The Girl in the Face of the Clock Read online

  “I’m sure,” said Jane uncertainly, as he got out of the car. “I’ll see you on Monday.”

  “Oh, I forgot to ask,” he said, leaning in the window. “Can you go out of town with me next week?”

  “Go where?”

  “Seattle,” said Perry excitedly. “I’ve just learned about a clock there that I may want to buy. Very rare. We have to act fast, before the competition gets wind of it. Seattle’s a really neat place. We’ll see the Space Needle, Pike’s Market, all kinds of fun stuff. We’ll stay overnight. Or maybe a few days if we feel like it.”

  Jane frowned. Perry Mannerback was already paying her a ridiculous salary to do practically nothing. He was treating her father to a series of exorbitantly expensive medical tests. Now he wanted to take her on what sounded like a vacation. Was a hired playmate allowed to say no? Jane felt obligated and hated it. She had never had a job like this. What were her rights?

  “It’ll be strictly business,” said Perry, misunderstanding her discomfort. “I don’t have any ulterior motives, believe me. I’m not that kind of fellow—no, no, not in this day and age. You don’t have to come if you don’t want to. I just think it will be fun. We’ll fly first class. I always fly first class. You’ll have your own hotel room and everything.”

  “Look, Mr. Mannerback …”

  “Please call me Perry. We’re friends now. Everybody calls me Perry.”

  “Look … Perry,” said Jane, “I appreciate what you’re doing for my father, I really do, but it’s just …”

  “You want to be here when they’re doing the tests, don’t you?” said Perry, trying to snap his fingers. “Of course you do. How could I be so stupid?”

  “No, no, it’s not that,” said Jane. “My being here isn’t going to make any difference. Nothing’s going to make any difference.”

  “You mustn’t say that. There’s always hope.”

  But there wasn’t. Not for her father. Her father was gone, Jane wanted to scream. Why couldn’t anybody admit the truth?

  “All right,” she said in a quiet voice. “I’ll go to Seattle with you.”

  “You will?”

  “I said so, didn’t I?”

  “Wonderful,” said Perry Mannerback, clapping his hands. “We’ll have a great time. Leonid, you take Miss Sailor right over to the hospital to see her father, then wait for her and take her home. She’s got to rest up over the weekend for our big trip.”

  “Yes, Mr. Mennerbeck,” said Leonid from the front seat.

  “We’ll pick you up at your apartment on Monday morning, nine o’clock sharp; our flight’s at ten-thirty. Pack for a few days in case we decide to stay over. We’ll have a lot of fun, you’ll see.”

  Perry marched off into the museum with the same satisfied expression on his face as when he wrote out a check to a struggling Off Off Broadway theatre group or for a child with a leaky heart valve. The limousine inched into traffic. Jane slumped back in her seat.

  There had been altogether too much for her to absorb about Perry Mannerback and his strange, frenetic world in one week. Too many new people. Too many facts. Too many questions. She really did need a weekend to rest, but tomorrow was the evening she had promised to go out to dinner with Dad’s rapacious art dealer, Elinore King. That would be about as restful as a night in a cement mixer.

  Along the way to the hospital, people turned and tried to make out who she was, sitting there in the back of the big black limousine. No, I’m nobody important, Jane wanted to roll down the window and shout. I’m just a poor dope who’s in over her head and doesn’t have the sense to get out.

  Yorkville East End stood out like a castle amidst the elegant apartment buildings of East End Avenue. A few blocks away was the mayor’s residence, Gracie Mansion. In Carl Schurz Park across the street, children played, dogs frolicked, and signs warned of rat poison. Leonid dropped Jane off at the front door of the hospital and went to try to find a place to double-park.

  If Royaume Israel was medical dead storage, Yorkville East End was the front lines of the war against injury and disease. The central waiting room bustled with the kind of well-heeled visitors you expected to see at one of the most prestigious hospitals in the city. Doctors in business suits barked urgent orders into cellular telephones. Others in green scrubs marched down the halls like soldiers on parade. Nurses and orderlies in starched white uniforms pursued various life-and-death missions.

