Elsinore

by Jerome Charyn

  “Even as I started to lose her, Holden, I was happy. I had a picture of her life, from moment to moment.”

  “But you’re not happy now.”

  The old man ate his coffee with a spoon.

  “It was inevitable. She ran away, married an accountant in Rochester. I wrecked his firm. He had no idea what was happening. The poor man committed suicide.”

  “And the girl?”

  “Went out of her mind, Holden.”

  “What was her name?”

  “Judith Church.”

  “She still alive?”

  “Yes. She’s a baby … sixty-seven.”

  “And you want me to find her? Is that what this breakfast is about?”

  “Find her, man? I know where she is. You think I’d ever lose sight of her?”

  “Did she recover her senses?”

  “Of course,” Phipps said. “The woman wasn’t a lunatic. She was under distress.”

  “Why didn’t you court her again?”

  “Bloody logical, aren’t you, Holden? I did court her again. She wouldn’t have me. Said I’d ruined her life. Hated my smell. Hated the look of my face. But that’s how I am. I manipulate. Stocks. Bonds. People.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “Right in New York.”

  “And you want her back?”

  “No, no. That’s not the point of the story. We were talking about my restaurant. I shut it down after Judith went to Rochester that first time. I couldn’t bear to watch people eating under this roof while she was away. I wanted to murder them all, the bloody bastards, chewing their steaks.”

  “That’s a bit eccentric for a businessman. Why didn’t you keep off the property?”

  “I couldn’t. I’d open my eyes and imagine her eating at a table with other men.”

  “I studied accounting, Mr. Phipps.”

  “I know. Three semesters at Bernard Baruch College. I had you investigated. I always do that when I consider hiring someone.”

  “You didn’t let me finish,” Holden said. “You were making a fortune from the place, right? You could have sold it, but you didn’t want to. Then why didn’t you come up to this joint wearing a blindfold, so you wouldn’t have to imagine looking at your lady?”

  The old man started to laugh and coffee dribbled from the edges of his mouth. A waiter arrived with an enormous napkin. Phipps seized it and patted his mouth. Then he returned the napkin and banished the waiter to some far corner of the restaurant. “I like you, Holden. I like you very much.”

  “I still don’t understand what I’m doing here. I can’t help you with your darling. I don’t kidnap women, Mr. Phipps. And three semesters at Baruch doesn’t qualify me for any of the outfits you run.”

  “You’re valuable to me.”

  “How? If it’s heavy-duty work, you could bribe the CIA or one of the new Mafia families. They could lend you a hand.”

  “That’s not the kind of hand I need.”

  “Then what is it?” Holden asked, tiring of all that food on the table. The unobstructed depth of the restaurant was killing him. He’d come to a ghost city. Would the waiters disappear if he pricked them with a needle? Were they animated balloons from one of the workshops downstairs? A product of Phipps Enterprises?

  “I’m ninety-two, Holden. I’d like a companion.”

  Holden looked at the old man’s eyes. “If it’s funny stuff, I’m not into that. I have a fiancée, even if I can’t reach her at the moment.” Holden stood up. “I think I’ll say good-bye … and you can have your check back.”

  “Sit down.”

  “I like it better when I stand. I can watch all the murals.”

  “Sit down.”

  Holden sat.

  “I’m sick of philanthropy … I want to get back into the life.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You know. That’s why I need you. I can’t go charging around all by myself.”

  “Then hire a nurse with a pair of guns.… Mr. Phipps, you’re a little crazy. The life. The life. You want to handle cocaine? Be my guest. All you have to do is buy a little airfield and you’re in business.”

  “I’m not interested in cocaine. I was thinking of funny paper.”

  “Oh, that’s a lovely idea. Funny paper, when you’ve got billions of the real thing. No wonder Judith Church ran away. You’re into scary projects … and why are you telling me all this? Are you so sure I’m not wearing a wire? I could be a rat for some federal prosecutor, waiting in line for the witness protection program. I could sink you, Mr. Phipps.”

  “Holden, I have dinner twice a month with the attorney general.”

  “All right, so you’re bulletproof, but why me?”

