The Babe Ruth Deception (11 page)

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tarting the walk down Broadway to her office, Eliza could think only of Violet. She had been gone for two days. Eliza could hear every word they had said to each other. And didn't say. Eliza had been a fool. She thought she could manage the situation, that she had calmed down. She expected Violet to be emotional, to cry and profess undying love for young Mr. Cook. Eliza would be understanding and loving, but firm and clear. There would be no nonsense about it. She couldn't, she wouldn't, let Violet throw away her life, not on some bootlegger, not on someone so completely different. It didn't matter how charming he was or how sure Violet thought she was. So she shooed Jamie off to bed and sat down in Violet's room to wait. She waited. And waited.

It was almost dawn when she started awake. Violet was in the room, leaning on her cane. She didn't need the crutch now. Her black shoes dangled by their straps from her free hand. Violet seemed surprised but not fazed.

“I know where you've been,” Eliza said, “and who you've been with.”

Violet tossed her cane on the bed. She limped to her closet and took out her bathrobe and nightgown. “Really, Mother,” she said, “it's late.”

It was the flatness of her daughter's voice. The lack of concern, even of interest. That threw Eliza off balance, kept her from reasoning with Violet, kept her from presenting the logic of the situation—that what Violet was doing just couldn't keep on. Instead, she snapped, “You simply can't do this, Violet. You can't.”

“Oh, Mother. Do we really have to have all this out now?”

“When were you going to tell us about this young man?”

“‘This young man.' ” Violet gazed levelly at her mother as she gathered up her dress to pull over her head. “He has a name, and you know it. He's Joshua. You remember Joshua, don't you? In France? And then how he pulled me out of the bank after the bomb went off and got me to the hospital? You know, I'd expect a mother to remember the name of a man who saved her child.”

Violet was so comfortable with his name. It was no effort for her to say it, to talk about him in this familiar way. It was too real, not just some scandalous story retailed by Wilfred in a theater lobby.

“Violet,” Eliza said, thinking she was under control, fooled by the steadiness of her own voice. “Don't you understand what a terrible mistake this all is? You can't be serious. You can't do this.”

Violet's eyes flashed. “I can't?” She pulled her dress back on and shimmied it over her body, then lurched back to the closet. She pulled out a suitcase and threw it on the bed. She limped to her dresser, the anger in her movements threatening her balance.

Eliza looked on as Violet opened a drawer and pulled out underclothes. She threw them into the suitcase. Eliza felt frozen. This couldn't happen, not over a Negro bootlegger. She rushed over and took Violet's arms. “Stop it. Just stop it. This is a terrible mistake. You just can't see it right now.” Violet, her eyes cold, stared back. “You're tired, dear. I'm tired. You were right. It's late. Let's get some sleep and talk about it in the morning.”

“There's nothing to talk about.” Violet pulled away and opened another dresser drawer.

Eliza pushed the drawer back in. “Violet, I started this badly, but we must talk. Really, we must. Your father and I, we care only about you, about your welfare, your safety. This romance, whatever it is, it can't end well. It can't and it won't. We can't stand to see you hurt. We're worried only for you. You're too young. You don't understand. You don't appreciate what you're doing. How people will react to it. People aren't ready for something like you and Joshua. They're not. It could be horrible. It
will
be horrible.” Then she stopped, frozen again by Violet's self-possession.

“Are you done?”

“Oh, dear. I've barely begun, but I can't get you to hear me. You must listen.” She grabbed her daughter's arms again.

“No, Mother. I mustn't and I won't. Not about this.” Violet broke free and hobbled back to the suitcase with an armful of blouses. She flung them in, stopping to stuff in a few stray sleeves.

“Violet. I'll make tea.” Violet was back at the closet, pulling skirts from hangers. “You can't go. Where would you go?”

“Where do you think?”

“Violet, just give me one chance to talk about this. I'm a woman, dear. I've been in love. You can ignore whatever I say, but at least hear me out. You're still just a girl.”