  As instructed by one of the three crisply efficient receptionists at the front desk, Jane followed a yellow line on the floor through a maze of corridors and double doors until she came to a well-lighted wing somewhere at the north end of the sprawling hospital complex. A wall plaque proclaimed this to be the head trauma unit. Here, a nurse at a central station directed Jane to a semi-private room down at the end of the hall, explaining that her father’s tests would start in the morning.

  It was a small room, painted a cheerful apricot, with a pair of windows looking out over the East River. Curtains attached to tracks in the ceiling could be pulled around each of the two beds to give the occupants an illusion of privacy. A television set was mounted on a large extendable metal arm at one side of the room, though the room’s occupants weren’t watching anything, both of them being unconscious and hooked up to banks of electronic monitoring equipment. One was a heavy set African American man whose head was turbaned in bandages and who was breathing laboriously. The other was Aaron Sailor.

  There was an armchair in the corner of the room, next to a tiny desk—in case a patient made a miraculous recovery and wanted to alert the family by letter, perhaps. Jane sat down and stared at her father’s still form. The electronic lines on the monitor attached to various parts of his anatomy moved in lazy patterns that she couldn’t interpret. A few new inscriptions now graced the cast on his arm. One read: “Hearty good wishes for a speedy recovery. Cordially, Benton Contino.” Another said: “So very sorry for your suffering, Reema.”

  Her father’s roommate suddenly started to wheeze a little louder. The lines on his monitor began to do a tango. This man’s injury apparently had been a recent one. Perhaps there was still a chance he could wake up and return to his life and loved ones with nothing more than a big headache and a raise in his health insurance premiums. Jane wondered whether she should call a nurse or something, but the electronic activity soon quieted down.

  Jane sat for a few more minutes, wanting desperately to feel something. Love. Pity. Hope. Nothing came except depression and a vague sense of guilt. Her thoughts drifted to tomorrow night’s dinner with Elinore and her husband. At least she’d get fed, Jane told herself. She could have a couple glasses of wine and beg off early with a headache. And Elinore might even be able to tell her something about the nude in Perry’s painting, the one he had acted so mysterious about. Then, next week, Jane would be on the West Coast with Perry.

  Jane had worked in several different cities in California but never anywhere in the Pacific Northwest. She’d once been up for a job choreographing a season of fights at the Oregon Rep, but they’d gone with somebody else. Seattle was supposed to be a beautiful area and one she’d always wanted to see.

  A trip with Perry might even be fun. Jane never got the chance to fly first class and they were bound to be staying in a nice hotel. She’d be collecting a salary all the while, besides. What was so terrible about that? And what was wrong with Perry Mannerback paying for some of the best doctors in the country to see what they could do for her father?

  As if on cue, a deadened voice from the still figure on the bed interrupted her thoughts.

  “Don’t do it, Perry,” said Aaron Sailor. “No, Perry, no.”

  “Janie, darling” screeched Elinore King, throwing her beefy arms around Jane and kissing the air. “I’m so happy! Here you are! Here we are! Isn’t it wonderful?”

  Jane tried not to look shocked. Though she had spoken to Elinore a few times since the Fyfe Museum had become interested in Aaron Sailor’s work, Jane hadn’t seen her in per
son for nearly eight years. To say Elinore had changed didn’t begin to describe the situation.

  Her father’s dealer was still a few inches shorter than Jane, but she had somehow expanded to three times her previous size. Elinore’s delicate features—the small eyes, little teeth, and tiny turned-up nose that had been pretty the last time Jane had seen her—now looked piggish in her bloated face. What had once been long blond hair was now short and hamster-colored, and so brittle-looking that Jane had to suppress an urge to give it a little squeeze to see if it would break.

  Elinore had stuffed herself into a gray silk Mandarin-style tunic, which might have been exotic on a thin young model, but on Elinore looked like someone’s bad attempt to gift-wrap a barrel. A fifteen-thousand-dollar Rolex graced her wrist. Great globs of gold dangled from her earlobes. Her fingers sparkled with diamonds and rubies in thick settings.

