Command of Silence

by Paulette Callen

  Claudia came downstairs and fell into a chair. Bungee curled at her feet. The television was still going and the thumping of the soccer ball had not resumed. “Thank goodness for Shrek,” she sighed.

  Michael asked her, “How is Miriam?”

  “I have her pills here.” She patted her pocket. “I didn’t give her any. When she asked for one, I gave her an aspirin. I don’t think she even noticed. By tomorrow…tomorrow, she’ll cry.”

  Vin made an entrance, bent over Claudia and took her hand in his.“Sweetheart, I’m going out for a smoke and do a little food shopping. You need anything?” She shook her head. “Are y’all staying for dinner?” He looked at me and at Michael Keating. “Why don’t y’all stay? I’ll just pick up a few extra tomatoes. It’s

  Tuesday, it’s tacos.”

  “It’s Wednesday.”

  “Oh.”

  “Tacos are fine.”

  “I’ll walk Bungee when I get back.”

  She nodded and gave his hand a return squeeze.

  “I have to leave now,” I said, getting to my feet. “I’ll be speaking to everyone again. If there is anything you want to tell me in the meantime, call me.” I handed Claudia my card.

  Vin went ahead of me, taking the stairs like a dancer taking stage levels. “If you wait a second, I’ll walk out with ya.” He went to Miriam’s room.

  I followed him but stayed at the door and watched him sit beside her in the window seat. She had Anna’s dolls folded in to her breast and was staring out.

  Vin patted her knee. “Darlin’, I’m goin’ out. You want anything?”

  She focused on him, but her eyes were dull. Her skin, while too young for lines, still seemed old, without the luminosity of a woman under thirty. She didn’t seem to have the energy to even shake her head.

  He stood up and brushed the side of her face with his palm and left.

  Looking down into the living room, I saw Michael and Claudia now seated side by side on the sofa. The priest was speaking—I couldn’t hear what he was saying—and she was nodding her head gently.

  Chapter 6

  The lethargy I had felt inside the Keating apartment lifted as soon as I closed the door behind me. Vin pushed the button for the elevator. “I’ll take the stairs,” I said, and headed toward the Exit sign at the end of the hall. I didn’t need Cootie or anybody else coming out now.

  “That’s a good idea. My legs are like Jell-O sittin’ in that kitchen all day.” He trotted after me. “That is—if you don’t mind the comp’ny.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  “I should use the stairs every day. Up and down.” He got to the fire door at the end of the hall ahead of me and held it open for me.

  As we descended the gray-walled stairwell, Vin asked, “Well, whaddya think?” He shook out a cigarette from the pack in his shirt pocket.

  “About what?”

  “About whu-ut?” He cackled. “You came here to scope us all out. Sort truth from li-iiies,” he drawled. “Fact from fiction. Father Ryan says you got some kind of mojo. So what’s your mojo tellin’ you?”

  “I couldn’t get a clear impression on individuals. Too much in the atmosphere.”

  “Why did you want us all together, then?” The question was more reasonable coming from Vin than it had been coming from Manfred Burke.

  “I wanted to observe you all together. See how you are as a family.”

  “And how are we, then?”

  “Peculiar.”

  He twiddled his cigarette between his fingers. “I don’t know much about normal families,” I said. “But I know this isn’t one.”

  “They’ve had a lot of tragedy. You know what they say— every family is happy in the same way and miserable in its own way. I paraphrase.”

  “Anna Karenina.”

  “You’re a reader?”

  “One of us is. Did you know Claudia’s mother was a suicide?”

  “She mentioned it.”

  “Just mentioned it? No details?”

  “No.” He patted himself down for his lighter and found it in the back pocket of his pants.

  “You’re such friends.”

  “I never pressed her.” He tapped his cigarette against the side of the lighter. “She’ll tell me when she’s ready—or not.”

  “She has photographs all over the apartment. Of her and her husband and the boys. There’s you and Miriam and Anna. There’s a dozen or so pictures of the dog. Not one of her uncle and his wife or of her father or her mother. Why is that?”

