The door was locked. There was no way of looking into the hallway where he might see an elevator and an indicator light that would show what floor the redhead was going to. Next to the second buzzer Georg made out Anderson, and next to the fifth there was a new bronze plaque with fancy lettering that said TOWNSEND ENTERPRISES. The names next to the other bells were faded or nonexistent.
What was he to do now? It was a quarter past five, the traffic was heavy. He crossed the street and stopped in front of the window of a sports store, keeping an eye on the entrance to the building. At a quarter to six the redhead came out, carrying a briefcase. With him was a young man in jeans and a blue shirt, its top buttons undone. Shortly after six, a group of young women left the building—secretaries, Georg surmised—and toward seven a number of gentlemen in dark suits. It was getting dark, and on the fifth and sixth floors the lights came on.
He was tired. He was sweating beneath the nylon of his coat, his beard itched, and his back ached. With exhaustion came disappointment. Each time the door opened, he had hoped to see Françoise, or at least Bulnakov, or—he himself didn’t know who.
Patience is a virtue, as the saying goes. But then again, nobody ever feels the virtue of standing around patiently. We are taught at an early age that you earn your bread by the sweat of your brow, and that we can count on success if we work hard enough at something. What we do not learn is to wait. All of this went through Georg’s mind. If only he could wait, knowing that there would be an outcome. But he had no idea whether he had gotten even an inch closer to Françoise.
28
BY SEVEN THE FOLLOWING MORNING GEORG was back at the MacIntyre Building. He had decided against the hairspray, the tanning color, and the coat and hat, and settled for a mustache and sunglasses instead. He walked along the opposite side of the street. From a window table at McDonald’s he could keep the entrance in sight, as well as from what he had learned to identify as a classic New York diner on the corner. But since he wanted to be able to see the door buzzers, to see which one the redhead would ring, he had to stand in a doorway across the street. He was eyed suspiciously by everyone coming in, and soon the super appeared to ask what he was doing there. Georg told him his girlfriend worked across the street and that she was coming back from a trip, but that he didn’t know exactly at what time. She was going to go straight to work, and he didn’t want to miss her. What company was she working for? Georg said he didn’t know, otherwise he wouldn’t be standing there but would have left her a message. All he knew, Georg said, was that she worked across the street, as he’d picked her up often enough.
“Why don’t you just go ask for her across the street?”
The question was so simple and logical that Georg couldn’t come up with anything. He crossed the street, the super watching him as he went. He rang the bottom buzzer. He didn’t know what he would say if anyone answered, nor did he know why he didn’t just pretend to ring the bell, or simply walk away. The intercom remained silent, and he rang the next bell. The super was still watching him. Suddenly the redhead came walking up the street. He was walking fast, his arms swinging. Georg turned around and walked away. It took all his strength to walk calmly. He wanted to run. His heart was pounding. After twenty yards he looked back and saw neither the redhead nor the super.
That evening Helen took him to a baseball game; the Yankees were playing the Cleveland Indians. The stadium looked enormous, even from outside. But after they had taken the escalators, gone up the ramps, and climbed the stairs to their seats, Georg felt as if they were sitting on the rim of a gigantic crater, one side of which had been blown away. The upper tier sloped steeply. Below it a further tier sloped gently down to the playing field. The pitcher, the catcher, the batter, and all the rest of the players Helen pointed out to him were as small as toy figures. There was a flat row of panels and monitors the size of movie screens at the far end of the playing field, and he could see the buildings of the Bronx, and above them the darkening evening sky.
Helen explained the game, and Georg managed to follow it. The pitcher throws the ball to the catcher, and the batter has to try to hit the flying ball with his bat and drive it as far away as possible, while he runs to a certain point before the ball is thrown there and caught by someone. The game keeps stopping, the players change their roles, and balls are thrown and caught by the players in the team as if for practice or fun. The fans root for their team, boo, clap, and howl, but don’t become rowdy, don’t smash things, or beat people up. Hot dogs, peanuts, and beer are sold. Just like a picnic, Georg thought. He laid an arm around Helen’s shoulder, and in the other hand held a paper cup. He felt great.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” she asked with a smile.
At times the ball soared up through the lights in a steep curve, a white sphere against the dark sky. A seagull flew through the lights above the stadium. The screen showed replays and close-ups of the players. The cameras also panned through the audience.
“Where is that?” Georg shouted at Helen.
“Where is what?”
“On the screen! Where are those people sitting?”
He had seen Françoise, he had seen her face. The screen was now showing a family, a laughing fat man wearing a Yankees cap, and two black girls who saw the camera and waved, all within seconds.
“Those are just people here in the stadium.” She didn’t understand.
“But where in the stadium? Down there, over there? Where are the cameras?”
