Molly Terrill
New York City
December 1950
Christmas day came and went, passing by outside Barlow’s miniscule apartment on Grove Street in cold, sun-drenched silence. The city slowed to a halt for a single turn of the Earth, and Barlow woke on December 26th to the usual racket of horns and emergency sirens, punctuated by the occasional irritated shout.
A jumble of mismatched furniture which, in a normal amount of space would have been allocated to a bedroom, sitting room and kitchen respectively, was crammed cheek-by-jowl into the fourteen-by-twelve-foot room. There was a tiny kitchen along one wall and a table by the window, which blocked half of the lower kitchen cupboards from opening fully. His single bed, the size of which seemed to cement and mock his loneliness, was wedged into the corner along the opposite wall. A hideous lime-green armchair was shoved up against the brass bedstead and an end table next to that held the room’s only lamp and his telephone. Barlow had seen some of the other units in the building and knew that by comparison his was quite luxurious, in part because his had a private, closet-sized bathroom tacked onto the kitchen, a double window and a real oven. The fact that Barlow used the oven to store his shoes was irrelevant, the point was that he had the ability to prepare his own meals if he so chose.
He whiled away the morning after Christmas smoking and reading a three-day-old issue of the Times, which he’d filched from his next-door neighbor’s doormat after inadvertently witnessing the man’s departure for what appeared to be a lengthy holiday break. Barlow smiled to himself, relishing the absence of his neighbor’s voice, who had a habit of running his stage lines late into the night.
By noon Barlow’s stomach was making it known that it would no longer tolerate nicotine as a suitable alternative for food. Laying the paper aside, he crossed three paces from his bed to the kitchen and peered into the refrigerator. Scowling at the limp carrot and slightly moldy wedge of cheese that were the entirety of its contents, he reached instead for his keys and began layering on jacket, scarf and shoes.
The lemon rays of the sun that had graced the morning had been superseded by a bank of grey clouds, plunging the temperature well below freezing. Barlow set off at a brisk pace and turned right at the end of the block to walk down Bleecker Street. The Village was charming in its snow-capped winter garb, reminding him of certain neighborhoods in London. He supposed that was why he’d chosen it. The narrow, crooked streets felt right to him in a way that razor straight boulevards and avenues never would. There were few people out; only a couple walking an awkward distance ahead of him engaged in a hushed argument that passed between them as white puffs of breath in the frigid air.
“I’m not accusing you of anything,” the woman was muttering tersely from behind a woolen muffler. “I was just pointing out that if you kept better track of your things –,”
“For heaven’s sake Betty, you’re the one who moved it!” the man retorted. “If you’d just keep your hands off my things in the first place, we wouldn’t –,”
Wanting to keep a respectful distance, Barlow turned abruptly to cross the road, and was startled out of his effort not to overhear what the couple was bickering about by the screeching of brakes and a tirade of angry admonishments. Heart in his throat, he looked down and realized that his palm was resting on the steaming hood of the cab that had almost run him down.
“Are you deaf?! What in the goddamn hell is the matter with you?!” The driver was leaning out of his open window, gesticulating wildly, cap and glasses askew.
“Sorry!” Barlow panted, his heart racing. “So – so sorry.”
“Are you crazy?! Get the hell out of the road!” The man’s beefy face was turning a nasty shade of puce, and as more of him emerged out of the window Barlow realized he was getting ready to open the door.
“Sorry,” Barlow said again, and forced his feet to move. The cab shot past him the moment he was clear of the hood.
“Asshole!” Barlow heard the driver shout as he accelerated down Bleecker Street, only to slam on his brakes again a moment later when the light at the corner turned red.
Barlow leaned against the brick wall of the nearest building, his heart continuing to beat a hectic rhythm and his breath coming in ragged pants. With the window rolled up the cab driver’s continued curses were muffled, but they issued forth in a steady stream.