  “I trust you.”

  “We’ve never met. Are you telling me I have an honest smile, some shit like that?”

  “I’ve known you since you were a boy.”

  “Stop that,” Holden said. “I wouldn’t forget a billionaire.”

  “I never really introduced myself to you. That would have been indiscreet. We had ice-cream sodas several times.”

  “Where and when?”

  “Jacobi’s on Kissena Boulevard … I’d say nineteen sixty or ’sixty-two.”

  Holden felt a murderous beat in his forehead. “My father always took me there. It was out of the way. He’d drive me in his company car … between assignments for Aladdin Furs. He was Bruno Schatz’s chauffeur.”

  “Sometimes Schatz lent your father out to me.”

  “That’s impossible,” Holden said. “My dad was under wraps. Schatz had to find him a new name and everything. He was an outlaw.”

  “You misunderstood. He didn’t hurt anyone for me. Your father was my collection agent. And we’d meet at Jacobi’s from time to time. I was fond of him … and his wife. A black woman.”

  “Mrs. Howard. They lived together. But they were never married.”

  “I wasn’t being technical about it,” Phipps said. “And we talked, you and I … at Jacobi’s.”

  “What about?”

  “Baseball, I think. Johnny Mize. And James Bond. You liked Double O Seven.”

  “Then it couldn’t have been nineteen sixty. That was before Doctor No.”

  A hollow appeared between the old man’s eyes. “Didn’t I say ’sixty or ’sixty-two?”

  They were silent for a moment, stuck in some little war game of years and ice-cream parlors. Holden still couldn’t remember an old man asking him questions about Johnny Mize. But Holden Sr. might have talked to Phipps about Mize. His dad had been delirious about baseball.

  Mrs. Vanderwelle had come upstairs with a message for the old man. She sat down at the table and Holden looked at the bow in her hair. He still couldn’t decide whether she was pretty or not. She had a cup of coffee while Phipps signed a few documents with a leaky ballpoint pen. His signature covered half the page.

  “Are you enjoying yourself, Mr. Holden?” she asked.

  “Yes. I like the decor. And the service.”

  “Then you ought to come again.” She got up, took the documents from Phipps, and walked to the elevator. Holden watched her rump. It was an enigma. He’d never met a woman he was so undecided about.

  “I don’t like the way you look at her, Holden,” Phipps said. “She’s off-limits.”

  “I apologize,” Holden said. “It’s just that I can’t picture her as the head of a foundation. And if she’s your personal lawyer, she must have an awful lot on her mind. Does she do criminal work? If you’re going to become a bandit at ninety-two, you’ll need a top attorney.”

  “She’s off-limits, I said.”

  “Why?”

  “She’s my daughter, Holden … but she doesn’t know that.”

  “Give me a clearer picture,” Holden said.

  “That’s clear enough.”

  “Then I’ll say good-bye. The breakfast was grand. It’s the first time I had an omelette with grapes.”

  “I
had a fling with her mother,” Phipps said. “The girl was born. I had no intention of marrying the woman. She sued. We settled out of court. It was a substantial sum.”

  “And you found a husband for her?”

  “No. She did that on her own.”

  “And Gloria thinks the other guy is her dad?”

  “Now you have it. Will you work for me or not?”

  “I have a couple of problems. You’re a little crazy and I’d prefer not to go to the slammer. But what the hell. I’ll tag along … on two conditions. I want to be president of Aladdin Furs, the chief officer, with voting privileges.”

  “And what does that make me?”

  “How should I know? Find yourself a title. Chairman of the board … you can be the main wizard.”

  “All right. Gloria will have to prepare the papers. And what else?”

  “I want the exact location of where the district attorney is hiding my fiancée.”

  “You’ll get it.”

  “When?” Holden asked.

  “Soon.”

  “Then soon is when I start.”

  The old man smiled, and Holden didn’t like the length of that grin.

  Phipps removed a piece of paper from his cardigan and unfolded it for Sidney Holden, who discovered a single word.

  Elsinore

  “Elsinore? And no address? What is Elsinore?”

