A Manhattan Ghost Story Read online

  At the far end of the street, near Fifth Avenue, and on the south side, I could make out two people walking toward me. An old couple. He was wearing a hat and a dark overcoat, and was carrying a cane, or an umbrella. She was stooped over slightly, was wearing a brown coat, and was apparently holding onto his arm.

  On my side of the street, in front of the light orange townhouse, two children were playing catch with a softball. They were dressed for early February, in cream-colored snowsuits and mittens. One of the children was facing me; he looked about ten or eleven, and he was short, with a long, thin face. His nearly continuous laughter drifted over to me as a slight, tinny noise, like dimes falling.

  I heard a stiff, cracking noise across the street, in the antique shop. I looked. Directly beneath the stylized mouse, there was a door that I hadn’t noticed earlier—probably, I decided, because it had no window in it and had been painted a shade of red that was much the same color as the building itself. The door had been opened inward, and a man was standing in the doorway. He was thin, middle-aged, with long, gray hair, and rimless glasses, and was dressed in blue jeans and a long-sleeved yellow shirt. He was motioning with his hand for me to come over.

  I watched him a few moments. He continued motioning to me—a kind of upside-down wave—and a little smile appeared on his mouth. At last I crossed the street to him. His smiled increased as I drew closer, and he motioned again, to indicate the inside of the antique shop.

  “In here,” he said, his voice a creaky, high tenor.

  I stopped walking. “No,” I said. “I don’t think so.”

  And he said, “Of course you do.”

  I considered a moment, then followed him inside.

  As I walked behind the thin, gray-haired man, through the shop—through aisles that were narrow and cluttered with odds and ends—I heard a small, tinkling noise to my right, as if he had put bells on the front door and a customer was coming in. But when I looked, there was a big pine cupboard in my way, so I saw nothing.

  The shop was even larger than was suggested by its outside. The floor was bare wood and gritty. Here and there, it squeaked as I walked on it, and in several spots it actually gave under my weight.

  “This way, please,” the gray-haired man said, his voice now small and friendly, as we made our way through the aisles, past old rocking chairs and battered cupboards and mantel clocks. I had no idea where he was taking me, of course. But I was more than willing to be led. I wanted to be led. It was very fitting, I thought, that I should be there, in an antique shop called The Mousetrap. I had the idea that there were answers here, that this man had answers for me, because I needed answers from someone.

  He stopped in front of a huge, rolltop desk that was cluttered with old papers and notebooks, and nodded meaningfully at the end of the desk opposite him. “Could you get that, please?” he said.

  “Sorry?” I said.

  “That end. Could you get that end?”

  “What for?”

  “So I can move it, of course,” he said.

  “So you can move it?”

  “Yes. Over there.” He nodded to his left at an empty spot near a kerosene heater. “It’s warmer.”

  “You asked me in here just so I could help you move your desk?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And that’s all?”

  He smiled patiently. “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

  I turned, walked quickly through the store and out, onto East 81st Street. I squinted at the bright sunlight, cringed at the noise of traffic on Lexington Avenue, and cursed repeatedly—at the gray-haired man, at myself, at Phyllis, and Art, and the eight million people around me.

  I felt someone tugging at my sleeve. “Mister?” I heard. I looked. It was the thin-faced boy in the cream-colored snowsuit. He was tugging at my sleeve with his left hand, clutching the softball in his right, and had a look of urgency about him. “Mister?” His eyes were green; a swatch of reddish hair stuck out from under the hood of his snowsuit, and there was a scratch, like a cat scratch, just above the right side of his jawline.

  “Yes?” I said.

  It seemed to please him that I’d finally responded. He smiled a broad, appealing smile, turned, walked quickly down the street, toward Park Avenue. I called after him, “Where’s your friend?”

  He glanced back at me, said nothing, continued walking. When he reached the light orange townhouse, he turned his head, and his smiled broadened as he went up the steps, opened the door—which was apparently unlocked—and went inside. It seemed very much like an invitation.

