by Sol Stein
“You’re not Jewish, are you?”
“Would it make a difference?” Henry asked.
“Not to me,” she said. “To others.”
“I’m Jewish.”
“You don’t look Jewish,” Margaret said.
“That’s okay,” Henry said. “You don’t look Methodist.”
“How’d you know I was a Methodist?”
“All Methodists have a certain look.”
It was then she realized he was kidding, and they both laughed.
“I looked you up,” Henry said. “Your father’s a minister. Is he the one it would make a difference to?”
“Yes, but he’d like the idea. Reverend Kittredge’s Sunday sermons are about his private conversations with God. They got him transferred to the poorest church in Omaha, which had no choice but to take us. He’d say things like, I’m going to open a clothing store. Why should the Jews make all the money? He hated our poverty and couldn’t do anything about it. He’d be pleased we’re going together. He’d say, Latch on to a Jew, they always know where the money is.”
When she saw Henry’s face, Margaret added, “You have to think of it as half a joke. He’d never lift a hand against another human being.”
“It’s a joke that is not a joke,” Henry said. “The essence of Jewish humor.”
“My mother was the big proponent of brains in my family. She would adore you.”
By the time they made that first trip to Omaha, Henry remembered, her mother was dead.
*
“I’m not Jewish,” Margaret was saying to Clete. “What’s that got to do with anything?”
“But you married a Jew, right?” Clete asked.
“Listen, young man,” Henry said. “You were polite when we arrived and now you’re being discourteous.”
“I’m sorry,” Clete said. “I was just getting some facts straight. We don’t like making mistakes.”
Damn, thought Henry, as he went back into the room to pick up the phone. He was prepared for everything but this.
The girl at the other end sounded alarmed. “Isn’t Clete with you?”
“I want to talk to the manager,” Henry said, trying to calm his voice.
“Mr. Whittaker doesn’t talk to guests,” the girl said. “Isn’t Clete there?”
“We were locked in our room.”
“You’ll have to talk to Clete about that.”
“I’m afraid he’s been rude to my wife and to me.”
“Oh, sir, Clete’s very polite. I’m sure you must be mistaken.”
Henry put the phone back on the cradle. What kind of a place was this? He turned to see Clete standing in the doorway. And he remembered the room clerk at the Highgate. Will you need a reservation at your next destination? May I recommend Cliffhaven in Big Sur? And the way he watched him all the way to the elevator?
“Coming, Mr. Brown?”
Henry could see Margaret’s anxious face behind Clete.
“I’d like to go down to the reception desk,” Henry said.
“Sure,” Clete said. “Just follow me.”
Outside, Henry took Margaret by the arm. “I think we’d better get out of here,” he whispered.
“What about our bags, our clothes?” Margaret asked, starting back into the room.
Henry tightened his grip on her arm. “Don’t go in there.” Then, loud enough for Clete to hear, he said, “We’ll come back to get our things, with the police, if necessary.”
Clete stopped. Slowly, he turned to face them. “Oh Mr. Brown, you seemed so calm before. I wish you wouldn’t get yourself all worked up. It’s so un-California, if you know what I mean.” His face was expressionless. “Please cool it.”
“I don’t like jokes like this.”
“Mr. Brown, this isn’t a joke.”
“Do you have my car keys?”
“I told you they’d be at the reception desk,” Clete said. “I wouldn’t lie to you.”
“Well, I’m going straight to the reception desk.” Henry took Margaret by the hand and went down the stairs, Clete right behind them.
“Don’t try to stop me, young man,” Henry said.
“I wouldn’t do that, Mr. Brown. And I wish you’d call me Clete, not young man.”
Henry turned to look at him. Clete was serious. The name meant something to him.
“You wouldn’t want me to call you old man, would you?” Clete asked.
He led Henry and Margaret around to the front of the building. Three other blue-and-orange T-shirted young men, blond like Clete, were lolling in front of another building.
Where were the other guests?