Suddenly Barlow’s head was filled with shouting, and his vision flickered. The street before him became a stone courtyard, winking sickeningly in and out of focus. Angry, frightened voices pressed in on him from all sides. His knees buckled in remembered fear. Terrified voices were drowning his thoughts in guttural German and panicked French. His breathing was shallow and quick. He needed to move, to run. He needed air. God dammit why wouldn’t his heart slow down?
When he came back to himself the street was nearly deserted, but for a few passing cars and a couple of pedestrians too burrowed into their winter layers to pay him much attention. The cab was gone, as was the bickering couple he’d tried to avoid. The neat buildings of Bleecker Street came into focus, and Barlow was able to pull a deep breath into his lungs. He felt as though he’d been held underwater for too long, and he gulped the cold air greedily, feeling his heart at last cease its reckless pounding. It had been more than a year since he’d suffered an attack.
Gingerly he moved away from the wall, noting with surprising clarity that he must have untied his scarf from his neck to ease his breathing. He wrapped it slowly around himself once more and tucked the ends neatly into his coat. He sniffed, spat, and continued down the road, occasionally looking about to be sure no one had noticed. He didn’t know whether he was grateful, or just alone.
When Barlow left the San Remo Café several hours later, he was three sheets to the wind and the sun had set. He fumbled with his cigarette, his normally dexterous fingers clumsy with cold and thorough suffusion of alcohol. He could feel the whisky coursing through him, turning his legs to wobbly columns of jelly and his stomach into an acidic lake that bubbled up occasionally in a powerful belch.
“Pardon,” Barlow mumbled, ejecting a plume of smoke towards two very affronted-looking women giving him a wide berth on the sidewalk. He had a vague sense that he should clear his head and turned his feet in the direction of Washington Square Park. He was finding it difficult to lift his shoes clear of the pavement, and his feet made trudges in the slick coating of dirty snow that had fallen while he’d been drowning his memories inside the San Remo. He paused to look muzzily around him and was pleased to see the bleary shape of the park’s triumphal arch materialize out of the darkness.
A turn around the park would do him good, he reasoned, stumbling as he tossed his cigarette, having over-estimated the amount of force this action required.
The fountain wasn’t running, but the thought of rushing water made him suddenly and painfully aware that his bladder was near to bursting. Lunging for the nearest clump of bare bushes, he scrabbled for his fly and groaned in immediate relief. His need had been so urgent that he had missed a couple canoodling on a bench nearby. He heard a woman’s quickly stifled giggle before a man said,
“Hey, wait a moment. Barlow, is that you?”
“Shit,” Barlow muttered to himself, keeping his head fixed in place but straining to see out of the corner of one eye.
“It is you!” the voice called in recognition, and Barlow realized the man had moved closer. “Kit Bloomfield, we were in Clark’s class at Columbia, remember? Blimey, you’re in a state, aren’t you?” the man chuckled.
“Bugger off,” Barlow said tightly through gritted teeth.
“I beg your pardon?” Kit said, clearly offended.
“Hoy!” An aggressive holler cut the air and made Barlow jump, unfortunately not before he was able to cut off his stream, which spattered across Kit’s shoes as he turned to face the police officer making a beeline towards them across the park.
“What do you think you’re doing?!” the officer shouted, the beam of his flashlight searching.
“Shit,” Barlow stammered again, doing up his zipper and staggering away from Kit’s irate face. The thought of being taken in for public indecency was like a slap in the face, and he didn’t fancy being on the receiving end of the literal slap Kit looked like he was winding up to deliver. Barlow’s feet gathered speed and propelled him out of the park and around the corner, where he quickly lost himself at the back of a group of frivolous bar-goers. At the corner of West 4th Street he peeled off, careening only slightly off the side of a brick building.
When he pushed open the door to his apartment twenty minutes later the telephone was rattling in an ear-splitting way on the rickety side table, which Barlow nearly upended in his uncoordinated effort to turn on the light and answer the line at the same time.
