The City When It Rains (36 page)

He was still in Lazar's apartment when he called Pike. “I'm going to pass on Groton's job,” he told him quietly.

“Suit yourself,” Pike said casually. “It's not a job I'll have any trouble filling.”

“No, you won't.”

“Too bad, though,” Pike added nonchalantly. “The fag liked you, said you were a pretty good shooter.”

“I'm glad to hear it.”

“Said you had an eye for things.”

“An eye,” Corman repeated unemphatically, then with more significance. “Lazar died yesterday.” He tapped the side of his camera bag. “I'm taking some of his clothes up. For the body.”

“He was good,” Pike said, “a good shooter. But he was weak, Corman. What the Irish call a harp.”

“He seemed tough enough to me.”

“How tough's that?”

“He drank it down to the worm,” Corman said. “He didn't fake anything.” If he'd been a sculptor, he thought as he hung up the phone, he would have etched the same proud words upon the old man's stone.

* * *

Corman laid the bag on the desk beside a tray of hospital plates. “This is for Mr. Lazar,” he said.

The attendant recognized him immediately and gave him a quizzical look. “Did anyone call you?” she asked delicately.

Corman nodded. “I know he died,” he told her. “I brought some clothes for him.”

“Oh, I see,” the woman said. “Well, Mr. Lazar is … we have … I mean he's downstairs.”

“Yes.”

“Would you like to see him?”

Corman shook his head. “No, I don't think so.”

The woman smiled softly. “He died in his sleep,” she said. “Very quiet. We didn't know anything had happened until we made our regular rounds.” She glanced at the bag for no reason, then returned her eyes to Corman. “He was sitting up. I mean, when it happened. I guess he was listening to the radio. He had it propped up against his ear.”

“Yes, he was probably doing that,” Corman said. He could feel a strange restlessness somewhere deep within him and worked to keep it down. “As far as a funeral, I'll make the arrangements. He owned a plot in a cemetery in Brooklyn. The one you see from the train on the way to Coney Island. It's very crowded. He liked that, crowds.”

“I know the one,” the woman said with a sudden cheeriness. “I live near it.”

“They would know about the plot,” Corman added. “Where it is. That kind of thing. I'll call them, make the arrangements.” He slid the bag over toward her. “I guess you can take these now?”

She pulled them toward her, peeked in. “Looks fine,” she said.

Corman placed his hand on the suitcase. He could feel the many miles it had traveled, smell the hotel beds where Lazar had flung it, see the roads, tracks, rails it had been hustled down. “Yes,” he said as he spread his hand across it, left it there a moment, then drew it achingly away.

Lucy had left a note on the door telling him she'd gone to Mrs. Donaldson's, so he trudged back down the hallway to get her. She answered the door immediately.

“Why are you here?” she asked, surprised.

He smiled quietly. “Just to pick you up.”

“I thought you were going out with Mom.”

“I am, a little later.”

“And I'm going home with her tonight, right?”

Corman nodded. Tonight and forever, he thought, and ever and ever and ever. And he would be away as she grew tall and her voice changed by imperceptible degrees. He would be away when she failed at this, triumphed at that, away when she woke up with a start, when the cat died, the bird escaped, away when she fell, away when she got up again. And in the end he would no longer feel familiar with the shape of her leg, the length of her hair, because, by some formula the world took powerfully to heart, he had failed to be what he should have been.

“So when are you meeting Mom?” Lucy asked.

“Around eight,” Corman told her. “Mrs. Donaldson will stay with you until we get back.”

Lucy turned excitedly and called to Mrs. Donaldson that her father had arrived, and that she was going home. “Is it okay if I eat with her tonight?” she asked as they headed toward their apartment. “She cooks better.”

“Yeah, it's okay.”

Lucy slapped her hands together. “Great,” she said happily, then rushed away, bounding down the corridor ahead of him for a few yards before she stopped abruptly, as if caught by a sudden thought. Then, for no reason he could understand, she returned to him slowly, her eyes oddly tender, tucked her hand in his arm and walked beside him silently to their door.

CHAPTER
THIRTY-FIVE

L
EXIE ARRIVED
almost exactly at eight. She smiled tentatively when Corman opened the door, then came slowly into the small foyer as he stepped back to let her pass.

Lucy rushed from her room to greet her. “Hi, Mom.”

Lexie pulled her into her arms, smiled warmly. “Hi. How are you?”

“Fine,” Lucy said. “I'm staying with you tonight.”

“Absolutely,” Lexie said. She looked at Corman, then spoke to him finally, her voice already a bit strained. “Hello, David.”

Corman nodded.

“You left the party quite early.”

“The shoot was over.”

Lucy tugged Lexie's hand. “Did Papa tell you?”

“Tell me what, honey?”

“Mr. Lazar died.”

Lexie's eyes shot over to Corman. “I'm sorry, David.”

“He'd had a stroke,” Corman said, almost dismissingly, carefully controlling himself. “He wasn't in very good shape.”

“Still, it's …”

“Yes, it is,” Corman said, cutting her off. He reached for another subject. “Well, this restaurant we're going to, do I need a tie, jacket?”

“Well, yes, I think so,” Lexie said. “I hope you don't mind.”

Corman shrugged. “No, I don't mind. Where are we going?”

“I thought we'd make things a little classy tonight,” Lexie told him. She smiled. “If that wouldn't bother you.”

“Not at all.”

“He'd like it,” Lucy said enthusiastically. “He eats pizza most of the time.”

Lexie's eyes remained on Corman's face, as if she were trying to determine exactly what was left between them, affection, amusement, just the pull of years.

“I'll be ready in a minute,” Corman told her. He turned, walked into the living room and pulled his jacket from the table. He could hear her moving toward him, stepping cautiously into the room, as if odd things might be lurking in its shadowy depths.