  “A nursing home in Queens.”

  “Oh, he’s a smart monkey, that Paul. He hides her … and she’s ten minutes from his door. What if he finds out where I got this bit of news?”

  “I could break Abruzzi before you finish your omelette.”

  “Then why the hell do you need me?”

  “I told you,” Phipps said. “I’m not getting into the life all alone.”

  “Forgive me if I’m nosy, but what are you going to find when you get there?”

  “Fun,” the old man said. “I have no appetite. I’m too old to be with women. Oh, the doctors could fix me up with some kind of clay prick. But the desire isn’t there.”

  “So you’ll go slumming. A life of crime. It’s not as romantic as you think.”

  “I was a bootlegger once,” Phipps said. “Believe me, it wasn’t romantic. Then I moved molasses and tea. And when I was fifty-five, I started this foundation. Call it whatever you want, the robber baron makes good. But it was only one more empire, Holden, one more power link. The more people I helped, the surlier I got.”

  “So we go out on the road and make a little trouble.”

  “And business,” Phipps said.

  “Thank you … I’ll be in touch.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I want to visit my fiancée.”

  “Holden, be here tomorrow at nine, or I swear, I’ll have Abruzzi’s own men chop you down.”

  Holden smiled. “That’s not the way to treat your future companion.”

  And he parted company with the old man, left him with his cane and his rubber boots, and that ghost city he’d constructed for his own meals. Holden preferred a fish sandwich at Blimpie’s or some ratatouille at home. And then he had to remind himself. His home was in that ceiling of stars downstairs in Phipps’ lobby.

  4

  Elsinore wasn’t hard to find. It was a country where a guy named Hamlet once lived. Holden had read the play in high school. He remembered poison going into somebody’s ear. And a mad princess. A queen who liked to kiss her son on the mouth. A prince who went around killing people. Hamlet was a bumper, like Sidney Holden.

  And this Elsinore was near the old Flushing airport. On a side street, in College Point. But Hamlet forgot to bring his sword. And Holden wasn’t wearing his shooter this afternoon. He didn’t have Hamlet’s noblesse oblige. He couldn’t afford to bump people at a nursing home. Elsinore was a great wooden hut with porches and a tin roof. There weren’t any weirdos drifting out on the porch, or keepers in white suits. It could have been the oversized cottage of a shingle salesman in College Point. But there was one clue. The street was on a tiny hill, and Holden could see across Flushing Bay to the roofs of Rikers Island. So he was in the mood for penitentiaries when he knocked on the nursing home’s front door.

  He expected a fuss. Shooflies with submachine guns. Nurses with clubs. Some poor old slob of an actor shouting Shakespeare. The usual hurly-burly of a mad-person’s inn. But it was a tranquil place where Abruzzi had put his daughter-in-law. The waiting rooms sat above the sea. The water was dark and green, and Holden felt like some voyager on a route he hadn’t charted for himself. Captain Sid.

  He didn’t have to go through a circle of secretaries. Holden got to the chief resident in a couple of minutes. And it disturbed him, because he liked the guy and he didn’t want to. The resident was younger than Holden, and he didn’t play the psychiatric genius. Dr. Herbert Garden.

  “We were expecting you,” the doctor said. “I’ve been told how persistent you can be.”

  “How come Paul doesn’t have one of his shooters in the house?”

  “I’d be an idiot, Mr. Holden, if I allowed detectives to run around scaring patients.”

  “But why did Paul pick this place? He must know lots of inns.”

  “Maybe he thought I could help Mrs. Abruzzi.”

  “She won’t be Mrs. Abruzzi for long,” Holden said. “I’m going to marry her when she’s feeling better.”

  “How did you meet Mrs. Abruzzi?”

  “Well, it’s complicated,” Holden said. “I rescued her from three friends of mine.”

  “I read about that incident in Newsday. But no rescuer was ever mentioned.”

  “Right. I’m not a sheriff, Dr. Garden. I don’t wear a badge. I have to creep around the law. Big Paul was feuding with the Pinzolo brothers. Mike, Ed, and the Rat. They grabbed her, and I had to get her from Mike.”

