Sam's Legacy (35 page)

“He offered me a deal,” Sam said, “but I turned it down cold.”

“A guy like that, even though we grew up here together,” Steve said, “he thinks he can come in now and clean up.” Steve stepped back, glanced to the right. Sam saw two black teenagers enter the store, both wearing black leather jackets. “I could tell, just from his coloring, that it's taking its toll already. You did the smart thing, Sam, for what my opinion's worth.”

The two boys sat down and ordered Cokes. The guy next to Sam unzipped his jacket, and on his belt Sam saw that there was, where a pistol would be, a slide rule, sticking out of a tan leather case. Sam asked Steve what he owed him, then paid. “See you around,” he said, pushing off from the stool.

“Yeah,” Steve said. “Take it slow. And give your old man all my best wishes. Tell him my father sent his regards—I mean, I know my old boy will say something, when he writes next.”

“And if Shimmy comes around asking for me again,” Sam said, and he winked, feeling warm, “you tell him you think I might have moved out with Ben, on the early retirement plan, right?”

Steve laughed and waved to Sam as he put two Cokes on the counter. Outside, Sam buttoned his jacket and headed down Church Avenue, toward the Granada Theater. The next time—he didn't want to press things—maybe he'd wait a few weeks, but he thought he might invite Steve to come over one night, after he'd closed the store up: they could have a few beers, some sandwiches, watch a game. It was strange how after all these years you could suddenly feel close to a guy you'd always known but had never been close to—and the others—except for Dutch, of course—who'd been your buddies, who you'd done everything with—there was something missing there now that your lives had taken different paths. The man and his dog rolled out toward Sam, and he tossed them a quarter, but didn't look when he heard the coin hit the sidewalk.

What he really would have liked to have bought—for Ben, and for himself too—was a pair of handmade shoes. Sam remembered that Mr. Fiala, who'd had the shoemaker's shop on Rogers Avenue until two or two and a half years before, had known how to make a pair of shoes, complete, from beginning to end. You lived in your shoes fifteen-sixteen hours a day, for a year or two years with a good pair. But Mr. Fiala's store was gone now, and Sam felt a peculiar hollow in his stomach, knowing he'd missed his chance.

At the corner of Church and Rogers, Sam entered a phone booth. There was no point in waiting until Ben had gone to start making plans.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Mrs. Cohen. This is Sam. Is Dutch in?”

“Hello, Sam,” Mrs. Cohen said. “Dutch is in
shul.”

“Shul?”

“He's been going every Saturday the past few weeks, and Monday and Thursday mornings also, for the reading of the Torah.”

Sam sighed. He could see Dutch's dark eyes laughing at him. He'd timed things just right, hadn't he? “Okay,” Sam said.

“He explains it all to me, of course, and it sounds reasonable, but…” She paused, and Sam waited. “What do you think, Sam? You're his closest friend.”

Sam could see Dutch, on the Long Island Railroad platform, and he heard him laughing. “I got things on my mind, Mrs. Cohen. Tell him I called. My old man leaves tonight, for California. I got to go now, okay?”

He hung up before she could reply. He should have been ready for something like this, with the way Ben had called him into the bedroom, leaving the
tephillin
bag where he had. He left the phone booth and started walking. The two of them wandering around the country together, dragging a trailer behind them—that was really rich.

He returned home at twelve-thirty, and he and Ben ate lunch together: cream of mushroom soup, and tuna fish sandwiches. Sam gave Ben the message from Steve's father, but he said nothing about Dutch or Shimmy, and he felt, coming in from the cold after a long walk, relaxed. Ben was quiet, and this was all right with Sam too. After lunch, Ben took a nap; the packing had fatigued him and he said that the change in time would tire him, after the plane flight. Sam did the dishes and then, feeling tired also, he lay down on his couch and was asleep immediately.

When he awoke, his head felt thick. Ben was sitting at the kitchen table, dressed in a brown suit, a white shirt and tie. “I could go myself, you know,” he said, “if you have something to do. It's Saturday night—”

“Come on,” Sam said, and waved him off. He stood, went to the kitchen sink, and rinsed his face, then shook the droplets off, dried himself. “Whenever you say.”