  The massive oak and glass front door of the townhouse was indeed unlocked. I opened it, stuck my head into the house, saw the boy’s legs as he disappeared up a bright green carpeted stairway to the right.

  “Hello,” I called.

  I heard at once, very faintly, from the second floor, “Come in, please, Mr. Cray.”

  “Sorry?” I called. I got no reply. I stuck my head in further, put one foot in. “Hello,” I called again.

  “Come in, please,” I heard. It was the same voice, a woman’s voice, from the second floor. “Go into the parlor, please, Mr. Cray.”

  I stepped into the house, pulled the door shut, checked to see if it had somehow locked automatically. It hadn’t. “Where is it?” I called.

  “Just to your right,” I heard.

  “To my right?”

  Nothing.

  “To my right, you said?”

  “Yes, Mr. Cray.” I noted the hint of impatience in the voice now. “To your right.”

  “How do you know my name?”

  “Go into the parlor, Mr. Cray. Please.”

  “Uh-huh,” I said, and took a few cautious steps forward toward a set of closed mahogany doors to my right. There was an identical set of doors to my left, closed as well, and at the end of the short hallway, halfway up the wall opposite me, a big, oval mirror, in a smooth, beige frame. I found that I couldn’t help watching myself in it, half in amusement, as if I were watching someone else. I nodded at myself, grinned.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I whispered.

  And from the second floor, I heard: “Please, Mr. Cray!” I went immediately to the set of mahogany doors, pulled them open, and went into the parlor.

  It reminded me very much of my childhood home in Maine. It was spacious, not awfully well lighted—because two sets of heavy, dark drapes on tall, narrow windows that overlooked East 81st Street were closed—and there were mid-Victorian pieces everywhere: a velvet rococo couch, covered in plastic, to my right, between the windows; two Windsor chairs to the left; a tall, dark cherry Queen Anne secretary straight ahead; several Tiffany lamps, in varying degrees of repair; a black upholstered Morris chair—the upholstery, like the rococo couch, also covered in plastic—near it.

  I heard shuffling noises from above, as if someone were moving about, and then, faintly, I heard voices. One sounded like the voice of a child, the other that of the woman who had invited me in, her voice now apparently raised in anger. Presently, the voices stopped and a door closed above, on the second floor. I turned and listened as someone moved down the stairway. I went back, through the double mahogany doors. I saw a woman coming down the stairs. She was dressed in a faded pink, floor-length nightgown, a strange thing to wear so late in the morning. She’d gathered the nightgown together, at the top of her breast, with a safety pin.

  “Hello, Mr. Cray,” she said, her voice now a pleasant, high tenor.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” I said.

  Her chest heaved, in a sigh. She was in her late forties, I guessed, and had a look of extreme weariness about her. Her hair had clearly been dyed brown—it was raggedly graying at the temples—and it was obvious that she had once been quite attractive.

  “You didn’t,” she said. She was at the bottom of the stairway now. She nodded toward the parlor. “Shall we go in there, please?”

  We went into the parlor together, she just ahead of me. She seated
herself in the Morris chair, crossed her legs, nodded at one of the Windsor chairs, several feet from her, and said, “Sit down, please.”

  I sat. She said, her eyes not on me but on the windows across the room, “Who brought you here?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t understand.”

  “Was it one of the cabbies?”

  I thought for a moment. “Yes,” I said.

  “Petersak?”

  “Yes. Is that significant?”

  She frowned slightly. Her gaze settled on me; I noticed, then, that her left eye was blue, the other one brown. She asked, “Do you know what’s happening to you, Mr. Cray.”

  “No,” I answered. “Do you?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I do.” She looked away again, toward the windows. She continued, “Perhaps you should think first. Perhaps you should know that this new … vision you have can be taken from you. It has been taken from others, and they were better off without it.” She said this almost as if by rote, almost as if she were reciting it.

  I said, “Who are you?”

  She ignored the question. She waved toward the windows as if to indicate the outside of the house. “Of course, all of them see, but they have no idea what they’re seeing. They think they’re seeing … life.”

