by Sol Stein
"Meaning?"
"Catching myself fencing with a twenty-seven-year-old kid."
"Want to go?"
"No."
"That's the nicest compliment I've had in ages."
"I don't compliment people. Let's get this straight, Francine. I'm the only rank in my business. I do my thing my own way at my own pace."
"As if the rest of the world didn't exist."
"Bullshit. I know it's there. It can do what it wants. I just don't want it poking its finger in my eye. Most people would like to stay out of jail. All people would like to keep from being jammed into a concentration camp, yet they live their business lives part of the time as if they were being regulated by blackshirts."
"White shirts."
"Same thing," I said.
"What do you know about concentration camps?"
"A lot," I said.
"You're not Jewish, are you?" Francine asked.
"Would it matter?"
"I don't know. I hope not."
"My father's an Armenian. They're the ones the twentieth century practiced on before they got around to the main act on the Jews."
"You're more political than I thought."
"You operate out of a whole garbage bag full of prejudices. You think 'political' means the kind of cloakroom crap your U.N. is full of? I run my own life. That's political."
I could see the waitress coming out of the kitchen with a full tray, headed in our direction. "Want to go?" I asked.
"No," Francine said. "But I don't want to impose on your freedom."
I could face sending the food back. I could even face Michael. It was time to confess. "I'm electing to be here," I said.
Francine was blushing. Without thinking, I rested my hand on hers, just a second, but it was enough.
"What's the matter?" I said finally.
"I started the evening as an imposition. I guess I'm very pleased to have turned into an elective," she said.
My apologies, Michael, for not paying full attention to your ambrosia as I ate. I used your meal the way I use a distraction in the courtroom that doesn't involve me: to think of my next step.
I like to know where I'm going. I like to plan my moves. Great actors, it is said, plan their most extemporaneous-seeming bits of business most carefully. I wasn't an actor. I didn't know where this script was leading to.
Francine said something complimentary about the food. I smiled a shit-ass smile. I hadn't been paying attention.
"Francine," I said. "There's no point in starting anything — I mean your case — unless I can see my way clear to a successful conclusion."
"You don't wing it?"
"That's unprofessional."
"Do you play chess?"
"I used to. As a kid."
"You stopped?"
"Yes."
"Because you couldn't count on winning all the time?"
"You trying to goad me?"
"It was a real question."
"Okay, a real answer. There's not enough at stake in chess. In my game, losers go to jail."
"In that case, you don't go in for any sports?"
I had to confess I didn't.
"Neither do I," Francine said. "Maybe we can take tennis lessons together. On second thought, you'd probably spend your time trying to psyche me instead of learning to play well."
"Not true. I can't psyche anybody successfully in or out of the courtroom without ammunition, facts, background. For instance, I don't know half enough about you to handle anything as personal as a rape case always turns out to be. I'd like to get your permission for me to see your Dr. Koch."
"Oh?" She didn't seem to warm to the idea. Then she said, "When do I get to talk to your shrink?"
I laughed. "When you're handling my case."
"Have you ever seen a shrink?" she asked.
"No."
"It might help you see between the interstices."
"What the hell does that mean?" I asked.
"You go from point to point in a preplanned way. A little free association might help you see the way life is. The elusive thoughts are sometimes the most interesting."
"You don't like my style."
"I like winners."
"Well," I said, "do I get to see Koch?"
"I was just thinking that while you were talking to him, I'd be paying for your time and his time both."
"How else am I going to learn about the interstices?"
"Okay," she said.
Was I more curious about the woman or the case? What could Koch tell me? "You'll have to phone him. Does he see people after normal working hours?"
"His working hours aren't normal. Some people probably call him at three in the morning with a pill bottle in hand. When can you make it?"
"After hours, almost any time."
She got up. "Excuse me." She headed for the phone booths in the back.
The coffee was just being served when she returned, slid gracefully into her chair as I half stood.
"He was very pleased to hear my voice," she said, "until I told him I was calling to make an appointment for someone else. He's got you down for Friday at seven." She wrote the address down on the back of a pack of matches. "Allow yourself time to park. It's Manhattan, you know."
Michael reappeared to chastise me for not ordering the mandatory sweet.
"Too much," I said, patting my midriff.
"Perhaps the lady?" Michael said.
"Next time," she said to Michael. Grateful for the promise, Michael waddled off, returning in a moment with an inch of marzipan on a small plate. "On the house," he said, "for a lovely lady."
I signed the check. Francine broke the marzipan in two, put a half between my lips, then nibbled at the second half. The bouzouki music seemed wild now, a dervish of sound.
Outside, in the car, I opened the door for her. She looked as if she hadn't expected me to do that. The truth is that I usually don't for Jane. Or the others.
I got in on the driver's side, strapped myself in, shoulder harness and seat belt. Francine, who hadn't used the seat belt on the way to the restaurant, followed my example.
"The car makers call it a restraining harness," I said.
She laughed.
