. I was just doing my job, man… Fuck with me, you end up in the can… Never get a job at the Times that way.
He turns his back on the dancing blond guy and goes left, under the stairs. Harder to see… Into a knot of necktie assholes… Nobody here I know or care about… Nobody… Just me.
8:45 p.m. Malik Shahid. Fourteenth Street.
He stands a bit apart from the homeless guys, hands jammed in the pockets of his coat, beret pulled low on his brow. The homeless guys are joking and laughing, all growls. Malik can’t hear their words. Just the hoarse laughter. Glimpses the sudden red glow of cigarettes. Turns his head. Malik is watching the door across the street. Up on the platform. Over the heads of the gawkers and the photographers. Past the ropes. Three weeks earlier, when he first saw this obscenity of a building on a morning bright with sun, Glorious was still alive. The infidel bitch was still slaving for her white mistress.
That day he wandered through Chinatown to Cooper Union to Washington Square, avoiding Patchin Place, wandered alone, still bearded, everything a jumble, looking for money, looking for a dropped wallet, an old fool counting his cash at an ATM, a woman with an open purse, any kind of money for Glorious, money for the coming of the baby, money for food. Heading west on 14th Street. Walking, planning, then seeing a Muslim on a prayer mat at five o’clock. Removing his own shoes. Kneeling beside him. On the bare concrete of the sidewalk. Praying. Speaking the words of the Quran. The man gave him ten dollars.