Keith Thomson - Once a spy

“An interesting piece of information is that there are one hundred and fifty species of trees in Prospect Park,” Drummond said. Once, he was a spigot of “interesting pieces of information,” which, Charlie always thought, should have been billed only as “pieces of information.”

Drummond was a shell of his old self, and out of whack in general, but the hour-long nap outside Helen’s office seemed to have energized him. His eyes were clearer and there was vitality to his step-taken in shoes a half size too large, procured by Helen, along with a woolen overcoat.

“Say, let’s let the taxicabs go on past and walk home through the park,” he said. “It’s such a nice afternoon.”

It was dreary and forty degrees tops.

“Great idea,” said Charlie. He would have agreed to do just about anything in order to capitalize on Drummond’s relative and possibly fleeting coherence. He needed him to sign the boilerplate durable power of attorney document hot off Helen’s laser printer.

Drummond spun abruptly and stared at a Department of Housing worker a half block behind them. The man was gazing into a pizzeria.

“Do you ever have the feeling people are following you?” Drummond whispered to Charlie.

Charlie had learned from Helen that paranoia was to Alzheimer’s what sniffles were to a cold. “When I’m getting on the bus,” he said.

Seeming to have forgotten all about the man, Drummond turned and resumed his course to the park. “Ah, a sycamore maple!” he said, pointing at the branches spilling over the gate.

In summertime, when attendance peaked and with the musicians, jugglers, and balloon sellers in full force, entering Prospect Park at the Flatbush and Empire gate was like walking into a parade. Now, as Charlie bought a pair of hot dogs and he and Drummond settled onto a bench to eat them, the crowd was limited to the lonesome vendor, a homeless man perched on a wall blowing into fingerless gloves, and a trio of construction workers quietly sipping cans of beer wrapped in paper bags.

A young father and a beaming little boy passed, hand in hand, probably on their way to the playground or the zoo or the carousel. Charlie was reminded how badly he’d wanted to go to those places as a kid. Drummond took him only to the historic house, where the butter-churning demonstration was as fun as it got.

Charlie tasted the same bitter regret now, which made broaching the topic of institutionalizing his father no harder than asking him to pass the ketchup.

“Dad, I think you’d do well to live somewhere with people to look out for you.”

Drummond happily tore open his third ketchup packet. “Why is that?”

“You remember the business with the Meals on Wheels van, right?”

Drummond was focused on squeezing the ketchup onto his hot dog. Charlie felt like he was talking over a lousy long distance connection.

“Meals on Wheels, Dad?”

“Right, right. I suppose that in another culture, I’d be shoved out to sea on an ice floe about now, correct?”

Charlie hadn’t anticipated nearly as much awareness. He hurried to unpocket the document. “Signing this gives me your power of attorney.”

“That’s reasonable, I suppose. What do you have in mind for me?”

“Helen recommended a few assisted-living residences.”

“Eh. Those places are just waiting rooms for the cemetery.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Charlie opened the manila envelope Helen had given him. “I personally would be delighted to move into any of these.” He passed four brochures to Drummond, who grudgingly accepted.

They could have been mistaken for glossy advertisements for resorts, and the names would have done little to correct the misimpression-the Greens at Four Oaks, Mountain View Lodge, the Orchard, Holiday Ranch. Each brochure brimmed with striking, full-color photo graphs of ascendant suns igniting dewy fairways, hiking trails through forests at the blazing peak of New England autumn, and lakes that outshone most gems. Only Holiday Ranch hinted on the cover that it was a senior citizens facility, billing itself as “An Active Retirement Residence!”

“According to Helen, Holiday Ranch is incredible across the board,” Charlie said. “But the really incredible part is they’ve just had an opening, which hardly ever-”

“What I want is to go to Switzerland,” Drummond cut in. He pushed the brochures away as if they were junk mail.

“Switzerland?” Helen had said that Drummond initially thought he was in Geneva. As far as Charlie knew, Drummond had never been to Europe. Also Charlie couldn’t recall him ever mentioning Switzerland, save a purportedly interesting piece of information about cheese. “What is it with you and Switzerland?”

“I don’t know anything about it.”

“For one thing, you just said you wanted to go there.”

“Oh, that, yes. The facility I had in mind is in Geneva.”

“That sounds great, but I have a feeling your financial picture doesn’t include Geneva. Other than the one upstate.”

“I can afford to go wherever I want,” Drummond said with uncharacteristic defiance.

Helen had warned of delusions. “My guess is we’re going to need to wring every cent we can out of Medicare to swing any of these places,” Charlie said, “and that’s before the shuffleboard fees. And assuming that Perriman Appliances has a decent pension plan. And that you get top dollar for your house.”

Drummond dismissed the notion with a flick of his hand. “I have nearly eight million dollars in my retirement account.”

“Oh, really? I didn’t see a picture of you in the Daily News holding up one of those giant checks from the lotto.”

“Give me the power of attorney document.”

Charlie happily handed it over, along with a pen, and flipped to the signature page. Drummond bypassed the signature line and began sketching, in the white space beneath it, what looked like a washing machine-which might cause the official responsible for approving durable power of attorney documents to question whether the signatory had been of sound mind.

“I think they’re looking for a signature on that, actually,” Charlie said, laboring to maintain his facade of cheerfulness.

“I need to show you something first,” Drummond said.

He set the document on the bench and stuffed the remainder of his hot dog into his mouth, freeing up the foil wrapper. He smoothed the wrapper over a thigh, flipped it to the white, papery side, and began to draw again.

Another washing machine. This time, where the clothing would go, he added zigzags, squares, and circles.

“It’s one of your machines,” Charlie said. “I get it, I get it.”

“You do?”

“Sure, you made eight million bucks selling washing machines.”

“How on earth did you know?”

“You told me, like, a minute ago.”

“Oh.”

Drummond looked down at his picture without recognition. Charlie could practically see the fog rolling back into his mind.

“It’s getting awfully warm,” Drummond said with a shiver.

“Sign the thing, I’ll get you a nice cold soda.”

Drummond took up the document and wrought the firm signature Charlie remembered, the letters in perfect alignment, like a ship’s masts. As soon as they left, the homeless man descended from his wall. He dipped a grimy sleeve into the garbage pail by the bench where Drummond Clark and his son had been sitting.

The construction workers swapped smirks. Probably they thought he was searching for redeemables. Were they to have looked closer, they would have seen him bypass several shiny Coke cans in favor of two balled-up hot dog wrappers. A closer look still would have revealed him to be remarkably fit. Even at that proximity, though, his own mother probably wouldn’t have recognized Pitman.