Victor lit the cigarette and waved out the match. “Why?”
“Most things don’t sell,” Corman told him. “That’s just the way it is.”
“The artistic life,” Victor said. “It’s a tough business. But then, you knew that when you started, right?”
“Yes.”
The waiter brought the coffees then disappeared behind the counter at the far end of the room.
Victor took a sip, his eyes watching Corman thoughtfully from over the rim of the cup. “You giving up, David?” he asked, as he lowered the cup to the table.
“On what?”
“The adventurous life.”
“It’s never been that adventurous.”
Victor took another drag on the cigarette, then crushed it into the ashtray. “Just make sure you keep your edge. That’s all you’ve got. It’s all anybody’s got. People should spend their time sharpening it, instead of flattening it out.”
Corman said nothing.
Victor looked at him solemnly. “I mean it, David. You lose that, and you’re nothing. Just a shutterbug with bills to pay.”
Corman let him go on about it for a few minutes after that, watching his face, the glint in his eyes, the way his fingers moved constantly, first drumming lightly on the table, then ceaselessly massaging the fork, spoon, cube of sugar, anything they settled on. A picture would reduce him to a caricature of the middle-aged hustler, the rogue male on parade, childless, wifeless, the nomadic habitue of countless resort hotels. And yet, as Corman remembered it, he had never been entirely wrong about anything.
“The edge is all there is,” Victor concluded finally. “It’s the thing you have to nurture.” He waited for Corman to respond.
Corman took a sip of coffee and said nothing.
“So, how’s Edgar?” Victor asked after a moment.
“The same.”
“Frances still the typical neurasthenic?”
“More or less.”
Victor shook his head. “Pure bathos, those two.”
Corman’s eyes drifted toward the table where two sets of initials were carved inside a jagged heart. It struck him that if the world made sense, only the most courageous natures would risk such public declarations. The rest would move about as Victor did, never tying their lives with such exquisite jeopardy to anyone, victimized by nothing but the cowardice of solitude.
“So what do they do, Edgar and Frances?” Victor asked, with a slight laugh.
“They manage,” Corman said.
Victor laughed again. “Manage? Is that the goal? To manage? Christ. The last time I saw Frances, she was boiling. I mean it, a blink away from humping the doorman.”
Corman turned away slightly.
“And she’d be better off if she did, too,” Victor added flatly.
Corman looked back toward him. “Do you ever think about Mississippi?”
Victor stared at him wonderingly. “What?”
“The way you lived in those days,” Corman said.
Victor’s face softened slightly. “Sometimes,” he said quietly. Then he smiled. “In fond remembrance.”
“I remember all your stories.”
Victor looked pleased. “Really?”
“Yes,” Corman said. “I think they made a difference.”
“In the world?”
“In me.”
Victor studied Corman’s face silently, his eyes narrowing very slightly before he spoke. “What’s the matter, David?” he asked solemnly. “I can tell something’s wrong.”
Corman shrugged.
Victor leaned forward and touched his hand. “I’m your brother. What is it?”
Corman drew in a long, slow breath. “Lexie wants me to let Lucy live with her and Jeffrey out in Westchester,” he said.
Victor brought his hands together on the table. “When did she tell you?”
“She told Edgar. He passed it on to me.”
“Is he representing you?”
“If it goes to court.”
“Will it?”
“I don’t know,” Corman said. “That’s up to Lexie.”
“So she’s just asking you, is that it?”
“That’s what Edgar thinks.”
“What are you going to say?”
“I’m not sure I have much to say,” Corman told him. “My work is off. Trang’s going to evict me. Lucy’s school is lousy. I know what they could give her.”
Victor started to speak, drew back, then began again. “I don’t know what to tell you, David. You know how I live. On the lam, more or less. I stay with a woman for a month, two on the outside. Kids are things I see on milk cartons. You know, the Missing.”
Corman nodded.
Victor shook his head slowly. “Mississippi. Why’d you bring that up? Christ, that was another world.” He picked up a fork and raked his index finger across the prongs. “It should have lasted. You could have come down when you got old enough, left the old man, worked with me in the Great Cause.”
Corman smiled. “I dreamed of that.”
Victor drew in a deep, faintly resigned breath. “But it died before we did,” he said, then smiled knowingly. “Most things do, right?” The smile withered. “And nothing stinks like a dead cause, you know?”
Corman nodded. “How long will you be in New York?”
“A few days,” Victor said. “I was thinking of taking Lucy out tonight. Maybe pick her up at school. Dinner and a show, something like that. Any objections?”
“No.”
“Still don’t think I’m a bad influence?”
“No more than most.”
Victor laughed sharply, then grew serious. “I wish you luck on this one, David. I know what she means to you.”
Corman said nothing.
Victor let his eyes linger on him for a few seconds, then he took a final sip of coffee and motioned for the check. “I guess you’d better get to work.”
“Yeah,” Corman said, then quickly drained the last of his coffee, too.
They walked out of the diner together and got into the car.
“Where do you want me to drop you?” Victor asked as he hit the ignition.
For a moment, Corman wasn’t sure himself, then he remembered the picture he’d taken in the basement of Midtown North, the small crumpled receipt. “A blood bank on the Bowery,” he said.
Victor’s eyes shot over to him. “Christ, David, you’re not …”
Corman shook his head. “No, not me,” he said. “Just something I’m working on.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