Violet clicked shut the latches on the suitcase and straightened. “I've seen nothing in your romantic life,” she said, “that I care to learn from, except maybe to marry a fine man. You did that. And so will I.”

That was when Eliza came closest to crying, but she didn't. Without thinking, she said, “How can you be so sure? What do you know about him?”

Violet sat on the bed and assumed a gentle tone. A patronizing tone. She loved Joshua. She would make her life with him. Her father would understand.

Eliza still couldn't unscramble how it ended. She recalled being at the front door. Jamie came rushing out of their bedroom in his pajamas. His face was terrible. “Violet, what's happening?” he said.

Violet cracked just a little. She hugged him. Her eyes were moist when she turned and gave Eliza a dutiful embrace. And she was gone. Eliza remembered standing before the window over Broadway, staring at a western sky that slowly brightened with reflected sunrise. She didn't let the tears come then either. She had to understand how everything got reversed. Instead of stopping Violet from this awful mistake, she had driven her deeper into it. She wanted to shriek over her irrelevance. Her world was shattering and it didn't care what she thought. She had no say. How could her child, the child of her heart, care about her so little? What could they do?

Jamie stormed at first, that goddamned pacing. He didn't shout any more. He sputtered. He slapped one fist into the other palm. The anger wasn't like him, but what was anyone like in a situation like this? She made herself not hear his words. She knew he didn't mean any of it, except the part about how she had failed. She had sent him to bed so she could handle Violet. She was her mother. She knew about these things. Of course he was angry. He finally sat down, his face bright red, his cheeks wet, kneading his hands together.

She knelt and put her head on his hands. She still had no words. It was her fault. Violet looked like her father and she laughed like her father, but inside . . . inside she was just as hard as her mother. How could Eliza not have known that?

She led Jamie to the kitchen. She made tea. She burned the toast. Jamie scraped off the char and ate it dry. He denied it when she said that Violet wasn't coming back. By the time he finished his toast, and then hers, he had stopped denying it.

They agreed to start looking for Violet right away, but not anything official. No police. If Violet was with Joshua, she would be in danger, but not the sort of danger the police could help with. Who knew what a bunch of ignorant policemen would do? They might start arresting people. Eliza would start with Violet's old school friends, and that Joan from the clinic, who must know about everything.

Jamie started with the Harlem nightclub where Wilfred had met the young couple. He asked the entire staff, then the people who worked at nearby nightclubs, all black-and-tans, catering to those thrilled by race mixing. By nightfall, he admitted that when he asked the coloreds where Joshua was, he got the feeling they wouldn't tell him even if they knew. If they knew Joshua, if they knew Violet, they would know that Jamie was The Father, the denier of romance, the oppressor.

“Where else do you look,” Jamie wondered, “for a bootlegger?”

“Joshua's father,” she said.

“I don't want to see him.”

“I know. But you have to.”

He sighed. He agreed.

Eliza was standing in front of that tired building on Eighth Avenue, between Fifty-second and Fifty-third. Her office. She couldn't remember the walk from the Ansonia, the streets crossed, the carts and cars evaded, the people ignored. The home of Fraser Productions was on the second floor. It bore a distinct resemblance, she realized, to the Marlowe Theater. Not in the best neighborhood. Affordable rent. Still presentable, but on the downward slide. She felt edgy, anxious. She thought she might explode.

The airless stairwell exaggerated the moist heat of late June. She climbed to the second floor, her blouse plastered to her upper arms, her skirt to her thighs. It wasn't even ten in the morning. On the landing, she paused to unstick her clothes. Her receptionist looked up when she entered the anteroom, quickly shifted her eyes to the left. Speed Cook rose from one of the two visitor chairs. He extended his hand. Unthinking, Eliza took it. Then quickly pulled hers back.

“If you're looking for Jamie, Mr. Cook,” she said, “he doesn't often come by here. Let me give you his address. He'll be glad to talk with you.”

Cook held his bowler hat by the brim, with both hands. “I thought we got past ‘Mr. Cook' over in France.” She didn't answer. “And I'm here to see you, not Jamie. It's a business matter. Won't be but a few moments.”