Henry started walking at a fast pace toward the nearest of the staff members. They wouldn’t all be crazy. But the young man, seeing him coming, glanced over at Clete, then went into the building behind him. As if on signal, the other two did the same thing.
There wasn’t another human being in sight. Behind the building, encircling the distant perimeter of the built-up area, was redwood forest, the trees like stiff sentinels almost all the way up the mountains behind Cliffhaven. Turning toward the Pacific, Henry saw seemingly impenetrable foliage that went all the way down to the whitecapped surf sounding against the rocks. Between the brush and the roiling water there had to be the curving highway they had come on. They had to get back down there.
“I’ll be happy to show you where reception is,” Clete said.
Henry looked over at Margaret. “There are times,” she said, “when a good mind is of absolutely no use.”
“Nonsense,” Henry had replied, though Margaret, who on occasion had to release a patient to death, was demonstrably right.
“Take your time,” Clete said. “I’ve got all the time in the world.”
“Well, I haven’t,” Henry said, motioning Clete on. He waited for Margaret, then followed Clete to the side of the next building. The young man leaped up the three steps onto the porch and held the glass door open for them, waiting.
The reception room was plain, just two couches at one end, with a coffee table in front of each, and some extra chairs. At the left as they entered was a large desk with a young lady seated behind it. She, too, was wearing one of the orange T-shirts with “Cliffhaven” stenciled on its front.
“Good evening,” she said cheerfully.
“I’m Henry Brown.”
“Yes, I know,” she said.
“I’d like my car keys, please.”
“Oh they’re locked up, Mr. Brown. I’m afraid I can’t give them to you without Clete’s permission.”
It is useless to lose one’s temper.
“Miss,” Henry said, “that Ford belongs to the Hertz people.”
The girl looked over at Clete. “Haven’t you briefed them?”
“I told him no keys. He’s just being stubborn the way some of them are.”
Henry turned. “Some of who?”
“Mr. Brown, don’t act naïve. You’re a very intelligent man. Come now, I’m going to take you and your wife for a real treat. The restaurant is three stars, you know.”
“Is that supposed to be the chief attraction of this place?” Henry asked, a touch of sarcasm in his voice.
“It wasn’t at first,” Clete said. “We got lucky. One of our first guests was a restaurateur—did I get that word right?—you know what I mean, who used to be a gourmet chef, and Mr. Clifford, he’s the most intelligent man I ever met, he immediately saw the potential.”
“You mean he hired the guest as cook? Why would the man be willing to work here?”
Clete smiled. “Willing is irrelevant, Mr. Brown. Our guests never leave us.”
3
An hour earlier, while Henry and Margaret were taking a nap, Clete had decided on a siesta, too. Siesta meant one thing to him. He went to his room and buzzed Charlotte’s.
“Come on over,” he said.
“I thought you weren’t calling today.”
“Don’t get sore,” Clete said. “I got held up with
some in-comers. You coming?”
Charlotte let his phrase hang in the air a second. Then she said, “Not yet,” and they both laughed.
*
Clete was lying on his bed when Charlotte knocked. She came in without waiting for his response, and locked the door behind her.
“Suppose I had someone in here?” Clete said.
“I’d kill her,” Charlotte said.
Charlotte was blonde, young and extraordinarily tall. Clete, who believed himself to be a connoisseur of female bodies, admired Charlotte’s proportions. Even her height pleased him, he just didn’t like standing next to her.
“There’s room,” he said, beckoning to the place beside him on the bed. “I like you better horizontal.”
“No finesse.” She lay down next to him as she had done so many afternoons before.
“No finesse, eh?” Clete said, touching the tip of her left breast through the orange T-shirt. He moved his finger in a small circle around the perimeter of the nipple, barely in contact with the nipple itself. As always, it aroused her, and when he saw that it had, he withdrew his finger. A little at a time, was his motto with women. Make them want it.
“Got myself some beauts,” he said. “Henry Brown. Wife’s a doctor.”
“Is she cute?” Charlotte asked.