  “Welcome, welcome,” said an eager male voice.

  Elinore spun around like a three-hundred-pound top.

  “I’m saying hello to her, Gregory, just let me say hello. Why are you always interrupting me? He’s always like that, Janie, always interrupting me.”

  “What a wonderful, wonderful pleasure,” said Gregory King, reaching over Elinore to sandwich Jane’s hand in both of his. “Simply fantastic. Elinore’s told me so much …”

  “Please, Greg, please!” said Elinore. “I’m trying to talk to her.”

  Jane had never met Elinore’s husband and was somehow expecting a sleazy huckster type. To her surprise, Gregory King turned out to be a tall, handsome man who looked like Cary Grant had at fifty: sensitive brown eyes, a strong chin, thick black hair with a distinguished touch of gray at the temples. He wore an elegant blue suit, a quietly patterned tie, and a white handkerchief in his breast pocket. His hands were warm and strong.

  “Come on, let’s sit down,” said Elinore, grabbing Jane by the arm and leading her another two steps into the room. “They better have our table ready. Greg, tell them to give us our table. You’re going to love this place, Janie.”

  “You’re going to absolutely love it,” echoed Gregory King happily, motioning to the hostess.

  Jane smiled politely as the woman led them to their table and Elinore rattled on nonstop about how nice it was to see Jane and what a wonderful place this was and how she and Gregory were such an “in” couple, always on the prowl for wonderful new restaurants to take out all the important people that they knew.

  Les Matins was an intimate, one-room affair with no more than twenty tables in a space that had been designed to look like a country farmhouse. The floors were wide pine planks. Baskets hung from the ceiling. A gas fire burned in a tiny fireplace, producing further atmosphere without additional heat.

  “So, let me look at you, Janie,” said Elinore after they had taken their seats. “You’re all grown-up, and you’ve dyed your hair red, isn’t that fun? Now I want to hear everything. What’s been going on with your … you know … that fighting stuff you do and all that? And your dad, how’s he?”

  “He’s fine,” said Jane meaninglessly, still trying to locate Elinore’s old face within all the extra flesh, unable to get over how much she had changed.

  “We used to have marvelous conversations in the old days, your father and I,” said Gregory King, his face suddenly serious. “Very nice man. Really a shame about what happened.”

  Their waitress, a slender and crisply efficient young blonde with the poise of an actress (which she probably was), placed menus in front of them and departed.

  “It’s such a pleasure to finally meet you, Janie, after all these years,” Gregory King went on.

  “Oh, you’ve met her before, Greg,” said Elinore. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “No, he’s right,” said Jane. “We’ve never met.”

  “Well, that’s amazing,” said Elinore, picking something out of her ear. “I thought everyone knew Greg. He’s a doctor, you know. An endocrinologist, whatever the hell that is. Why couldn’t you be a plastic surgeon, that’s what I want to know? That’s where all the money is.”

  “That’s right,” said Greg with a big laugh. “That’s where the real money is. But actually the secretions of the thyroid, the adrenals and the pituitary glands are very …”

  “Everything here is so wonderful,” said Elinore, cutting him off. “We’ll have to have appetizers and everything. And save room for dessert. This dinner is going to cost us an absolute fortune, but you’re worth it, Janie. You’re the daughter of a great painter, you know.”

  Elinore opened her fancy menu and started reading off the dishes and rattling on about how wonderful and fantastic everything was. Jane finally settled on Copper River salmon and wild mushrooms. The Kings opted for the veal. Dr. King ordered a pair of two-hundred-dollar California cabernets against Jane’s protests. Elinore made sure that everyone within earshot understood how much it would cost.

  “So you practice on the East Side?” Jane asked Dr. King when the waitress departed with their orders.

  “He has an office on Park Avenue,” answered Elinore. “For all those people with endocrine problems.”

  Elinore laughed uproariously at her little joke. So did Dr. King. Jane tried to smile.

  “I’m also affiliated with Yorkville East End,” he said proudly.

  “They just brought my father there for tests,” said Jane without thinking. “It’s a very good hospital, I understand.”

