Death Wish

It rang before he touched it. Jack, to tell him about Carol’s hospitalization.

Paul didn’t remember the conversation clearly afterward. He knew he had shouted at Jack—damn fool questions to which Jack couldn’t possibly have the answers; cruel inane accusations that only succeeded in eliciting chilly replies from Jack. Finally Jack hung up on him.

He hadn’t even got the psychiatrist’s name. He would have to call back and get it. But not right away; he had to give Jack time to cool off first—and give himself time for the same thing.

He showered—scrubbed himself viciously until the flesh stung with a red rash. Shaved with meticulous care. Got into a completely clean set of clothes from the skin out for the first time in five days. His best office suit—the gray gabardine Esther had insisted he buy in the Oxford Street shop the last time they had been to London, three years ago. He knotted his tie precisely and fixed it to his shirt with the silver tiepin. Wiped off his shoes with a rag. Checked himself in the mirror, re-combed his hair, and braced himself to walk out the door.

In front of the building splinters of shattered glass lay like frost on the sidewalk—a broken bottle. He stepped around it and looked both ways for traffic and jaywalked across to the east side of the avenue. When he walked up Seventieth toward Broadway the children were leaving P.S. 199, making a racket, traveling in packs and knots. His stomach muscles knotted. At first he didn’t look any of them in the face—as if by pretending they didn’t exist he could prevent them from seeing him. He let them flow around him. There was a lot of rough-edged laughter in high voices. Did it have a savage brutal ring to it or was he only hearing it that way?

As he forged into the midst of the yelling mass he suddenly began looking them straight in the faces. In his pocket his fist closed around the knotted sock, weighted with its roll of coins.

One tall youth caught Paul’s glance. The youth’s eyes flickered when they touched Paul’s: flickered and slid away. Paul almost stopped. His head swiveled to follow the youth, who said something to the kid beside him; they both laughed but they didn’t look back in Paul’s direction.

He had the light at the corner; he trotted across Amsterdam and was stopped by the light at Broadway so he turned right on the curb and began to walk toward Columbus Circle. He was out of the packs of kids now; his gut relaxed. But his thoughts raced: what had he expected? To be attacked in the midst of a street crowded with schoolchildren? To get into a stare-down match with that tall youth, and come to blows?

You have got to get hold of yourself.

He approached the clean attractive buildings of the Lincoln Center complex. A sudden impulse sent him across Broadway on Sixty-fifth and he went into Central Park, heading across town.

Just inside the park a bum staggered near with palm outstretched; and Paul, who had always felt obliged to pay off the infirm ones, hurried past with his face averted.

The park was covered with the leavings of callous humanity: discarded newspapers, crumpled lunch bags, rusty bottlecaps, rustless empty cans, broken bottles. Several years ago he had worked an entire summer, every spare hour of it, for the volunteer anti-litter campaign. All right, they’ve been told, they’ve had their chance.

He didn’t follow the implications of the thought through: he was afraid to.

Near the zoo a drunk sat swaying on a bench. His eyes tracked Paul. He looked as if he had no past and was entitled to no future. He kept watching Paul, his head turning to follow Paul’s passage. It set Paul’s teeth on edge. He hurried through the zoo and out onto Fifth Avenue.

He had started with no particular destination, only an urge to get out, get moving, put an end to his unhealthy isolation. By now he knew where he was heading. He quickened his pace even though his feet were begi

The door sucked shut behind him. Marilyn the receptionist, who was a matronly twenty-six-year-old brunette with the suggestion of a double chin, did a double-take that contrived to combine in one expression amazement, pleasure and sympathy. “Why Mr. Benjamin!” she chirped. “How nice!” Then she remembered; her face changed with comic abruptness. “Oh we were all so frightfully sorry to hear … Poor Mrs. Benjamin … It must have been just terrible for you——”

He nodded and muttered something and hurried through the corridor door before she could take a notion to suffocate him protectively against her big soft bosom.

He went along to Sam Kreutzer’s office and got a similar reception from Sam’s secretary; when he went into the office Dundee was with Sam. They were both effusive; it was a while before he could get a word in. “I was getting cabin fever. Thought I’d come back to work. I’m probably not much good for anything yet but it might help just to sit there and push papers around.”

“I think you’re dead right,” Dundee said. “At least you’ll have some friendly faces for company.”

He steadied himself against the banal predictability of their throat-clearing and face-rearranging. Sam said, “Hell, Paul.”

Dundee gripped his arm with one hand and patted his shoulder with the other. “It always takes a while, fella, but we’re all a hundred percent with you. Anything you need, anything at all.…”

“It’s okay, Bill.” He endeavored to lighten things: “Actually, Sam, if that invitation’s still open, the one thing I think I really need more than anything else is a square meal. I’ve been living on frozen food—TV di

He wasn’t sure if he imagined it: the briefest discomfiture on Sam’s face? But a smile chased it away. “You bet, Paul. I’ll call herself and tell her to set a place.”

It bothered him: was Sam really chagrined? Did he feel it would be awkward? Maybe Paul shouldn’t have asked.…

“I know exactly what you mean,” Dundee was saying. “That time A

A smell was bothering Paul; sicksweet and thick. He finally ascertained it was Dundee’s barber-shave.

Dundee’s smile had gone rigid—as if he had jut realized his anecdote had been misplaced. A

Sam Kreutzer said, “As a matter of fact we were talking over one of your clients just now when you came in. Nemserman. Son of a bitch really got his tail caught in a crack, didn’t he.”

“Has he been bugging you?”

“He calls every day or two, wanting to know how soon you’ll be back in harness. He told me to convey his sympathies, by the way.”

Paul wondered if that was true. He doubted it; Nemserman lacked that brand of consideration. Probably Sam had made it up on the spur of the moment because it was something that ought to be said.

Dundee said, “I talked to him yesterday—Sam was out when he called. He must’ve been calling from some bookie joint—the background noise was unbelievable.”