Chapter 23
"Will
you serve," Maxwell scolded. "We still have customers you know."
Maxwell
shoved clean platters at him just fast enough for him to slap eggs and home
fries on them and cast them through the serving windows into the waiting hands.
After
three nights up late, Maxwell felt drained, hardly up to the grind of The
Greasy Spoon. Yet the constant motion supplied him with an odd sense of relief.
He didn't have to think or draw conclusions. All he had to do was collect
plates, cups and silverware, wash them and let Jack have them again. All he
thought about were the egg stains changing to stains from hamburgers and fries.
By the time the noon rush had ended, his weariness made even this primitive
thought impossible, and he stared into the empty store, aching to return home
and to his waiting bed.
Then,
Jack moaned, drawing Maxwell out of his daze.
"What's
wrong?" Maxwell asked.
Jack
pointed. Peering in through the streaked window was the maple-colored face of
Jack's young girlfriend, Linda, her face framed by freshly dyed auburn hair.
She grinned when she spotted Jack and wiggled her fingers at Jack, who return
gesture lacked her enthusiasm.
"Tell
her to come in," Maxwell said.
"I
can't," Jack said. "Her family told her to avoid this place."
"She's
doing a hell of a good job at it," Maxwell mumbled.
"I
mean avoid the inside."
"Even
that seems a challenge," Maxwell said. "She's coming in anyway."
Linda
didn't look 14 -- especially when she wore sweaters and skirts tight enough to
reveal the absolute dimensions of her body. She had an abundant chest and her
face was made up to look like a magazine model. She could have easily gone to
any local bar without getting proofed.
"What
the hell do you think you're doing?" Jack yelped as he rushed around the
counter and dragged her away from the window, all the time eyeing the outside
in case someone had already seen her. "Didn't you're brothers say they
didn't want you hanging around here any more?"
"Pooh
on my brothers," Linda said. "They can't tell me what to do."
"Maybe
not," Jack said, easing her even deeper into the store. "But they can
certainly make life hard on me. What did you come here for anyway?"
"I
need to talk to you, Jackie," Linda said, giving a sharp glance at
Maxwell. "In private."
"You
can talk in front of Max," Jack said.
"Not
about this," she said.
"All
right. We'll go in the back," Jack said, and led her into the stock room
closing the door behind them.
Maxwell
continued to wash dishes, staring sleepily out at the street, not recognizing
for a moment the black Trans Am when it pulled up to the curb in front of the
store. It didn't park. It huffed and puffed, its warm engine releasing plumes
of steam into the air.
Then,
adding to Maxwell's jangled nerves, the phone rang, and the black Trans Am
jerked away as if reacting to the ringing. Maxwell woke, blinking at the space
where the car had been, shaken away by the insistent ringing. Jack added to the
confusion, suddenly shouting loud enough for Maxwell to hear him through the
closed door.
"WHAT?
How the hell did that happen?" Jack yelled, but lowered his voice
immediately so that whatever followed, Maxwell could not hear.
The
ringing phone persisted and Maxwell wiped his hands on a dirty towel, and made
his way around the counter to answer it.
"So
where the hell did you go?" Patty's voice demanded the moment Maxwell
picked up the receiver.
"Home,"
Maxwell said. "What was I supposed to do? You fell asleep."
"If
I promise not to fall asleep again like that, will you come pick me up?"
Maxwell
sagged against the wall, wiping his weary eyes with his free hand.
"Tonight?"
"Yes,"
Patty said. "I want to see where you live."
Outside,
the Trans Am made another pass, this time traveling on the other side, slowing
as it neared the bus stop. While Maxwell could see no face behind the tinted
driver's side window, he knew the driver had less trouble making out Maxwell's
shape inside the door -- the lights of the interior giving him away.
In the
back room, Jack's voice exploded again, then sank back into a series of mumbled
curses.
"I
don't know if my room mate has plans or not," Maxwell told Patty.
