Israel (86 page)

Becky laughed, pleased. “I'm glad to see you so happy. I knew Horace would come up with the money. Believe me, he can afford it, and right now I don't think any Jew who is well off could say no.”

“They say no to me, but nobody could refuse you,” Herschel heard himself say. “You are far too lovely.”

Becky looked away, obviously discomforted, and Herschel was embarrassed into chattering. “Yes, you are most definitely a heroine of Zionism. I thought my mother could command a meeting, but you, Becky—one-two-three, you could be the leader of a kibbutz.”

Her laughter sounded grateful, Herschel thought, himself greatly relieved. When Becky lit a cigarette he asked if he could have one, reaching for the pack.

“I thought you didn't smoke.”

“I haven't since prison,” he blurted, and then it was his turn to look away. He toyed with the cigarettes and then put them down. “It was a British prison,” he said weakly, wincing. “I'm talking like a fool. It's the alcohol going to my head, I suppose—that and being here with you in this strange city. I feel I'm dreaming. Anything is possible.”

“I knew about prison,” Becky said. “When we first began working together someone from the Institute approached me and told me you were a terrorist.”

“I'm not. I'm not looking to terrorize anyone. I want only to return to my home and live in peace.”

“I understand that. Tell me about Palestine. What's it like, living in a kibbutz? My husband claims people weren't meant to live like bees in a hive. He says once the necessities
of life are provided, it's only natural to revert to capitalism.” She paused.

“Carl's possessions mean a lot to him, but I don't think I'd mind not owning things very much as long as my work was interesting and everyone was friendly to me.” She searched his face. “What I've read said that everyone on a kibbutz is very protective of one another, that there is no loneliness, no cause for shyness, that everyone takes care of one another.”

“It is like that to a degree,” Herschel replied, “but I wouldn't go so far as to say that there are never any spats. Despite what your husband may think, Socialists are individuals, not insects.”

He began to tell her about his childhood at Degania, about what it was like to be the child of pioneers in a raw, unsettled land. He talked quietly and plainly of the beauty of Palestine and of the pride its people felt in building cities upon the shifting sands and turning swamps into gardens.

It had been so long since he'd let his guard down to speak of his past, his fears and his aspirations. As he spoke he watched Becky's reactions. She listened intently, nodding now and then, asking an occasional question, but mostly looking beautiful in the lambent candlelight, looking approving, looking admiring. Maybe she cared for him a little.

He downed his Scotch and ordered another. He talked of the adolescent, vulgar vitality of Tel Aviv and of the holy serenity of Jerusalem. He talked of orange groves and the Mediterranean, of hiding from the Turks during the First World War and of killing Arabs in defense of Degania later in the service of the Irgun. He talked about his mother and Yol.

If there'd been time, he probably would have found the courage to talk about his father and a certain unmarked grave close to Degania. If there'd been time, he might
have told her that his family name was not Kol, but Kolesnikoff, that his father was able to reach the Holy Land thanks to the kindness of a guardian named Abe Herodetzky, that his father helped sire both Tel Aviv and Degania.

But long before he could bring himself to reveal so much, the waitress came to tell them that the cocktail lounge was closing. Herschel, his throat dry, realized he'd been talking for hours.

Becky let him pay for their drinks. He offered to escort her in a taxi back to her hotel, and she accepted. As they waited for the doorman to flag one he was acutely aware of her arm in his.

In the cab he told her, “Someday you must come to Palestine and see it with your own eyes. Perhaps my country would work its magic on you and you would stay.”

“Oh, what could I do there?”

“You would live, thrive, and the country would thrive with you. In my country what one individual decides to do with life still makes a difference. Perhaps if we are fortunate it always shall.”

“Perhaps some day you'll show me all this beauty first-hand.” Her collar was turned up, framing her face. The cold had brought a blush to her cheeks and her lips looked delicious.

Thought and action became one. His fingers turned her head and tilted up her chin, and then his lips touched hers. She submitted to his kiss, or seemed to submit, but then she pushed him away and turned her head to the window.