“She’s old enough to be my mother, for Christ’s sake!” Clete said.
“So’s Mrs. Clifford.”
“You watch yourself.” He returned his finger to its circling motion, this time on Charlotte’s right nipple.
“You can’t always tell when people are Jewish,” Clete said. “They ought to wear signs.”
Charlotte pointed to her nose.
“Oh, some of them have nose jobs,” Clete said. “But some just in their natural looks, you can’t tell. This guy Brown doesn’t look it. If anything, his wife—that’s the doctor—she might look a little, but I’ll bet she’s not.”
Clete had moved his hand to Charlotte’s belly, expanding the circular motion.
“I’m glad you find me attractive,” Charlotte said.
“How do you know I find you attractive?” Clete said.
Charlotte quickly flicked her fingers at his hardened crotch.
“Hey, don’t do that.”
She moved her hand gently across his jeans.
“Better?”
“A lot better.”
“You ever fuck a Jewish girl?” Charlotte asked.
“Not that I know of,” Clete said quickly, thinking of the Minter woman.
“You don’t sound sure,” Charlotte said, removing her hand from his jeans.
“I’m sure, I’m sure.”
Clete had eyeballed Phyllis Minter on her first day in the dining room. He’d have guessed her to be thirty-five max, though her eyes and carriage conveyed the self-confidence Clete associated with older women. It wasn’t just her tits, ass, and legs, it was how it all came together, even the way she held her fucking head high. If he was ever going to sample Jewish pussy, it ought to be hers. He’d bring her head down to where she could see what he had for her.
It was a simple matter for him to find out her room number. A small favor got him the key from someone who would never tell Charlotte.
*
Phyllis Minter was born two years before World War II ended in a part of Brooklyn then inhabited almost entirely by Jews. Her father, a good-looking man as proved by a World War II photograph, returned from the army safe, got a job driving a cab in Manhattan on the swing shift. As an ex-serviceman, when he cruised for customers, Morton Minter naturally gave preference to men in uniform. During his second week, his cab was hailed by a man in soldier’s uniform, who had him drive to somewhere under the El-tracks and there pointed a pistol at Morton’s head and said, “Let’s have your dough.” Morton turned to tell the man he was an ex-G.I. trying to make an honest living, but as he turned around to do so, the man fired. It was the last sound ever heard by Morton Minter, who became the first cab driver casualty that February in New York City. The thief got less than six dollars.
Phyllis was told that her father had gone back into the army. Though only four, she refused to believe it. He hadn’t said good-bye, and his uniforms were still hanging in the closet. Phyllis’s mother, a fragile woman, let her sanity be shrouded in grief. Unable to cope, she let relatives place Phyllis, kicking and screaming, into a Hebrew orphanage run by an Orthodox sadist, who had an excessive interest in barely pubescent children. He kept his eye on Phyllis. When she was almost twelve, the director called her to his office and offered her twenty-five cents to do something Phyllis had only read about in a book that circulated clandestinely among the girls for under-the-cover reading late at night. Phyllis, a cynic at twelve, was quite prepared to sell the only thing she possessed that was of interest, but not for twenty-five cents. Though the director preached socialism—which he called “sharing”—Phyllis was the possessor of a remarkable intelligence and had read the countervailing literature. This was a society in which one sold for the highest possible price, which wasn’t a quarter. She ran away to try her luck.
By the time Phyllis was seventeen, she was well-to-do, though she had slept with only four men in all that time, and with each of them a few times at most. The first two were easy—older men, married, with a penchant for youngsters—who learned to their dismay that Phyllis understood not only what jailbait meant but was quite prepared to trade their freedom from prosecution for a fair sum. The sum, which seemed unfair to them, was designated as fair by Phyllis, who pegged the amount to the largest sum she thought she could get away with. She was not a pirate, but a canny businesswoman who never overreached herself.
