The Ghost of Hannah Mendes

by Naomi Ragen

  Francesca felt the rush of questions push up urgently, but somehow, looking at Gilbert and then at the guard, she didn’t really want the answers. Instead, she nodded sympathetically, silent and wary.

  Gilbert pushed his glasses up his slippery, glistening nose, and Francesca felt him lean toward her in a way that someone else—a woman of normal instincts who hadn’t sat near Gilbert Odessa for two years—might have wrongly interpreted as an intimate gesture.

  “My mother died at forty-four,” he told her, undeterred by her lack of verbal encouragement and her slight recoil. “Massive stroke. Didn’t drink, smoke, or do drugs. Married to the same guy for twenty-five years. Never worked a day in her life. Lived in the same house for twenty years….” Gilbert looked at the guard, who’d just lifted the box and set it down meaningfully upon his desk.

  He patted his balding head mournfully. “Life is totally unpredictable. Anything can happen to anyone,” he said, devastated. Slowly, he began loading his personal belongings: the pictures of ducks, the duck ashtrays, the duck mugs, the wooden decoys, the Donald Duck stuffed toy, and the framed photographs of himself wearing a ducktail haircut. When he was finished, he came back.

  “Good-bye, Francesca. It was nice working near you.”

  She took two steps toward him, gripping his hand with both of hers. “Good-bye, Gilbert.”

  He walked with the guard to the elevators.

  And then he was gone.

  Just like that.

  Francesca sat down, her stomach gripped with a horrible queasy fear, as if she’d just witnessed an auto-da-fé. Better get to work. Fast, she told herself with a swift glance around to see if her diligence was going to be noticed. She took out the specifications and turned on her computer, reassured by its vibrant hum and the comforting flash of green words. No use worrying, she told herself, typing in her password. Just get the work done. It was important work, work only she, and she alone, was really expert at in her division. Indispensable work, she reassured herself.

  ACCESS DENIED, the computer flashed at her poisonously.

  Access denied.

  She took a deep breath, rebooted, and tried again, typing her secret password in much more slowly and carefully.

  “ACCESS DENIED!” it screamed.

  Before she could dial her supervisor, her telephone rang.

  It was Human Resources.

  The interview took ten minutes, nine of which she didn’t hear. She left with a letter in a white envelope and a tall, handsome security guard who accompanied her, unsmiling, back to her desk. He, too, handed her a carton.

  She ignored him, sitting down in her chair and looking at the missive in her hands. Like an engraved invitation to Hell, she thought, taking out her letter opener and slitting its throat.

  “Dear Employee,” it began.

  The bank has been MERGED WITH THE AMERICORP BANK GROUP, who are now STREAMLINING OPERATIONS. MOST REGRETTABLY, as a result, your entire division HAS BEEN ELIMINATED. In light of this, METROCORP DEEPLY REGRETTED its inability to continue offering you, as a VALUED EMPLOYEE, a position SUITABLE TO YOUR HIGH LEVEL OF ABILITY AND PERFORMANCE. On behalf of Metrocorp, please accept DEEPEST THANKS, a month’s salary, and BEST WISHES ON ACHIEVING PERSONAL CAREER GOALS ELSEWHERE.

  She slumped down, letting a small groan escape. Then she picked up her attaché case and swung it against her thighs once more. Bang! Bang! Bang! she thought, looking at the guard, who stood there patiently, waiting to make sure she did not steal anything, type anything damaging into the computer, or become verbally or physically abusive.

  Bang! And you’re dead.

  Just like that.

  Francesca stood up and walked to the water cooler.

  “Fired, huh?”

  It was one of the secretaries. Helen something. She looked almost gleeful, Francesca realized, staring at her styleless hair, her predictable polyester pantsuit. This same woman had greeted her each morning, smiled, made coffee, sent everyone Christmas cards, and regularly collected money for staff birthday gifts. Francesca glanced around the room, wondering how many other low-level employees of advanced middle age had been secretly wishing unemployment, as well as early death and dismemberment, upon the young hotshots around them.