He jumped up and ran down the stairs. Françoise had to be sitting down below. The camera had shown seats that were almost at the level of the playing field. He tripped, nearly fell, caught himself, kept running. Aisles, handrails, ushers in red caps, blue shirts, and pants—this is where the better seats began. He jumped railings, climbed over the backs of seats of three empty rows, ran left to the next flight of stairs, and continued his descent. He had dodged an usher, but the usher had seen him. There were more stairs; he ran faster down to the next handrail, beneath which the seats were occupied. He wanted to turn left, to the continuation of the stairs, but he saw an usher there. On the right too. So he jumped over the railing where there was a free seat, made his way along the row, over the back of the next free seat, and then again, and down the stairs.
He came to the railing where the upper tier ended. The players and fans were far below. Had Françoise been wearing something red? A blouse? His eyes scanned the rows, saw red everywhere, barely able to tell women and men apart: jackets, sweatshirts, blouses.
“Françoise!” he yelled. People around him had noticed and, amused by his running and shouting, began to chime in, “Françoise! Françoise!”
When the ushers came, Georg followed them without a word. Not a single person in the lower tier had looked up. The ushers were friendly, asked to see his ticket stub, and escorted him back to the upper seats. Helen was waiting for him.
“I’m sorry, but I have to get down there.”
“We’re in the final inning. Unless there’s a miracle, the Indians will lose within the next two minutes.”
He wasn’t listening. “I’m really sorry, but I really do have to get down there,” he said. He walked over to the aisle. She followed him. “Is this about her? Did you see her? Do you love her so much?”
“Do you know how I can get all the way down? Down to the front rows?” He was walking faster, heading down.
“The game’s over, it’s over! Did you hear me?”
He stopped. The fans were clapping rhythmically, shouting “Yanks! Yanks!” And within seconds people were pouring into the aisles, and over the ramps and stairs.
“But I have to …”
“There are forty thousand people here.”
“Forty thousand in a stadium is still better than all the millions in New York,” he said stubbornly, but could no longer stop to reason with her as the stream of crowds carried them down the stairs and out onto the street. On the way to the subway, and down on the platform, he craned
his neck and looked around.
“What would you have done if—” Helen began, “I mean, what would you do if you found her?” They were standing in front of Helen’s house, and she was playing with the buttons of his shirt.
He didn’t know what to say. He had imagined all sorts of things: a furious eruption, coolly walking out on her, a stormy or a dignified reconciliation.
“Do you want to get back together with her?”
“I …” he began, but fell silent.
“There’s not much prospect of success when one has to fight so hard for someone. Being back together might at first be heaven on earth. But then, how can she ever repay what you have suffered on her account? Why should she even want to repay it? Did she ask you to suffer?”
Georg looked at her downcast.
“Call me one of these days,” she said, kissed his cheek, and left.
Georg bought a beer and sat down on a bench in Riverside Park. He had no idea what to do, what his next step should be. Tomorrow, he told himself, tomorrow I’ll make up my mind. Or else things will figure themselves out. Perhaps patience is a virtue also when it comes to decisions. Perhaps things fall into place on their own.
29
THE FOLLOWING DAY GEORG took particular care with his disguise: the brown tanning color, the black hairspray, mustache, sunglasses, jacket, and tie. The previous day the redhead had turned up at a quarter past eight. Georg waited by the sports store. He saw the redhead arriving, crossed the street, and reached the door just as he did. The redhead looked pleasant enough: his face was scarred by acne, but he had clear blue eyes, strong cheekbones, and a broad smile. With his gray suit and buffalo-leather briefcase, he would have blended in at any investment bank or law firm. He looked at Georg blankly, though perhaps with a touch of curiosity, and rang the fourth-floor bell. Georg pressed the eighth-floor bell.
“Another hot day,” Georg said.
“Mm.”
The door buzzed. The floor of the hallway and the stairs were covered with gray construction paper. The woodwork and banisters had been sanded down, and a first coat of paint had been applied to the walls. Two wood planks were nailed across the missing elevator door.
“They’re still working on the elevator,” the redhead said. “You’ve got quite a climb.”
“At least I have company halfway.”
The construction paper covering the stairs was slippery. Above the third floor there was a new dark gray carpet, the walls were light gray, and the woodwork had been painted Bordeaux red. There was still a smell of fresh paint. On the fourth floor the redhead wished him a nice day and opened a heavy metallic door that bore no inscription. Georg continued climbing the stairs. On the fifth floor was an opaque brown-tinted glass door that read TOWNSEND ENTERPRISES in gold letters, and on the sixth and seventh floors there were again bare metallic doors. The door on the eighth floor stood ajar and he pushed it open.
The floor was unoccupied. Here, too, there was a fresh coat of paint, construction paper on the floor, ladders, and trestle tables. From a corner window he could see Union Square across tarred rooftops, and farther away the Twin Towers. The redhead probably knew that the eighth floor was empty. He might be suspicious.
Georg went down to the fourth floor and rang the bell at Townsend Enterprises. The door swung open with a soft click and he saw a large room, and on the wall an inlaid gold and bronze map of the world. The door fell shut behind him, and from a hall to the left a woman appeared in a pink blouse, a gray suit, with extravagantly pinned-up black hair and ugly pink glasses.
“Can I help you?”
“I was looking for the law firm of Webster, Katz, and Weingarten on the eighth floor. Do you know where they might have moved?”
