“Mrs. Hart, I can’t eat another bite. About that train set—”
She waved me off. “You ain’t drunk your buttermilk, which I made fresh. Nor finished your pie. What I’m gonna do with all that?”
“I’m full, Mrs. Hart. Lovely pie. I’ll take it home.”
“It’ll spoil. Can’t go about wasting it. The Bible says Jesus told his Disciples, ‘Gather up the leftover fragments so nothing’s wasted.’ That’s John 6:12, sir. Gimme.” She pulled the plate over to her and set to work on my piece, then grabbed my jar of milk and gurgled it down her throat in one impressive, mighty gulp.
“About the train,” I asked timidly. “Where’s it from?”
“It’s just some old toy his grandma had or something,” she said between mouthfuls of pie. “Spurgeon said take it, so take it.”
“I have to pay you.”
“He didn’t say sell it. He said give it. Bible says, ‘Don’t say to your neighbor come back tomorrow and I’ll give you what you need. Give it now.’ Proverbs 3:28, I believe.” And with that, she rose again, reached over atop the refrigerator, brought down a large shoebox, and set the box on the kitchen table.
• • •
HOW WOULD YOU FEEL if someone set down a Rembrandt in front of you? Or if someone placed the riches of the ancient Egyptian pharaohs in your lap, or several bars of gold from the Mayan ruins, and then sat and ate sweet potato pie right in front of the thing, as if the riches of the world, just inches away, were nothing more than crumbs and buttermilk being chugged down their throat?
I have always favored African Americans. They have had their share of troubles, well documented. But at that moment, I could have strangled the woman. To show such disrespect for a valued artifact, a genuine piece of American history, was too much. I nearly blacked out with rage.
But then my excitement was overwhelming and I wanted to shout for joy as she pushed the box toward me with her elbow, so as to not drop her fork and drip a crumb of her precious sweet potato pie.
It took all my will to calmly reach out, pull the box close, open it, and gaze down upon my future.
“Might I have a glass of water?” I said.
“Surely,” she said.
• • •
I INSPECTED THE TRAIN for an hour. It was in perfect condition. All three coaches, the coal car, and the engine. All of it, by God, kept in an old Thom McAn shoebox. A few bits of it were missing, mostly paint chipped and a few tiny pieces of piping off the coal car, but nothing that one of the great modern toy restorers of Austria or Belgium could not repaint or reproduce. Its tiny compartments, the engineer’s cabin, the passenger car railings, were extraordinary, simply out of this world. The workmanship overall was exquisite, as if it had been made by a thousand tiny, thimble-sized engineers: perfectly crafted gauges, gadgets, switches, pipes, fittings, down to the tiniest detail. It was magical. Otherworldly. Immaculate. I felt faint as I examined it.
“I’m dreaming,” I whispered to myself.
She looked at me, puzzled, chewing as she spoke. “Common sense is shy as rats in this world,” she said. “That a soul would let a little toy have such power over ’em. Blessed God.”
I barely heard. She was a fool and I was in love. I couldn’t see her. Couldn’t see anything but the train. I wanted it. I had to have it. My initial thought was to steal the train by offering them the increments of $9,000 I carried in my briefcase until I reached the $90,000 I had there. I discarded that idea. I decided to offer the $90,000 as a down payment.
“Do you have any idea what this is?” I managed to croak. My voice took a minute to come back.
“In this house, we care about souls, sir. The Word. Toys don’t count. You want your water? You ain’t touched it. ’Cause if you’re not thirsty, I’ll have that, too. We don’t waste in this house. How you like your gift?”
“I can’t accept it as a gift,” I said. “But would your husband sell it to me?”
“He don’t want no money,” she said. “Spurgeon said give it to you. How many times you gotta hear it?”
“I can’t do that,” I said. “It’s valuable.”
“You free, white, and over twenty-one, mister. Do what you want.”
“I’ll pay him. I insist. I’ll pay him a lot.”