  The tempo of the day, she thought, was definitely not that of Vivaldi’s Mandolin Concerto. More like Mozart’s Requiem.

  She packed her carton. “Can I just make one phone call?” she asked the guard.

  He shifted uncomfortably, tugging on his cap. “Hey, I’m sorry. My instructions are not to allow any calls from up here. There’s a public booth down in the lobby,” he said, expressionless.

  So that was it: from expert and respected hotshot to piece of burned-out waste material in twenty minutes! Gilbert was right. Life certainly was unpredictable.

  Riding down in the elevator with the guard, who suddenly seemed more like a Fascist stormtrooper and less like tempting but unworthy husband material, she shrank with humiliation. Under his watchful gaze, she turned in her employee badge and walked out into the public lobby. Only when he was satisfied she was truly gone did he turn his back and return to the elevator banks.

  She leaned against the cold marble wall, her hands trembling with anger, fright, and a feeling of terrible waste. She couldn’t believe it! For four years, this job had been the steady, solid hub of her existence. Everything had revolved around it, been postponed or decided because of it. It had been like the ground beneath her feet.

  She looked at her belongings: a few books and photographs. A silly teddy bear. Some manuals…All that effort and devotion, thought and dedication, reduced to one small, pathetic box. And it could always happen again with some other job.

  Something else has to be the hub, she thought. But what?

  She sat down in the phone booth, holding her head in both hands. Then she dialed.

  “Gran, it’s me. Is lunch still available? I suddenly have all the time in the world.”

  7

  “Abuela,” Francesca said, pecking both her grandmother’s cheeks, European style.

  “Francesca.” Catherine allowed herself to be pecked.

  They looked at each other and waited.

  “You look beautiful, my dear, but a little tired, I think.”

  “Actually, I feel woozy,” Francesca admitted, astonishing herself.

  There was an ironclad rule that one never admitted weakness or misfortune of any kind to close family members who would simply tsktsk and find a way to blame you for your troubles before extending a reluctant, put-upon helping hand.

  To her great surprise, instead of insisting upon immediate medical attention, vitamins, or lifestyle changes, Catherine simply murmured, “I’m not in the most dazzling physical condition myself these days, either.”

  Francesca took her arm, concerned. “I guess we’d both better sit down then, Gran.”

  The place was quiet and pleasant, the white-metal balustrade and greenery calming. From the next table, the tempting fragrance of a large plate of steaming pasta, redolent with sauce, wafted over them.

  Francesca motioned to the waiter. “Could you bring me a double Scotch on the rocks as soon as possible?”

  “Wouldn’t you rather eat first, dear? That pasta smells lovely. And now they say if you don’t load it with cheese and butter it’s not actually fattening, either….”

  “Trust me, Gran. I need a drink.”

  The Scotch appeared. Then it disappeared.

  “Francesca, dear, either you’re not yourself, or we’ve been away from each other much longer than I remember.”

  “Actually, Gran, I’ve just been canned.”

  Catherine stared at her. “What in Heaven’s name does that mean?”

  “Oh, let’s see, how would they say this in Britain? ‘Been made redundant,’ I believe is the proper phrase. In short, sacked, booted, fired. Disconnected from my only visible means of support.”

  “What did you do?”

  She looked up and grinned,
the alcohol giving her an irrational desire to giggle. “Me? Nothing. I’m a VALUED EMPLOYEE WITH A HIGH LEVEL OF ABILITY AND PERFORMANCE,” she tittered, draining the last drop from the glass. She motioned to the waiter to refill it.

  “So you’re really out of work.” Catherine clapped her hands together, delighted.

  Francesca stared, astonished. “You’re pleased?

  “It’s wonderful! I thought that was going to be the most impossible task, prying you loose from your computer. I wonder how she did it.”

  “What do you mean, ‘prying me loose’? And who is ‘she’?”

  “Never mind. Let’s order some food. I’m famished.”

  “I’m not hungry at all,” Francesca said, momentarily forgetting her questions, overcome by a churning in her stomach and ice water in her bowels. She wasn’t a drinker, and her stomach was empty. The waiter brought the second drink. She eyed it with a newfound respect, sipping carefully.

