Ira Levin (17 page)

    He headed for the corner beyond the elevators.

    She went into the drugstore. French schoolgirls jabbered over the magazine rack, the perfume and costume- jewelry displays.

    She picked up toothpaste and a flashlight, charged them to the suite, then went to the back and spoke to the smiling pharmacist. He withdrew from the counter.

    Rosemary scanned the store with her shades, took them off, smiled at the clerk smiling at her. The clerk screwed a finger in her ear, wincing, as the schoolgirls hurried out the door.

    The pharmacist came back, reached over the counter. "Midnight Mass?"

    "You guessed it, Also. Thank you. Merry Christmas." "A half will keep you wide awake for three or four hours. Merry Christmas, Rosemary." less-than s@lz greater-than andri335andJ

    U T Ti, Rosemary. Joe. Give me a call when you get

    JL JL-IN, will you? I've got a problem."

    The problem, he told her when she called him, involved Mary Elizabeth, his twenty-three-year-old daughter, who had just come out as a lesbian and moved in with her lover, a woman in her forties. "Ronnie got a sudden impulse and invited them for dinner, she's big on Christmas spirit, and they're coming. The trains are getting through, and I'm afraid if I don't go, Mary Elizabeth is liable to think I'm shutting the-was

    "Oh go, Joe!" she said. "Do, don't worry! I'm glad you're all sitting down together."

    "And I want to meet her. I mean, if she's living with her, I at least want to get some kind of-was

    "Joe, I'll tell you the truth," Rosemary said, "I'd just as soon go by myself. Honestly. I haven't been to church in a long time, even before the coma, and maybe it'll be better for me if it's more-private. Don't worry, go. You should, I want you to."

    "Thanks, Rosie. Go in by the entrance on Fifty-first near Madison. Someone'll be there with a list, just give my name. What time tomorrow?"

    "Around eleven," she said.

    "See you then. Thanks again." She was doubly thankful too, because they all were sitting down together and because caret he really did want to be alone. Garboing on the inside too.

    She hadn't thought of going to Mass till Tuesday night, after she had decided where she'd be going later Christmas Eve. The cathedral would be packed, even though extra Masses had been scheduled this Christmas of 1999, and she didn't like the idea of wearing shades in church, so she had asked Joe if he could arrange for special seating. She had invited him because she'd had to; she sensed that he had accepted likewise. He was no more devout than she, both with their divorces.

    And she'd have had to ditch him later anywayanother letdown for him.

    Poor Joe. Poor both of them. He'd checked out fine and had seen as little reason for postponing things as she did, but every time they had planned a proper night or weekend together, something had come up to get in the way. First the Dublin power failure, then the fire in the inn outside Belfast, then his pinched spinal nerve, and then the blizzard. It was almost as if, somewhere in the universe, a malevolent spiritual power had made it his sole goal to oppose their getting into the sack together before New Year's Eve. t caret zandrfiandfandAj

    She called her brothers and sister. Gave out the last of the staff Christmas gifts.

    Her gifts for the GC inner circle, possibly Andy's coven-innocent until proven guilty-would wait till tomorrow or never, depending.

    Judy's scarf in its Hermes wrap-she wasn't sure what she'd do with that. Wear it herself probably. An Indian design. Ha.

    She ate the other half of the pastrami sandwich sitting at the window, thinking how she would put things, marshaling her thoughts so she wouldn't waste His time, assuming… It was, after all, one of His busier nights.

    Hutch's bones must have been rolling over in the "worm cafeteria," as he called it.

    Judy/alice would have been annoyed too, for sure, though she probably would have accepted it as a kind of "centering" thing.

    When you have proof positive, gained in a hard way, of Satan's reality-you tend to regain your belief in God's. Of course He may no longer believe in you, may even get edgy if you set foot in His house or dare to take His Holy Communion, so you maintain a respectful distance…

    Until it seems really necessary to clarify things.

    She left the Tower at seven, fully Garboed. The doorman said there were taxis around but she had allowed plenty of time, the night was clear, and she was from Nebraska; she walked.