  “Well, I got pictures of my dog Fred and my friends and Claudy and the boys all over my hovel and none of my mother and none of my brother or my father. My family pictures are in an album somewhere, but I don’t have them out. I left Jackson to get away from all that.”

  “But she hasn’t gotten away, has she?”

  “All the more reason not to have to look at their pictures.”

  “If she feels that way, why didn’t she move away?”

  We kept going down and right, down and right. Vin paused a moment on the landing we had just reached, and looked at me thoughtfully. “Frankly?” he said. “I don’t know. But, I think… it’s complicated.” We started moving again. “Claudy is fragile, in a way. She lucked out when she met Dan. He took care of her, and because the Burkes didn’t like him, they kind of kept their distance. There was no actual estrangement. Nobody ever had words or anything like that…they just didn’t see much of each other. And Dan was practical. The Burke money...he could have taken it or left it. He wasn’t hung up about it one way or the other. But it gave his boys a standard of living they wouldn’t have had otherwise and there didn’t seem to be strings attached, so he took the gifts that were sent and was happy to have the apartment. He paid all the expenses while he was working. When he got sick, the Burkes slipped in and picked them up.”

  “Strange,” I said.

  “What especially?”

  “O’Hagan, when he hired me, described Mrs. Keating as strong…no, the word he used was tough.”

  “Well, maybe he doesn’t know everything.”

  We came to the ground floor and finally emerged in the back of the lobby. I saw a different doorman on duty. “Who’s that?”

  “Arturo.”

  Arturo Cole: on duty the day Charlotte was taken.

  Vin hailed him from across the lobby. “Hey, Arturo! Qué pasa!”

  The doorman wore the same style of uniform as his predecessor, but this one had sharper creases and all the buttons buttoned, even though the air drifting through the open lobby doors felt warmer than when I first arrived. He had short-cropped hair, dark, acne-scarred skin.

  “Vin! How is everybody today?”

  Vin shrugged. “Emm, you know.”

  Arturo Cole nodded gravely, with a military air.

  Vin pointed his unlit cigarette at me. “This is Shiloh. She’s helping the police.”

  The doorman faced me squarely.

  I said, “You were here the day Mrs. Keating came back with the baby. She called you to tell you Charlotte was missing?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long was it—from when she came in to when she called you?”

  “Forty-five minutes, give or take.”

  “And no one strange to you went in or out during that time?”

  He took a deep breath and lifted his eyes past me to some private horizon. “I’m here most of the time during my shift, but I carry bags and do things for people. Help them in and out of cars, call cabs, get packages out of the mailroom—my face isn’t always pointed the right way. I take a whiz, get a cup of coffee. I can’t stay in one place for two hours. I don’t really remember every move I make at every minute, so I’m pretty sure, but I can’t be positive. There’s no security camera.”

  “What do you think of Claudia Keating?”

  He raised his eyebrows slightly before answering. “She’s quiet. She’s a nice woman, but quiet. And sad. Kind of sad, I always thought, even before all th
is happened.”

  “Has she ever asked you to walk her dog?”

  “Bungee? That little rat-on-a-rope? He hates me.” He grinned and shook his head.

  “I may want to talk to you again.”

  “Sure.”

  “One more thing. Mrs. Keating came back around two o’clock. Not on your shift.”

  “I pulled a double that day. Victor needed to do something and I covered. He’s done it for me. Management doesn’t care as long as shifts are covered and it doesn’t cost them overtime.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “Later, man,” said Vin.

  As soon as we stepped outside, Vin lit his cigarette and took a deep drag. The sun glazed the sides of buildings like butter, and the breeze that had fluttered and flapped around the city for two days was at rest. These are the rare moments when New York seems at peace with herself, resting in her own quiet glow. A bird twittered in the single tree in front of the building. Then a couple of cars passed, and the moment was over.

