Margot: A Novel (19 page)

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“I was just wondering,” I say. “Would Bertram ever drive a
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pink Cadillac?”
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“A pink Cadillac?” She laughs. “Oh, my dear, if you are
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thinking of buying a car, take Bertram with you. Do not try
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to bargain with the salesman on your own.”
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“Okay,” I say, letting her believe that is why I’m asking,
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because it’s easier that way. “But a pink Cadillac,” I press. “Is
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that a man’s car or a woman’s car?”
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“Well . . .” She thinks about it for a moment. “It’s more for
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a woman, I suppose. But certainly, Elvis is all man, and he
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drives one.”
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“Elvis Presley?” I ask.
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“Yes, my dear. The one and only.”
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I cannot imagine the American Pete Pelt being anything
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like Elvis Presley, swaying his hips to rock-and-roll music, but
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it is possible that he might drive such a car, nonetheless.
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Maybe he got it at a very reasonable price and could not pass
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up the deal?
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“My dear,” Ilsa says, her voice catching for just a moment
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in her throat. “How is your secret case going?”
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“Oh, that,” I tell her, thinking of Gustav Grossman calling
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me early in the morning last week, sounding so lonely, mak
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ing me feel so lonely, in return. In addition to him, I have
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received two women callers, both in the evenings, both offer
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ing me not much more than names and contact information.
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“It is really not such a big deal.”
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“Are you sure?” she says. I nod, forgetting that she cannot
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see me. “And there is nothing else?” she asks.
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“Nothing else?”
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“Nothing else that is bothering you?”
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I sigh, sorry that I called. I should’ve asked Shelby about
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the car in the morning. “No, Ilsa,” I say. “Nothing else is both
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ering me.”
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“But you know if there is,” she says, “you can tell me. I will
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help you.”
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“Of course,” I tell her. “Of course I know that.”
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But I will not tell Ilsa anything else, no matter how much
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I love her. I will not tell her anything.
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The next morning, when I walk outside to go to work,
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I am surprised to find Joshua waiting for me outside my apart
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ment. He is sitting on the bench out front, reading the
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Inquirer
. All my worries about the pink Cadillac, Ilsa’s ques
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tions, and even Joshua’s weekend with Penny, they disappear
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for a moment. And I smile at how comfortable he looks sitting
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there.
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“Good morning,” I say, and he lowers the paper and smiles
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back. His gray-green eyes look bright in the early-morning
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sunlight and his face is a little red. I wonder how long he has
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been outside, waiting for me.
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“Come,” he says, standing. “Let’s walk to work together. So
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we can talk.”
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I nod, and we quickly fall into step. I watch the shadow of
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our feet, moving together down Ludlow Street—his long
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strides, my short ones.
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“Sorry about Friday,” he says. “My father.” He shrugs. “Do
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you get along with your father, Margie?”
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“My father is dead,” I say, the lie falling out so fast, so easy,
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that it doesn’t even feel like a lie. What would Joshua say if he
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knew? If I were to tell him about all the letters in my head,
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never written? The great wide ocean separating us now, the
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great wide weight of lies.
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“Oh.” Joshua’s face falls, and my body floods with guilt.
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But it is not a complete lie to say my father is dead, is it? After
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all, he is a different person now too. Husband to a new
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woman. Resident of a new country. Now-famous editor of my
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sister’s book, carrier of her indelible legacy. “I’m so sorry, Mar
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gie,” Joshua says. “I didn’t know.”
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I nod, trying to think of a way to quickly change the topic,
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to steer the conversation away from my father. “I was always
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closer to my mother,” I tell him.
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“And your mother,” Joshua asks. “She’s still living?” The
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image of her comes to me, suddenly, like a heavy brick falling
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upon and crushing my chest. She is a sack of bones and loose
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flesh, whispering her plan to me with a feverish urgency. I
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shake my head and bite my lip to keep a sound from a escap
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ing: a confession, or a scream. I’m not exactly sure which one.
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Joshua stops for a moment and puts his hand on my shoul
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der. “I didn’t know,” he says again, as if he should’ve, as if he
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might expect himself to know things about me, real things.
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“I’m so sorry,” he says again. His voice is soft, and I feel his
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gray-green eyes on my face. The skin of my cheeks feels
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warm, flushed.
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“Thank you,” I say. “But they’ve been dead for many years
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now. I’m used to it.”
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“Any brothers or sisters?” he asks.
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I shake my head, and my brain wants my lips to tell him,
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about my sister, that she existed once, and not as some
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made-up character but as a real living, breathing, annoying,
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and lovable person. Three years younger than me, I would
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say. I loved her and I resented her. I failed her and I miss her.
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She died too young. She was murdered. I writhe in guilt. But
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my mouth says nothing.
