The White Rose

by Jean Hanff Korelitz

  Number thirteen. “Ah, hello Mrs. Kahn. My name is Frieda Schaube,” says a voice, clipped and formal and strongly accented. “I am calling on behalf of Mr. Mortimer Klein and Miss Sophie Klein. I am telephoning everyone invited to the rehearsal dinner on Friday night to inform them that the location of the dinner has been changed. The dinner will now be held at The Retreat, and not at the Black Horse Inn, as originally planned.”

  Aha! thinks Marian. The Black Horse Inn! She writes it on her pad.

  “Time remains seven P.M. Dress code will remain black tie. Should you need directions, you may telephone me here in the city, or in Millbrook from Thursday,” Frieda Schaube says, helpfully giving the numbers.

  Number fourteen. “Oh…it’s Soriah. Okay.”

  Marian snatches up the phone and calls the apartment on Hughes Avenue again, though she knows it’s pointless. Scenarios race through her brain, less and less likely, more and more ominous: they are visiting a neighbor, they are at a doctor’s appointment, they are sitting outside (to take in the pleasant December afternoon?).

  Something’s happened, thinks Marian, hanging up. She stares at the phone.

  To distract herself, and to delay her next attempt to phone the apartment, Marian calls information for the number of the Black Horse Inn in Millbrook and dials the number. “I’m driving up for a wedding this weekend,” she tells the man who answers. “The Ochstein, um…” She frowns, momentarily losing the name of Barton’s fiancée. “Klein?”

  “Oh sure,” he says amiably. “We’ve got a load of people coming in for that on Friday. We were going to do the rehearsal dinner, too, but that’s been moved.”

  “So I understand. That’s too bad,” she says politely. “I understand you have wonderful food.”

  “Oh we do!” he confirms with pleasure.

  “Well anyway, I’m coming up a bit early. On Thursday night?” Marian says. “I was hoping I could get a room for the whole weekend. I really shouldn’t have left it this late. You must be full.”

  “Yes,” he agrees. “Have been for weeks, but the gods must like you because someone canceled this morning. I can give you her room. It’s a suite on the second floor. Very pretty.”

  “Perfect,” Marian says.

  “And Thursday’s no problem. Wide open, just you and one other guest. Hang on, let me get my book,” he says. Marian waits, drawing another box around the word Soriah on her pad.

  “Here it is,” the man says. “Now, let’s start with your name.”

  She tells him her name. She tells him her address and her phone number and her platinum card number, then she jots down the directions from Rhinebeck, which seem very involved. After hanging up, she immediately calls Soriah again.

  Five rings, six rings. Marian starts to hang up.

  “ ’ello?” says a curious voice.

  “Oh!” Marian almost shouts. “Mrs. Nelson?”

  “Mrs. Nelson not here.”

  “Oh. Well, who is this please? I’m looking for Soriah.”

  “Soriah not here. It’s Marisol. I’m the—”

  “Yes!” Marian cries in relief. “Hello, Marisol. It’s Marian Kahn. We met last month? I came to take Soriah to see her mother?”

  There is a pause. How many people come to visit, anyway? Marian thinks.

  “I remember, yes. Soriah not here.”

  “Do you know when she’ll be back?” says Marian.

  “Uh-uh. The caseworker come and take her. Mrs. Nelson had to go in the hospital. She have a stroke.”

  So, thinks Marian.

  “That’s terrible. How is she?”

  “I don’t know. I just here to get my things.”

  I’ll bet, Marian thinks. All those afternoons watching TV on the couch. I don’t suppose you’ve even been to visit.

  “But… what hospital is she at? And how do I get in touch with Soriah?”

  She can almost see the home health aide roll her eyes. “I don’t know. I guess the caseworker.”

  “But who is the caseworker?” Marian says, courtesy failing her at last. “Do you have a number? Do you have a name?”

  “I don’t know. She the usual one who comes. Wait a minute.”

  Then there is a little clatter as the phone lands on a surface, and Marian can make out the faint sounds of rummaging. At last, Marisol returns and says, “I find the card. It’s Hilda. Last name is Rodriguez. Okay? And the number?”