  Catherine cleared her throat, but just then a waiter appeared, pencil and pad in hand. They ordered and ate in companionable silence: large, steaming plates of fresh pasta tossed with basil and oregano and fresh tomatoes; steamed forest mushrooms with tiny, delicate pieces of smoked salmon.

  Catherine thought of the meal she had eaten with Suzanne amid the pickle barrels and red lanterns; all the foods called one thing and actually made with something else. Fake pork, fake shrimp, fake chicken…. Something good for you masquerading as something that wasn’t good for you, but which you wanted anyway. Like diet Coke, and Weight Watcher brownies.

  She looked around at the simple white walls and the clean white tablecloths, the white plates with their simple, delicious food, looking and tasting exactly as you hoped and expected. Suzanne would no doubt find that boring, she thought.

  Anything described as “new” was invariably something very old and familiar simply dressed up and plastered over with some kind of makeup. Food, the arts, ideas. It was all the same. All clever fakes. There was nothing new under the sun.

  Take that phrase psychologists and anthropologists thought up for Newsweek in the late 1970s: The New Morality. They made it sound so revolutionary: open marriages, uncommitted but honest. Passionate, spontaneous, casual adult relationships. It had turned out to be nothing very new at all; simply a rationale (for psychologists and anthropologists?) to justify sleeping around, picking up one-night stands in bars. Of course, herpes, and then AIDS, had come along. No one was talking about New Morality anymore. Now it was all about the New Celibacy.

  She chuckled.

  Why is it when we’re young, we are always convinced the world was born on the same day we were, its possibilities limited only by our imaginations? Why can’t we connect to the past, see the patterns, learn the lessons? Why is mankind doomed to begin continually at square one and painfully repeat all the old mistakes?

  “Dessert?”

  Francesca shook her head. “Let’s not add injury to an already insulting day.”

  “Insulting?”

  “How would you describe being thrown out of your office with ten minutes’ notice, and given to understand that you are superfluous and that the working world could get on just fine without you? Redundant.” She shook her head.

  “Well, instead of dessert, let me offer you this: a job.”

  “Sure, any systems analysis in C, Windows, or Motif you need taken care of, especially when it comes to a currency-trading back-office system, I’d be happy to do for you. But I’ll only work with personal computers, not mainframes, I warn you,” she said dryly.

  “I’m not talking about your little computers, you know. The world doesn’t rise and fall because of computers. We all got along perfectly well without them for thousands of years.”

  “Don’t let Bill Gates hear you say that.”

  “William who?”

  “Never mind.”

  “I’d like you to do some research on our family history. You’d have to do some traveling in Europe. I want you to find the missing pages of a manuscript that’s been in the family for hundreds of years.”

  Francesca’s head swam. She shaded her eyes, which suddenly watered from the light. “Whoa! I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “You say you’ve been fired. Well, I’ll pay you the same as you’ve been getting, plus all your expenses. All you need to do is make up a research report for me to read each week.”

  Francesca suddenly leaned forward. “You know, there are so many sources on the Internet I could look into—university libraries, the Vatican collection,” she said, suddenly excited. With that and severance pay, she could last weeks, maybe even a few months! Surely she could find another job in a few months!

  Then another thought hit her and her face reddened. “I don’t need your pity, Gran.”

  “My dear, this was the very reason I invited you out to lunch in the first place. Ask Suzanne.”

  “You mean you were going to ask me to quit my job?” she said incredulously.

  Catherine nodded. “Or take a leave. That’s what Suzanne’s doing.”

  “So, we’d be working together.” She paused thoughtfully, her forehead puckering.

  “Yes, side by side.”

  “I suppose the manuscript would be very valuable, a very significant addition to your collection.”

  “Child, I’m not doing this for any ‘collection’! This is personal. It has been a lifelong dream of mine to read the rest of my ancestor’s story. I’m not getting any younger. I feel now is the time to try.”

  “Have you contacted rare-book and manuscript dealers?”