    The same route she had walked with Andy-on shoveled sidewalks now, by ranges of snow mountains pocked here and there with glints of entombed chrome.

    Santas in phony beards rang their bells over their kettles-going right up there with Chanel No. 5 and Stage Deli's pastrami sandwiches qn Fresh Eyes' list of Unchanged Good Things, an idea for the fourth or fifth program, or maybe a weekly feature.

    She passed the entrance to Rockefeller Plaza with just a glance at the cone of night-bright lights-not too bad- and went on to Fifth Avenue, where snow mountains had been banished and traffic, what-little there was, diverted. St. Patrick's Cathedral stood on the other side of the avenue in all its Gothic majesty, every detail of its tri-arched front and twin spires lavished with white frosting, brilliantly floodlighted, never more splendid.

    Another big plus for 1999 New York-night lighting of landmark buildings.

    She was more than an hour early. The line, behind blue police barriers, snaked around into Fiftieth Street but wasn't long enough yet to fill the pews. Travel conditions were probably keeping away a lot of people from Long Island, We/chester, all the suburbs.

    The idea of house seats for serious prayer hadn't sat well with her from the beginning, and when she crossed the avenue and got a good look at some of the people in the line-bikers in studded leather, a girl with purple hair, for pete's sake-she decided to go in with the commoners,- the Garbo gear wouldn't raise an eyebrow, certainly not His.

    The elderly couple in front of her-they'd made it in from We/chester-smiled at her and faced forward.

    The blizzard didn't start up again when she passed through the portal and vestibule; nor did lightning strike when she knelt and crossed herself. She found more than enough space in a back pew on the right, slipped in and sat.

    She took a deep breath, and loosed her coat's belt and buttons. Sank back in the creaking pew, savoring the organ's cascading harmonies, marveling at the beauty and vastness of the vaulted space before her-the ranks of soaring stone pillars and arches, each pillar hung with a red-ribboned wreath, each outer arch framing stained glass that gleamed jewel-bright in the light from outside. Flats of orange candle flames flickered at the rows of side altars in their alcoves; the gold-and-white high altar and sanctuary far ahead stood empty, waiting, spotlighted, banked with masses of red poinsettias.

    Throat clearing. A woman waited by the pew-stout and white-haired in a pink hat and suit, i caret andy and i V rosemary side by side on a shoulder. Rosemary smiled at her and slid farther toward the man on her right. The woman hesitated, smiled, squeezed herself down in. The pew creaked. "They all creak," she whispered.

    "I know," Rosemary whispered.

    "Merry Christmas," the woman whispered.

    "Merry Christmas," Rosemary whispered.

    They faced front.

    The woman shifted. Folded her coat on her knees, shifted. Fussed with her handbag. Shifted. Poor dear comes to Mass and finds herself next to this weirdo in space goggles. Too embarrassed or polite to get up and look for another seat, if there is one.

    Rosemary leaned toward her, tapped the stem of the shades. "Eye surgery," she whispered.

    "Ah!" the woman whispered, nodding. "I see, I see, I was wond'rin'. What was it, dear? I'm a nurse at Saint Clare's.8I

    Rosemary whispered. "A detached retina."

    "Ahh," the nurse whispered, nodding. Patted Rosemary's hand.

    They smiled at each other, faced front.

    Lying in church. To an Irish nurse. Off to a great start.

    She straightened her back.

    Tried to get her head straight too.

    The organ poured descending scales in all its voices. Almost everyone now knelt praying-the old man on her right, and the nurse too, murmuring, her broad back bent. What a lot of voices rising upward!

    Rosemary eased her knees down onto the padded red leather kneeler, tucked her booted feet back under, folded her hands on the oak rim of the pew before her, lowered her head.