  She recites it. Marian writes it down.

  “Marisol? When did this happen? When did Mrs. Nelson have her stroke?”

  “Uh…” She stops to think. “I guess last Wednesday. She took a sleep but she don’t wake up. I call the ambulance.”

  Bully for you, thinks Marian.

  “Thank you, Marisol.”

  “Okay,” she says, and hangs up the phone.

  And just help yourself to anything you want in the apartment, Marian thinks, still holding the receiver.

  She puts down the phone, and picks it up again immediately to dial Hilda Rodriguez, but the extension is outdated and the system hangs up on her after a maddening sequence of clicks and rings and silences. Marian opens her desk drawer and takes out her phone book, but the directory gives only the number for Children’s Services in Manhattan, and Hilda Rodriguez’s number has a 718 prefix. She phones the Manhattan office anyway and asks for the office overseeing cases in the Bronx, and so begins another odyssey through the city bureaucracy and its fiendish phone system. When at last she is rewarded with the voicemail of a person who says her name is Hilda Rodriguez, Marian—relieved to have reached her goal but dubious about the efficacy of the voicemail system—leaves a polite but insistent request to be called. Then, without further apparent options, she hangs up again and sits staring at the phone.

  Soriah. No.

  The grandmother. No.

  The home health care aide. No.

  The caseworker. Not yet.

  Who else is there? A teacher she could call? Marian doesn’t even know the name of Soriah’s school. A neighbor who might know where she’s been taken? Not a clue. Would it be worth trying to make contact with Denise at Bedford Hills?

  Then Marian remembers the professor from Fordham, who takes Soriah to the library—the woman who gave her the Lady Charlotte book and encouraged her to write to Marian. Named…Marian concentrates, and finally it comes to her: Reynolds. Professor Reynolds. At Fordham. She clutches the phone, gets the general number for the university, calls it, and asks for Professor Reynolds. There are three of them. A female professor Reynolds, she tells the man she is speaking to. There are two of them: English and Slavic Languages. “English,” says Marian, guessing.

  She is transferred to the English department.

  “May I speak to Professor Reynolds, please?”

  “One moment.”

  No, thinks Marian, breathing rapidly. It can’t be this simple. She’s teaching, she’s with a student and not picking up the phone, she can’t just be there.

  “Carol Reynolds,” a woman says.

  “Oh! Hello, this is Marian Kahn. Professor Reynolds?”

  “Well, this is an honor.”

  “Thanks…ah…I’m phoning you about Soriah Neal.”

  The woman pauses. Marian can hear her sigh. “Yes, of course. It’s awful, isn’t it? Not a huge surprise, but still.”

  “But what exactly happened? Do you know?”

  “I don’t know anything more current than Thursday. I usually pick Soriah up at school on Wednesdays and we go to the library, but she wasn’t in school when I got there last week. I called the caseworker’s number, and she told me about Mrs. Nelson. I don’t think she’s regained consciousness, so no one is very optimistic.”

  “But where is Soriah?” asks Marian. “Is she staying with friends?”

  She asks this, but she knows the answer. What friends, after all?

  “No. She’s been placed in foster care. The caseworker wouldn’t tell me where, because I’m not a family member. I mean, the whole system
is completely inhumane.”

  “But have they been bringing her to see her grandmother in the hospital?” Marian asks urgently.

  “I really have no idea. You should call and ask.”

  “I have,” Marian says. “I’m waiting for a call back.”

  There is a pause as both women have the same thought: Right.

  “What’s going to happen to her?” Marian asks. “Who will take care of her?”

  “It might work out all right,” the woman says. “It might be a great placement. She might even end up in a better school.”

  “Unlikely,” Marian says caustically. “What a waste.”

  “Yes,” Professor Reynolds says. “I’ve been tearing my hair out since Thursday. That poor kid. She can’t catch a break, you know? And so much promise.”

  “Look,” says Marian with sudden desperate inspiration, “couldn’t you…I don’t know, let her stay with you for a while? Until this is over?” Until what is over? she thinks, even as she says it. “Couldn’t you…Do you have room to keep her?”

