“What’s wrong?”
“We must go to Miami,” the madrina said.
“But La Familia has suffered and you have no more enemies in town.”
“You must not say that. The other madrinas are jealous. They don’t have a champion like you. They say I slept with Changó, tricked him into my bed, so that the lord would favor you in our fight with Don Edmundo. They have woken the spirits, and Oyá is mad. She is the lord’s mistress, after all. And she will steal my daughter if I stay.”
“Dolores, what can I do?”
“Do nothing. It is priests’ business. We will pray to Santa Barbara when we get off the bus.”
“But I can send you by plane.”
“Please. Oyá will borrow the lord’s thunder and strike all the planes you send. We will sit before Barbara’s shrine. We will ask forgiveness. And if we are worthy, Changó will come to us in his red dress. Then we can return to the north.”
“Will you give me your address?”
“I cannot write, señor. You have been lucky, and all the priests are jealous.”
“Where’s the girl?”
“With me, señor. But I am not certain she should look at your face. She could be harmed.”
Dolores relented and called the little girl in Creole. Barbara arrived from under the couch. She wore a dirty smock and she didn’t have her doll.
“Querida,” Holden said. He’d been a ghost until the santita, a bumper who lived in closets. He’d found a certain recreation in her eyes, a feel of himself. The girl had nourished him with those animal eyes.
“Froggy,” she said, “will you miss me?”
And he started to cry, because he’d lived thirty-seven years as some kind of pilgrim. He’d loved Andrushka the twig. He’d loved Loretta Howard. And he’d loved his dad in a phantom way. But he’d spent his time dispatching people. The paradise man.
He wanted to hug the little girl, but Carmen Miranda scolded him from her couch. “You cannot touch the little one, señor. It is forbidden.”
“Mother, I—”
“You must not call me that. Señor, you have to go. Oyá will curse our bus, and we shall never get to Miami.”
Holden left that marketland under the bridge. He got into a cab with the kid. He was having murderous thoughts. The kid had helped destroy Mrs. Howard. But if Holden destroyed Gottlieb, he’d have one more person to mourn. “Adiós,” he said, and dropped the kid off at one of the banks where the kid had a vault and then Holden continued uptown to Aladdin. He didn’t have to collect any debts. There were mannequins in the showroom, but they couldn’t excite him the way the twig had done. They were college girls trying to earn a dime for their tuition. They didn’t have that frenzy of the twig. They flirted with Holden because he was rich and wore a king’s suit. But the involvement in their eyes only saddened him. He was the Froggy who couldn’t be brought to life by college girls.
He piddled around in his office and returned to Central Park West. He had an odd sensation outside his door. As if Oyá were still angry at him for interfering in Cuban politics. He shouldn’t have been involved with African gods who sometimes wore a Christian face.
Oyá could swim in the Niger whenever she wants. He opened the door and gave a little scream.
Someone stood in Holden’s rooms, wearing a red dress.
“Changó,” he muttered. And then he noticed a head of curly blonde hair and a suitcase. He felt cheated. “Who let you in?”
Fay turned around and Holden had to fight an impulse to kiss his darling.
“I bribed the super,” she said.
“I’m speechless. I mean, I pay a million two for this apartment and the security stinks.”
“You’re always speechless, Sidney. That’s one of your nicest traits.”
“But you could have been sent here to kill me. How would a super know the difference?”
“He wouldn’t. But he trusted me. I told him it was a big surprise ... that it was your birthday.”
“It’s not my birthday,” Holden said.
“But you could pretend it was.”
She’d worn him down and he’d only been home a minute. He wished he had some coffee in the house. Coffee would have bolted him awake. And he could have provided the necessary answers.
“Why did you run away from me at Mansions?”
“You were with your daughters and Rex. Your family. And I was frightened.”
“You’re never frightened ... are you glad to see me?”
“I am glad,” he had to admit. “Very glad. But you have a husband. You have daughters.”
“My daughters can visit. All it takes is the crosstown bus ... I’m not in love with Rex.”
“And Paul, what about Paul?”
“He’ll have to grow up.”
“He’s already grown up. He’s the district attorney.”
“Paul won’t bother us.”
“I know Paul. Paul’s a brooder.”
“So he’s a brooder,” she said. And Holden couldn’t battle with his darling. He didn’t care about the practicalities. Two daughters on a crosstown bus. He wanted Fay with him in his tower.
“I can’t make coffee. I always forget to buy the beans.”
“I won’t drink coffee when I’m with you.”
“You shouldn’t have told Florinda that we made love in the toilet.”
“Why not?”
“It’s personal,” he said.
