Things as They Are (21 page)

He stood on the sidewalk looking up at the tenth floor, vacillating. Walk away, he said to himself. It’s still not too late.

When she opened the door to him, Reg warily studied her demeanour and sniffed the air. Immediately he brightened.
His instincts told him everything was copacetic here. Brightening up did Reg a world of good in more ways than one. When he was cheerful, residues of the old good looks and charm surfaced, like flotsam from a shipwreck. His old feeling of confidence and control returned as he calmly spread his props out on the coffee table, a receipt he had typed up the night before on his Olivetti portable and a zip-lock plastic sandwich bag labelled “Evidence.” The receipt was a useful delaying tactic with the Alzheimer Annies. Give them an official-looking piece of paper and the hens would sit quiet on the roost long enough for the fox to clear out of the hen house. Depositing the money in a plastic bag and sealing it before their very eyes also lent the whole exchange a bureaucratic air which they found reassuring.

Once Mrs. Cora Rook produced the cash, Reg went through the drill, carefully counting the money, recording the amount in the blank space on the paper with the forged signature of somebody called J.J. Tolman (Reg’s old high-school principal) and presenting her with the receipt. Then he put the evidence in the “Evidence” bag, sealed it, wrote “$1,000.00 (One Thousand Dollars)” on the label, and explained that now the money would not be removed from the bag for
any reason whatsoever
until the trial date. It was in government safe keeping.

Mrs. Cora Rook could hardly wait for him to finish his explanation so she could suggest they have a small drink to celebrate the conclusion of their mission. Which she did. Reg agreed there was no harm in one drink. The way things had shaken down he was feeling pretty pleased with himself. What did it hurt to have a snort with a lonely old girl? Besides, some of the effects of his earlier brush with the heebie-jeebies still lingered. A drink might be exactly what the doctor ordered.

Mrs. Cora Rook produced a bottle of single malt, the Glendronach she ordered by the case, and splashed it generously around in a pair of tumblers. Reg leaned back, stretched out his legs, sipped and savoured. Very good whisky. He patted
the chesterfield on which he sat. Very good furniture. Now that he was relaxing after a job well done and taking in his surroundings, he realized the old dame had changed her outfit sometime between leaving the bank and greeting him at the door. She wore mules and apricot satin lounging pyjamas with a gold brooch shaped like a pretzel pinned to them. The salt on the pretzel was diamond chips.

Mrs. Cora Rook positioned herself on a chair in front of the picture window, insuring that she was back-lit and her profile was turned to her guest. At seventy she was elegantly emaciated in the style of the Duchess of Windsor and Isak Dinesen in their old age, women who expected clothes and men to hang well on them.

She took several brisk, bird-like nips at her whisky. She knew that it was a lady’s duty to be entertaining but she wasn’t sure what a bank inspector would find amusing. So she decided to conduct the conversation along customary lines. She asked Reg what his last name was.

Reg said that he was not allowed to divulge that for security reasons – it was a rule with bank inspectors.

“In that case,” she said, “you’ll have to stop calling me Mrs. Rook and call me Cora. First names both. It’s only fair.” And much nicer too, she thought. Reg had the same pleasant feel on her tongue as Len had. The names were remarkably similar. Three letters each. Reg, Len. Len, Reg. She leaned across the coffee table and clutched the whisky bottle in her be-ringed fingers. “Let me top that up for you, Reg,” she said.

“Only if you’ll join me, Cora,” said Reg. You only live once, he reminded himself, this was thirty-five-dollar-a-bottle whisky. “It’d be criminal to refuse,” he said, barking laughter.

Cora laughed too, although the joke didn’t mean to her what it did to him.

By four o’clock in the afternoon Cora was finding it uncomfortably warm being back-lit by the blazing July sun. She rose
and, drink in hand, swayed to the air-conditioner, turned it on full blast, and swayed back to her chair to resume the conversation where she had left it suspended in mid-sentence.