“Y-you shouldn't have done that.”

Her voice was hushed; was it a whisper or a sob?

“I love you,” Herschel said, as surprised as she but sure it was the truth.

“No, you don't, Herschel. That's just the whiskey
and the night and your own loneliness talking. Believe me, I know.” She was still turned away.

“You must not be angry with me, Becky.”

“I'm not.” She turned to look at him and squeezed his hand. “Listen to me. I'm married. I love my husband very much. You are far away from your home. You've grown fond of me because you're lonely. That's all right, Herschel. I've grown fond of you as well.”

“Then let me make love to you, Becky.”

“Try and understand, Herschel. This isn't easy for me to say.” She stroked his cheek. “I want to too, but I won't. All I have that matters besides my work is my honor. If I betray my husband, my honor will be gone.”

“We are so distant from New York. He would never know—”

“I would know.”

“Perhaps he cheats on you,” Herschel said, frustrated and angry. If she wished to love him, why wouldn't she?

“I don't think he does.” Becky smiled. “But it wouldn't matter if he did. If all the world cheated, I still wouldn't. All I've got is my work and my honor.”

The hotel loomed and the doorman was approaching.

“It doesn't matter, really,” Herschel whispered. “In our circumstances just saying you wished to is as important as doing it.”

Then the doorman had the door open and Becky was getting out. “Good night, Herschel,” she said. Then she was gone, leaving behind the lingering fragrance of her perfume.

Herschel gave the driver the address of his pension and the taxi pulled away. Now that Becky was gone and the Scotch was wearing off, Herschel began to wonder if he hadn't done something worse than act like a fool. He wondered if he had done something dreadful to Becky.

He was mortified; he pressed his hot, flushed forehead
to the cool glass of the taxi window. He had repaid her efforts to save his country by groping at her as if she were a whore.

He spent a fitful, sleepless night with his recriminations. The next day he scribbled a note of abject apology and sent it off with some flowers to Becky at her hotel. The flowers came back to the florist, who reported to Herschel that Mrs. Pickman had checked out of the hotel early that morning.

Herschel understood. She had left Toronto because she could not bring herself to see him again. He didn't blame her; he hated himself for his behavior.

During his appointment with Max Ross the engineer mentioned that it was a hell of a thing about Mrs. Pickman's husband.

“What do you mean?” Herschel asked.

“I guess you haven't heard.” Ross shrugged. “I only found out because I talked to Horace Crown this morning. They found Carl Pickman dead last night.”

“The housekeeper says Carl went out for his walk around six Wednesday night, and the doorman remembers warning him to mind the ice on the sidewalks.” Norman Collins shook his head. “What I don't understand is why Carl would have wanted to go out for a stroll on a cold, dark November night.”

“He'd been having bad headaches during the day.” As Becky spoke she struggled to keep her tone emotionless and her grief and shock under control. “They went away toward evening. Wednesday night he'd probably been feeling better and wanted some air.”

It was Friday morning and Becky was in Norman Collins' walnut-paneled study. The lawyer was in his sixties, a short, slender man with an abundance of snow-white, fluffy hair and a walrus mustache. He favored fancy walking sticks and tweedy country squire suits custom tailored in
England. For the past three decades he had been Carl's attorney and his closest friend.

“I'm sorry about the autopsy, Becky,” Collins told her. “There was nothing I could do to prevent it. The authorities were adamant. It's not every day a man of Carl's stature is found lying dead in a city park. I'm just glad that I was able to keep most of this out of the newspapers.”

Becky nodded. “I understand and I'm grateful for everything.”

Collins called her in Toronto late Wednesday night with the terrible news and made reservations for her on the first flight home Thursday morning. He sent his limousine to meet her at the airport and all that day he dealt with the authorities while Becky made the funeral arrangements. The burial was at four, just before sunset.

“Don't forget that Carl was my friend,” Collins said, waving aside her expressions of gratitude, “and don't forget that I'm your friend as well. It's been years since Carl introduced us so I could look after that building of yours downtown. I must admit that initially I concerned myself with it purely as a favor to Carl. Even then I could sense that you were quite special to him.”

