The Garden of Betrayal (6 page)

The Kingdom was Saudi Arabia, and their concern was easy to understand. Fifteen of the nineteen September 11 hijackers had been Saudis, a fact that made the royal family nervous as hell about political repercussions. The Saudis lived in a bad neighborhood, and they needed America for security.

“Is there any reason to think Saudi nationals were involved?”

“Not that I know of,” he said. “I have to answer a call on my other line. Stay in touch.”

I slipped my phone back into my jacket pocket, inclined to accept his explanation at face value. Rashid’s position with OPEC made him dependent on the goodwill of the more influential member states, which was the primary reason he swapped information with me. It helped him to be in the know about matters of interest to his constituents.

I tipped the driver a five when we finally got to my building, spent a couple of minutes bemoaning the Knicks with the doorman, and then rode the elevator up to my floor. The elevator car is antique mahogany banded by brass, the lower panels scuffed and scratched by generations of strollers and scooters and teenage roughhousing. As always, my eyes were drawn to a ding beneath the operating panel that an excited Kyle had left with a carelessly handled baseball bat when he was eleven. I touched the ding sometimes, when I was alone. The junk mail the super intercepted made me sad, because it reminded me of all the things I’d never get to do with my son—to teach him to shave, or to visit colleges with him, or to slip him a little extra money so he could take a girl to a concert and a nice dinner. But the ding in the elevator made me happy. He’d gotten three hits the morning he made it, and his coach had awarded him the game ball. It had been a great day, one that I liked to remember.

I could hear Claire on the piano as the elevator approached our
floor. A violin began playing with the piano as the elevator doors opened, and then a second violin joined, contrapuntal to the first. The performers were likely Claire, Kate—and who? Opening my apartment door, I saw an NYU backpack on the floor and abruptly recalled something Claire had told me a few days ago—that she, Kate, and a college kid from NYU were scheduled to perform together in a holiday recital at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, the hospital where Claire was the volunteer director of the arts program. Hanging up my coat, I headed for the living room.

The black Yamaha baby grand I’d given Claire as a wedding gift had been rolled out of the corner where it usually sat. Claire was on the bench, leaning slightly forward as she played. Her shoulders were pulled back, her torso balanced over her hips and her forearms precisely parallel to the floor. Both the piano and the bench were custom-built; Claire suffered near-constant back pain if she wasn’t seated correctly. Facing her were Kate and a tall, skinny Asian boy wearing wire-rimmed glasses. Kate had lost her baby fat as a teen, and her hair had lightened, but she still had Claire’s Mediterranean coloring and full features. The combination gave her a slightly exotic look, like a blond Roman. She’d grown as well, towering over her mother and only a few inches shy of my six feet. Despite her height and her slim, womanly figure, she’d seemed a child to me until recently. Something had changed, and it wasn’t just that we’d been filling out college applications together—there was a new maturity to her, a poise she hadn’t had before.

Claire’s head was turned from me, but Kate spotted me and wiggled the pinky finger on her bow hand. The boy smiled politely. I nodded to both of them, loosened my tie, and settled on the couch to listen. They were playing a Bach concerto. Assuming they played straight through, it had about ten minutes to go.

My eyes drifted back to Claire. Hearing her piano from the elevator had reminded me of our early days together. We met at a SoHo gallery opening that a colleague had cajoled me into attending. His girlfriend was the artist. I’d stationed myself next to the small buffet, trying to look like I was waiting for someone, and counted down the minutes until I could leave without offending anyone. A slender, dark-haired woman walked up and scrutinized the food on the table. She had on black jeans, a black T-shirt, and black ballet slippers. It was a downtown ensemble, more austere than I usually found attractive, but her forearms
were toned and graceful, and I noticed that she had delicate wrists. She put her hands on her hips and frowned, pale lips drawn down into an exaggerated moue.

“Problem?” I asked, surprising myself by speaking.

“The amaretto cookies are gone.”

Most of the amaretto cookies were in my stomach, a casualty of my boredom. I made a hasty attempt to change the subject.

“You come to a lot of openings here?” It came out sounding like a line, and I winced.

