The House That Jack Built (3 page)

    'Is that all that anybody goin' to bid?' the youth asked, in mock astonishment. 'Why, twenty dollars, that's nothin' for a full-growed fully-functional ball.'

    'Thirty,' said Craig. This was the most chilling kind of torture, because he didn't know whether they wanted him to win or lose - or what would happen if he did either. If he won, he was terrified that they would cut off his testicle and give it to him. If he lost - well, God alone knew what they would do. He even began to think about the Bobbitt case, in which a vengeful Laurene Bobbitt had cut off her husband's penis and thrown it out of her car window. He tried to remind himself to look closely where these two tossed his genitals, if they castrated him, so that he could recover them quickly; and he also had to think of places where he could find some ice, so that he could keep them in good condition while he called for an ambulance.

    He thought he remembered seeing a bar across the street. A bar would have ice. Then he thought: what am I thinking? This is a nightmare.

    'Thirty-five,' the other youth bid.

    'A hundred,' Craig countered, in a much higher voice than he had meant to.

    'Hundert-and-twenny five.'

    'Two hundred.'

    'Five hundert.'

    'A million.'

    A pause. Then, 'A million! Come on, pal, nobody's ball worth a million.'

    'Mine is, to me.'

    The youth in the frock coat came up very close to him, and said, 'You serious?'

    'Sure I'm serious. You let me go, you can have a million dollars, in cash, no questions asked.'

    'Well, hey… now you talkin'.'

    'I mean it. A million, in cash, in used currency, no marked or sequential bills. Delivered anyplace you like, any time you like.'

    'I think you serious, pal. I genuinely think you serious.'

    'I am serious, for Christ's sake. Just tell me where you want the money, and when. Or else I can give you my phone number, and we can arrange it later.'

    'A million,' breathed the youth, and ostentatiously licked his lips. 'What you think about that, bruthah? You think you can bid more than a million?'

    'No way, man. I'm out.'

    'Okay then. For one million dollars, this valuable ball…one of a fine pair… going... going...' Craig lifted his eyes in relief. For the first time since the two youths had jumped on him, he clearly heard the sound of the traffic and the storm outside. On the ceiling, he saw the shadowy ripples of rainwater coursing down the drugstore window, and the flickering long-legged images of passers-by.

    Then the youth in the frock coat lifted his hammer like an auctioneer's gavel, hesitated for a moment, and smashed it down onto Craig's right testicle. The flesh was flattened, almost as thin as a veal patty, and the hammerhead punched a semi-circular hole right through the skin of his scrotum.

    Craig was too shocked even to scream. The youth who was holding him stepped smartly back, both hands whipped up high, so that Craig twisted around and dropped to the floor on his knees, convulsing like an electrocuted ox.

    He had never experienced such agony in his life. He felt as if somebody were directing an oxy-acetylene cutting-torch right between his legs. All he could see was wave after wave of dazzling scarlet, and all he could hear was a grinding, churning noise; which was his blood churning in his ears.

    He didn't even hear the youth in the frock coat when he leaned very close to his ear and said, 'You must take me for some kind of fool, pal. Once I let you loose, you were still goin' to pay me one million dollars - one million dollars - for somethin' that was safely tucked up in your shorts? You the fool, pal, not me.'

    The other youth whooped and cackled; and then the two of them stepped out of the drugstore doorway and into the rain. They didn't hurry. They didn't have to. They knew that Craig wouldn't be following them, and that they had plenty of time before he called the police.

    On the corner of Eighth Avenue, the girl with the curly hair and the puffy white face stepped out of a rubbish-filled doorway, and linked arms with the youth in the frock coat, and the three of them pranced through the storm as if it couldn't touch them, as if nothing could.

    

    

    Effie said, 'The car's outside.'

    Craig continued to stare out of the window. Below him, East 86th Street was striped with sunlight. He was watching two small schoolchildren trying to cross the street, even though there was scarcely any traffic. A bossy elder sister and a little boy, just like him and his sister Rosie used to be, except that these children were obviously wealthy, from the Sutton Place School. Every time the street was clear, the elder sister insisted that they wait at the kerb. Whenever an automobile was approaching, she ventured out, and then they had to scuttle back to the kerb again.