“Okay,” he said when he turned back toward her. “I'm ready.”

For a moment, she didn't move. Her eyes scanned the room, surveying its stained walls and battered furnishings, the way everything seemed crippled by age and wear, the downward tug of squandered chances. She looked like a lawyer taking notes, building a case for impermissible disarray.

“I said, I'm ready,” Corman repeated.

“Oh, good,” Lexie said, coming back to him. She looked toward the door, smiled at Lucy as she headed toward it then hugged her once again when she got there. “See you later,” she said lightly.

Corman stepped around her and opened the door. “ 'Bye, kid,” he said to Lucy. “I'll tell Mrs. Donaldson to come right over.”

“She's bringing dinner,” Lucy said to Lexie. “Pot roast. It's great.”

Lexie smiled thinly. “Sounds wonderful,” she said, her voice faintly distant, as if it were coming from a better part of town.

Corman headed down the corridor, stopped at Mrs. Donaldson's door and knocked lightly.

The door opened immediately.

“Lucy ready for dinner?” Mrs. Donaldson asked.

Corman nodded toward Lexie. “This is Lucy's mother,” he said. Then to Lexie, “Mrs. Donaldson.”

They shook hands quickly.

“You have a wonderful little girl,” Mrs. Donaldson said. “Such a sweetie.” She smiled sympathetically at Lexie, as if in commiseration for all the times she'd had to put up with a rootless man.

“Well, we'd better be going,” Corman said to her. “We should be back fairly early.”

Mrs. Donaldson waved her hand. “Take your own sweet time,” she said expansively. “Me and Lucy always have a grand old time.”

Lexie led the way to the restaurant, walking briskly, as she always did, until they'd made their way silently across town to a place called Pierre-Louis on East 56th Street. Pierre himself was standing at the door as Corman followed Lexie in. For a few minutes, the two of them stood together, talking of mutual acquaintances and the state of things in the Hamptons while Corman shifted awkwardly just to Lexie's right, silent, patient, one of her retainers.

“Well, it's very good to see you again, Mrs. Mills,” Pierre said in conclusion. “Mathieu will show you to your table.”

Mathieu did precisely that, then directed a few other people around until the table had been served with drink, bread and butter. The bread was good, like the butter. Corman recognized the scotch as the same Jeffrey had ordered for him at the Bull and Bear.

“So, it's … the restaurant … it's nice,” he began haltingly after the first sip.

Lexie smiled. “It's funny how little we have to talk about.”

“Divorce puts a clamp on things.”

“Yes.”

“That's just the way it is.”

“I'm afraid so,” Lexie said. She took another sip from her drink. “I'm really sorry to hear about Mr. Lazar.”

“I was, too.”

“Was it painless?”

Corman shrugged. “I don't know.”

Lexie bowed her head slightly. “Anyway, I was sorry to hear it.”

Corman nodded and finished his drink.

Lexie immediately ordered another and waited for it to come before continuing.

“I hear you have something going,” she said. “Some sort of project.”

“Who told you that? Frances? Edgar?”

Lexie didn't answer. “A book, isn't it?” she asked instead.

Corman shook his head. “There's no book,” he said.

Lexie looked surprised, but Corman couldn't tell whether it was because he'd dropped the book idea or simply been willing to admit it instantly.

“But why?” she asked. “Julian says …”

“Julian?” Corman blurted. “I didn't know you were still in touch with Julian.”

Lexie's face tightened almost imperceptibly. “Sometimes.”

Corman looked at her pointedly. “Lexie, you think I care if you're seeing Julian?”

“It's not like that.”

“I don't care what it's like,” Corman said. “It's not my business.” He looked at her very seriously, trying to find a route into her that would broaden both of them and let them live in some sort of collusion against whatever it was that had spoiled things for them. “Anyway, there won't be a book,” he told her.

“Why not?”

“Because it didn't add up to anything Julian would be interested in.”

“He said something about a woman.”

Corman shook his head. “They weren't really interested in her, I don't think. They had their own ideas. I'm not sure what. Maybe to get the father somehow. For a villain.”

“And the father wasn't one?”

“No, I don't think he was,” Corman said. “At least not intentionally. I mean, who's to blame when it all goes wrong?”

Lexie's eyes rested on him. They seemed oddly lifeless. He half-expected them to tumble from their sockets, roll across the table and drop into his lap.

“So, what it comes down to,” he said, “there's not going to be a book.”

“I see,” Lexie said. She hesitated a moment, as if trying to get her bearings, then began, “I know Edgar talked to you.”

“Yes,” Corman said. He could feel it coming, like an executioner moving slowly down the corridor toward his cell, grim, unstoppable, prepared to carry out the court's inflexible decree.

“The worst thing for a child is bitterness,” Lexie said, as if quoting the latest manual on the subject. “Friction. Hostility. Even ambiguity. Things like that have to be avoided.”

Corman said nothing. He felt that any words from him would fall upon her like tiny drops of water, explode on impact then turn to little dribbling streams.

“It's always been very smooth between us, David,” she went on. “Especially these last few years.” Her eyes narrowed significantly. “I don't want that to change.”

Corman cleared his throat weakly, offered a quick, inconsequential remark. “I don't want anything to change.”

“Which brings us back to Edgar,” Lexie said. “Or should I say, to Lucy.” She stared at him solemnly. “You have to understand, David, that whatever I want, I want it for Lucy. Not for me at all. And I mean that.” She gave him a quick smile. “To tell you the truth, I don't get the feeling Jeffrey's terribly excited about having a little girl around. But I can't think of him, of his interests, anymore than I can think of yours. It's Lucy's welfare. That's what I'm interested in. Only that. Nothing else.”