    Sneaked the shades off and into a pocket, folded her hands again, closed her eyes, let breath out. She'd forgotten the comfort of the position. Breathed again… Father, forgive me for I have sinned. As well You know. But I'm here about Andy, and about what's going on. Thank You for allowing me in. I know this is presumptuous, I guess it's from everyone talking about my miraculous awakening and my miraculous recovery so much, but I've begun to think the last few days that maybe You had a hand in Stan Shand dying when he did, so I would wake up and do something You want to be done. The problem is, I'm not sure what it is, and I'm afraid it may involve hurting Andy, maybe severely.

    The pew she leaned on trembled, creaked. She waited, head bowed, while the people there reordered themselves. I'm trying to take things a step at a time. If I find what I'm afraid I'll find tonight, Andy conducting a Black Mass, please help me take the next right step. Some kind of sign would be greatly appreciated. Is desperately needed, in fact. All I presume to ask in return is that You remember that Andy is half human-more than half, I hope-and that if things turn out badly for him, I pray You'll show him at least half of Your usual mercy. That'sLike a steel wheel thrown through the cathedral, a scream sheared up to the vaulted ceiling, banged off into the transepts, rang back doubled into the nave, another scream shearing after it, scream after steel-wheel scream banging, ringing, shearing away echoes. Heads up, eyes up, in every pew of the cross-shaped church-nave, apse, transepts-lips bitten, rosaries kissed, hands sketching crosses.

    The nurse shoved her coat and bag down between them, grabbed the pew in front, hoisted herself, squeezed out, hurried down the aisle. A few pews ahead a standing man sidled-"I'm a doctor, excuse me."

    Small screams shimmered away. Silence spread, stuffed the cathedral to its walls and windows.

    Sobbing down front where the nurse and others flocked. A priest hurrying out from behind the altar.

    The organ poured music; everyone breathed. Prayed, whispered.

    Rosemary sat straight and still, her fist at her chest where her cross had ended. caret IRA IeaE VIN Clear enough sign, Fresh Eyes! She swallowed, drew breath.

    Gathering her coat around her, she pushed the nurse's things into the corner,- got out of the pew and headed for the vestibule, belting the coat, putting on the shades, tugging down the hat as she hurried through.

    "That was Rosemary! I swear it was!"

    "Go on. Dressed like that? Leaving now? Alone? Yeah, sure, it was Rosemary."

    Sheer coincidence, she told herself, walking along with her head down and her hands in her pockets, on the clear-swept sidewalks of Central Park South. Coincidences happen, even in St. Patrick's on Christmas Eve. Stupid of her to take some poor soul's seizure as a sign to her from Him. Not just stupid, arrogant-casting herself as God's agent on Earth. And thinking for even an instant that, out of the hundreds of millions of prayers rising up to Him that night, He had zeroed in on hers for His immediate attention and splashy reply.

    She passed hotels and apartment houses, people leaving, people arriving, Christmas gifts and Christmas grins. She walked from the heated downdraft of a broad marquee to Sixth Avenue's cold crosswind.

    The Tower, nearing, shone as in daylight, the city's nightglow magnified by the snow in the park and streets. She had hoped to spot a telltale lighted window on one of GC'S floors, had left a marker in her bedroom window-a blue kerchief pinned taut between the draperies, a shadeless lamp behind it-to locate the floors above. She couldn't even spot the blue window in the shiny gold-mirror facade.

    When she had crossed Central Park South at Columbus Circle, she stepped to the side of the trodden snow path and looked all the way up, lowering her shades. The skyscraper, towering over her, kept its shades in place; there was no seeing in its face of luminous sky which of its windows were light or dark-or blue or purple.

    She went on around the Circle and over toward the cut through the snowbank across from the marquee. t caret so caret Jr caret So caret tesUs

    She changed into black slacks, a green blouse, black sweater, black flats. Wrestled the slim black flashlight out of its plastic-shelled card, fed the batteries into it, capped it, checked the on-off twist of its head. Bright light, neat design. Good New Thing.

    She put it into her left-hand pocket, her card in the right.

    She wouldn't need anything else. She'd only be up there a minute or two; they would either be there, getting ready for their blasphemous whatever-thehell-they- did, or the floor would be dark. It wasn't as if she were planning to hang around and watch.