She looked at me oddly. “What’s the matter with you? That little ol’ thing’s just a worldly something. Spurgeon ain’t no worldly man,” she said proudly. “He’s a man of God. He made a promise. The Bible says it: Ecclesiastes, fifth chapter, fourth verse: ‘When you make a vow to God, do not delay fulfilling it; for he has no pleasure in fools.’ God’s first in Spurgeon’s life,” she declared. “Mine’s too. You know Spurgeon’s been running First Tabernacle out on Fulton Avenue in Brooklyn for twenty-six years this coming August.”
“How nice. Couldn’t your church use some money if you sold it?”
She thought a moment. “I reckon First Tabernacle could. That building’s falling apart. And we need a new van. American made. But you got to talk to Spurgeon.”
“Well, I will pay you enough for a van and to fix the church and even buy your family a car,” I said.
“You talking crazy. Why would we take a car when the House of the Lord needs fixing?”
“You can do what you want with what I pay.”
She eyed me. “Make sure you talk to Spurgeon, ’cause right now our phone is about to get cut off and Junior needs some new shoes. He eats enough for two people. Growing so fast I can’t keep up with him. Why, he’s twelve and he’s bigger than me!”
Given her size, Junior must be so big they feed him with a harpoon.
“Let me tell you about this train,” I said. “See this smokestack—”
“Mister,” she was impatient now, “if it ain’t got God’s Kingdom in it, I ain’t interested. Jesus, mister. Jesus! Put Jesus in your heart. Spurgeon is gonna try to save you when you meet him. Have you been saved?”
“Saved?”
“Got Jesus, mister?”
“Well, um. I do like him . . . but can we talk about this train? And the price?”
“It’s nice of you to come all the way out here. But I got prayer meeting in half an hour. Spurgeon told me what to tell you. I done it. He said give it to you. Now you do what you think is best.”
“I need to talk to him. Can I reach him today?”
“He’s out at Rikers Island doing prison ministry.”
That didn’t seem safe. Even I have my limits as to where I’ll go to talk about toys. “Tomorrow?” I asked.
“Prayer meeting from noon to seven.”
“Friday?”
“Hour of Power Bible Study. He runs four classes.”
“Saturday?”
“Church bingo in the morning, then feeding the homeless in the evening. Then his janitor job at Brooklyn College till two a.m., ’cause he’s saving to send Junior to Disney World. Then his regular job at the night shift at the Domino Sugar factory in Williamsburg. From there he goes to the shelter on Kent Avenue and works with the homeless till noon. On Fridays he got a third job at a horrible club in Brooklyn someplace, sweeping the floor till four in the morning. But like I said, he wants to get Junior a ticket to Disney World.”
“Doesn’t he sleep?”
“You don’t sleep when you got the calling.”
“What about Saturday before church bingo? Bingo doesn’t start at eight a.m. does it?”
“He’s got prison ministry in Newark seven a.m. Saturdays. They need God in New Jersey, too.”
“Sunday?”
She looked at me strangely. “Sunday’s church day, mister.”
“How can I see him, then?”
She rose from the table. “Don’t you worry. Take the toy. I’ll tell him you was here. If you want to give us a few dollars, go ahead, but you ain’t got to. Spurgeon said take it. He
was pretty clear about it.”
I stared at my briefcase. Ninety thousand dollars and a release form, and I was rich for the rest of my life. Free of Bucks County. I could get rid of that drafty converted barn with its lousy heating system and field mice. No more pretending to be a professor for stupid clients willing to kill each other over hundred-year-old dolls made of porcelain and wood. No more being the only Jew in the room with no connection to anyone or anything. I would find a temple I liked. Hell, I would build a temple I liked. Even with attendant lawsuits, bad publicity, and more lawsuits—and a prize like this would draw more lawyers than dung draws flies—the worth of the train would cover me in retirement in Maui for the rest of my life. That was my dream. Maui. I could see it. I never thought it would happen.