  “I’ve been in touch with many of them. Each and every one has a different theory, different leads. You’ll need to meet with the most important of them and make some order out of it. They’ll be willing to help you. But I think the search could use a new head, a fresh vision. So many great paintings and manuscripts were lost for centuries until some enterprising and persistent individual simply took a better look at what was there all along. Besides, you are one of her descendants. You have her genes. Perhaps you’ll have an intuitive sense about where to look.”

  “Well, that’s too mumbo-jumbo for me.” She shook her head.

  Catherine looked at her, surprised. There was a little of Janice in her curvy, petite frame. But otherwise, she had always seemed to take after her father’s side of the family: the calm, reasonable, respectful Abrahams. The echo of Janice’s favorite, insulting phrase gave Catherine goose bumps. Who knew what stores of hidden influence a bad parent had on a child? Was the cause lost before the battle had even begun?

  “Well then, you agree?”

  “Agree?” Francesca reached across the table and grasped her grandmother’s hand. “It’s like a dream! I was so depressed when I walked in here and now, it’ll save my life!”

  Catherine smiled at her. Surprise, surprise! No emotional blackmail, no threats, no funeral stories. Straight business. Francesca, whom she’d thought would be as impossible to disentangle from her job as a piece of chewing gum from a child’s hair. “This calls for a celebration. Waiter, bring us two lemon-raspberry tarts and cappuccino.”

  “Why not?” Francesca thought, intuiting that tomorrow would not be the sixth day in her fifteen-day program to reduce her thighs and firm her buttocks. That it would be much, much more.

  8

  On the fourth ring, Janice Barren stopped propping up the sagging volume of her oversprayed hair, turning her attention from the hall mirror to the louvered doors leading to the kitchen.

  “Imelda,” she called pleasantly, maintaining that edge of modulation necessary to prove to the new maid she was demanding but not unkind.

  The phone rang again.

  “Imelda!” She raised her voice slightly, wondering if this was going to be a problem. The thought of indoctrinating yet another Third World stranger into the intimate mysteries of the elegant Barren household brought a sad droop to her recently uplifted cheeks. It was too awful to consider.

&
nbsp; She sighed, picking up the phone herself.

  “Hello…. Yes, this is Mrs. Barren speaking.” She paused, listening, her eyes widening. “Who is this?” she demanded.

  “Missus Barren?” the maid called timidly.

  Janice looked up from the phone into the girl’s eager, guilty eyes. She covered the mouthpiece. “It’s all right, Imelda. I’ve got it this time. Didn’t I explain to you? Wasn’t I clear?” she pleaded. “Please, Imelda. Try to answer the phone no later than the second or third ring…“What!” she gasped into the phone. “What’s that? Mr. Barren? Kenneth? WHAT…DID…YOU…SAY?” She slammed her palm over the mouthpiece. “That will be all, Imelda! JUST…GO!”

  The little, dark-haired woman lowered her gaze so that her new employer wouldn’t see the tiny flash of hatred that lit up her meek, docile eyes. Swiftly, she dashed through the doors.

  Janice stood there motionless, listening, a cold chill drenching her hot face, draining the color. She hung up, sitting down in the nearest chair and pressing her sweating palms hard against her knees to steady them. When she felt the shivers subside, she picked up the receiver to call Kenny. She stared at it in her hand, hesitating. Then slowly, and with infinite resignation, she replaced it.

  Bastard, she thought.

  She went back to the mirror and dabbed makeup over the tear streaks. She was almost out the door when the phone rang again. Let it, she thought, wondering what she dreaded more: some unknown female’s disgusting revelations or her husband’s slick, soothing lies.

  “It’s for you, Missus.”

  “I don’t want to talk to anyone, Imelda.”

  “But…you said…when it ring, pick up…”

  Gauging the height of the linguistic and cultural barriers she would need to vault to explain herself, Janice reluctantly took the phone, smiling with guilty haste as a flash of the previous housekeeper’s unhappy face flitted across her memory. “Thank you, dear. You did that very well.”

  Ignoring the smile, the maid left.