Becky nodded, swallowing hard, choking down her grief. All last night and the night before she had cried. Tonight she would wander the empty apartment on Central Park West and cry some more. Her tears were private, however.

“As best we can reconstruct it, Carl entered Central Park, slipped on some ice and rolled down an embankment. The fall broke his left hip. It was just bad luck that nobody came down that path in time to help him. The blood clot had been in his brain for quite some time, I'm told. Perhaps panic brought on the stroke. We'll never know. A gentleman out walking his dog about nine o'clock Wednesday evening discovered him and called the police.”

*     *     *

The funeral was private. Phil Cooper was there. Becky spent a few tense moments with Gertrude Hoffer Pickman and her two young daughters and with Carl's sisters and their husbands. Then she moved away to sit with her father and brother.

Notes and telegrams of condolence were delivered to the apartment. In lieu of flowers, mourners were requested to make donations to the Gertrude Hoffer Pickman Museum fund, which Carl had chartered the previous summer. Carl was not religious, and neither was Becky. There would be no sitting shiva for a week. Carl's death had thrown Pickman's into disarray. She was needed at the store, and the best way she knew to honor his memory was to work night and day to make the store prosper.

On Tuesday morning she issued a staff memorandum thanking them for their expressions of sympathy and announcing that she would be assuming the post of president. That same day she began her move into Carl's office. By Friday she expected to be settled in. She had no plans to redecorate the office; she wanted it exactly the way Carl left it.

Thursday night Becky received a telephone call at home from Norman Collins; he asked her to come to his office on Friday morning. It seemed that there was some confusion as to whether Becky was the store's majority stockholder.

“I don't understand.” Becky frowned at Collins across his paper-strewn desk. “I do inherit Carl's seventy percent of Pickman's, don't I? Is his ex-wife contesting that?”

Collins sighed. “Carl's divorce settlement was quite explicit about what Gertrude and the girls would receive. No, Becky, Gertrude isn't contesting anything. She doesn't have to.”

“Norman, please, just explain. I don't care about anything but the store. As Carl's widow it seems to me—”

“Hold it,” Collins said. “First of all, I loved Carl, but sometimes he was as stubborn as a mule, and this, unfortunately, was one of those times. Carl's sisters have fifteen percent each, and nineteen percent of the store is held in trust for his two daughters. Carl was to control those shares until they were twenty-one, a decade from now, but with his death those shares are now controlled by Gertrude.”

“I see, but what's the problem? I still have Carl's fifty-one percent, which makes me the majority stockholder. Right, Norman?”

Collins stared at her, saying nothing. Becky lit a cigarette. “Norman, if you don't stop this sadistic teasing and tell me what's what I swear I'll scream.”

The attorney nodded in satisfaction. “Then you don't know. I was hoping you didn't. I felt betrayed, you see. Becky, behind our backs Carl assigned ten percent to Philip Cooper. He went to another attorney to have their agreement drawn up. He probably figured that if I handled it, there would be a greater likelihood of your finding out about it.”

Becky stood up and went to the windows. She stared down at the lanes of Park Avenue traffic disappearing into the mammoth portals carved into the base of the building. “I understand why he did it, Norman. You see, he lied to me about how happy Philip was that I was being made general manager. He was always so protective of me—he would have done anything to keep me from knowing he had to bribe Philip to accept me.”

“Becky, come sit down. I'm afraid it gets worse.” When Becky had returned to her chair he said, “The other attorney made a bad mistake. The agreement stated that Philip Cooper had to sell back all of his shares if he ever left Pickman's and that he could never vote against Carl, but no mention was made of what was to become of those shares if Carl should die.”

“Oh, my God.”

“Philip now has autonomy to vote his shares as he wishes. You have only forty-one percent in your control, Becky. If Gertrude and Carl's sisters vote together to oust you from the presidency, and there's every reason to think they shall, the vote will be their forty-nine percent to your forty-one.”