    Craig wondered if they would ever make it; or whether they would still be here in twenty years' time, trying to cross the street, while their mother grew old and their supper turned to dust.

    Effie came up to him and laid a hand on his shoulder. Very carefully, because he was still hypersensitive to sudden touches. He still jolted violently during the night, dreaming about that hammer. He still sat up sweating and gasping and trying to say something which nobody could have articulated.

    
If only I hadn't said it. If I could cut out my tongue.
'Listen, I don't need some fucking Egyptian to tell me the way around my own city, right?'

    Effie said, 'Come on, Craig, it's time to go. I want to get to Cold Spring by eight.'

    He turned, and awkwardly held her wrist, and nodded. 'Okay, whatever. I was watching those kids, that's all.'

    Effie nearly blurted out, 'You can have kids. You can have kids like any other man.' But she had learned not to raise the subject of potency. It still led to red storms of uncontrollable rage, and endless screaming matches, and then terrible quaking aftershocks of deep remorse, which were worse, in a way, than the arguments. It had been three months now since Craig had been attacked, and she was tired of his tears.

    He had always been so steel-sprung, so positive. Sometimes too positive. But too positive was infinitely preferable to this complete collapse. It was like trying to drag around a shuffling, forgetful parent.

    Effie's best friend Shura Janowska had lost her right breast to cancer; and yet Shura was brave and funny and never believed that she was any less of a woman. Why did Craig seem to think that he wasn't a man any longer?

    Craig picked up his walking-cane and limped after Effie to the door. Jones the porter was waiting outside, ready to lock up for them. Craig took a look around the quiet, high-cellinged apartment. The afternoon sun filled it with buttery light. His huge success at international corporate law had enabled him to furnish it with colonial antiques, gilded mirrors, and elaborate cream-and-yellow curtains. Over the fireplace hung an abstract painting by Max Weber - over three-quarters-of-a-million-dollars' worth of vibrant blues and singing crimsons. The whole four-bed-roomed apartment looked as if it had been furnished for a spread in
Architectural Digest
, but Craig took no joy in it any longer. He had a premonition that he would never see it again, and he wasn't at all sure that he would be happier if he didn't.

    On one of the sofas, an embroidery cushion was propped, with the handstitched inscription,
'I Fought The Law & The Law Lost'
.

    The door closed behind them. 'How long are you planning to stay upstate, Mrs. Bellman?' asked Jones. He was a black man, uniformed, smooth, very smooth. Even when he was carrying their suitcases he walked with a supernatural glide.

    Effie glanced around to make sure that Craig was following. 'We're just going to play it by ear. We're visiting my sister in Albany, and then we may spend some time up at Glens Falls.'

    'Planning on fishing, Mr. Bellman?' asked Jones. 'They say you can't beat Oscawana Lake trout.'

    Craig said, 'Fishing? No. Well, I don't know - I might. It depends if we get that far. Going upstate isn't exactly my idea of time profitably spent.'

    Effie linked arms with him, and smiled, although her smile was strained. 'Any time spent getting your head straight has got to be profitably spent.'

    Craig twisted his arm away. 'I see. Now my head's not straight. Tell me some part of my anatomy which is.'

    Jones looked embarrassed, and remained silent with his gloved hands clasped in front of him as they descended in the elevator to the lobby. He and Effie watched each other in the elevator's mirrored walls, but neither of them gave anything away. Jones was the perfect porter. It wasn't his place to express opinions about any of The Sutton's residents, even when that resident had turned so suddenly irascible.

    Effie thought she looked pale. She was a small, dark brunette, with an oval face that one of her two previous lovers had always compared to paintings by Bernini - slightly medieval, with a thin, straight nose and very full lips, like angel's bows, and eyes the colour of Stradivarius violins, hazel, amber and the thinnest of honeys, one transparent layer of varnish painted on another, until they shone.