I put my hand out and found hers, just for a second. She didn't pull it away, just disengaged it gently, and said, "We sitting here or going somewhere?"
I put the key into the ignition, but didn't turn it. From our darkened car we could see a middle-aged couple come out of the restaurant, walking in the same direction as if they didn't know each other.
"I'll bet they're married," I said.
The woman got into the driver's seat. The man slid in from the passenger side.
"I wonder why she's driving," said Francine.
"He's lost his hcense. Accident. Drunken driving."
"Maybe she's the better driver."
"He'd still drive if he had the license."
"Maybe he never learned," said Francine.
"If he's American, he learned," I said.
"You're very sure of yourself."
"On some things."
"On what not?"
"You," I said.
I turned the ignition key back a notch and switched the radio on to WQXR.
"Brandenburg," she said.
"Which?"
"I don't know," she said.
"I don't either," I admitted.
"That was a very nice meal, thank you."
"Michael's a nice man," I said. "I enjoyed your company."
Encapsuled in the car, we listened to Bach. And to our separate thoughts. I wish I knew hers.
Finally she said, "Feels funny strapped in like this and going nowhere."
"Shall I drive you back to your car?"
"It'll keep overnight. It's silly to go all the way back there now. I'm staying with my parents. My mother can drive me there after she drops my father off at the station."
"Which means you want a ride to your parents' house now?"
"I'd stay at
the apartment if I had an armed guard."
"I have no arms."
"Not true."
"You like to play with words."
"I do. You do."
"Sounds like a marriage ceremony."
"See," she said. "You do." Then, "Have you ever been close to getting married?"
"Only in the very old days once, when abortions were hard to come by and dangerous."
"What happened?"
"She met another guy and they went off somewhere and got married."
"Does that mean you may have a child somewhere?"
"I don't know what happened."
"Don't you care?"
I started the engine.
"You've built a lot of insulation around yourself," she said.
"It doesn't keep me warm on cold nights."
She held her left hand in the air for a moment as if she were going to touch me with it.
"That lawyer you wear," she said, "may be hiding a nice man."
"I doubt it." I snapped the radio off.
"Please leave it on."
I turned it back on a bit too loud. Which I suppose was childish.
"Do you know where my parents' house is?"
"You'll have to direct me."
"When we get there, will you come in?" This time her hand touched my hand, just for a second.
"It'd be awkward," I said. "You wouldn't care to come up to my place first. For a drink?"
"I'm not a prude," she said. "But that thing was much too recent."
"What thing?"
She seemed suddenly angry. "The thing I came to you about."
"Koslak," I said.
"Yes."
"And you're angry at all men?"
"In a way."
"Is that fair?"
"It isn't a question of being fair."
"You mean that if it wasn't for what happened, you might come up tonight?"
"I might."
Brandenburg seemed loud against the silence of the parking lot. "You're very hard to figure, Francine. You seem very smart-ass at times."
"And?"
"And at times very vulnerable."
"That's right. That's me. Smart-ass and vulnerable. Don't you think they go together?"
"I know they do."
"Are you ever vulnerable, counselor?"
"Yes."
"When?"
"Right now," I said, turning the engine on, backing out of the parking space, zipping out of the lot too fast, tires squealing, heading for the parkway.
"You seem in an awful hurry," she said.
I didn't answer.
After a while she said, "You're afraid of your feelings, aren't you?"
"Aren't you?"
"You sound angry."
"I didn't mean to sound angry."
I slowed down some. I followed her directions. When we pulled up in her parents' driveway, I felt an exhaustion in my chest. I saw the foyer light go on.
"You want to get away fast, don't you?" she said.
I kept both hands tight on the wheel.
She got out of the car. Before the door of the house was opened for her, I was pulling away.
I felt as if we'd had a lovers' quarrel and we weren't even lovers.
Thirteen
Koch
I think about this name Thomassy. Never have I heard a name like that exactly. George could be anything, Georg, Georgio, Jorge, Georges, the English had kings named George. Everywhere the Tigris and Euphrates fertilize, the land is rich with Georges. In the thirties, if this Thomassy was to be an actor, the movie people would call him what? George Thomas? Now they keep their names. George Segal. They put foreign flags on their bumpers. My forebears came from somewhere else, make something of it, a challenge to the Wasp world whose daughters run loose among Greeks, Italians, Jews, whatnot, seeking interesting genes. Almighty, You are manipulating us for some plan that will give us again a Jewbaby hidden in the bulrushes by a shiksa of high station. In the Sistine Chapel the fingers still almost touch. Scientists bring their children to look up at God and Adam. Do they laugh? Do they say it is a good painting period? They do not? They are in awe. Gunther, Marta would say were she still alive, you are about to declare yourself a failure. You still think of yourself the way your mother thought of you: Go out into the world and make a name for yourself, meaning that if your mind leads you to interesting speculations, put them down, make an article, a book even, pass them on. Success she demanded, meaning the name that she gave you will be recognized. Gunther, Marta would say, it is permitted to be a dilettante if that pleases you, it is not a failure to depart the world leaving no grandchildren and no books. Passing through is okay, Marta, my heart cries, it would be a comfort to believe you! It is not my mother who is nagging me now, it is myself telling me that I am sixty and there is not much time to leave a mark.