"Well,
maybe you'd better find out, eh?" she asked. "How am I supposed to
get to know you better if I don't see how you live?"
Maxwell
sighed.
"Hold
on," he said, then let the receiver hang as he crossed the room to the
stock room door. He tapped lightly. "Jack?"
The
harsh whispering halted. "What do you want?" Jack asked.
"I
need to talk to you a minute."
"I'm
busy."
"I
just want to know if I can use the loft tonight."
Jack
did not respond for a long time, though another hurried whispering exchange
seemed to transpire. Then, the door popped open and Jack's red eyes filled the
gap. He looked angry or scared or both, his mouth fixed into an expression
Maxwell had not seen before.
"Look,"
Jack finally said. "Can we talk about it later? I'm in the middle of
something now."
Jack
closed the door again, and returned to the harsh whispers. Maxwell made his way
back to the phone, remembering his promise to Creeley only as he picked up the
receiver -- to deliver the package from Rosey.
"Well?"
Patty asked, apparently gauging his return from his heavy breathing.
"I
can't do it tonight," he said.
"Can't
or won't?"
"I
have a previous engagement."
"Another
woman?" Patty asked, sounding more surprised than jealous.
"No.
I have to drive out to West Jersey. I'm doing a favor for an old friend."
"So
when can I come over?"
"How
does Sunday sound?"
"No
can do," Patty said. "I have to dance."
Maxwell
wanted to ask where, but didn't.
"Monday?"
he asked.
Patty
remained silent for a moment, though Maxwell could hear the sound of turning
pages.
"That
looks clear to me," she said. "What time are you going to pick me
up?"
***********
The
ruins of Bertrand's Island's Amusement Park leaped out to the touch of the head
lights, the abandoned rides and buildings falling to dust bit by bit -- the
ribs of the carousel building showing along one side as if the old world had
been struct by cancer.
Maxwell
remembered the place when it was still up and running, from those days when he
was younger and came here as a kid and later as an adult. Creeley had often
taken his summer retreat here, owning a small bungalow on the west end of the
island. Maxwell had even come to visit during those days dating Suzanne.
In many
ways, the park was among New Jersey's forgotten monuments, a play ground of the
post Victorian era, popular among the wealthy and poor of New Jersey and
Pennsylvania as Coney Island was to the people of New York. Trains had come
here from as far away as Scranton and Cape May. Summer homes were constructed
along the banks of the Lake Hopatcong just to service the thousands of weekend
guests.
The
place did not, however, start out with a park in mind. The property owner,
Louis Kraus, had simply installed a boardwalk along the water's edge in 1920 to
accommodate visitors. Four year later, the open air cafeteria opened, and a
year after that, the roller coaster and airplane swing, followed by whip rides.
But Kraus recognized the market appeal of the place and kept adding on. Years
later, after World War Two, two new partners purchased the park and added
Kiddieland -- and the entertainment continued to thrive for nearly another
thirty years. Then, the nature of the area changed. People started moving here
year round and the amusement park became more of a nuisance than a resort.
Finally, the new property owners closed its doors in 1983 and plotted to
replace it with townhouses.
Now in
the dark, the remaining buildings looked haunted, as weather abused the
structures, making them sag here and bow there. The once "greatest wooden
roller coaster in the world" fell in on itself inch by inch, little more
than a collection of sticks waiting for some kid with a match to set it ablaze.
The
car's headlights created shadows around these, giving the impression that
someone was running through the park, jogging on the asphalt path that
connected the various rides and buildings from the dance hall on the northeast
corner to the merry-go-round at the southwest, passed the bumper car building,
the roller coaster and the two dozen free-standing buildings which once housed
food concessions and games of chance.
Then
the road turned and the headlights moved away from the graveyard and
illuminated a rutted, muddy road instead, one that passed under an archway and
into what had once served as an exclusive lake-side summer community.