  “What kind of tests?” demanded Elinore.

  “Oh, just some tests,” said Jane, mentally kicking herself for bringing it up.

  “I thought he was … that your father was … you know,” said Elinore, waving her hand at the side of her head. Suddenly, her expression changed. “Is there something new? Is he taking a turn for the worse? Oh, my God! Is it, you know? Like … the end?”

  “He just took a fall and has been mumbling things, that’s all,” said Jane.

  “What a relief,” said Elinore, placing one hand over her titanic bosom and fanning herself with the other. “I was worried there for a minute. I thought he was … you know. But is he waking up? Do they think he’s going to wake up?”

  Jane shook her head.

  “My God,” shrieked Elinore, “it must be costing you a mint! That hospital is the most expensive place in town.”

  Jane shrugged.

  “I promise to look in on him this week, Janie,” said Gregory soberly. “See how things are going.”

  “Janie, Jane honey, Jane,” said Elinore, patting Jane’s hand, her piggy eyes sparkling. “I know we’ve maybe had our little differences, but you know I’m your friend, don’t you? We go back … since you were … you know, like a teenager and all. I care about you. I really do. If you want to talk, I’m always there for you. And if you need help with the money, I’m sure we can think of something. I know you don’t have a pot to pee in.”

  “Actually, Perry Mannerback is paying,” said Jane in her sweetest voice. Now that the cat was out of the bag she might as well see where it would run.

  “Perry Mannerback!” exclaimed Elinore, looking genuinely astonished. “How did you get Perry Mannerback to pay?”

  “I didn’t get him to pay. He volunteered. I’m working for him.”

  “No!” said Elinore, falling back against her chair in amazement. “When did this happen?”

  “I called him up to talk about my father and he offered me a job,” said Jane, happy to see Elinore so nonplussed.

  “That’s fantastic,” said Elinore. “Simply fantastic. But I still don’t understand. Why is he paying for Aaron?”

  “Actually, I’m not really sure myself,” said Jane. “Do you know of any reason why my father might be mumbling things about Perry, repeating his name?”

  “I’m thinking,” said Elinore, holding up her fork like a divining rod. “I’m trying to think. But nothing’s happening.”

  “Isn’t this a lovely room?” asked Gregory King. “It reminds me of…”

  “W
ill you please shut up, Greg?” snapped Elinore. “You’re so stupid. What’s the matter with you?”

  “I just …”

  “He’s always like that,” said Elinore to Jane angrily. “He just butts in like the village idiot. It’s really amazing he could get through medical school. Do you know that, Greg? Do you know how stupid you are sometimes?”

  “Yes, yes,” said Gregory, reddening. “That’s probably true. I’m sorry, El.”

  Jane looked away in embarrassment. If the purpose of this evening was to win Jane’s trust, Elinore certainly had a strange way of going about it. Did she really think she would make a better impression by castrating her husband before the appetizer?

  “You know what I think?” declared Elinore, buttering a roll and stuffing it into her mouth.

  “About what?” asked Jane, wondering how she was going to get through an entire evening of this.

  “I think Perry Mannerback is trying to hook up with you so he can get an inside line on more of Aaron’s paintings.”

  Jane couldn’t keep from rolling her eyes, the idea was so ridiculous.

  “No, I’m not kidding,” pressed Elinore. “Perry owns that one painting of Aaron’s and he wants another.”

  “I really don’t think so.”

  “Janie,” said Elinore to Jane, shaking her head. “Darling. Sweetie. You’re a very smart girl. You’re a brilliant girl. But you’re very naïve about a lot of things. You don’t know how these people operate. This Perry Mannerback is a very shrewd and sharp operator. If he’s paying for all these tests for Aaron, he’s not doing it for charity, believe me.”

  “Charity is practically his middle name,” said Jane. “He spends most of his time giving away his money.”

  “Which is why he’s probably looking for a nice painting he can give himself,” said Elinore triumphantly.

  The waitress arrived with their expensive wine at this point, mercifully cutting her short. The next hour was a blur of fancy food, husband-bashing, and Elinore’s opinions about everything under the sun.