“We'll go downstairs first, to say good-bye.”

“Sure,” Sam said. He put his shoes on, changed his shirt, then sat at the kitchen table and drank a cup of coffee Ben had poured for him. He was surprised at how black his sleep had been. That rarely happened in the middle of the day. Ben's eyes were closed, as if he were dreaming. Sam saw his grandfather, remembered Ben's story from the night before. “You didn't sleep, then?” Sam asked.

“Oh no,” Ben said. “I slept. I know I slept because I remember dreaming.”

“What'd you dream?”

Ben smiled, his eyes open now. “That I couldn't fall asleep.”

Sam wiped his mouth, laughed. “You,” he said. He picked up his mackinaw from the easy chair next to the breakfront, then took a suitcase in each hand. “I'll take these downstairs now.”

Ben opened the door, and Sam walked onto the landing. The suitcases weren't too heavy. Ben had probably left all his books and papers in the trunk—clothing never weighed much. Muriel gazed at him from between the wooden posts, and Sam thought he saw her smile. Downstairs, he went out the front door—he didn't want to push through the shoppers, from the rear—and entered the rummage shop through the street entrance.

“How's tricks?” he said to Marion, at her desk. “You sleep okay after all that stuff last night?”

She nodded. “Just fine, Sam.”

“These are Ben's,” Sam said. “I'll leave them here—don't sell them, okay?” Marion smiled, and Sam put the suitcases behind her chair. The store was crowded. “Busy, huh?” he said.

A woman handed Marion a cardboard carton, filled with torn nylons. Marion took them out, one by one. “The usual,” she said. “Mrs. Scofield was in this morning—she asked about you. You remember her, don't you?”

“Sure,” Sam said. He wondered if that was why—what Ben had told him—he'd always had the feeling she was waiting for him. “I gotta get some more things.”

He walked outside, went back into his building and up the stairs. Ben stood in the middle of the room, a raincoat over one arm, a briefcase in his other hand. “If you take that valise—the one you gave me—we can leave.”

Sam was sweating. He took off his mackinaw and held it under one arm. Ben opened the door, handed Sam his key, glanced back briefly, then left. Sam locked the door. Ben kissed Muriel good-bye, on the forehead, then walked down the stairs, stiffly, Sam following. When they entered the rummage shop, Flo was there, next to Marion's desk.

“Mason?” Ben asked.

“He said to say good-bye—that you'd understand.”

Ben put his raincoat down, on Marion's desk, and reached into his inside jacket pocket. “I had something for him—for all of you—it came this morning, from Andy. I know Mason would appreciate it—you give it to him later, all right? It's an item from the newspaper.”

Marion was taking money from a customer. From the back of the store somebody called for Flo—asking the price on a desk and chair. Flo left them, touching Sam's hand as she went by, and Sam and Ben stood at the side of the door, leaving a passageway for shoppers. “I bought this suit here,” Ben explained to Sam. “But this is only the second time I've worn it.”

Flo returned, her glasses swinging from around her neck. “I'll go down to Church Avenue and get a taxi,” Sam said. “It might take a while.”

Ben held his son's arm. “You should see this also—it's nothing special, just Andy's sense of humor, but—” He handed it to Flo. “So that you see the world I'm entering, so that—”

Ben stopped. Flo held the small piece of newspaper in her hand, and Sam leaned over her shoulder, to read it:

Above the item, in ink, Andy had written: “Prevues of Coming Attractions. (Ha ha)” Flo laughed easily, but Sam—though he too found the item funny—felt something inside him clench. He wanted to get going. “I am sorry,” Ben said, “that I forfeited my chance—as Mason put it—by leaving.”

