Canarino

‘I think you better get off this damn sofa, for starters.’ And suddenly he picked the dog up and dumped it on the floor so that it fell on its side. It sprang up and tottered out of the room.

‘There has to be someone here for the dog—one of her Filipinas. She must have told me.’ David ran unyielding fingers through his hair again, as he made for the stairs following the dog.

There were lights on in the kitchen and he could hear noises before he even got to the bottom of the basement stairs—water running, cabinet doors opening and shutting, then the roar of the garbage disposal.

I was never alone for a second, he thought. Elizabeth has it all organized. He felt a little irritated, a little disappointed. But he didn’t feel surprised.

‘Yes, Mr Judd, good evening, sir.’

She said it with a shy smile, stiffly. David was pretty certain that her name was Francine, but he wasn’t willing to risk it. She already seemed embarrassed, being there in the house with him all alone. He just nodded at her, trying not to notice. But he thought maybe she was a nice woman; she’d been around a longish time; she was, he thought, Elizabeth’s favorite. She had children of her own. Elizabeth was always saying she felt guilty taking a mother away from her family. That’s why there were three different Filipinas, more even; David didn’t know. They all wore the same blue-and-white-striped uniform which didn’t help him with telling them apart.

‘I have some cold drink for you, sir, if you would like a beer. I can open it for you, and I can serve it in your study before your dinner.’

David blinked at her, trying not to look startled. ‘Fine. In my study. What’s the dinner?’

‘Just simple chicken, grilled plain, and some salad, sir. Maybe you like a little rice?’

‘A little.’

David turned around and went back up the stairs. Usually when he arrived home, the children’s supper was long over; there might be something left out that he could pick at if he was hungry. He poured his own beer if he was having one. More often than not, he ate out, either with clients in London or in some foreign city. He hadn’t lifted a finger to cook or clean for years, but he was taken aback by the sudden attentions of a personal servant. How would he stand the scheduling? The scrutiny? The need to be polite? What was Elizabeth thinking?

His study was another surprise. The movers had packed absolutely everything. There was not a photograph, not a book, not a paperweight in sight. Even his desk was gone. The telephone and the fax machine were sitting on the floor beside a small pink-and-green-flowered armchair that David thought might have come from a spare bedroom upstairs. The chair looked absurdly feminine in the walnut-paneled room. His computer, with the screen and the keyboard, had been transferred onto a rickety-looking work station that he’d never seen before; did it belong to the children? Had Elizabeth bought it especially? Such a cheap sort of thing? There were faint black outlines on the beige wall-to-wall carpet where his desk and his files and his various chairs had once stood, a few more on the walls where his maps of London and New York and his New Yorker cartoons had hung. He opened the paneled supply-cupboard door; it was nearly empty—just two reams of copier paper, some stationery, a few pencils. He ran a finger over a shelf in the bookcase. Already dusted. David thought he could still smell cigars, sour and fragrant. Unpackable, he said to himself, the vile, rancid cloud.

Francine came to the door with his beer, in an enormous misty mug, on a tray. David smiled broadly, practically guffawed. A chilled beer mug? He didn’t conceal his pleasure.

‘That’s great, Francine.’ He took a long pull at the inch-high foam and smacked his lips.

‘It’s up to me, the glasses, now the house manager is off. In Peter Jones, I wasn’t sure, but maybe this one is nice for a bachelor—for just a few weeks, I mean. And I have others if you prefer it?’

David ignored the anxiety in her voice. ‘What about the dog, Francine? Did my wife tell you what her plans are for Puck?’

David thought Francine looked a little nervous, but right away she said boldly, ‘Don’t worry about the dog, sir. He’s my responsibility. It’s no problem with me at all. I walk him plenty and the walking is good for us both.’

She was still gripping the tray with both hands, then she released one hand, letting the tray hang at her side for a moment before lifting it again and offering it to David.

‘Do you need this, for your drink, sir?’

David looked at Francine silently and took the tray, placing it behind him on the empty bookcase. He took another sip of his beer, shifting his feet on the carpet, broadening his stance.