“Is it about . . . ?” Eliza caught herself. The receptionist. The girl didn't need to hear about Violet, which would only lead to more gossip. She composed her face and gestured for Cook to enter her office.

Armored behind her large desk, Eliza waited while Cook placed his hat on the edge of the desk, then sat. When he sat forward, she heard a knee pop.

“I'm here on a confidential matter,” he said.

Her heart began to flutter. He must have news about Violet. Maybe Jamie had been right all along. Maybe he wasn't so bad. Maybe he was. “Yes?”

“Yes.” Cook cleared his throat. “I'm acting for Mr. Babe Ruth on this matter.” Eliza couldn't keep the disbelief from her face. “Yes, I know it's surprising that he should retain me, but he did, for his own reasons.” Eliza saw his lips move but couldn't listen. The world made no sense. He stopped talking and looked at her.

“What did you say?” she asked.

“I know it's surprising. It's because of this fellow Abe Attell, and the movie that you produced with Mr. Ruth and Mr. Attell last summer,
Headin' Home
.”

Eliza wanted to scream. When she finally spoke, she couldn't be bothered keeping the tension out of her voice. “You're here about
Headin' Home
?”

“Yes, ma'am. My concern is with the financing side, which I know is what you do.” Cook was oblivious to her agitation. “Now, Babe, well, he's not the savviest businessman, as you know. He's told me that part of the financing involved a debt he owed to Abe Attell and his gambling partners. Particularly Arnold Rothstein.”

“My God, you came here to talk to me about Babe Ruth and Arnold Rothstein?”

“Yes, and your movie.” She seemed to want him to speak more quickly, so he sped up. “See, with the investigation going on now out in Chicago—you know, into the connections between ballplayers and gamblers and all—we're concerned about this debt Babe had, which was supposed to be resolved, but hasn't been, and which might not look so good if it came to light. Actually, it's really important. It could even determine whether organized baseball survives, because the Babe, he's become the key to the whole thing. Believe me, I wouldn't be here if I could figure out another way—”

When Eliza stood, her chair slid back and banged into the shelves behind her desk. She felt every hair on her head bristle. “Mr. Cook, where is my daughter?”

“Excuse me?”

The man was an idiot. “My daughter, Violet. You've met her.”

“Yes, yes, I remember. She brought the cognac for those police in Paris. Saved my bacon that day, for sure.” He furrowed his forehead. “I was sorry to hear of her injuries, but Jamie said she was recovering, last I saw him. That's some time back, of course.” He shifted his eyes, realization creeping in. “Has she gone somewhere? Is she missing?”

“How can you do that? Talk like nothing's happened? You know perfectly well that she's been seeing your son for months, and I don't know what all else has been going on, and now we haven't seen her for more than a day and we're crazy with worry.”

A severe look fell over Cook's face. “Why would you think she's with Joshua?”

“Mr. Cook, they've been together for weeks and months now. She deceived us about it until very, very recently.”

“He wouldn't do that. Joshua wouldn't do that.” Cook had sat back in the chair. He spoke quietly, but with force.

“Why not?”

“His mother and I raised him to be smarter than that. That boy's got a college degree.”

Cook's face, creased and dark and alarmed, told her. He hadn't known. Eliza's righteousness began to slip away. The chair springs creaked when she sat. “Yes, well, I can tell you only that Violet thinks she's in love with him.”

“She said that?”

“Yes. And she couldn't act the way she has if she didn't think so. At least I don't think she could.”

“And you don't know where she is?”

Eliza nodded. She hated how much she wanted to be comforted, just to collapse. She wouldn't. Not in front of this man. “I tried to talk to her about it, but I couldn't get through.”

Cook shook his head, spoke angrily. “Sweet Jesus. After everything, all we went through for him in Paris, I'll thrash that boy if he's fixing to throw it all away like this. The war, that goddamned war. It changed him. Some things, he doesn't register them like he should. He doesn't respect risk, not like he should. Jesus. They'll kill him.”