I was meandering in thoughts like these when the doorbell rang and I went to greet this Thomassy. We shook hands. I do not want him in the study where I see my patients. I show him to a comfortable chair in my living room. He looks at me, I look at him, two animals of similar but different species inhabiting the same forest and meeting for the first time.
I would say he is in his middle forties. No accent, therefore probably American born or arrived before the age of twelve. Perhaps Greek-looking, but taller by far than Greeks, and in his movement strength, in his face I see what I envy, a man the world will not abuse easily. I wish I had a Rorschach of him!
"How much time have we got?" he says.
"You have twenty-five years, I have ten."
It takes him only a second to see that I am subtracting from three score and ten, and he laughs.
"You have a good laugh," I tell him.
"As distinguished from?"
"A bad laugh is a form of manipulation. I laugh to show I despise what you have said or what you are. I put you down. A good laugh is a quick, uncontrolled reaction, finding amusement or joy. Yours was a good laugh."
"Thank you," Thomassy said. "I suppose we get to think of analysts in terms of fifty minutes. We may need more. I have quite a few questions."
"Take all the time you need. Have you ever been to an analyst yourself?"
"No."
"Forgive me," I said, "I didn't mean to intrude on your private life. It's just I wanted to know if I may use the terms of reference we have. You are familiar with them?"
"Oh yes," he said. "Even the uneducated witness in the box now recognizes his unconscious slips have meaning."
I nodded. "Before we begin," I said, "I wonder if you would satisfy a small point of curiosity. I have not heard the name Thomassy before."
"It's Armenian, Thomassian. I shortened it."
"Why?"
"To keep people guessing. Koch is German?"
"I am a Jew," I said.
"I knew someone once who spent months trying to find a Gentile psychoanalyst."
"An anti-Semite looking to avoid a transference?"
"I guess he thought a Christian would be more forgiving."
I could not help laughing.
"I guess that was a good laugh," said Thomassy.
I was liking the man, which surprised me. I expect lawyers to be like lawyers the way the inexperienced expect Jews to be like Jews.
"Armenians suffered a great deal," I said.
"Most people don't know they exist."
"They were the first Christians. They carried their cross into the twentieth century."
"My father left his at Ellis Island."
"Too much was left at Ellis Island. We are beginning to reclaim it." I sighed. "The Turks were as bad as the Nazis."
"No," said Thomassy. "They weren't hypocrites. No Beethovens, Kants, no claims of high civilization. They hated us, they wanted us all dead. Straightforward. Anyway, I'm not here to right the wrongs of the world, doctor. I just want to see if I can be of some help to…"
"The Widmer woman, of course."
"Francine."
"Yes, let u
s call her Francine. She has asked you to pursue her assailant until he is punished for violating the one orifice that requires permission for its senses to be activated."
Thomassy seemed puzzled.
"The ears hear whatever sounds strike them," I explained. "The eyes, when open, see. The nose smells full time. The vagina requires an admission ticket."
"Dr. Koch, if you talk like that, I promise I'll never call you as a witness."
"Splendid. Already I have accomplished something."
"Francine feels she has been the victim of a serious crime some men don't understand."
I could not help sighing again. Francine had been working on him. "There are a thousand ways in which we rape each other, including ways that cause death sooner or later, yet there is only one form of rape that is categorized as a major crime. I think women have had greater influence on the law than they think."
"You think, doctor, that she is making too much of what happened to her?"
"No. But one must understand the woman to understand what this particular event meant. Can I get you some coffee?"
Thomassy said he preferred a scotch and soda. "I will join you," I said, "though I am not a drinker really." Then, settled once more, I said, "Francine is a zealot, which means she will try to pursue an idea till its end. She has courage, what we men chauvinistically refer to as 'balls.' "
"Would you explain?"
"It is my lifelong adventure to explain. It is my ego's flower. She has political interests, in the broad sense, as do many young women of this period. Where does she find employment? In the most conspicuous place where power does not work at all. In the enemy camp, in the United Nations. She is probably a disruptive force there, or could be. Do you find her disruptive?"
"Yes. I also find her attractive."
He too? "That can be a handicap with a client as with a patient."
"Yes," said Thomassy.
"What attracts you?"
"I don't want to bore you."
"No, no, go on."
"Spunk. What you said, balls."
"An aggressive quality normally associated with males. We analysts sometimes pay close attention to words. You know the other meaning of spunk?"
"Semen."
"Yes. Now how do you think I might help with this case of hers?"
Thomassy lit up his pipe, giving him a moment to formulate. I'm sure he does not enjoy this luxury in the courtroom. There would be other devices. Going to the counsel table for a pad. Pacing.