  She stopped a moment, looked at me again, smiled coyly. “And in a way, they are.” She paused again, briefly, went on, “You probably don’t understand a word I’m saying to you, isn’t that right?”

  I answered, “That’s right.”

  Her smile broadened, then quickly dissipated. It was a nice smile; she had good, straight teeth and full lips. She said, “What do you believe in, Mr. Cray?”

  The question took me by surprise. I said, truthfully, “I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”

  She took a quick, agitated breath. “I think you do, Mr. Cray.”

  “How do you know my name?”

  She ignored me again, uncrossed her legs—which, I guessed, had also once been quite attractive; now they were laced with varicose veins—pushed herself to her feet, and went to one of the windows. After a moment she said, her back to me, “Do you believe in life, Mr. Cray?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand that—please, you’re going to have to tell me what to call you.”

  “Madeline.”

  “Madeline,” I said. It seemed to fit her.

  “Again, do you believe in life, Mr. Cray?”

  “Do you mean,” I began, and she cut in angrily, “I mean life, for God’s sake! I mean life!”

  “Yes,” I answered, “of course I do.”

  “And so you believe in death as well?”

  I nodded, though her back still was turned. “Yes,” I whispered.

  “Good, I think we’re getting somewhere.” I imagined from the tone of her voice that she smiled. “And do you believe that you know the difference—between life and death?”

  “Yes,” I answered, “I do. They’re opposites.”

  “That is the popular mythology, isn’t it?” And again I imagined from her tone that she smiled. “The popular mythology,” she repeated, as if she liked the phrase. “Up/down, dark/light, near/far, life/death—all opposites.”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “No, Mr. Cray. They aren’t. It’s a matter of how you look at it, a matter of how you see.”

  “I don’t understand. See what?”

  “Life, death, dark, light. All just a matter of how you see. Like sunspots, Mr. Cray. You think sunspots are dark—they aren’t, of course; they’re very bright. They only appear dark because the rest of the sun is so much brighter. That’s a good analogy, don’t you think? I’ve used it before, and I’ve been told that it’s a good analogy.” Again I got the idea that she was smiling, pleased with herself.

  I said to her, my voice low and tight, “I want to know what’s happening to me. Can you tell me what’s happening to me?”

  She turned abruptly. She had a broad, pleased smile on her face. “Of course I can, Mr. Cray. I’ve told you I can. It’s why you’re here.” She went back to her chair, sat, crossed her legs again, leaned forward with her hands clasped. “Would you like some coffee, some tea? Gerald can get it for you.”

  “Gerald?”

  “The little boy in the snowsuit. Gerald. My son.”

  “No. Thank you.” I was growing impatient.

  “Of course you don’t.” Again she smiled. “You want me to tell you what’s happening to you.”

  “Yes.”

  “And I will. Of course. That’s why you’re here.”

  “Yes, you said that.”

  Her smile vanished at once. I saw, then, that Gerald—the thin-faced boy in the cream-colored snowsuit and shock of red hair, Madeline’s son—was standing beside her. He still had a softball in his hand, and the thin scratch I had noticed at his jawline seemed wider, more inflamed than I remembered. He was grinning playfully at me.

  Madeline said, “You don’t really want to know what’s happening to you. And if you did, I couldn’t tell you anyway. I don’t even know what’s happening to poor Gerald.” She reached up, lightly touched the scratch at his jawline. “This is a cat scratch, Mr. Cray. He got it from a big, mangy tom he was trying to befriend. And, of course, as sometimes happens with cat scratches, it’s become infected.”

  “Take him to a doctor,” I suggested.

  She smiled thinly as if at a tasteless joke. “Of course, Mr. Cray. I’ll do that. But not in time.”

  “What do you mean, but not in time? Call now—take him in now.”

  “Oh, you really do have a thick head, don’t you?”

  I said nothing.

  “I’ll tell you what is happening to you, Mr. Cray. You are an all-but-blind and bottom-dwelling fish, and you are coming up, into the light. And you are not going to like it—no, not at all!”