His darling laughed. She started to unbutton his collar. “Yes. It’s personal,” she said. Fay was like that city outside his window, that mirage of walls. He couldn’t say what love was about. A knock on the head. A naked woman in a bungalow. Curly blonde hair. The tremors in his darling’s throat. That was more than enough for Sidney Holden.
She brought him into the toilet. She didn’t examine the fixtures and the faucets. He held her from behind. He could taste her hair. She clutched the toilet seat. Holden’s socks were on the floor, near the PPK. He entered his darling like that first little bump of a dream.
Something bothered him. A noise he heard. The movement of a key. Or a dark scratch, as if the leopards had come down from that wall in Avignon. Holden walked out of the toilet with the PPK in his hand. But the leopards had already pounced.
Paul stood above him with the PPK. Holden was on the floor. He had a headache. Paul was in his undertaker’s suit. His voice was very sweet. “Holden, I’m not used to a blackjack. I had to borrow it from Dimitrios. Did I hit you too hard?”
“Not at all,” the Frog said, with blood under his ear. “I don’t have to ask you how you got in. You followed Fay.”
“Holden, I’m the district attorney.”
“In Queens you are. Not on Central Park West.”
“It’s all the same crib, Holden. Haven’t you learned that?”
“What is it you want?”
“Fay. Only Fay.”
“You can’t have her. I told you. We’re getting married.”
“You’re a ridiculous fellow. Sitting with your cock out. I could kill you, Holden, and swear it was self-defense.”
“You’d have to convince a jury.”
Paul looked at Holden with such contempt, the bumper began to feel lonely again. “Holden, you’re a hardened criminal, a psychopath, with God knows how many murders behind you.”
“But I had a stinking angel on my shoulder. The angel was you.”
“No jury would ever believe that. And you won’t be around to tell.”
“But Fay will.”
Paul started to laugh. “Fay has daughters to protect. She’ll grieve for you. I don’t doubt that. But she’d never put her family through the muck. Besides, she wouldn’t make a very good witness. She’s had a couple of breakdowns, Sidney.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“All right, Frog. I won’t. But you can’t win no matter what.”
“I’ll decide that,” Fay said, standing in one of Holden’s robes. Her face had a deep burn, as if she�
�d come out of the most brutal sun, rather than Sidney’s toilet. But Paul didn’t seem perturbed.
“Are you comfy, dear, in your new nest? I didn’t mind that rat’s palace down in Chelsea. It was Holden’s craphouse. But did you think I’d ever let you live with him out in the open? Among decent people? Dear, you don’t know me very well.”
“I know you, Paul,” she said. “Get out of this apartment.”
Paul kept laughing with his teeth. “I have Sidney’s gun. And if you come near me with such a temper, I’ll shoot his kneecaps off. He won’t be much good to you, dear. So get dressed like a quiet little girl and come with me.”
“I’m not coming with you, Paul. This is where I live. With Holden.”
“That’s preposterous,” Paul said. “You have nothing in common with him.”
“I had three semesters at Bernard Baruch,” Holden said, getting off his ass and dancing in front of the PPK.
“Did you study Milton? Or Shaw?” the district attorney asked, with a sneer on his face.
“I’m married to Milton,” Fay said. “And I don’t need him. I need Holden.”
And Paul’s eyes turned mean. He could have been a little boy robbed of his candy. “Then I’ll have to shoot your precious psychopath.”
Fay stood in front of Holden. But the Frog couldn’t let his own darling be his shield. He stepped outside the warm expanse of her body. “Go on, Paul. But make it good. Because if you don’t finish me with the first bullet, I swear I’ll shake you to death.”
Paul never bothered to look at the Frog. He watched Fay; her eyes were like a mirror to his own black life. Fay didn’t have the least regard or pity for him. He could neither woo her nor win her with Holden’s gun. Bumping Holden wouldn’t bring her back. There was a twitch in Paul’s cheek, like an animal under the skin.
Holden retrieved his PPK and marched into the toilet to put on a robe; when he returned to Paul, the twitch was gone. Sidney was the pope of this tower. And Paul was the ruler of Queens.
“I wouldn’t discuss this visit, old boy.”
Holden didn’t bite back. He let the district attorney have his little say.
Paul got onto the elevator and Holden went back to his darling. Fay swabbed Holden’s head with a bit of wet cotton. “I’m starving,” he told her.
“I’ll make some ratatouille,” his darling said. She was trembling, and Holden caressed her in the kitchen. “Ratatouille,” she said.
“But there’s no vegetables in the house ... and no coffee beans.”
“Then I’ll improvise.”
And Holden brought her suitcase into the bedroom while his darling searched the cupboards. The Frog had come home.
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copyright © 1987 by Jerome Charyn
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Paradise Man Page 23