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“That wasn’t snarling,” I pointed out. “Not even remotely. If you’re pla
make the distinction between a snarl and a wel -placed bon mot. They are not one and the same.”
I took out a pen and o ered him the inside of my arm.
“Just write down the address and we’l be squared away.”
He took the pen and wrote down an address on East Twenty-second Street, pressing down a lit le too hard on my skin.
“Thank you, sir,” I said, reclaiming the boot. “I’l be sure to put in a good word with Mr. Strand for you!”
As I exited the aisle, I felt a treatise on American naval misadventure shot-put past my head. I left it on the ground for the shot-put er to reshelve.
I wil admit: There was a part of me that wanted to wash my arm. Not because of Mark’s handwriting, which was the kind of chicken scratch
more associated with death row convicts than bookstore clerks. No—it wasn’t the handwriting I was tempted to erase, but the information it
conveyed. Because here was the key to meeting Lily … and I wasn’t sure I wanted to put it in the lock.
So a’s words were nagging at me: Was Lily the girl in my head? And if she was, wasn’t reality bound to be disappointing?
No, I had to reassure myself. The words in the red Moleskine were not writ en by the girl in your head. You have to trust the words. They do not
create anything more than themselves.
When I rang the doorbel , I could hear it chime throughout the brownstone, the kind of intonation that lets you believe a servant wil be answering
the door. For at least a minute, there was a responding silence—I shifted the boot from hand to hand and debated whether to ring again. My
restraint was a rare victory of politeness over expediency, and I was rewarded eventual y by a shu e of feet and a maneuvering of locks and bolts.
The door was answered by neither a butler nor a maid. Instead, it was answered by a museum guard from Madame Tussauds.
“I know you!” I sput ered.
The old woman gave me a long, hard look.
“And I know that boot,” she replied.
“Yes,” I said. “There’s that.”
I had no idea whether she remembered me from the museum. But then she opened the door a lit le wider and motioned for me to come in.
I half expected to be greeted by a waxwork statue of Jackie Chan. (In other words, I expected her to have taken some of her work home with
her.) But instead, the foyer was an antechamber of antiques, like suddenly I had stepped back into a dozen decades at once, and none of them
were later than 1940. Next to the door was a stand l ed with umbrel as—at least a dozen of them, each with its own curved wood handle.
The old woman caught me staring.
“You’ve never seen an umbrel a stand before?” she asked haughtily.
“I was just trying to imagine a situation where one person would need twelve umbrel as. It seems almost indecent to have so many, when there
are so many people who don’t have any.”
She nodded at this, then asked, “What’s your name, young man?”
“Dash,” I told her.
“Dash?”
“It’s short for Dashiel ,” I explained.
“I never said it wasn’t,” she replied atly.
She led me into a room that could only be cal ed a parlor. The drapery was so thick and the furniture so cloaked that I half expected to nd
Sherlock Holmes thumb-wrestling with Jane Austen in the corner. It wasn’t as dusty or smoky as one expects a parlor to be, but al the wood had
the weight of card catalogs and the fabric seemed soaked in wine. Knee-high sculptures perched in corners and by the replace, while jacketless
books crowded on shelves, peering down like old professors too tired to speak to one another.
I felt very much at home.
Fol owing a gesture from the old woman, I set led on a set ee. When I breathed in, the air smel ed like old money.
“Is Lily home?” I asked.
The woman set led down across from me and laughed.
“Who’s to say I’m not Lily?” she asked back.
“Wel ,” I said, “a few of my friends have actual y met Lily, and I like to think they would’ve mentioned if she were eighty.”
“Eighty!” The old woman feigned shock. “I’l have you know I’m not a year over forty-three.”
“With al due respect,” I said, “if you’re forty-three, then I’m a fetus.”
She leaned back in her chair and examined me like she was contemplating a purchase. Her hair was fastened tightly in a bun, and I felt fastened
just as tightly into her scrutiny.
“Seriously,” I said. “Where’s Lily?”
“I need to gauge your intentions,” she said, “before I can al ow you to dil ydal y with my niece.”
“I assure you I have neither dil ying nor dal ying on my mind,” I replied. “I simply want to meet her. In person. You see, we’ve been—”
She raised her hand to cut me o . “I am aware of your epistolary irtation. Which is al wel and good—as long as it’s wel and good. Before I
ask you some questions, perhaps you would like some tea?”
“That would depend on what kind of tea you were o ering.”
“So di dent! Suppose it was Earl Grey.”
I shook my head. “Tastes like pencil shavings.”
“Lady Grey.”
“I don’t drink beverages named after beheaded monarchs. It seems so tacky.”
“Chamomile?”
“Might as wel sip but er y wings.”
“Might as wel sip but er y wings.”
“Green tea?”
“You can’t be serious.”
The old woman nodded her approval. “I wasn’t.”
“Because you know when a cow chews grass? And he or she chews and chews and chews? Wel , green tea tastes like French-kissing that cow
after it’s done chewing al that grass.”
“Would you like some mint tea?”
“Only under duress.”
“English breakfast.”
I clapped my hands. “Now you’re talking!”
The old woman made no move to get the tea.
“I’m afraid I’m out,” she said.
“No worries,” I replied. “Do you want your boot back in the meantime?”
I handed it her way and she took it for a moment before handing it back to me.
“This was from my majoret e days,” she said.
“You were in the army?”
“An army of cheer, Dash. I was in an army of cheer.”
There was a series of urns on the bookshelf behind her. I wondered if they were decorative or if they contained some of her relatives’ remains.
“So what else can I tel you?” I asked. “I mean, to get you to reveal Lily to me.”
She triangled her ngers under her chin. “Let’s see. Are you a bed wet er?”
“Am I a …?”
“Bed wet er. I am asking if you are a bed wet er.”
I knew she was trying to get me to blink. But I wouldn’t.
“No, ma’am. I leave my beds dry.”
“Not even a lit le drip every now and then?”
“I’m trying hard to see how this is germane.”
“I’m gauging your honesty. What is the last periodical you read methodical y?”
“Vogue. Although, in the interest of ful disclosure, that’s mostly because I was in my mother’s bathroom, enduring a rather long bowel
movement. You know, the kind that requires Lamaze?”
“What adjective do you feel the most longing for?”
That was easy. “I wil admit I have a soft spot for fanciful.”
“Let’s say I have a hundred mil ion dol ars and o er it to you. The only condition is that if you take it, a man in China wil fal o his bicycle
and die. What do you do?”
“I don’t understand why it mat ers whether he’s in China or not. And of course I wouldn’t take the money.”
The old woman nodded.
“Do you think Abraham Lincoln was a homosexual?”
“Al I can say for sure is that he never made a pass at me.”
“Are you a museumgoer?”
“Is the pope a churchgoer?”
“When you see a ower painted by Georgia O’Kee e, what comes to mind?”
“That’s just a transparent ploy to get me to say the word vagina, isn’t it? There. I’ve said it. Vagina.”