Francine was definitely pretty, David thought. Her brown eyes had a soft look at the edges, gentle, lively. And actually, the uniform was appealing; it gave her that aura of sweetness and willingness that nurses sometimes have. Not an aura he felt inclined to disturb, just one he enjoyed. Women go for soldiers, why can’t men go for nurses? David mused. He could see that Francine had on some sort of thick slip underneath her uniform, displaying more modesty than most of the young English nurses he’d seen in their uniforms which were generally notably transparent.

David liked to size people up precisely; now that he’d noticed Francine, he was curious as to exactly who she was. He concluded that the slip was a mark of her conservative background and her status as a mother; it commanded his respect. Maybe that was just what Francine had intended it to do, he thought.

‘How does Puck get to Virginia, Francine?’

‘Mrs Judd has made arrangements, sir. For the end of the summer.’ Francine glanced behind her, as if she wanted to leave. Then she smiled at David.

‘I think Mrs Judd wants to settle the children first. Excuse me, sir, but the water is maybe boiling now. I’ll lay your place in the dining-room?’

David grunted, and she was gone. It made sense, settling the children, he decided. But if the damned dog could stay, why the hell couldn’t he have his desk and his files? Was there a TV in the house? Had she taken the bed?

He took off his jacket and laid it over the computer screen, then picked up his beer again and collapsed into the little pink-and-green chair. It was a snug fit. He slopped beer over his lap as both elbows struck hard against the arms of the chair.

‘Well this sucks!’

He craned forward, laughing, fishing about with his tie to see if it was wet. He could feel the beer running between his thighs. Francine, he thought, you’re going back to Peter Jones tomorrow to buy me a real chair. He pictured a huge leather recliner on sale; Elizabeth would be horrified, but he couldn’t stop the thought. She’d never know anyway. Maybe Francine would like to take the chair home in August when he left. She deserved some booty if she was going to be unemployed.

As he stood up to shake the wet off his trouser legs, the telephone rang. He ignored it. It went on ringing and he patted his hips and his chest, where his jacket pockets might have been, thinking about his cell phone. Anybody who seriously wanted to reach him called him on his cell phone. He looked at his jacket hanging over the computer screen and thought, I left the phone downstairs in my bag. Still, he picked the jacket up, felt the weight of it, shook it a little, batted at the pockets. Then suddenly he reached for the phone on the floor, thinking, Maybe it’s Elizabeth. They must have arrived.

His voice was just a flat bark. ‘Yup?’

‘Is that David?’ It was a man.

Nailed by the office; guess I’m a sucker. ‘Yup, it’s David. What is it?’

‘Do you mean who is it?’

‘Oh, Christ.’ But David’s blood was already rising; he was always ready to spar. He knew the voice, a big, deep American voice. Teasing, basically friendly. Who the hell was it?

‘David! It’s Leon!’

‘Jesus! Leon? How’d you find me here?’

‘It’s just your house, isn’t it? This number?’

‘Yeah—barely! I’m about to sell the house and move home!’

‘Home?’

‘Well—Virginia.’

‘Virginia?’

‘Jesus, Leon, where the hell are you? Are you in London?’

‘Of course I’m in London. I live here. I’ve lived here for nearly a year!’

‘You’re joking! What are you doing?’

‘Calling you.’

‘Asshole! Come over and have a beer with me. I’m all alone in Belgravia. Ditched by Elizabeth and the kids till the end of the summer. A quivering wreck!’

‘I’m there. I’m staring at your address. Give me twenty minutes.’

How could Leon spend a whole year in London and not call until tonight? It was unbelievable.

In college, David had seen Leon every day, twice a day, all day long and half the night. And afterwards, those strident, crazy years starting out in New York. Twenty-five-hour days at the office, it had seemed like. The towering, gut-boiling canyons of steel and glass. The sweaty shock of competing full-out with everyone in the whole world all the time; bosses and colleagues who didn’t necessarily want you to win and who didn’t necessarily even look upon you as a team-mate; results that made the real newspapers. We went into that life full-bore, David thought, busting for action action action. Everything so fast-forward that pretty soon nothing else would do. Speed-addicting days, with the occasional split second of wrung-out leisure in that airless walk-up on East 12th Street, drifts of dirty clothes on the floor, tin-foil-and-white-paper packaging from the Chinese carry-out erupting from the kitchen trash can. David could just about smell sesame noodles, pizza, stale beer. He thought of their slapstick antics trying to clean the place up and make it seem like a real apartment when one of them wanted to bring a girl back.