But I couldn’t stand it. I’m a dealer, a businessman, not a thief. I wanted the thing free and clear. Besides, the Reverend, not his wife, was the owner of the train. It had been passed down from his grandmother, she said. I needed the story behind it. A toy dealer is only as good as the story of his toys. That’s what you use in part to sell the thing. It’s a good part of the value. I needed that, too. The stories sell the product. Given the rarity of the asset, I needed that story badly.
“I’ll wait for him, then. Here. If you don’t mind.”
“You can’t do that,” she said. “I got to go and you can’t stay with Buster here. Not by yourself. That dog’s crazy. Plus you want Junior to come home from choir practice and find a white man in a suit setting at the table and nobody explaining nothing to him? He’ll be scared stiff. You wanna take it or not?”
As tempting as it was, I had to be aboveboard. “I can’t. I have to get your husband’s okay in writing. He has to sign a release.”
She shrugged and stood up. “Suit yourself. I’m already late for prayer meeting. You wanna take some pie with you?”
I nodded out of courtesy. She wrapped another piece in a paper towel, handed it to me, and headed toward the door. To my horror, she left the train on the table.
Trying to hide my incredulousness, I chirped out, “Mrs. Hart. The train . . . it shouldn’t be left on the table.”
“Oh, you’re right,” she said. “Spurgeon is funny about this darned thing.”
She picked up the world’s rarest, most precious toy train set and dropped it back in the shoebox as if it were a pile of junk, then plopped the box atop her decrepit refrigerator, next to a box marked “Rat Poison.”
“He had a little wood box that came with it at one time,” she said. “Handmade. Nice little thing. It’s around here somewhere. Junior keeps his Legos in it.”
It was at that point that I had to restrain myself from grabbing her by the throat—assuming I could reach it—and cracking her head against the table. Toy boxes in mint condition are often nearly as valuable as the toy itself. In this case, the box could be worth God knows how much . . . many millions.
“Mrs. Hart, just so you know, this train is worth quite a bit of money,” I repeated. “In fact—”
She cut me off and patted my hand patiently. “Mister, the only train I care about is the train to Kingdom Come. Jesus, mister! Come to Jesus! You ain’t saved. I can tell. Don’t worry. Spurgeon’ll fix you.”
She placed her hands on her hips. It was time for me to go.
“Can I call him tonight?” I asked.
“I told you our phone’s getting cut off. Phone company’s shutting it off today at five. That’s what they said and they ain’t fooling. We’ll pay it next week and get it going again. He’ll get back to you then. Don’t worry.”
“Isn’t there any way of reaching him now?”
She shrugged. “Well, I suppose you could scoot over to the Domino plant if you want,” she said. “He works the overnight shift.”
“You sure I can catch him there?”
“Why not?” she said, ushering me to the door and out onto the front step. I glanced at my car, which was mercifully intact.
“His shift starts at eleven. Take care, mister. And you ought to check yourself. Running around after a silly little train. There’s a bigger train coming for you. The big train, honey, bound for glory. You best be ready.”
With that, she nudged me down the steps and closed the door.
• • •
THAT NIGHT, cloistered in a room at the Hilton on Sixth Avenue, I made a few careful inquiries by phone to three of my most important buyers, massively rich clients who try to outspend each other just for fun, frivolity, and ego. After spending several minutes convincing them that I was not joking and might in fact shortly be procuring, at great cost, the Under Graham Railroad Box Set that was once the property of General Robert E. Lee, their laughs and disbelief turned first to shocked silence, then to muted exuberance, and finally to bursts of fast figures, first murmured, then shouted. The initial offers began in millions—then tens of millions. The numbers made me sweat. I told them I’d get back to them and then hung up.
The Reverend’s shift started at eleven. I was out of the hotel and heading for the Domino Sugar plant in Brooklyn by ten o’clock. I had changed and was dressed for battle, wearing a crisp white shirt, khakis, and—to complete the transformation—left the Benz at the hotel garage in favor of a rented car and driver. The briefcase was locked in my hotel room safe. The idea of pawning off 90K and a release to this man for the train set was, I decided, a bad idea. This man worked several jobs, was obviously intelligent, and, I suspected, would not part with this object easily. Despite what his wife said, I decided there was a game afoot, a long-winded game plan to coax more dollars out of me. There was no reason that train was sitting on the refrigerator with him telling his wife to give it to me other than he wanted it to bait me in some kind of way or draw me into some kind of trap.