“Yes. I know the owner. I watch the gallery for her sometimes.” Her gaze flicked down my body and back to my face. I’d arrived straight from work, dressed in a boxy Brooks Brothers suit, duty-free Hermès tie, and scuffed loafers. “Banker, right?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Pretty much. Plus, Anna’s dating a banker,” she said, naming my colleague’s girlfriend, “and you look like you got roped into attending by a friend of the artist.”

“There’s a specific look for that?”

“More of a behavior. The biggest clue is hanging around the buffet table alone and eating all the amaretto cookies.”

She delivered the line deadpan, and I couldn’t tell if she was flirting or genuinely annoyed.

“Busted,” I said lightly. “What can I do to make it up to you?”

She folded her arms and tipped her head to one side.

“Are you being polite, or do you really want to know?”

I had the strong sense that she was about to tell me to fuck off back to Wall Street, but I liked her directness and the casual once-over she’d given me, and the way her black jeans rode low on her narrow waist, so I fed her the straight line anyway.

“I really want to know.”

“There’s a biscotteria on Mott Street that bakes everything fresh.”

Mott Street was in Little Italy, only a couple of blocks away. I did a quick check of the room, working hard to keep a stupid grin off my face. The gallery was full, the opening a success.

“Mark Wallace,” I said, offering her my hand. “I don’t think anyone’s going to miss us. We could walk over there now, if you’d like.”

“Claire Rossi,” she answered, smiling demurely. “Now would be lovely.”

I expected the biscotteria to be a bare-bones bakery with a couple of Formica tables and an apron-clad proprietor, but the place she led me to was an immense pastry palace, with marble counters, an espresso machine that looked like a church organ, and tuxedoed waiters who sang opera. All the staff knew her, and we were serenaded twice. It would have been awkward if she hadn’t been so clearly enjoying herself.

“I was at Juilliard with the owner’s son,” she explained, after a small man with a huge mustache sang us the Toreador song from
Carmen
.

“You’re a musician?”

“A pianist.”

“Is that something you always wanted to do?”

She nodded.

“Why?”

Her eyes narrowed quizzically.

“I mean, was there a pianist you really admired when you were young, or did one of your parents play, or did you have a great teacher, or something like that?”

She smoothed her hair, not making eye contact. I had the sense I’d misstepped, but I didn’t know how.

“I’d love it if you played for me sometime,” I said, trying to get the conversation back on track.

“For you?” she asked, with a hint of her previous assertiveness.

“As a swap. I’ll do something for you.”

“What?”

“Whatever you want.”

She laughed, and I felt relieved.

“You have any talents?”

“Beyond analyzing financial reports and building spreadsheets?”

“Right. Beyond that. I build my own spreadsheets.”

“Guy stuff. Opening jars, hanging shelves, burning breakfast.”

“Hmm …” She took a pen from her purse and scribbled something on a napkin. She pushed it toward me and stood up. “I’ll think about it. I have to go now. Give me a call sometime.”

I stayed to finish my coffee, toying with the napkin and wondering how soon I could phone without seeming too eager. Her sudden departure had left me edgy and heated. I called the next morning. We went on a second date, and a third. I was working a hundred hours a week, but sleep soon became less important to me than being with her. I saw her
giggly, and tender, and tearful, and passionate. But she never offered to play for me, and—much as I wanted to—I never asked again, convinced she was still thinking about it, for reasons of her own. Her gift on the two-month anniversary of our visit to the biscotteria was a key to the Chelsea ballet studio where she was employed evenings, and the murmured information that she stayed on to practice most nights, after the dancers went home.

I left my office at midnight the next day, catching the E train from the World Trade Center to Twenty-third Street, winding my way north and west through deserted warehouse blocks to a drafty industrial building on the West Side Highway. The sound of her piano echoed down the stairwell like a beacon, and my heart pounded as I climbed toward it. Opening the door to the studio, I saw her on the bench and abruptly understood why she’d been puzzled by my question about becoming a pianist. She played as if transported, hands confident and face rapturous. She’d been born to be a pianist. The joy her music elicited in me was tainted by fear. Her deepest self was rooted in a world that a nonmusician like myself could never fully appreciate. She noticed me at the door, and the piano fell silent as she rose to greet me.