Her third mark was a popular crooner, who enjoyed the groupies clustering around him in his dressing room at the Paramount. Through a friend of a friend, Phyllis infiltrated this group, attracted the crooner’s attention, whose mistake was to assume this very bright and pretty young girl was one of his worshipers. He allowed himself to be seduced. When the time came—which Phyllis put off as long as possible in order to raise the price—she surprised him by confessing that she was not interested in his passing affection but in endowment. He told her to git, whereupon he was visited a day later by a policeman in uniform, who didn’t threaten arrest or anything unpleasant, provided the crooner paid Phyllis Minter her due. “You her pimp?” screamed the crooner. “Get the fuck out of here!”
The police officer, a man thoroughly at home in the ways of the world, patiently explained that his role was not unlike that of the theatrical agents the crooner was used to. There was a certain amount of money to pay each month—it wouldn’t make a serious dent in his income—and the policeman, who would see to it that it was paid, took, with permission, ten percent before turning the balance over to Phyllis, who was now sixteen and looked several years older. It was the stink bombs—rolls of camera film wrapped tightly in cardboard—that caused the management of the Paramount to urge the crooner to settle with the aggrieved.
When the policeman next showed, the crooner offered a deal. Instead of monthly payments, five thousand dollars cash, a bounty at the time. After the transfer of the money, they shook hands, as businessmen will.
The policeman, prepared to turn over Phyllis’s share to her, thought of negotiating his fee upward to twenty percent. The expression in Phyllis’s face in response to his proposal was fearsome. He’d seen men—but never a woman—look like that.
“What’s the matter?” he said.
With a minimal movement of her lips, which she’d seen women of menace do in movies, Phyllis reminded the policeman of his wife. She said, “I’ll visit the police commissioner first, then her.”
That was all it took. The policeman, having worked with Phyllis, believed her. He not only turned over her ninety percent, but to show his continued good will introduced her to a man he had only told her about, a stockbroker who was having a particular run of postwar luck with laundered dollars.
They were still in bed
when Phyllis suggested that the stockbroker invest her forty-five hundred dollars cash in whatever was his best going deal.
“You can’t always guess perfectly in this business,” the broker said, not wanting to put her off entirely because he wanted a repetition of the pleasure he had just experienced.
“Oh that’s easy,” Phyllis said. “Whatever turned out best for the year, you’ll consider the first forty-five hundred mine and the rest whoever else’s.”
It took a little persuasion, but Phyllis became the most fortunate investor on the street. Whatever was the most productive deal of the year, turned out to be what she had “invested” in, even if her friend had to make up the difference out of his own pocket.
Her eventual affluence decided her. There was no point to getting married; she already had what she considered her “alimony” from several men. She moved, at twenty-three, to Los Angeles, where an acquaintance introduced her to the prospects of real estate. As one might expect, she turned into a terrific saleswoman because she never seemed to need to make the sale. Phyllis Minter was thirty-five when she went to that new resort she had heard about—Cliffhaven—to rest and reflect in an environment she suspected would suit her: she was told everybody went there in couples. She, as usual, would go alone, and by that very fact be both exceptional and, just in case, desirable.
When Clete inveigled a key to Phyllis’s room, she thought she’d found her exit visa from crazy Cliffhaven.
“You’re a terrific looker,” Clete told her.
These California beachboy types, thought Phyllis, had the style of a preformed hamburger. He was examining her with his eyes. That part was free.
Clete had come in with the express desire of having what he thought of as his first Jewish pussy, but when he saw the way Phyllis moved her mouth, he thought he’d try another avenue first.
“I’ve got something for you,” he said. “You hungry?”
“What’s in it for me?” Phyllis said, biding her time.
Clete decided to show her. He let his jeans and shorts drop.
“Don’t you think you ought to take your sneakers off?” asked Phyllis.
Clete looked down. It was kind of ridiculous-looking. He had to sit down on the edge of the bed to untie his Keds. When he got them off and pulled his pants and undershorts off, he stood up. But the process of undressing on order had minimized his tumescence, and she was staring at it, which didn’t help.