  “And that’s how you met.”

  “Well, I went out to Rockaway. That’s where they were holding her. In a bungalow. I had a talk with Red Mike. And then Fay appeared, without her clothes. It was Mike’s idea. They were holding her like that, so she couldn’t run away.… I didn’t have a choice. I loved Mikey and his brothers. I grew up with them, but Mikey wouldn’t give her back.”

  “And who were you working for?”

  “I can’t disclose that.”

  “I’m sorry,” Garden said. “I didn’t mean to pry. But I have to examine the moment, the moment you met.”

  “She was naked. And I shot the three brothers.”

  “Did you wait until she left the room?”

  “No. She saw me in the act.”

  “That’s how it started then, Fay’s decline. She must have felt guilty about their deaths, more than she could imagine. She fell in love with you, which made her their executioner. And how could she resolve that, Mr. Holden?”

  “I’m not sure,” Holden said. “By killing me, I suppose.”

  “And herself. She stopped making love. Wouldn’t eat. Wouldn’t talk. Isn’t that how it was?”

  “But will she get better, Doc?”

  “Perhaps. But I don’t think she’ll ever be able to live with you again.”

  “Can I see her?”

  “She won’t recognize you,” Garden said. “She can’t afford to. Not now.”

  “But can I see her? For a second.”

  “Yes. Why not? But this is my ship, Holden. When I say jump, you jump. I don’t want an argument. I don’t want a fight.”

  “Agreed,” Holden said, and he followed Dr. Garden across a narrow corridor. There didn’t seem to be anyone aboard Garden’s ship. Holden didn’t meet a patient or a fucking nurse. Garden knocked on a door and said, “Darling, may I come in?”

  Holden didn’t like that word. Fay was his darling. But he didn’t argue with the doctor.

  Garden knocked again.

  “Fay. It’s Herbert. And a friend. We’d like to come in.”

  Garden entered, with Holden behind him. Fay’s curly hair was gone. She had a boy’s scalp.
She wore a white hospital gown without a bra. Her eyes didn’t have the slightest touch of fever, as if she’d been transported somewhere else, gone through some horrible looking glass.

  “Hello, Herbert,” she said. “How are you?”

  “Fine, Fay. Would you like to meet my friend?”

  “Oh, yes,” she said with all the polite enthusiasm of the damned and the dead.

  Holden’s legs were shaking.

  Garden introduced him. “This is Sidney Holden.”

  Fay took his hand. “It’s kind of you to come.”

  He couldn’t open his mouth.

  “Would you care for a Perrier?”

  “I think Sidney has to go, darling,” the doctor said.

  “It’s a pity. We have so many things to talk about.… Make him promise that he’ll come again.”

  “Oh, he’s loyal,” the doctor said. “He wouldn’t leave you in the lurch.”

  And Holden ran outside to the toilet and threw up his breakfast into the sink. Holden looked up when he saw Garden in the mirror.

  “I’m sorry you had to see her like that. But you insisted.”

  And Holden left Elsinore without rinsing his mouth.

  He’d have gone to the Amazon, lived among whatever savages were around, but it wouldn’t have cured Holden’s disease. He’d never rescued Fay. He’d killed his friend Mike and brought her slowly to her doom. He didn’t return to the Copenhagen to lick himself clean. He was like some forest animal who needed Mr. Phipps. But something bothered him about Phipps’ little presentation in that giant breakfast room. Ninety-two-year-old man seeks adventure and hires Holden his guide. Phipps’ whole story began to stink.

  And Holden visited the one encyclopedist he knew. Tosh, an eccentric book dealer who gathered information for bloodhounds and the mob. Tosh had his own morgue, like the New York Times. Six rooms of files. He’d never really been Holden’s rat. Tosh was much too independent. Mob lawyers liked to use him because Tosh himself was an encyclopedia of crime. His files were open day and night, but Tosh was no bachelor, no night fish. He had a wife and three kids who lived in the rooms above his inventory, and he was a devoted husband and dad. Holden admired him for that. Tosh might have disappeared into all the paper and the dust without his family.