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Joshua opens his mouth, as if he is about to ask me more,
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as if he senses now there is so much more for me to say. His
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eyes hold on to me, with such intensity it is almost as if I can
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hear his thoughts:
How did they die? How is it you are all alone
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now?
I plead with him in my head not to ask these questions.
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And after a moment he nods, as if he understands, without
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me even having to say, that this is a subject about which I
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cannot speak. He moves his hand from my shoulder, and we
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start walking again, up Sixteenth Street. Matching strides.
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The space on my shoulder, where he touched, still feels warm,
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as if it’s glowing, like candlelight.
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“My father is all I have left, you know,” he finally says. “My
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mother passed almost four years ago, this summer.”
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“I know. I’m so sorry,” I murmur. He nods, and his eyes
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search the ground, as if he has lost something along the tops
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of his shiny black shoes. I think about how Shelby always says
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Ezra was much nicer to Joshua before Joshua’s mother died.
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“You were closer to her?” I ask him.
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He nods again. “She never thought I would be a lawyer.
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She’d tease me, say I was much too kind and honorable for
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that. She told me that one day I’d meet a nice girl and move
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out to the country and realize how silly the law was.”
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“But you didn’t?” I say.
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“No.” He smiles. “I love the law. Not my father’s law neces
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sarily, but . . .” He shrugs and raises his palms in the air. We
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walk for a moment, not saying anything, and then he says,
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“She was incurable. Cancer. The hospital told us and then
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sent her home to die. My father has never been the same
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since.”
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I surprise myself now by reaching up and putting my hand
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on his shoulder, but I cannot stop it from moving there. He
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stops walking, turns, and looks at me, his eyes now filled with
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sorrow. “What about you?” I whisper. “Have you been the
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same?”
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“Watching her die. It was . . . indescribable. She used to
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be this really vibrant woman. Heading up the Children’s Hos
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pital charity, always raising money for the less fortunate, and
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running the house and laughing. She had the most incredible
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laugh. It lit our house up.” He pauses. “Then the cancer made
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her shrink. It took everything, even her laugh. Especially her
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laugh.”
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I close my eyes, and I can see my mother again and my
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sister now too, both their bodies, loose flesh and limbs, lying
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next to me in the darkness at night at the camp. Fleas were
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jumping off them like sparks, and yet they were too frail to
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slap them away. My sister moaned in her sleep; everything,
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every bit of life, had been taken from her.
“Ah,” Joshua says as we turn onto Market Street. “Not the
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way I intended for us to start our Monday morning. I’m sorry.”
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“But it is impossible to forget, isn’t it?” I say.
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“Impossible,” he echoes. We walk in step, past the glass
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front of Isaac’s. “Anyway,” he says, “the reason I was waiting for
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you is that I was wanting to hear all about your phone calls.”
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I blink and try to push the images of my sister and Mother
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away. Only, they stick there, in my head. They never go away,
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no matter how much I will them to.
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“How many have you gotten?” Joshua asks, and then I
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remember, he is still walking here next to me, wanting to
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know about his case.
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“Only three so far,” I say.
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“Three?” Joshua’s voice turns in disbelief. “But I don’t
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understand it. Is it that they’re not reading the paper?”
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“Maybe,” I say softly, “it is that they’re still hiding.”
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He raises his eyebrows, as if I’ve confused him, and then
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I know it: I’ve said too much. I’d opened myself for a moment,
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and then I’d forgotten to close back up again. I swallow back
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the taste of bile in my throat. “I mean, I—I am guessing,” I
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stammer. “But perhaps these people, if they are immigrant
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Jews like Bryda Korzynski, they are used to living in fear.
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Used to hiding. Perhaps they are not ready to announce
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themselves, just like that.”
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“Hmm.” Joshua strokes his beardless chin. “Maybe you’re
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right and they are worried about losing their jobs.” That was
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not exactly what I meant, but that could be the reason too.
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We have stopped at the entrance to the office building,
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and Joshua holds the large glass door open for me to go inside.
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We ride the elevator together, not saying anything else, and
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then Joshua leaves me at my desk with this: “Let me think on
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this some more, okay?” he says. “We’ll talk later.”
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I nod. Charles Bakerfield, the wife killer, is already wait
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ing for his nine a.m. appointment with Joshua. He sits in a
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chair by my desk, and once Joshua walks into his office,
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Charles looks at me and smiles a little.
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“He’ll be ready for you in just a moment,” I say.
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I sit down and start typing, but even after Charles goes
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into Joshua’s office, I can’t seem to shake the sensation of his
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wild eyes on my face.