  Gerald grinned at me again. I believed that I grinned back. And he said, “Not in time, mister. Too bad.”

  “He’s always had a sense of humor,” Madeline said. “I think it’s important, don’t you?”

  I said nothing. I felt like I was watching some kind of perverse sideshow.

  She stroked her son’s cheek affectionately—he was still grinning at me. “Do you know, Mr. Cray,” she said, “that cold is really just the relative absence of warmth? Do you know that there are degrees of warmth?” She paused a beat and smiled as if I had understood what she was saying, and was happy for it. Then she went on, nodding at her son, “My poor Gerald is not awfully warm, Mr. Cray. But neither is he awfully cold. He’s just a little colder than you or I.”

  I took a quick, agitated breath. I desperately did not want to be in that house.

  Madeline went on, “You may leave, of course, whenever you wish.” She hesitated; I stayed where I was. She smiled again, a quick smile. “But, of course, you’re not going to. Not at the moment anyway. You’re going to stick around. You’re confused, and I can’t blame you for it. We are all confused, Mr. Cray. Even Gerald here is confused, and that poor man you left twitching on Fifth Avenue and those girls hailing a taxi. They are all confused. How different do you suppose their world is from ours, Mr. Cray, merely because it is the world of the dead?”

  “I don’t know how to answer that,” I said.

  “And neither do I,” she said. “I wish I did—God, I wish I did. But I know really as little about their world as I do about our own. One springs from the other, so I believe that they are equally complex—and equally terrifying. I can tell you what I know about Gerald. I can tell you that I love him and that he is a comfort to me, and that he has pain, Mr. Cray—oh, intense, unbelievable pain. And I can tell you that someday he will leave here; he will leave this house, this street, and he will go somewhere else. I don’t know where. And I can tell you that I used to cry. I used to cry quite a lot. But I don’t cry anymore.

  “And I can tell you this, too. I used to go to where we put him, where we buried him, and I used to stare at the place he is, and I hav
e no idea now what I saw there. Or what I felt. Because I have him with me again. Almost.” She stopped a moment, then went on, a clear note of strain in her voice, “Not to watch him grow up, and not to have hopes for him, and not to worry about him. And he will never give me grandchildren, of course. All that is stopped, I think. All stopped. Those are things, I believe, that death stops once and for all.

  “And all the other Geralds are out there, Mr. Cray—they are all out on those streets, and in those houses. They are driving taxis, shoplifting, weeping. They are all there. All the Geralds, and all the men in ragged T-shirts. You don’t want to hear this, but you are being made to see and so you must hear it. They are all there. Whole and in pieces, buying stocks and doing laundry and watching cable TV. But hear this, too; you are allowed to know them and to see them, but not well, Mr. Cray. Not well at all. Only as well as you know and see the living. Which is why I stay in this house and talk to people like you. Because I have only Gerald here. And I love him—cold as he is. I love him.

  “You may go now.”

  And I did. I went out onto East 73rd Street. I stood at the top of the steps, watched a snowfall start, and thought about Phyllis again.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  And realized that I still loved her, that I missed her, and that I would go looking for her.

  As if I were some kind of super sleuth. A Sam Spade. A Sherlock Holmes. And I thought it would be an exciting adventure. Something to savor and to enjoy.

  The snowfall grew heavier and I vomited there, at the top of Madeline’s steps. What else was I going to do?

  At the Hammet Mausoleum, Halloween, 1965

  Sam told me, “So that’s why I ain’t afraid too much to die. ‘Cuz I got it figured out.”

  I said, “You’re scary, Sam. Sometimes you’re scary.”

  “Uh-huh. Sure I am.” He fingered the wax dripping from one of the candles. “I scare myself, sometimes, Abner.” He repositioned himself on the cement floor so he was lying on his side, his right hand propping his head up. He went on, “What do you say, Abner—we gonna try to call up old Joe Hammet or are we gonna jabber all night long?”