St. Urbain's Horseman (45 page)

So Ruthy had demanded her cards back and gone to register with Dr. Engel. Owl-faced Engel, dribbling cigarette ash, had flicked through the cards, piles of letters from the hospital, and other
records, and then said: “You know there's only one kind of patient who comes to me with a record like this.”

“And what kind is that, doctor?”

The neurotic.

“As if,” Ruthy protested to Jake, “the
NHS
comes to us free. We're taxed plenty. If Engel doesn't like being on the
NHS
, why doesn't he emigrate?”

“And what about you,” Jake asked, “have you ever considered it?”

“Certainly not,” she replied, affronted. “Harry says you're going to pay me back what your cousin stole from me. Is that true?”

“I've brought you a check.”

“Would you care for tea?”

“Oh, thanks. Yes. Ruthy, if you're really that worried about your son, why don't you let me call my doctor. I'm sure he'd come immediately.”

“All you have to do is snap your fingers. It must be nice,” she mused, “to live your style. With connections everywhere.”

“Do you want me to call him or not?”

“Sure, call him. My David is as good as any of yours.”

“Where's the phone, then?”

“The second floor maid is using it. You've got six pence?”

“Yes.”

“It's in the hall.”

O'Brien agreed to look in within an hour. Jake followed Ruthy into the kitchen, where he was astonished to see, as she opened a cupboard in search of tea bags, shelf upon shelf of tins, tins of every conceivable size and shape, all of them shorn of their labels.

“What's going on here?” Jake asked.

“Oh,” she giggled, “I'm a competitor from the competitors. Didn't you know?”

Ruthy led him to her “office,” the bridge table in the corner of the living room, which was stacked with neatly ordered labels from soups, sardines, soft drinks, biscuits, chocolate bars, crisps, and so
forth. There were scissors, paste, envelopes, and entry forms. There was this week's
News of the World
Spot the Ball contest, £5,000 for the outright winner, the competitor who, scrutinizing the action photograph of a football game, made his X exactly where the missing ball was in play. Alongside lay entry forms for the Heinz Golden Opportunity contest, the Opals/Spangles competition, Brooke Bond Name-the-Chimp contest, the Daily Sketch Jackpot, Topcat Win a “Woman” Dream Kitchen, the Great Tetley Treasure Island contest and the £1,000 Pepsi Personality Analysis competition, as well as Horlick's Secret Dream and the Wall's Name-the-Soup contest.

“Would you save your labels for me?” Ruthy asked.

“Well, yes. But which ones?”

“Any with a contest. You don't drink Beefeater's Gin, do you?”

“I could.”

“Ooo, they're giving away a Triumph sports car. Would you bring me the labels?”

“Yes. Certainly. But have you ever won anything, Ruthy?”

“You think I'm a dummy. So does my brother. Sure, I've won plenty.”

The bridge table. A stainless steel carving set. A dinner service. A carton of Heinz soup. Seven days at Butlin's Holiday Camp. And many, many more prizes.

“I also once won fifty pounds in the pools. So, you think Harry would make a good dad for my boys?”

“He's a rather complex man, Ruthy, isn't he?”

The boys needed a dad. David, her eldest, was too moody and sensitive for exams; he had failed his 11-plus and had to go to a secondary modern school. Sidney, her youngest, still sucked his thumb. Nothing helped. Not tying his arm, not coating his thumb with hot mustard. But her nephew was a boarder at Carmel College, the Jewish public school in Wallingford. “Not bad for a father who was brought up on the Commercial Road and never got any further than the Jewish Free School.” On the High Holidays, she said, her brother's family stayed
at the Green Park Hotel in Bournemouth. “Have you ever seen it? It's beautiful. Fantastic. It's just like Versailles.”

“Have you been there, then?”

“Are you kidding? Me? ‘let them eat cake.' Do you know who said that?”

David called and Ruthy excused herself. Their voices were raised. Ruthy spoke sharply. David began to sob, then she slammed the door. “He wants to get out of bed. But your doctor's coming; I'd look like a fool.”

“What's his temperature now?”

“Only ninety-nine,” she admitted glumly.

O'Brien swept in, examined the boy, and emerged from the bedroom to say, “Mild case of tonsillitis. He should have them out, you know.”

“Don't you think I'm on a waiting list? It's four months already I'm waiting. Maybe, doctor, with your connections …”

“Please,” Jake said, “Dr. O'Brien is a very busy man.”

“You're all busy men,” Ruthy said, seeing O'Brien to the door. Then she picked up Jake's check and scrutinized it again. “Assuming it's good,” she said, giggling, “I've got Harry to thank for this. He's such a brilliant man, but he's disappointed in himself. If he wasn't Jewish, with his ability, he'd be very rich today.”

“Being Jewish didn't stop Charles Clore.”

“It's this country, you know. It's the class system. Harry's got the wrong accent. There's no old boys' network to take care of him. If he came from Canada, like you, where quality doesn't count, he'd be very important. His background wouldn't be held against him.”

“Maybe Harry's trouble is self-pity?”

“You think Prince Charles could get into Mensa?”

“He doesn't need to.”

“You said it,” she replied triumphantly.

“All right, then, why not emigrate with Harry? Maybe your kids would have a better chance in Canada?”

“You think I haven't looked into it? Just listen to this, will you?” She read from the application form. “Have you or has any one of the persons included in this application ever been convicted of, or admit to having committed, any crime or offence?' That takes care of Harry, doesn't it?”

Ruthy opened a dresser drawer and produced a Xerox of the ten-year-old
News of the World
clipping.

“He got two years,” Ruthy said, “and she went on to bigger and better parts. Only Harry's going to re-open the case now. We're going to clear his name.”

“Wouldn't it cost a good deal to appeal the case now?”

