“It’s a good one,” she said. She stretched her hand toward him. “Want the change?”
“You keep it.”
She smiled brightly. “Thanks.”
For the next few minutes they sat together silently while Lucy finished off the pretzel. Some sort of band was beginning to set up on the orchestra shell. They were all dressed in black shirts and trousers. From the look of their instruments, it was going to be a fully electrified performance. Tangles of thick black wire hung over the side of the platform or spread out in ever-widening coils along the stage itself.
“It’s the Heebee-Jeebees,” Lucy informed him. “It’s heavy metal.”
“I see.”
“You wouldn’t like it.”
“I might.”
Lucy shook her head determinedly. “No, you wouldn’t.”
“I like all kinds of music,” Corman insisted.
“Not this,” Lucy said. She got to her feet. “Let’s go.”
She was pedaled away in an instant. Corman trailed after her, following her out of the esplanade then around the park again. He thought she might wheel back around the band shell, but she continued on, past the wide wet expanse of the Sheep Meadow, then to the whirling carousel, and still onward around the park, circling it again and again, stopping only once, briefly, near the exit at 72nd Street, where a lone troubadour stood almost within the dark shadow of the Dakota, crooning one John Lennon song after another, as if in perpetual reverence for the things he had imagined.
Toward early afternoon, Corman called Edgar and told him to bring Giselle to the large playground near the southern end of the park. They arrived a few minutes later, Giselle bounding happily ahead while her father lumbered behind, his somewhat portly body wrapped in a Humphrey Bogart-style trenchcoat and floppy hat.
Edgar glanced doubtfully at the bench as he came toward it. “Is this thing dry?”
“As much as it’s going to get,” Corman said.
“Okay,” Edgar said as he sat down. He pulled off his hat and slapped it against his knee, then abruptly stopped himself. “Christ, Dad used to do that.”
Corman said nothing.
“It’s weird,” Edgar added. “The stuff we pick up.”
Lucy and Giselle rushed up to the bench, hand in hand.
“Can we climb the rock?” Lucy asked.
Edgar looked hesitant. “That’s pretty high.” He cast an evaluating glance at Giselle. “You sure you won’t fall?”
Lucy squeezed her cousin’s hand. “I’ll watch her.”
“Let Giselle watch after herself,” Corman said.
Edgar unnecessarily straightened the collar which circled Giselle’s throat. “Just be careful,” he said to her. “And watch for glass.”
The two girls nodded obediently, then darted toward the immense gray stone which rested at the other side of the playground.
Edgar turned to Corman, smiled. “So, how you doing these days?”
“Okay.”
“Still shooting the city?”
“Yeah.”
“I cover the waterfront,” Edgar said, his standard line for Corman’s work. “Shot anything interesting lately?”
Corman thought of the woman, the blue blanket, nodded.
Edgar didn’t go into it. “I’m handling that plane crash outside Las Vegas. It’s a real tangle. Multimillion-dollar damages. Excluding punitive.”
“How’s Frances?”
“Sick,” Edgar said wearily. “Like always.” He shrugged. “The whole thing could be in her head.”
“I doubt it.”
“I’m not so sure,” Edgar admitted. “But what can you do? Nobody can get to the root of it.” He stroked his sleek, clean-shaven chin. “When you get to be our age, things start to break down.”
“She’s only thirty-seven,” Corman reminded him.
“With some people, it starts early,” Edgar said casually. He glanced toward the rock. Lucy and Giselle had nearly made it to the top. “If she gets hurt, Frances’ll kill me,” he said.
Corman’s eyes drifted toward the traffic on Fifth Avenue, for an instant envisioning the carriage parades of the old city, opera singers in their barouches, couples in sleek white phaetons, the elegant black victoria of Madame Restell, the Avenue’s luxuriant abortionist.
After a moment, Edgar touched his knee gently. “It really is good to see you, David. We should see each other more often.”
Corman nodded. “Victor, too.”
Edgar frowned, waved his hand sourly. “Forget Victor. He’s in his own world.”
“You always say that.”
Edgar shrugged. “Anyway, as far as we’re concerned, the two of us, we should get together more often.”
Corman said nothing.
“But your work,” Edgar added tentatively. “It keeps you busy.”
“Yours, too.”
“But you’re out at night again,” Edgar said. He looked at Corman pointedly. “Or am I wrong about that?”
“Sometimes I work at night.”
“Sometimes? Or is it pretty much a permanent thing?”
“It varies.”
“Two, three nights a week?”
Corman sat back slightly, stared evenly into his brother’s eyes. “Why all the questions about how often I’m out at night?” he asked.
Edgar laughed edgily. “You’ve got a good eye,” he said. “You always had a good eye.”
“What’s on your mind, Edgar?”
Edgar cleared his throat sharply, glanced away, then returned his eyes to Corman. “I got a call from Lexie. She’s making noises. Like a couple of years ago.”
“About Lucy?”
“Yes.”
“What is it this time?”
“She wants to talk to you about a few things. She’s a little concerned about how things are working out.”
“Things are fine.”
“She doesn’t see it that way.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t know where she gets her information,” Edgar said. “But she knows you’ve gone back to working nights.”
“How could she know that? It couldn’t be Lucy. She knows to keep quiet.”
“No, I don’t think it came from Lucy.”
“Frances,” Corman blurted. “It must be Frances.”
“It could be,” Edgar admitted reluctantly. “She doesn’t mean to let things slip, but sometimes she gets on the phone with Lexie and, you know how it is, the ladies exchange information.”
“So she’s told Lexie I’m working nights again?”
Edgar nodded. “You’re not supposed to be working nights, David. You know that. It’s part of the custody arrangement.”
“I don’t have a choice right now.”