  “You want a cab?” Vin asked.

  “No.” My energy had returned in full. I wanted to walk Claudia Keating’s route the day Charlotte went missing. “I’m going around the block. Which corner is Riverside Apothecary on?”

  “Thattaway.”

  He fell into step beside me. Riverside Apothecary was privately owned, featured expensive products with fancy wrappings in the windows, and was less than a minute’s walk east from the apartment building.

  As I stood contemplating the display of Crabtree and Evelyn creams, perfumes and soaps, Swedish loofas and small wooden implements, the use of which I couldn’t imagine, Vin asked, “So what’s this mojo like? What do you do exactly?”

  “I listen to people. I watch them. I can usually tell if they are lying or not. I pick up things...Arturo feels guilty.”

  “About what?”

  “That he didn’t see anything. He feels like he should have been at that door every second. Even though that would be impossible, as he took pains to make clear—mostly to himself.”

  “You picked that up. You a radio receiver or something?” That was as good a metaphor as any. “Well, Father Ryan said you were good.”

  “We’ll see how good I am. Leo and his team are good too. They follow evidence. What I do is different.”

  “Well, with respect to the detective and his team, what they been doin’ hasn’t come up with jack. So we definitely need somebody doin’ something different.”

  “Mrs. Keating told me that she started around the block when she left the drugstore. She didn’t say she crossed the street. So, she…went north on Broadway.”

  “I guess.”

  Vin kept up with me as I turned north. “Do you know how far she walked that day, before she turned back?”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “She said she was out for about twenty minutes so I’ll see how far I get in the next ten.”

  A homeless man, bundled under shabby sweaters, a coat tied around the middle with twine, wearing a muffler, gloves and a knit hat pulled down to his eyebrows, approached us pushing a grocery cart full of junk—probably all his worldly goods, items painstakingly collected for as long as he had lived on the streets. Other people passing him gave him a wide berth.

  Give him some money, pleaded Hester.

  If we give money to every street person, we will be a street person.

  Olive, you’re a cold bitch.

  And you’re a stupid, sentimental one.

  While Hester and Olive sniped at each other, I saw Vin dig into his pocket, and as the man rattled past, drop some coins into the Styrofoam cup wired to the side of his cart.

  “God bless you,” the man muttered to Vin, who replied with a nod and kept pace with me. We passed a small restaurant with outside tables.

  Aren’t we hungry? When did we last eat? Shut up, Cootie, all you think about is food. Go back to the gyre. You won’t feel your stomach.

  Cootie chattered through Olive’s reprimand. Look there’s a falafel place. Fast food but not junk. We could get that. You’re always saying—

  Cootie, Olive is right. We’re working. We’ll eat later.

  “What’s the matter?” Vin eyed me. We had slowed down. “You look like you got a headache.”

  “A little one…just a little buzzing in my ears. It comes and goes.”

  “Migraines?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Take something for it?”

  “Usually, just a nap. It goes away.”

  Ooooo, there’s a nail salon. When we’re done, I need a manicure. My hands are an embarrassment. Why, I hardly wanted to shake hands with the reverend today, they were so awful.

  A detective’s hands don’t need a forty-dollar manicure.

  Well, what do you care, Olive, you have man hands.

  They’re the same hands you have, Hester.

  It’s how I use them. With expressive grace and femininity. On you, they’re hams.

  I picked up the pace again so the Company wouldn’t have time to comment on every shoe store, Korean vegetable market or bodega we passed. And my head was beginning to hurt.

  Hey! A Gap! I wanna get me one of those jean jackets in the window. Man they are so cool.

  I’m not going around in a jean jacket!

  I stopped and held my head in my hands. All of you. Shut up! When we get home, I’m calling Ray.

  Oooooh, she’s calling Ray.

  We’ll renegotiate. You won’t be allowed out of the gyre when I’m working.

  You need us when we’re working.

  I don’t need this! I’d rather do it without you.

  That shut them up. For awhile.

