Compulsion

“Live off divorce money, you got time take lessons.”

“Rich ex.”

“Plastic surgeon. He do her boobies, like what he do, marry her, get to look at it all the time.”

“What’s his name?”

“Who remembers?”

“He marries your cousin and you don’t remember?”

“Jewish guy,” he said. “They get married in Anguilla, no one invited. Five years, she move to a big house in Lawrence, then divorce.”

“She still gets alimony?”

“She live good.”

“Where’s this doctor’s office?”

“Also the Five Towns.”

“Which one?”

“Maybe Lawrence, maybe Cedarhurst.”

“You don’t remember his name.”

“Jew name, some kind of Witz, maybe Markowitz, maybe Leibowitz – no, no, Lefkowitz. Bob Lefkowitz. Plays tennis.” Miming a wide swing.

“So Sonia was seeing Dale Bright while she was married to Dr. Lefkowitz.”

Silence.

I said, “You already told me she was.”

“What I say is she tell me Bright needs apartment.”

“Living with her husband but she kept an apartment on West Thirty-fifth?”

Korvutz looked away. The cords in his neck were miniature bridge struts. “I give her apartment, so what?”

Gigi beelined for another can.

Korvutz said, “Here we go again.”

I said, “What show was Sonia in when she met Dale Bright?”

“Who remembers?”

“Did you see it?”

“She keep saying come. For free. Finally, I have to go. Some stupid place.”

“Downtown?”

“East Village, no theater. Room over a Mexican restaurant, they set up chairs, piano, black drapes. Everyone dressed black, black bathrobes, black hoods. The whole time they run around chanting. At the end, someone throws up. Then you clap.”

“What was the name of the show?”

“Maybe Black Bathrobes and Throwing Up?” Snickering at his own wit.

I pulled out the list I’d gotten from the newspaper files, began reading off titles.

“Yeah,” said Korvutz. “That’s the one, Dark Nose Holiday. What the hell does that mean, Dark Nose? I ask Sonia. She say it’s climb into someone’s brain. Like a tunnel here.” Wiggling a nostril. “In here the truth.” Laughing. “Achoo, eh? No more truth.”

Gigi checked out the flower bed in a towering brick building. I examined the listings for Dark Nose Holiday. The Times was the only paper to capsulize the play. “Neo-absurdist drama exploring mystical meta-motivations.” No cast or credits cited.

I said, “How many people were in the play?”

“This is important?”

“Could be.”

“How many? Four? I don’t know. Not a lot.”

“Was Dale Bright one of the actors?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe?”

“I told you, hoods, the faces you don’t see, maybe it was him, maybe Mickey Mouse.”

“Sonia definitely said she’d met him at the production.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“What else do you know about him?”

“Nothing.”

“When the Safrans disappeared-”

“Uh-uh, no, no, I told you, we don’t go there. They almost ruined my life.”

“The Safrans?”

“The cops. Harassing, I try to do business, they come in the office with badges, bye-bye business. This Italian guy, look like a gangster. Harass ’cause I’m Belarusssian, want to know about smuggling, Moscow Mafia. Stupid.”

“Prejudiced,” I said.

“I keep telling him, look, you not going to find nothing ’cause there is nothing to find.”

Gigi trotted to a discarded cardboard box and lifted her leg.

Korvutz saluted the air above his head. “Finally, dog.”

I said, “The Safrans only interest me because-”

“Good night and good luck. Only reason I talk to you first place I don’t want you bothering my kid no more. Also, I got nothing to hide. You gonna be back in L.A. soon?”

“Soon enough.”

“Say hello to the palm trees.”

“Talking about the Safrans really bothers you.”

Keeping his mouth shut, he blew out air, ballooning the skin around his lips.

I said, “If you’ve got nothing to hide-”

The air escaped in a hiss. “Maybe they fly to the moon. Maybe Ass-kiss do something to them. Do I give a shit? Not even a little one – not even a Gigi shit.”

“Good riddance to bad rubbish,” I said.

“Hey,” he said, “don’t put words in. Why I gonna cry for them? They fight me just to fight me. I run away from all that.”

“From fighting?”

“From communism – little slow dog, finish finish aready.”

“The Safrans were communists.”

“Bother someone else, mister.”

“Is Sonia in town?”

“I should know?”

“Call her. If she can talk to me right now, I’m finished with you.”

“You finished anyway.”

“Call her.”

“Why I do you a favor?”

“Your kid and your dog like me.”

He glared. Laughed. “Why not, Sonia recommend stupid ass-kisser to me, I recommend you to her.”

He left me outside his building, handed the Pomeranian to the doorman, used the house phone. Brief chat; thumbs-up okay.

I mouthed, “Thanks.” Korvutz gave no sign he’d noticed as he crossed the lobby.

The doorman followed. Impassive, as the dog licked his face.