“– and I’ll tell you another secret, Reg, no fooling, you remind me of my deceased husband–”

“Leonard Darwin Rook,” interjected Reg. Yesterday he had thoroughly cross-examined her on her family situation. Now he dug up the name more or less to prove to himself that he wasn’t drunk yet. Far from it. Miles off.

Cora wobbled with whisky and astonishment. In a voice that had slurred and deepened with cigarettes and scotch over the course of the afternoon, she declared that, “You, Reg, have an
amazing
memory.”

She wasn’t going to get an argument out of Reg. “In my line of work – you have to. If you don’t – one slip and its game over.”

“Figures,” said Cora.

“What?” Len was having some difficulty concentrating. He put it down to all that hot sun shining in his eyes.

“Figures,” repeated his hostess. With her index finger she wrote several numerals in the air - 3, 8, 10. “In your line of work you have to be able to remember figures.”

“Of course,” said Reg, finally catching what she was getting at. He raised his drink aloft. “This is my sixth glass if I don’t stand corrected.” He pointed his finger at her. “And I don’t, do I?”

“Who’s counting,” said Cora. “Not little old me. I have a terrible memory for numbers.” She smiled a small, helpless smile. “But I never forget a face or a pleasant moment. And I just want to say, Reg, that I have seldom spent a more congenial moment than the congenial moments that you and I have passed this afternoon. They are congenial moments that I will recall in days to come with much pleasure.”

“Very enjoyable, very enjoyable,” Reg muttered into his glass.

“I’m not afraid to say it, Reg. I am one of those women who have always preferred the company of men. I have always
believed in the mingling of the sexes. Don’t you agree that we only present our best sides when we have someone of the opposite sex to present them to?”

“There’s something to be said for that opinion, Cora.”

“Does your wife feel similarly? Women most often do.”

“I never married,” said Reg. This was not strictly the truth, not if commonlaws counted.

“How sad,” said Cora.

“Yes,” said Reg doubtfully.

“Since Len passed on I haven’t been the same,” Cora confessed, skinning her palms along the slippery satin encasing her thighs. “I miss the
companionship.”
Reg failed to respond so Cora adopted a more elegiac tenor. “He always brought out the best in me. Men do that for women, you know. I dressed only for my man!” She indicated her outfit. “This was a favourite of his.” She sighed. “But I’m afraid grief has led me to neglect my appearance.”

“Cora,” said Reg, “if every woman neglected herself the way you do, men would have no reason to complain.”

“Reg, you have no idea how I appreciate that.”

Reg didn’t appear to have heard her. He was staring at the face of his watch trying to decipher the time. When he did, he lurched abruptly to his feet. “I’m late,” he said.

At the door Cora did what she could to delay his departure. “I’ve enjoyed working with you. I’d do it again in a minute,” she said, propped up against the door jamb.

“You handled yourself like a real pro,” said Reg. “You handled yourself beautifully.”

Cora was reluctant to let the moment pass. “What if there are more of them in on it? I could go back and do it again. Just to make sure.”

“I see where you’re coming from. One bad apple can spoil the barrel. Right?”

“Exactly,” said Cora.

Reg aimed his forefinger between her eyes. “I get you. The rot spreads.” He paused. “Why the hell not? Let’s do it again.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Without question or comment. And this time, pull two thousand.” He stooped over her, breathing a confidence down into her uplifted face. “Because you know, Cora, the more they steal, the longer the sentence they get.”

In the next week Cora made three more trips to the bank, withdrawing two thousand dollars each time. It was thrilling, the adventure of a lifetime. In early afternoon Reg would arrive to collect the evidence and Cora would serve drinks and snacks and they would have long, intimate conversations. She could feel the strength of their regard for one another growing day by day. A difference in age was no impediment to mutual respect and affection.

Reg was sweet in an irresistibly boyish sort of way – she couldn’t forget how he had pretended to resist when she had coaxed him into dancing with her to Perry Como on the stereo. A bachelor’s shyness. Whatever he might have said to the contrary, Cora was sure that dancing had done him as much good as it had done her. It had made her blissfully happy.