  “Hey,you want to stop and get something for that headache?” We were standing in the middle of the sidewalk. Vin was peering at me with concern. “There’s a Duane Reade across the street. You want me to get you something?”

  “No. It’s better now. I have a technique. I can sort of will it away. They’re gone now, for awhile. The pains.”

  We get it.

  People passed us without paying attention to us the way New Yorkers do to preserve psychological space in a city with so little physical space. We started moving again. A heavyset, older woman walked toward us, her orange frizzed hair sprouted from the edges of a green bandanna. She was apparently unaware of the psychic space rule, because without slowing down, she looked me right in the eye and said, “I’m going to try to shit one more time.” She kept on walking past us.

  Vin looked at me, his mouth slightly open. I said, “She must be having issues with regularity.”

  He doubled over and squealed with laughter. He hadn’t finished his cigarette but dropped it and ground it and kept laughing.

  We came to the end of the block. Only a few minutes had passed. I turned left again onto the street, headed west, away from Broadway. The street was residential, quiet and shaded with tall trees whose new leaves filtered the sky like lace.

  Vin stopped laughing, coughed, and said, “What are we doin’ exactly?”

  “I just want to check out the neighborhood.”

  On our side of the street we passed a couple of brownstones and then a twelve- or fifteen-story apartment building. Just beyond it, we came to a brick building set back from the sidewalk. Flush with the walk was a wrought iron fence and gate festooned with signs, artistically rendered in bright colors.

  From the gate, a sidewalk curved in to steps going up to a narrow portico. From the portico, two doors gave entrance to the building. The one straight ahead of me was large, wood and ornate, and the second at the western end was an ordinary door with a small glass window and another sign. The patch of ground in front of the building was planted with grass, small bushes and flowers. A small, gated oasis of serenity just off busy Broadway. I perused the signs. Heartwood Buddhist Center taught everything from Buddhist studies, yoga and meditation to flower arranging and calligraphy. They offered, among many things, silent retreats that lasted from ten hours to n
ine days, a vegetarian cooking class on Wednesday nights, senior citizen activities on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and childcare for people attending classes.

  Vin said, “It’s a monastery or ashram or somethin’. You see them in their orange robes at the market over there sometimes.” He pointed toward Broadway. “They’re nice and friendly and don’t proselytize. Except for the shaved heads, these women seem pretty normal.” He ran his hand over his own shaved head.

  “Women?”

  “Yeah. They’re all women. Nuns. Or…I guess you call ’em nuns. I don’t know much about them, but they don’t cause any trouble, and the neighborhood is no worse for their being here. Prob’ly better.”

  I pushed the gate. It was not locked.

  If Claudia came this far, she would have been out about twenty minutes.

  Vin and I walked back to Broadway and joined the congested bustle of the five o’clock street. We were close to Columbia University. Everyone was a bit glazed and private with relief from classes or a workday over, determined to get home and close their doors behind them.Vin was still with me as we walked south. “Aren’t you going shopping or something?” I asked.

  “Or something. I need the air. How far you goin’?”

  “Eighty-first.”

  “Well, I ain’t goin’ that far. I just need a stretch, stoke up on some nicotine, and then I’ll be goin’ back.”

  I try to tune out as much as I can in crowds. For me, it is like negotiating a whitewater of humanity in a little raft of private psychic space. To notice everything would drive the dullest wit stark mad. In my case, I didn’t have that far to go. But someone stood out in the crowd ahead. A brown-skinned man, shirtless. The fact that he was shirtless and carried something draped around his shoulders, like a long piece of yellow tubing, was why I noticed him in the river of pedestrian traffic. At this time of day, people were in working clothes or school duds. This was the wrong neighborhood and the wrong season for shirtless men.

  Vin shook out another cigarette, and I watched him perform his ritual of tapping it against his lighter before igniting it.

  When I looked away from Vin the shirtless man was near, and just as he passed me close on my right, I saw what he had around his neck. Not yellow tubing.