We made love on a blanket on the hardwood floor. After, we sat up against the wall in the dark, the blanket wrapped around us like a cloak. The entire western wall of the studio was glass, and we could see out over the highway and the abandoned piers to the Hudson River beyond. The lights of Hoboken glinted on the turbulent water, and the passing tugs and barges looked like toys. We shared small secrets, whispering for the pleasure of feeling conspiratorial.

“Not so much,” I said, when she asked if I’d been lonely as a boy. We were both only children. “I invented a baseball game that I used to play with dice, my team against historical teams or whoever was in town to play the Yankees. I kept box scores and statistics, and was always tinkering with the rules to try to make the probabilities work out like the real game.”

“It sounds like you were lonely.”

“Maybe,” I admitted. “What about you?”

“Pretty much the same. I was always daydreaming. My big fantasy when I was twelve was that I was married to a famous cellist and that we had a child who was a prodigy on the violin. We toured Europe as a family trio, and everywhere we went, people applauded and threw flowers.
I had a whole schedule of performances worked out, that I took from a library book about Jenny Lind.”

Her recollection crystallized the apprehension that had been weighing on me since I’d opened the studio door—that she’d be happy only with someone who shared her passion and ability. I was afraid to ask what she daydreamed about now.

“Jenny Lind,” I repeated, to fill the uncomfortable pause in the conversation. An indistinct memory came back to me. “The Swedish Canary?”

“The Swedish Nightingale.” She dug an elbow into my ribs. “One of the greatest sopranos ever. Philistine.”

“Sorry,” I said, feeling her breast warm against my arm as I warded her off. My desire was rising again. “And what about the kid? Boy prodigy or girl prodigy?”

“I could never decide. If it was a girl, I was afraid she’d be prettier than me. But if it was a boy, I wouldn’t have anyone to go to the bathroom with, and the idea of going by myself in a foreign country scared me.”

I managed a laugh, screwing up my courage as I nuzzled her neck.

“No one could be prettier than you. But you have a bigger problem now.”

“What’s that?”

“You’re dating a guy who’s never played anything except a kazoo.”

I held my breath as I waited for her reply. She kissed my face, hands roaming gently.

“Maybe a boy and a girl, then,” she sighed. “Both on the violin, so they can practice together. And a husband to applaud and throw flowers.”

“And teach them about baseball?” I asked, elated.

She nodded.

“I can do that,” I said, pulling her closer. “Nobody throws flowers like me.”

An uncomfortable tightness in my chest was just dissipating when the concerto finished. Claire struck a bittersweet Picardy third and then held the major chord with the right pedal as Kate and the boy drew their bows downward in unison, echoing her. I waited for the reverberations
to die, took a measured breath, and then stood and clapped enthusiastically. Claire smiled discreetly in my direction before starting to tidy her music, but Kate tucked her violin beneath one arm and bowed low, sweeping her free hand up and out with an operatic flourish. Straightening with a grin, she tapped the boy on his shirtfront with her bow.

“This is Phil,” she said. “He goes to NYU.” She pointed the bow toward me. “And this is my dad.”

Phil winced and rubbed his chest before extending a hand to me, grimacing at Kate in mock reproach. She rolled her eyes and gave him a sidelong smirk that instantly tripped my father alarm. I hadn’t really had to deal with boys much yet—Kate wasn’t particularly social. I’d quietly been rooting for her to meet someone she liked, concerned that she might be keeping close to home because she thought Claire and I needed her, or because she was afraid of exposing herself to another loss. Shaking Phil’s hand, though, I realized I wasn’t entirely ready for the reality of a guy in my living room—particularly someone older than her.

“NYU’s a great school,” I said. “What year are you in?”

“Sophomore,” he answered. “Kind of.”

“Phil took a year off to travel,” Kate explained, “but he’ll be a junior next semester because he’s been taking a heavy course load and he had a bunch of AP credit.”

Which made him nineteen or twenty, two or three years Kate’s senior. I let the thought roll around in my head, trying to decide how I felt about it. He seemed like a nice enough kid—no visible tattoos or piercings, a decent violinist, and a hospital volunteer. I was wondering what his father did for a living when it occurred to me that I was getting ahead of myself.