Sam rolled his eyes, and found that he was seeing Tidewater and hearing what Tidewater had said to him about Ben being worried. “She was on her knees,” Flo was saying, her mouth close to Ben's cheek, “with the tears streaming down her face, and she was praying. This morning”—Flo glanced at Sam—“her husband and sons had pulled it—the refrigerator—into the store on a dolly, and everybody had gathered around. I was embarrassed at first—but when I understood, I didn't laugh. She hadn't heard the motor when she'd plugged it in—the machine is almost new, and very silent—and had thought, therefore, that it didn't work. But when I explained to her that the motor made no noise—I showed her the ice beginning to form—she hadn't even looked inside—she dropped to her knees and cried and blessed me.”

“You'll write,” Ben said. “And we'll trade stories, yes? Maybe Sam can help out with the few things I did for you—telephoning, and—”

“Sure,” Sam said. “I've got the time.”

Flo smiled at him, and he felt pleased. “You'd better get the taxi now,” she said.

Sam left the store. He walked, then stood in front of Steve's candy store and, to his surprise, was able to flag down a taxi on the opposite side of Church Avenue immediately. He crossed the street and got in. “We're going to the airport,” Sam said. “Kennedy. But we got to pick up my father first. He's the one who's going. Back on Nostrand Avenue, between Martense and Linden.”

“Right, mack,” the driver said, and flipped the lever down to start his meter going. He made the first right turn he could, to be able to circle around, and Sam settled back, relieved to have found a taxi so soon. “Yeah,” he said. “My old man's retiring. He's going to live in California, in a senior citizen place.”

“Good for him,” the driver said. His voice was friendly, sharp. “I got an older brother who moved into one of them places, near Miami, and his wife went and died on him the first year. There's a lot of action, you know—more than you'd think. My brother says there's even guys who phony up records to get in early, so they can get a piece of the action, if you know what I mean.” Sam thought of Andy's newspaper item, and laughed. “He was the goodlooking one in the family, my brother—we were six brothers and three sisters—but he says he's never rolled in it the way he's doing now.” The driver lifted the cigarette lighter from the dashboard and lit a half-smoked cigar. “And then there's all that sunshine, a couple of good race tracks, and the dogs, if you go for that stuff. With the way the city's been changing, if you know what I mean, you got to be crazy—like me—to stay here. I got another brother moving down there this spring, but the brother I was telling you about—” The taxi stopped for a red light, back again at Church Avenue. “You got a minute—? He was a plumber, see, and he's seen it all, let me tell you. This one time, he was on his back under a sink, wedged in like, working away and all of a sudden he felt this thing crawling up his leg. He nearly cracked his head open, sitting up—surprised—but he couldn't move and—get this—this chick was going down on him right there, half his age, with her baby crying in the bedroom somewhere.”

The driver blew smoke toward the roof of the car. The light changed. “Next block—in front of the rummage shop,” Sam said, then added: “My old man was a taxi driver too—for over thirty years.”

“Oh yeah?” the driver said, and Sam didn't know why, but he felt pleased, sensing the sudden coldness in the man's voice. They pulled up in front of the store, and Sam got out, went inside. He took two suitcases, brought them to the car, and left them at the curb, for the driver to put into the trunk. Then he returned. Two women were screaming at each other, arguing over who had seen a dress first. Flo held onto Ben's hand while she called to the women, trying to calm them. “It's all right,” Ben said, and kissed Flo on the cheek. “I'll be all right.” Nobody seemed to notice when Ben bent down and kissed Marion, on the forehead. Sam looked around the store—Tidewater wasn't there. Flo had her hands on the shoulders of the two women, facing the rear of the store, and Sam was glad—he could imagine what she was probably thinking; he vowed that, in the next few weeks, he would give her a lot of attention.

Ben walked to the taxi and got in. Sam got in beside him and didn't look into his father's face. The driver turned right, along Linden Boulevard, and headed for the Belt Parkway—he said nothing, and Ben too sat silently, seeming smaller than usual to Sam, in his suit, his raincoat folded across his lap. The sun was bright, and farther along Linden Bulevard, when they were closer to the highway, Sam remembered having been driven there as a boy, so that his mother could show him that there were still farms in Brooklyn. He nodded to himself. That part of Tidewater's story had been true.