“It's not Cyril's money; it's mine,” she protested petulantly. “My darling brother convinced my late husband I was a dummy, so my legacy is being held in trust. Harry's read the will. It's full of loopholes, he says. We're going to contest it.”

Poor Cyril.

“Oh, one thing, Ruthy. Now that I've settled my cousin's debt, as it were, I would like to have his riding clothes. And the saddle, if I may?”

“Good riddance,” she said, going to fetch them.

As Jake entered the house, the saddle slung over his shoulder, riding crop in hand, Nancy clapped her hands, “Look, children, it isn't Daddy. It's Ben Cartwright.”

“Ha, ha.”

Only then did he notice the packed bag on the hall floor. He froze.

“Don't panic. The contractions are still fairly mild and far apart. But a child can come quickly.”

Pilar saw them into the car, sniffling, and Jake drove off with extreme caution. He told her he had given Ruthy the seven hundred pounds.

“I don't understand why you even bother with them,” Nancy said.

“Well, we don't stand in queues. And my cousin did take her for a ride, you know.”

“Harry gives me the shivers.”

“Harry's a street accident and I just happen to be a witness. What should I do, flee without handing in my name?”

“Don't be sharp with me, please.”

“I can't stand this enforced idleness any more.”

“Look for a film, then. If you find one you want to do, forfeit the balance of the money.”

“You make it sound so simple.”

“It is, isn't it?”

“Yes,” he said, relieved. “You're right.”

B
EN CAME EASILY, BORN SQUEALING AND IN HASTE
, early the following morning. May 10, 1967. And Jake, jubilant, hurried home to tell Sammy and Molly the news, only to discover that Pilar had taken them to a movie. Luke's secretary informed him the master was in Cannes. On impulse, Jake phoned Hoffman's office and asked for Harry.

“Yes. Stein here.”

“Is that the mad bomber himself?”

“Who's this?”

“We at Mensa have decided to disqualify you on the grounds of sexual perversion. You are a disgrace to the rest of the best.”

“It's Jacob Hersh, then?”

He invited Harry to lunch, and a half hour later, strolling in the sun through St. James's Park with him, he regretted it. He interrupted one of Harry's diatribes to say, “My God, Hershel, I don't give a shit about the iniquity of the top-hat tax avoidance schemes. Or how Marmaduke's school fees are paid. It's spring. I'm a father again. You and I, we're going to have Scotch salmon together, mouth-watering asparagus, a bottle of hock. Fresh strawberries. I feel good. Don't you ever feel good?”

“Grateful for the treat is what you mean to say. Well, no. I don't fancy being a charity case.”

“Harry, you vile thing, what's to be done with you?”

“Right now,” he said, “there are lascivious bastards no better than me sunning themselves on the decks of their yachts in the Bay of Cannes, with nubile starlets waiting below, just panting for a chance to suck their cocks. And when I return to the office after lunch, it's to sweat over their accounts.”

“Oh, Hershel, Hershel, your idea of the good life and mine are not the same, you know. Leave Ruthy alone, please.”

“What?” he said, startled.

“She's not overly bright. Be a
mensh
, Harry. This once.”

“I would be ever so grateful if you would not intrude into my personal affairs.”

“I thought we were friends now, Harry.”

Harry laughed dryly. “Come off it. I amuse you. You enjoy hearing my prison stories. I've got the courage to do things you only dream of.”

“Like hell,” Jake replied, his anger rising.

“You're not my friend. You'd never invite me to dinner at your house, because I'm not good enough for your wife. Or to be introduced to your real friends. I'm just a thing to you.”

“All right, that settles it. As soon as Nancy's up to it, you're invited to dinner.”

“Going to make me the household Cockney, are you now?”

“I'm no Old Etonian, you know. I'm a working-class boy too.”

“Look, mate, I've never had any friends and I like it that way. You think I'd ever trust you?”

“Why not?”

“Everybody's rotten.”

“What if I wasn't?”

“Don't worry. You're rotten.”

“Oy veh
. Did I ever pick somebody to celebrate a birth with. I must be crazy.”

But when they reached the White Elephant there was a bottle of champagne drifting in a bucket at Jake's table.

“I ordered it,” Harry protested, “and I'm paying for it. It's Veuve Clicquot. Is that good enough?”

“Of course it is. Thank you, Harry. I'm touched. Really I am.”

“You've had a bottle or two before, mate. Let's not break into tears over it.”

“Cheers, comrade.”

“Cheers. Have you put the boy down for a good school yet?”

“Cut it out, Harry. Relax. Let's have a good time.”

But Harry was no longer listening. Eyes charged with rancor, he scanned the other tables. Lissome girls in miniskirts laughing at jokes made by men old enough to be their fathers. Harry watched, his silence terrifying, as a tall raven-haired girl in a clinging Pucci shift glided toward the ladies' room, stopping, with the utmost assurance, to pluck a strawberry from the fruit trolley, flicking it on to a darting pink tongue, and then nodding yes, yes, an appreciative hand held to her bosom. “Immediately, madame,” the waiter purred.

All at once, Harry seized Jake by the arm. “You don't understand,” he cried. “I'm not getting enough of anything, don't you see? And most of the things I want I'm already too old to enjoy.”

I
N THE END, NANCY AND JAKE DECIDED SPAIN WAS
impractical, so was the south of France, and they took a house in Cornwall instead. A week after Nancy came out of the hospital, Jake drove her and the children to the place he had rented near Newquay. Pilar, who had gone on ahead by train, was standing in the door to meet them. Jake stayed the weekend and then returned to London, hopefully for no more than a week, to meet with his lawyers, consult his agent, and discuss the possibility of doing a ninety-minute film for
BBC TV
.