  There is silence on the phone, but not the silence of hostility. Not the silence of consideration, either. The woman on the other end of the phone, thinks Marian, is merely formulating her response.

  “Dr. Kahn—”

  “Marian. Please.”

  “All right. Marian. I think Soriah is terrific, and I would do a great deal to help her. I have done a great deal to help her, and I don’t begrudge the time at all, because she’s been such a rewarding kid to deal with. But my life is complicated. I’ve got three small children of my own, and a hellish commute. I live in Princeton, you know.”

  “I didn’t know,” says Marian, her heart sinking. She doesn’t know anything about this woman, who has, after all, done far more for Soriah than she herself has done. And who is Marian, anyway, to ask such a thing?

  “I couldn’t take it on,” says Professor Reynolds. “Not because I don’t care, but the red tape would do me in. Besides, my husband would absolutely refuse. I wish I could say otherwise, but I can’t. I just can’t.”

  “I understand,” Marian says. “I’m sorry for even mentioning it. I’m just upset.”

  “It’s okay. I’m upset, too.”

  They sit in silent communion for a moment.

  “Well, it was nice talking to you, anyway,” Professor Reynolds says at last. “Soriah was so thrilled you answered her letter. And she loved your book, you know. So did I,” she says, with a small, embarrassed laugh. “Did I say that?”

  “No. Thanks.”

  “Look,” the woman says suddenly, “we can’t fix it, you know? It’s too big to fix. It never gets fixed. We just…I don’t know…we do what we can.”

  “I know,” Marian says. “Well, thank you. It was nice…meeting you.”

  “You too. Good-bye,” she says sadly, and hangs up the phone.

  Marian hangs up her own phone. She feels numb. She can’t remember what she is supposed to be doing now, and she hopes it isn’t very important.

  I don’t know the number here, Soriah had said.

  The phone rings.

  “Soriah?” Marian says, snatching it up.

  “This is Hilda Rodriguez,” a woman says, brusquely. “Returning your call.”

  “Oh good! Thank you for calling me back so quickly. I really appreciate that!” Marian, to her own ears, is sounding hysterical. She swallows and tries again. “I phoned about Soriah Neal. I just heard what happened to her grandmother.”

  “Soriah Neal…,” says Hilda Rodriguez.

  “You just put her in foster care?” Marian reminds her in disbelief.

  “Yes, I’m getting the file. Bear with me.”

  “I’m sorry!” Marian cries. And waits.

  “The grandmother died this morning,” the woman says, offhandedly.

  Marian closes her eyes, hearing only the sound of her own breath. “That’s terrible,” she manages to say, at last.

  “Now what can I do for you?”

  “I just… I’ve gotten to know Soriah this fall. I wondered if there was anything I could do.”

  “I don’t know,” the woman says mildly. “Is there anything you could do?”

  “I…,” Marian sputters, ashamed and irritated in equal parts, “could I get in touch with her?”

  “Are you a family member?” asks Hilda Rodriguez.

  “No, I’m not.”

  “I’m sorry, I can’t give out her contact information if you’re not a relative.”

  “I’m a friend.”

  “I’m sorry,” she says.

  Marian bites her lip.

  “What’s going to happen to Soriah now? Will she stay with this foster family, or what?”

  “I really have no idea,” the woman says. “We’ll see how it works out. Sometimes you need a few tries to find the right place.”

  “But…,” Marian says and takes a breath, “Ms. Rodriguez, I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but Soriah is very gifted. Academically. She needs a good school, and she needs stability, so she can continue to do her work. She’s far ahead of her grade level, you know.”

  There is a pause. “I don’t have anything about that in the file,” she says finally.

  “But it’s true. I’m a college professor. I’ve been working with her. So has a professor from Fordham.”

  “Well, I can assure you, she’ll be in school, Mrs. Kahn,” the woman says, clearly offended. “Going into foster care doesn’t mean getting taken out of school.”

  “No, I know, it’s just…this girl is really special.”

  There is a groan from the other end of the phone. The unspoken rebuke—They’re all special—passes between them.