Reg was not happy. Despite having seven thousand dollars in his pocket, his stomach hurt. After three thousand dollars, he’d told himself That’s enough, pack it in, get while the getting is good. He’d told himself the same thing after five thousand and seven thousand but he couldn’t stop. He knew the longer he hung in, the greater the risks he ran. If he kept on with this life – aspirins for tension headaches and whisky to take the kinks out of his neck – his guts were going to end up Swiss cheese.

Wasn’t this always the way? A man gets to the very peak of his career, he’s conducting some old broad like she was an orchestra, and still he can’t shake the queer feeling that he’s had ever since he laid eyes on her – that he’s losing control of his own life.

“Reggie,” said Mrs. Cora Rook, stretching her arms out to him, “let’s dance.” Andy Williams was on the stereo.

“I don’t want to dance,” said Reg. It was true. He didn’t like the way she felt under her caftan when he held her in his arms. It was like steering a bundle of sticks and twigs.

“Reg,” said Cora, “a gentleman does not refuse the invitation of a lady.”

“The middle of the afternoon is the wrong time for dancing,” argued Reg. “Have another drink instead.”

“No, it isn’t. Len and I often had a dance in the afternoon.”

“Well, I’m not Len.”

Cora pouted, held out her glass for him to fill. “I’m feeling gay and Mr. Growl Bear is being a poop.” She had started calling him that in the past couple of days. He didn’t like it. But what was he going to say? She had volunteered to go to the bank again which put him under some obligation to be nice to her. Come to think of it, maybe it was only wise to dance.

He did. Cora crooned “Moon River” in his ear the whole time.

Reg developed a theory about Cora. After four drinks she got unpredictable and could go one way or the other, sunshine or showers. One afternoon she rained on him for hours, telling him how hard her life was.

“There are some women – I won’t mention names – who like being widows. But not me, because if you have a loving heart you want to share it. Len used to say to me, ‘Dicky bird, I’m the happiest man alive and I owe it all to you.’ And truer words were never spoken. I gave myself completely to that man’s happiness – his slightest wish was my command – but the way I look at it, that’s the least a woman owes a man who takes charge of all the more sordid details of life. I don’t think a woman wants to be involved in the sordid details of life, money and taxes and bank accounts and all that sort of rigmarole. That life isn’t for me, Reg. I don’t know who is
cheating me and who isn’t. A very masculine type of woman could maybe manage this, but I was not made to be bumped and bruised. Len used to say to me, ‘Honest to God, dicky bird, you were not made for this world.’ If he knew the heartache his money has given me, I’m sure Len – even though he was a very jealous man – would want me to marry again. Marry a man with a little business expertise, a man with financial experience like yourself, Reg, who could take over these things and relieve my mind and make me happy again. A man for who I could be Queen of the Home. Do you think I’ll ever find a man like that, Reg?”

Reg walked for hours that night, up and down darkened streets. It was clear to him that there was no future for him in his present occupation. Years of preparation and effort and what did it get him? A stomach in knots, a case of nerves you wouldn’t believe. And yesterday, diarrhoea. What did it count that he was twice as intelligent as anybody else in his field of endeavour, that he had taken the trouble to make an analysis of it, read books and try to improve himself, always pay attention to the smallest details? Who else had come up with plastic sandwich bags and receipts? Not those other schmucks, those snatch and grab goons. And yet they still did as well as he did –
better –
despite being dumber, despite falling far short of his charm and
savoir-faire
and good looks and
je ne sais quoi –
all qualities that were supposed to be at a premium in this line of work. Which only went to show you a man was only as good as his luck and Reg Stamp’s had always been bad. If he’d been born into the right family, given a proper start, he was sure that a man of his abilities could have been every bit as big a success as the famous Len. He, too, could have been the owner of six dry-cleaning outlets and up to his ass in clover. But when it came to luck, he’d been short changed.