    She wore a plain linen suit in periwinkle blue, which was smart, but a little too city-smart for a drive to the country. She had chosen it because it made her feel calm and controlled, and today she needed calm and control in spades. It also made her feel comfortable. She always believed that she was too large-breasted for her height, but the way this suit was cut made her feel slim. She could date her feelings about her figure right back to the day that Craig had said to her, 'You know something? You remind me of Elizabeth Taylor.' And Effie had never been able to tell him that she hated Elizabeth Taylor, or at least the way that Elizabeth Taylor looked.

    Control, that was what she needed. Calm, and control.

    Only the purplish circles under her eyes betrayed how stressed Craig's accident had made her.

    He insisted on calling it an 'accident', instead of a mugging, and Effie could understand why. It was far too disturbing for him to think that, every year of his life, his destiny had been taking him step by step to the darkened entrance of K-Plus Drugs. How could he have been born and raised with all that love and dedication for no other purpose than to walk into that doorway and come face-to-face with that terrible youth with the hammer and the black frock coat? His parents hadn't sent him to law school for that, had they? Surely he hadn't argued and struggled and battled his way to the top of his profession to have his manhood pulverised by some freak in a derelict building.

    He refused to believe that it was meant to be, because if it was meant to be, God must have marked his card. Surely God couldn't be that sick. Why had God allowed him to be so successful, if only to show him how vulnerable he was? That was why he called it an accident. Accidents are nothing more than bad luck - the cards don't come up, the dice go cold. Destiny is something else altogether. Destiny is something terrifying that's waiting for you round the next corner, except that you don't know it.

    Jones said, as he stowed their bags into the trunk of Effie's scarlet BMW, 'You take good care now, Mrs. Bellman. You know what my granma used to do, before she took a trip anyplace?' He flicked his right shoulder with his hand. 'That's to brush off the devil, so he don't ride along with you, whispering no evil nonsense in you' ear.'

    'Evil nonsense?' said Craig, raising one eyebrow.

    'You never know, Mr. Bellman. The devil's full of tricks, and he's got breath like chimney smoke. Choke you before you know it.'

    'Thanks for the tip,' Craig told him. He climbed into the car and slammed the door.

    'And thank you for the tip,' said Jones, under his breath, as the Bellmans drove away.

    They drove north on the Henry Hudson Parkway, playing Madam Butterfly on the CD. Effie had been brought up in a house filled with opera, and in the seven years they had been married she had gradually converted Craig to a liking for Verdi and Puccini, although he wouldn't listen to Wagner. 'Warbling tubs of lard in tinplate Wonderbras,' was how he described
The Ring
.

    'I really don't need this,' said Craig, as they crossed the Harlem River into the Bronx. Directly in front of them, a huge grimy truck was toiling along, its rear doors decorated with a grinning Joker. Lucky Times, Inc. But no indication of what Lucky Times, Inc., might be selling.

    Effie said, 'You need to take some time away from work, darling, that's all. You had a bad experience, you must give yourself time to recover, to think it all through.'

    'Think it all through? I've been thinking it all through ever since it happened, every hour on the hour. For Christ's sake, Effie, it's been almost impossible to think about anything else.'

    'Craig, it's over. It's really over. There's no point in torturing yourself. You were fantastically brave.'

    'Fantastically stupid, more like. Why didn't I just tell that girl to take a hike?'

    'Because you're you; and because you care about people.'

    'I didn't go into that drugstore because I cared about people. I went into that drugstore because I was pissed with the weather, and I was pissed with goddamned taxi drivers who don't know where the hell they're going, and I was pissed with Hakayawa for making me feel like a clumsy hamfisted Occidental who couldn't even arrive for a goddamned dinner on time.'

    They passed a sheer wall of tawny-grey concrete, and then they were out in the sunlight again. Butterfly was singing
Un bel vedremo
. Effie said, 'You know what Dr. Samstag told you. You have to think about yourself differently. You have to revise your whole view of yourself. What happened in that drugstore, that made you question your manhood, your sense of being in charge, everything. They could have killed you. They could have done anything to you, and there wasn't a damned thing that you could have done about it.'