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Shelby bounces off the elevator at five minutes after
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nine, and just by looking at her, I can tell something is differ
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ent. Her cheeks are flushed, and her pink lips break into a
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wide toothy smile when she sees me. I don’t even have time
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to ask her what is going on before she is standing there, next
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to my desk, shoving her left hand in front of my face.
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There it is, a small but sparkling round diamond set in
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gold. Ron has actually, finally, asked her to marry him. Even
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before there was any mention of a hussy, Ron always struck
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me as the kind of man who would marry a calmer girl, like
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Peggy, though Shelby always insisted there would be a ring.
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And there it is, hanging in front of my face.
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“Congratulations.” I smile at her, and she laughs and
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bounces to her chair. I cannot help but wonder if the owner
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of the pink Cadillac is a woman and also Peter’s wife now,
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and if she too is flashing a diamond much like Shelby’s to her
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friends. The thought tightens in my chest. Is it possible that
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he has come here to Philadelphia, just as he we said, and that
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he has married someone else?
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I glance through the glass of Joshua’s office, and I can see
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Joshua and Charles exchanging papers and words across Josh
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ua’s desk.
Guilty as sin,
Joshua had said.
I love the law. Not my
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father’s law . . .
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Even with his head bent over his desk, speaking to a mur
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derer, the sight of Joshua makes me smile. I think of him this
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morning, sitting on the bench outside my apartment building,
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reading the paper. The way his hand held gently on to my
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shoulder. And then I think,
Yes, it is possible
. In all this time,
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Peter could’ve fallen in love with someone else.
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“Oh, Margie,” Shelby is whispering across the desks now,
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and I turn my attention back to her. “The whole thing was so
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romantic. He took me to dinner at the Four Seasons on Sat
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urday, and he had the ring hidden in a piece of chocolate
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cake. I nearly swallowed it!” She laughs, and the image of her
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choking on a ring does not seem at all romantic to me, but I
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suppose it is an American romance, one I cannot exactly
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understand.
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I nod. “I’m so happy for you,” I say. And I am. I wonder
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again about Ron’s hussy, but I am not going to bring that up
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to Shelby now, when she shines in her happiness. After all,
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she seems to have satisfied herself, with her spying. I wish
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that I could’ve done the same.
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“You’ll be in the wedding, won’t you?” Shelby is asking me
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now. “Peggy’s going to be maid of honor, of course, but you’ll
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have to be a bridesmaid.”
I imagine that Shelby will most likely get married in the
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summer, outdoors, in a flower garden, because that is how I
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imagine American weddings. She will want to dress me in a
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pink silk or taffeta, in a dress with no sleeves. She will not
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allow a sweater, even if I claim I am cold.
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“Oh, please say yes,” she says.
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“Of course,” I tell her, and I smile, though already I am
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wondering how I will possibly be able to be in her wedding
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without baring my arm, my soul. I wonder how Shelby would
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look at me if she knew the truth, and not just that, but how
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many people she would tell, about her friend, the Jew, dam
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aged in the war, and surely some of those people would be
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anti-Semites, and then, what might happen? And even if no
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one nailed a flaming flare to my apartment door, still, it would
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not be long before Shelby would ask, before everyone would
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ask, about my family, about where I really came from. No. I
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cannot go back. I will never go back. I will invent another lie
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to get myself out of this, to keep my arm covered. I love
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Shelby, and I am happy for her. And that is one of the worst
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things about this life. As a liar, a pretend person, you cannot
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really truly ever be someone’s friend. My American life, it is
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lonely. Often, it is very, very lonely.
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Just before noon, I watch Penny sashay off the elevator and
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walk toward her father’s office. What good timing, I think.
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She is here for lunch. And within five minutes, she is making
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her way out of Saul Greenberg’s office and over toward my
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desk. Today she is dressed in a powder-blue dress that
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accentuates both her trim waistline and her large pointy
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chest. She wears a snow-white hat, with her curls pulled back
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behind it in a twist.
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“Has Josh gone to lunch yet?” she asks, barely glancing at
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me as she speaks. She is, instead, staring past me, arching her
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neck to see into the glass window.
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“I believe he’s eating at his desk today,” I lie. “He men
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tioned he has a lot of work to do.” He has not mentioned any
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of these things, and I remember why Joshua said he does not
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eat at his desk, because it is good for him to get out of this
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place, if only for a lunch break.
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“Oh.” She frowns. “I see. Well maybe I can persuade him
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otherwise.”
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“Shall I buzz him for you?” I ask before she has the gall to
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step inside his office, uninvited. She nods and takes the seat
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Charles Bakerfield was sitting in earlier this morning.
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I pick up the phone, but do not actually depress the inter
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com button. I know it’s wrong, but I do not want Penny and
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Joshua to have another lunch together. I do not want Penny
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walking in here, taking, taking, taking whatever she wants.