Creeley's
family had owned property on the island's tip from those days when people still
considered it exclusive. Like the park itself, the neighborhood had
deteriorated over time, its bungalows falling into disrepair when the sea side
became the preferred destination for vacationers. Later, these homes made their
slow recovery as Wall Street and property values climbed, and the area became
attractive to New York City-bound professionals willing to make the
hour-and-a-half commute to the Lincoln Tunnel, or to back offices on the rise
in the much nearer Morristown.
Offered
unexpectedly high prices for their houses -- and faced with a radically altered
neighborhood -- many of the original families sold out, seeing their previous
woods torn up by bulldozers in a building boom that ruined the rural landscape
and made conditions here nearly as intolerable as the city from which many of
the new comers had fled. New homes and town house developments rose along the
lake, filling nearly every corner. Only Bertrand's Island remained the same,
blessed by a low water table that allowed people to purchase existing homes,
but not build new ones.
But
many of the older homes changed, repackaged to fit the tastes of the new
population, bearing the grander, tasteless eloquence newly wealthy people adopt
in their effort to show their worth, all glass and glitter, bulging out from
properties never meant to hold such monstrosities. The vehicles populating the
driveways also changed from pickup trucks and old Chevys to cars marked with
logos for BMW, Volvo and Mercedes.
One of
the few exceptions was Creeley's place, modified in the early 1950s just enough
to make the place livable year round: with a heating system and indoor
plumbing, and storm windows that helped keep out the wind off the lake. The
family had even more recently made repairs to the roof and siding, so that the
building looked as it must have looked earlier in the century when first
constructed. Yet among the obscene buildings constructed around it, the place
looked a little like a child's play house, so small and insignificant, and
subject to numerous stares from neighborhoods who saw Creeley had a detriment
to the neighborhood, his resistance to the trend bringing down the Island's
property values.
One dim
lamp illuminated the front porch as Maxwell pulled the car up the gravel road.
He pulled the car to the side, the right wheels poised on the edge of a
drainage ditch. The stench of unmoving water oozing up at him. The dim light
grew only marginally brighter as Maxwell cut off the headlights the car. It
might have been a candle, although Creeley generally kept such things for
important rituals.
For a
while, Maxwell made no move to exit the car, listening to the car's clicking as
the engine cooled. Unlike back in Paterson, Maxwell could see the stars here --
bright points casting nearly as much light as a full moon. Their touch shaped
the island into an eerie landscape, mocking the posh homes, making their pale
sides resemble grave stones. Beyond the veil of trees, the starlight shimmered
on the surface of the lake. A sudden gust of wind off the lake shook the car.
Maxwell
shoved open the door, retrieved his keys from the ignition and the Rosey's
package from the trunk, then made his way up the drive, each footfall on the
gravel announcing his arrival as vibrantly as a door bell, marking him as a
city boy who did not know how to walk in the woods. The outside light to the
right of the door flashed on, its weak beam managing to expose the beds of
flowers lining the walk from the road to the door -- dead flowers left in place
through the winter. In the driveway, Creeley's useless 1948 Studebaker sat
rusting away.
The
smell of dead plants gave the yard a remarkable perfume, which was the excuse
Creeley used for leaving them, despite neighbors calling them weeds. In a few
weeks when the ground thawed sufficiently, Creeley would replace them with
seedlings already started in the house. Though Spring, Summer and Fall, his
yard would glisten like a multi-colored jewel, putting the posh houses with
their ordinarily-manicured lawns to shame.
Somehow
the smell of dead and dying pleased Maxwell in a way he could not explain,
especially at this time of year when the dead season faded and the growing
season began. The smell reminded him of snatches of perfume he would catch
while walking in the city, forcing him to imagine the features of the woman to
which the scent belonged.