“We’ve only been here for two weeks. I don’t know anything about previous tenants. Would you like me to check the phone book?”
“That’s very kind of you, but thanks all the same.” As he turned to leave, he saw her press the city of Lima on the map, at which the door sprang open. He also noticed to her right a spiral staircase in the corridor leading to the floor below.
He called Mr. Epp from a public phone.
“Do you know how I can find out what kind of company Townsend Enterprises is? It’s at 874 Broadway?”
“You could ask for a credit report.”
“Where?”
“I’ll do it for you. Call me back in a few hours.”
Two hours later Georg found out that Townsend Enterprises imported rare woods and precious metals, and that it had gone bankrupt six months ago and been taken over.
“Who took it over?”
“The report doesn’t say,” Mr. Epp replied.
“But where there’s a seller there has to be a buyer.”
“You’re right, but the buyer didn’t appear on the credit report.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that the buyer didn’t take out a loan to take over the company. If, for instance, you buy an apartment on Central Park South and pay cash, there won’t be a credit report on you. That’s a bad example, though, because you’d arouse suspicion if you turned up with half a million dollars in cash. Nor is it necessarily a given that the buyer didn’t borrow any money: if he has enough assets to cover the credit, then the creditor doesn’t care whether he uses the money to buy Townsend or to go to Bermuda on vacation.”
“So how can I find the buyer?”
“If he doesn’t want to be found by you or someone like you, there’s nothing you can do.”
“What about the seller?”
“You can try that. Townsend Enterprises belonged to a Mr. Townsend, who lived in Queens. Perhaps he still does. Would you like his address?”
Georg wrote it down. He went to Queens, but didn’t get very far. Mr. Townsend said he wouldn’t tell him anything. No, he wouldn’t let him in. No, he didn’t care how important it was. No, he wouldn’t talk to him, even if he paid him. Mr. Townsend kept the chain on the door.
Georg called home to Germany, the call costing him more money than he had. But in the end his parents and some friends promised to wire him seven thousand marks.
Then he called Helen. “Can we meet this evening? I have a problem I can’t solve. I’d like to discuss it with you.” It was a difficult call for him to make.
“All right,” she replied hesitantly.
30
THEY MET AGAIN AT PERTUTTI and waited for a table.
“What did you do today?” he asked.
“I spent the day writing.”
“What were you writing?”
“My thesis.”
“What part are you working on right now?”
“The Brothers Grimm had various versions of their fairy tales, and … oh, let’s forget about that. You’re not really interested, and I’m not either right now. If you aren’t ready to start on what you wanted to talk to me about, then don’t say anything. That seems to be your specialty.”
They remained silent until they were seated at the table, had ordered, and had a bottle of wine in front of them.
“It’s about that girl from France, the one I told you about.”
“The one you’re looking for? You want me to help you find her?”
He rolled the wineglass back and forth between his palms.
“That’s what it is, isn’t it,” she continued. “You sleep with me, but she’s the one you want to be with. And now you’re asking me to help you get back together with her? Don’t you think that’s a bit twisted?”
“I’m sorry if I hurt you, Helen. I didn’t mean to. The night we spent together was wonderful, and I wasn’t thinking about Françoise. You asked if I still love her. I really don’t know. But I must find her. I need to know what it was between her and me—whether it was all in my imagination. I don’t trust anyone or anything anymore, especially not myself and my feelings. I … it’s as if everything is blocked and grinding to a halt.”
“What is it you imagined?”
; “That everything between her and me was perfect. Like with no other woman.”
Helen looked at him sadly.
“I can’t tell you the whole tangled story,” he went on. “I think you’ll see why when I tell you what I can tell you. If you’d rather I didn’t”—he looked up and saw that the waitress had brought their food—“then we can just have our spaghetti.” He sprinkled some cheese on his dish. “You told me last night that I need to figure out what I want. I don’t just want to find her—I want to put my life back on track. I want to be able to connect with people again, to talk about myself, listen to people, ask for advice when I’m stuck, and even for help. I don’t think you took what I said before seriously, but it is true, I have lost my social skills. I think I’ll go crazy if I go on like this.” He laughed. “I know I can’t expect people to welcome me back with open arms, but I also know I can’t go off and feel sorry for myself if they don’t.” He wound the spaghetti around his fork. “You know, I probably should be happy I could even ask you.”
“And what is the question you would be happy to ask if you could ask?”
“Ah, you’ve happened upon one of those linguistic issues.”
“No, it’s a logical one. And I didn’t happen upon it—I crafted it. But do go on.”
He pushed his full plate to the side. “I don’t even know what her name is. In France she called herself Françoise Kramsky, but I’m certain that’s not her name. The French and Polish background reflected in that name might be real, but then again it might just have been part of the role she was playing. She was passing herself off as a Polish woman who has to work for the Polish or Russian secret service because her parents and brother back in Poland are in danger. For all I know this may or may not be the case. Either way, she used to live in New York, and I think she’s still living here. After yesterday, I believe this more than ever.”