“Hallo?” he panted breathlessly, rotating on the spot to untangle himself from the cord and finally collapsing into the ugly armchair at the end of his bed, pulling the base of the phone onto his lap.
“Thomas? What’s happened?”
“Oh, nothing, Iona. M’alright,” he slurred. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Nothing’s the matter.”
“Are you sure? You sound winded.”
“I’ve just come in.”
“Oh?”
There was an uncomfortable pause while she waited for him to elaborate. When he didn’t she went on, “I’ve had a thought about your cello.”
“My what? Oh,” he had to work hard to follow her. “It isn’t mine, Iona.”
“Yes, whatever. Listen,” she said, as Barlow lifted his hips so that he could reach into his pocket and extract his cigarettes, causing the base of the phone to slide off and crash onto the floor, followed by the earpiece.
“Bloody hell,” he mumbled, lighting his cigarette before leaning down to scoop the phone off the floor.
“ – ok? Thomas? What’s going on?”
“Nothing, Iona, just dropped the phone. Sorry. What is it?”
“Are you sure you’re alright? I could come over –,”
“Is that Barlow? What’s wrong with him?” Iona’s husband Larry chimed in in the background.
“Is he ill?”
“I’m FINE!” Barlow bellowed. “Iona,” he said, lowering his voice, “What is it?”
“ – tell him about your idea?” came Larry’s distant voice.
“I’m getting to it, give me a second.” Barlow could picture Iona’s fluttering hands shooing Larry away from the phone.
“Jesus,” he muttered, rubbing his eyes and taking a deep pull on his cigarette.
“Listen, Thomas,” Iona said seriously. “Have you written the appraisal yet?”
“Yes,” he answered.
“And?”
“I think we should brace for the reaction we’re all expecting when he reads it.”
There was silence on the other end of the line, broken by Larry’s whisper, who must have been leaning in close to the phone.
“What did he say? I can’t hear.”
“Ssshhh!” Iona shushed. “I was thinking that you might want to consider seeking a second opinion. Before you give the appraisal to Jon I mean.”
“What do you think I am, Iona?” Barlow said, exasperated. “I am the second opinion!”
There was another short weighty silence, and this time Barlow imagined a meaningful marital look passing between Iona and Larry.
“Thomas, it’s just – if you can avoid a confrontation with Jon, I think we all know that would be in your best interest.”
“Oh, it would, would it?”
“Don’t be an idiot,” Iona snapped, and Barlow straightened in his seat, readying himself for verbal combat.
“How many years has it been since you’ve spoken to him? You’d be a fool to trust him, Thomas, and you know it. He can’t be relied on to act rationally.”
Barlow sat quietly, his intoxicated mind churning begrudgingly back to life. He did know it. He’d known from the moment he’d taken Jon’s call weeks before, that he was inviting something dangerous into his life. He couldn’t say why he’d agreed to Jon’s request for an appointment, except that he had felt in his gut that he had to do it. It was the first true feeling he’d had about anything since the end of the war.
“All I’m saying,” Iona went on, more confidently now that she was sure she had his attention, “is that it couldn’t hurt to have the added weight of an additional opinion when you give him your appraisal.”
“Some back-up, you mean,” Barlow said, an edge in his voice.
“Yes,” Iona said defiantly. “Some back-up.”
Barlow decided that the best way to end the conversation quickly was to play along. He didn’t have to follow her advice if he didn’t want to. “Whose opinion did you have in mind?” he asked, looking around for the ashtray, and in the absence of finding one lifted one foot and squashed the stub of his cigarette out on the sole of his shoe.
“You said this cello was formerly owned by Robert Maas?”
“I did,” Barlow said, bewildered.
“Then I think,” Iona said over Larry’s muffled whisper of “Robert Maas, really?”
“I think that you should go and see Anna Clark.”
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