As
Maxwell approached, the front door opened and the old man appeared, looking
older than even Maxwell remembered, and bearing a touch of sadness Maxwell had
not expected. Creeley seemed more bent than before, and his mouth drawn in such
as way as to pull his wrinkled skin over his bony cheeks into an expression
that resembled pain. His hair -- which had previously contained streaks of gray
-- now hung over his ears and forehead like a worn dish rag.
"Did
you bring it?" the old man hissed, shaking as he held the door open, the
door shaking as a result. The brass knocker chattered.
"Yes,"
Maxwell said, holding up the small package.
"Give
it to me," Creeley demanded and snatched the package from Maxwell's hands.
"I'll be right back."
The old
man vanished into the deeper gloom inside the house, leaving Maxwell to occupy
the small front porch -- a porch enclosed in glass in order to provide the
small house with an extra room. Plants lined the entire space, seedlings
spouting in a variety of cups, dishes, jars and plastic containers, as vibrant
as the dead flowers outside were not, their faces pressed against the glass
hungering for sunlight and the great outdoors. In daylight, they painted the
entire room in a green glow. But now, they reflected the dim porch light giving
the impression of green flesh as if the porch was armored with the skin of
living lizards.
While
the room smelled earthy, Maxwell caught the more distant scent of incense, the
product of some ritual Creeley had conducted while waiting for him to arrive.
It was a smell Maxwell had caught often in the Paterson loft while Creeley
lived there, and one that had seeped into the walls and floors so he could
still smell it now that Creeley had gone.
Then,
Maxwell caught a newer, stronger smell that was not incense, one that he had
smelled before from Patty's apartment, one that he sometimes caught coming from
Jack's room at night, this smell, the uniquely sweet scent of melting heroin.
***********
"So
tell me about this girl you met?" Creeley asked, seated across a small
table that served as a place to eat as well as a place to sacrifice and
experiment, clumps of dried white and black wax hung from one side. Burn marks
showed on its top. A few dirty dishes sat near Creeley's hand from a hurried
meal of brown rice and pink beans.
The old
man's face had calmed, his desperate stare vanquished, a Zen look that said the
world could rumble and not shake him. The eyes -- slightly glazed -- studied
Maxwell carefully.
"What's
there to know?" Maxwell said with a shrug, always a little disturbed by
this ritual, as Creeley grilled him for information he already had -- the man
having sources in Paterson which Maxwell knew nothing about. Creeley sometimes
knew more about what went on in the old city than Maxwell.
"Where
did you meet her?"
"At
the lounge. She danced there."
Creeley's
gray brows folded down towards the bridge of his nose.
"You're
dating a go go dancer?"
"It's
not as bad as it sounds."
"Dating
a prostitute sounds pretty bad to me."
"She
is not a prostitute."
"All
go go dancer are," the old man said.
"Let's
drop the subject," Maxwell said.
"I'm
just concerned for you, Maxwell," Creeley said. "I don't want you to
get hurt."
"I
won't."
"Why
don't you move up here with me."
"I
have a job down there."
"You
can find something up here."
"And
the loft? I would have to give that up."
"It's
only an apartment."
"A
cheap apartment."
"You
could live here for free."
"No,"
Maxwell said. "I said I wouldn't move until I was ready to go to
Nashville."
"You've
been planning for the for years, and you seem no closer now than you were when
I left Paterson."
"I
have money in the bank," Maxwell said. "I just need a little
more."
Creeley
sighed. "Have it your way," he mumbled. "Just be very careful,
Maxwell."
"I
will," Maxwell promised.
************
"I
don't like it," Jack said, seated across the railroad cable spindle, his
and Maxwell's coffee staining its otherwise pale surface -- the rings testimony
to the daily routine. Maxwell could read the history of their last two years
together from its surface. "You shouldn't bring that woman here."
"Why
not?"
"Because
you've got stuff to lose," Jack said. "You have guitars and a stereo,
and I have -- well, I have personal stuff I wouldn't want no thieves making off
with."