  “Ms. Rodriguez?” Marian says, “I’ve been thinking of trying to get Soriah into a better school. Maybe here in Manhattan.”

  She has? thinks Marian. She has been thinking of getting Soriah into a better school in Manhattan? Since when?

  “Yes?” is the noncommittal reply.

  “I was wondering…,” but words fail her here, and it takes a moment for Marian to discover what it is that she wants to say. “I was wondering, couldn’t she stay with me for a while?”

  The question falls like a great weight. Marian closes her eyes. I said that, thinks Marian. I heard myself.

  “You’re not a relative, you said,” says Hilda Rodriguez.

  “No. Not a relative,” Marian agrees.

  “Well, are you a foster parent registered with Children’s Services?”

  “No!” Marian says in alarm.

  “Well, then…”

  But, she wants to say, I’m rich! I live on Park Avenue! Don’t you understand what I’m offering?

  “I don’t see how I can help you, Mrs. Kahn.”

  “Wait!” says Marian. “How do you get to be a foster parent? Do you have to get a license or something?”

  It can’t be much, thinks Marian frantically. Like a driver’s license. A wedding license. You show your birth certificate and have a blood test. How big a deal can it be? Aren’t they desperate for people? Aren’t they always saying so?

  “Yes,” Hilda Rodriguez says, “there is a licensing process. There is a training program and there are evaluations, leading to a license. Foster parenting is a paid service, you know.”

  “Oh,” Marian insists, “I don’t need the money.”

  She doesn’t want the money, she thinks, and in consideration of that, won’t they just let her take the girl?

  “Well, you’d still need to undergo the training and evaluation, Mrs. Kahn. I’m sure you appreciate that.” There is silence. Then she seems to relent. “Look, Mrs. Kahn, I know you’re trying to do something for Soriah. It’s all any of us is trying to do. Sometimes we get overwhelmed, is all. I mean, I’ve got eighty-six active cases right now. I don’t want to discourage you if you’re serious about taking her to live with you. Are you serious?”

  Are you serious? This is precisely what Marshall will say—will shout—when she tells
him. She has not said very much to Marshall about her young friend from the Bronx. She has not, for instance, mentioned Soriah’s incarcerated mother, nor her own recent trip to Bedford Hills prison. And she has never hinted at the possibility of bringing this, or indeed any, child into their home, even years ago, when the idea of it might not have struck him as quite so absurd. So is she serious now?

  “I am,” she tells Hilda Rodriguez. “I would like to find out more.”

  The world does not stop. The walls do not come crashing in. Marian sits, waiting, but oddly peaceful after all.

  “Okay,” the woman says. “I’m going to have Gloria Hernandez call you, from foster care. She’ll set you up with an orientation session and then, if you want to go forward, we’ll start on the home study and a background check. Let me…right, I’ve got your number here. Okay, Mrs. Kahn. Give me a call if anything comes up.”

  If I change my mind, in other words, Marian thinks.

  “Thank you, Ms. Rodriguez.”

  After they have hung up, Marian remains in her chair, looking at the ceiling of her office. It is painted a warm rust color and studded with inset lights that rise and fall on a dimmer switch. Her desk is an antique, English, bought from Sotheby’s in the eighties, and Marian has always appreciated its bowlegs and well-used pine surfaces. She will have to move it now, she thinks, perhaps to the little alcove near the master bath. She will have to move the low chaise that takes up most of the rest of the space, to where she has no idea. And the stacks of books, the wig that got her through the months she was bald from chemotherapy and mourning the children she would never have, and the boxes and boxes of Lady Charlotte letters filling the room’s little closet, jammed in behind its shuttered accordion doors—she will have to get rid of it all.

  The rest of the room is not as dark as the ceiling, but it’s a somber red. Something must be done about it, thinks Marian, vaguely considering: yellow, blue. A child with a newly dead grandmother and an imprisoned mother should not be expected to live with such sad colors. And something must be done about the light, because there isn’t enough light, really. A lamp on the wall over the bed is needed. This room, her office, typical of the maids’ quarters in this type of New York apartment, is not large, but it has been large enough for her. And it will be large enough for Soriah.