I decided the Reverend was toying with me and gave up the idea of walking away with the train for a mere pittance. I was ready to bargain. The Reverend, profoundly clever operator that I knew he was, would not find a better toy dealer. I would convince him of that.
Instead of cash, I toted along a backpack bearing the Reverend’s portfolio. The plastic binder had long ago been replaced by a hand-hewn leather-bound spiraled job with the name “The Reverend Spurgeon T. Hart” emblazoned in crisp, gold, roman letters, with gold braiding around the edges. The photo of the Under Graham Railroad Box Car Set was between two pieces of glass, covered with acid-free paper. I hadn’t shown this wonderful piece of theater to his wife, saving it for what I expected would be a second go-round or perhaps a last-ditch attempt to lure the prospective client. This seemed an appropriate moment.
I arrived at the plant’s front entrance with no small amount of fanfare, having given the plant owners the dazzle treatment before I left the hotel, a song-and-dance involving one of my customers, a bank branch president I called at home, at night, who in turn telephoned the CEO of the Domino Sugar Packing Company and made a few discreet comments about values, indexes, blue-chip stocks, and the kind of clients I represent. The rich have their own language, and it worked like magic. When I arrived at the plant and emerged from the back seat of my shiny, hired Lincoln Town Car, I was promptly ushered inside by a sheepish-looking foreman to a long row of workers on an assembly line stamping sugar cubes out of huge sugar blocks.
“There’s your guy,” my guide said.
Rev. Spurgeon Hart, owner of the most valuable toy in the world and a millionaire in waiting, was stamping sugar cubes and stacking them in one-pound yellow boxes in a line with twenty-five other workers. He was rail thin, a foot and a half shorter than his wife, a light-skinned black fellow with long dangling arms and a tattered baseball cap that said “Jesus Is Coming.” He wore a plain plaid shirt, a pair of yellow ragged polyester pants, and scuffed shoes.
The plant floor was busy, and over the hammering of the machinery the infernal racket of rap music was pounding in a boom box near the Reverend, property of a you
ng man who worked across from him on the other side of the assembly line. Clearly, the music seemed to cause the Reverend no small amount of consternation, for he occasionally glanced at the boom box in irritation as he dumped sugar cubes into boxes and expertly placed them on the rack, where they were fed to another set of workers who crated them. The incessant boom of the irritating music, combined with the hammering of the assembly line machinery, was so loud I could barely hear myself think.
As I approached, the Reverend glanced up, saw me coming, and actually seemed to shrink inside himself. He began to work faster, as if by being busier it would make me disappear. He didn’t wait for me to speak.
“I know who you are,” he shouted over the din. “My wife told me you were coming. Can we talk tomorrow? I’m busy.”
“I think what I have here is worth taking a break for,” I said. I smiled and held up the cover of the portfolio with his name emblazoned in golden letters. I had spent several days putting it together and was quite proud of it. I held it high so he could see it. He glanced at it and grimaced.
“I told her to give you the train already,” he shouted, pulling a stack of yellow sugar boxes off the rack and placing them into a carton.
“But we have to agree on a price.”
He stopped packing for a moment and sighed heavily, stepping closer so I could hear him. “Meet me in the workers’ cafeteria at two a.m.,” he said grumpily. “We get a break then.”
“Will they let me stay that long?”
“Foreman says you know the president or something like that,” he grunted. “Ain’t nobody gonna fool with you.” Then he turned away and began stamping sugar cubes again.
I sat in the cafeteria a solid two hours, drinking coffee from an old coffee machine that charged fifty cents a cup. The sugar, though, was free. At 2 a.m. the assembly line machinery ground to a stop, the roar of the cranks died, and several weary workers tromped into the room, Rev. Hart among them.