"Are
you trying to tell me Patty is a thief?"
"No.
But bar people know bar people and they all tend to talk. You're the one whose
always telling me to keep quiet about our living up here, not to let too many
people know."
"So
I'm making an exception in this case," Maxwell said.
"But
you won't let me bring Linda up here."
"Linda
is 14 years old," Maxwell said. "And you're already hot for her. Why
tempt fate by providing you with too much privacy."
"You're
acting as if we couldn't get privacy some place else."
"True,
but if you take her to a motel, someone might ask questions -- and you two
would have to think real hard before you make anything happen."
"So
now you're going to counsel me on my morals?"
"No,
I'm just keep myself out of it," Maxwell said. "What does on in this
apartment is my business, especially if it meals the police might kick down the
front door."
Jack
took a hard swallow of his coffee, then stared into the cup.
"So
when does all this happen?" he asked. "Should I stay out of the loft
all night?"
"No,
we'll clear out by eleven, I should think. She just wants to see the place and
how I live."
"It
sounds suspicious," Jack grumbled. "Meanwhile, what am I supposed to
do? Walk the streets?"
"I
offered to pay for a movie."
"I've
seen the crowd that goes into the Fabian these days. I'll be safer on the
streets."
"Then
I'll pay for the bus to New York and give you cash to drink at that Irish
tavern of yours."
"Drinking
alone is no fun," Jack said. "But don't worry. I'll keep myself
amused. And with my own money. Just get her out by eleven."
***********
Maxwell
pulled the car in through the gate. The old dog opened its eyes, but made no
move to rise from its dog house at the end of the yard. It sniffed, stirred by
the scent of stranger, but apparently Maxwell's scent reached him at the same
time, and the dog closed his eyes again.
"Some
watch dog," Patty said as she climbed out of the car and eased into the
court yard. Maxwell lifted a bag out of the backseat, the bottle of pineapple juice
clinking against the bottle of gin.
"He
knows you're with me," Maxwell said. "Otherwise he'd be at your
throat."
Patty
glanced at the dog again, then around at the court yard, the garages and the
wall, all illuminated by two harsh flood lights.
"What
is this? Fort Apache?"
"Sort
of," Maxwell said, motioning Patty towards the fire escape ladder.
"You
expect me to climb that?" she asked.
"We
could go around the long way, but I'd rather avoid the street," Maxwell
said, thinking about the Black Trans Am and how it had not been outside Patty's
apartment when he picked her up.
"I'm
beginning to have doubts about you, Longfellow," Patty said, yet stuck her
snearkered foot into the first run as Maxwell held the ladder down. She climbed
carefully until she reached the first level. Maxwell followed, then led her up
two more sets of metal stairs until they reached the roof.
Here,
the pattern of dead plants he had seen at the lake repeated itself, pot after
pot of drooping brown stems greeting his guest. These were left over from the
days when Creeley had performed his magic here, and making the roof top bloom
three seasons out of four.
Patty
eyed these as she passed, but offered no comment. She followed Maxwell as he
led her across the black top, passed the skylight to the roof top door. This,
as he expected, was unlocked, and he dropped down the short set of stairs to
the room below. He felt for the light switch and flicked it on.
"I
have someone delivering pizza," Maxwell told Patty when she finally made
the descent from the room.
She
squinted as she studied the interior of the loft.
"You
live here?" she asked.
Despite
all Maxwell's earlier efforts to straighten up, the place looked shabby. The
dead plants and moldy books gave the main room the appearance of a cave, a cave
into which Maxwell crawled every night.
"It
looks better in day light," he said. "When the sun peeks through the
skylight."
Patty
shook her head slow, then frowned when she saw Maxwell's guitars -- the
instruments leaning against the sides of his bed like bookends.
"You
never told me you play guitar," she said, glancing at him accusingly as if
he had deliberately with held vital information.
"I
don't play as well as I would like," Maxwell said, straightening things as
he crossed the room, recovering his and Jack's breakfast cups from the top of
the spindle.
"Play
something for me," Patty said, crossing towards the guitars.
"Now?
What about having supper first?"
"Supper
can wait," Patty said, standing now in the middle of the room, turning
slowly as if to take in the whole panorama of Maxwell's life.
Posters
covered sections of the walls: Jimi Hendrix from the Filmore East, the Beatles
from several record albums, along with posters of The Rolling Stones. She
squinted at the spines of books on the shelves. Many were music books, others
periodicals dating from the late 1960s. Many of the books were histories of
anti-war protests and civil rights.
"Are
you some kind of hippie?" she asked, glancing at Maxwell.
"No,"
Maxwell said.
"Then
why are you collecting all this stuff?"
"I
like the time period. It seemed more simple then, more innocent. Everyone
seemed to have hope for the future."
"And
now?"
"People
don't believe in anything," Maxwell said. "People seem to want
everything to happen right at this moment. They don't want to build towards
tomorrow."
Patty
started at him, her expression growing more and more puzzled.
"You're
weird," she said finally, without any touch of humor in her voice.
"Just play the guitar. Your philosophy disgusts me."
Maxwell
sighed, put down the cups again on the spindle, and crossed to the first of his
guitars.
This
was a 1965 acoustic Gibson, the sunburst model the Beatles had used in their
movie, Hard Days Night. He strummed a chord, cringed, adjusted the b-string,
then stumbled again, producing a better, but not perfect sound.
The old
beast, he thought, is being temperamental.
But he
would not do battle with it tonight; Maxwell played, strumming out the chords
of an old folk song, humming over those lyrics he could not remember. When
finished, he looked up, and found Patty staring at him, her mouth open slightly
-- in shock.
"What's
the matter?" Maxwell asked, fingers dropping from the fretboard.
"Don't
stop," Patty pleaded.
But
just then, a tapping sounded from the skylight, like keys being rapped against
the glass. Maxwell looked up and saw a face framed in one of the panes.
"Oh
no!" he moaned, then leaped to his feet and rushed towards the door
leading to the roof.
"Hi,
Max," Laura Jean said, pushing her way through the door the moment Maxwell
unlocked it. She looked -- as always -- as if she had stepped out from the
pages of a magazine on the modern woman, wearing matching jogging jacket and
pants, Jorde Ash sneakers and a Dallas Cowboy baseball style hat -- out the
rear of which hung her pony tale. "Am I interrupting anything?"
This,
too, was ritual, something she said each time she showed up -- which almost
always came at a particularly inopportune time, although Maxwell could recall
not previous visit quite an inopportune as this time.
"As
a matter of fact," Maxwell said. "I'm in the middle of a date."
"A
date? With a girl?" Laura Jean said, her thin finger rising to her thin
lips. "I'm so sorry. I know I've come at bad times before -- especially
when you're in the shower. But I've never walked in on one of your dates
before."
"Aren't
you going to introduce us?" Patty asked, appearing at the bottom of the
stairs, her voice sharp and cold.
Maxwell
made a hasty introduction.
"Laura
Jean is an old friend of mine from the poetry circuit," Maxwell explained.
"I'm
sure she is," Patty said.
"No
really, he's right," Laura Jean said, struggling not to giggle. "Max
and I are just good friends."
"I
can see that," Patty said. "Which is why he lets you use his back
door to get in. Maybe you should take me home, Longfellow. It's getting
late."
"Look,
I didn't mean to cause any trouble. I always show up at people's houses like
this. Stay, please. Maxwell's a nice guy. He's not like all those other bums I
know. He's not pulling anything over on you, honest."
"I
still think I should go home," Patty said, then glanced at Maxwell.
"Are you going to drive me or should I call a cab?"
"No,"
Maxwell mumbled. "I'll take you. It's the least I can do."
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