Philip Roth - Letting Go

First he heard a voice cry out, “Son of a bitch! No good rat! Louse!”

“Caaaaalm yourself,” Levy was intoning in the meantime. “Caaaalm yourself down.”

“Let go, cock sucker! Let me be! I’m going where I’m going!”

There was an unearthly banging on the door, a sound larger than he could have imagined two, three, or four old men making. “Herz! I’m Korngold!” Then: “Hands off , you bastard!”

Paul knocked over a chair running to the door; behind him, Libby stirred and mumbled.

The door opened, and before Paul could slam it shut, Korngold fell like a sack in his arms — simply toppled in. Levy was left standing in the hallway in furry slippers and a red satin robe initialed in gold ALL. All what! Wheedlingly he said, “Korngold, straighten up, act a man. Step back over here.”

“Shush you cock sucker you! Herz, help me from him.” Korngold struggled up straight in Paul’s arms, then freed himself and turned on Levy. “Go! Wait! The authorities will drag you screaming away! Close the door on him!” he said to Paul.

“Uh-uh,” said Levy, and his cane came poking through the door. “You wait up a second—”

“Paul …?” All three men turned and looked at her. Libby had flipped on the reading lamp. Her cheeks were drawn; her eyes were clouds of black. “Paul — Paul, what?”

“Sick?” asked Levy. “Or recovering?”

“Quiet!” Paul whispered. “Both of you! Now, please, let’s all of us step outside—”

“This son of a bitch—” began Korngold in a trembling voice.

“Korngold.” Paul grabbed the man’s arm. “Korngold, please, be still — now come on—”

Almost crying, Korngold raised his arms and said, “He stole my underwear. Seven years,” he moaned, “and along comes this cock sucker—”

“Korngold!” Paul shouted, and shook him.

“That’s the story …” the man said. Released by Paul, he fell, in tears, into a chair.

“Look, gentlemen,” said Paul. “My wife is sick. She has to sleep. This is an outright invasion—”

“You hear him?” said Levy to Korngold. “Come along.”

“Oh-oh,” Korngold wailed, “thief, mamza , rat!”

“He’s in hysterics, almost a fit,” Levy explained, for now Libby was propped up in bed, and her bewilderment seemed to demand a reason, a word.

Paul went to Korngold and laid a hand, a friendly hand, on his arm. Korngold instantly put out both of his hands, sandwiching Paul’s. “Help,” he whispered. “I’m fleeced still again.”

“Mr. Korngold …” Paul knelt beside him, aware that now Levy had moved all the way into the room and was circling behind them. “Mr. Korngold, tonight you have to pull yourself together. We’re going to go out into the hall now. My wife is very sick—”

“Recovering …” he heard, and saw the rubber tip of Levy’s cane near his foot. In the bed, Libby was reddening, not with health but with helplessness. She kept saying, “Paul,” while he went on convincing Korngold.

“You’ve got to go home now,” Paul said. “Get some sleep.”

“What a life,” exclaimed Korngold, bringing the three-hand sandwich up to rest his cheek upon. “I can’t go to the toilet, I ain’t stolen blind.”

“What?” Paul said.

But Levy’s cane was as good as in his ear. “We split — is that robbery?” asked Levy. “I moved them jockeys for him before they rot and mildew. A wet spring and he was finished. Is that a thing to throw a fit on? You understand?”

“Twenty dollars is a split?” cried Korngold. “On first-rate shorts? On a quality T-shirt? Die, you bastard, die you son of a bitch—”

“Control, Korngold. Control. You’re in the room of a convalescent. Right, Paul?”

Still squatting at Korngold’s knees, he looked up at Levy. The lawyer held his caneless hand to his chest, protecting his respiratory system with the plushy satin robe. “Paul,” Levy said again — and saying that little word, it was as though he owned the world. “Senile,” he whispered. “Don’t be foolish, Paul. They would sit in that room till he passes on. Twenty dollars is not nothing. For him almost a month’s rent.”

“How much did you get, Levy?”

“Add twenty and twenty, what else? A split.” He looked over at Libby as though perhaps she was the member of the family with the mathematical head.

“Paul,” Libby said, “what happened?”

“Please,” Paul said. “Please”—he controlled himself so, that tears were squeezed from his eyes—“let’s go out into the hall. Let’s go into Levy’s room.” But he could not drag Korngold from his chair.

He said please again, and then he said it one final time. In the moment that followed all sense fled, all plans; all the rules of his life deserted him, and he expelled a confused, immense groan.

Korngold looked at him in fright and awe. “ What —” he cried.

Before it even happened Levy began backing away. But Paul had already grabbed him by the throat with two aching hands.

“Stop pinching! ” screamed Levy.

“How much! How much was it! How much!” He was foaming, actually foaming at the mouth.

“I’m suffocating to death,” Levy cried. He wheeled his cane, striking out at the madman who was whirling him into a corner. “Let go, abortionist! Let go — I’m having you incarcerated—”

Korngold was at last out of his chair, on Paul’s heels. “Don’t hurt him — just ask—”

“Give him the money!” Paul cried. “Give it up, you son of a bitch!”

“Aaaaaaacchhh …” went Levy, his eyes showing a sudden belief that the end was really at hand.

“Hey, Herz—” yelled Korngold. “Herz, you’ll strangle him dead! Herz!”

“I give, I give—” Levy was screaming, his arms collapsing as though broken. “All right, I give!”

“He admits it!” Korngold triumphantly addressed the ceiling.

And then Paul felt Libby’s arms pulling him back. Under his fingers he still had Levy’s quaking chicken neck, still felt the disgusting bristly hairs. “Paul” came Libby’s voice. “Paul, oh honey, you’re going crazy—”

“Get in bed!” He turned and took her by the hair. “Get in bed! Are you crazy? Get in bed! ”

Her expression was incredulous, as though having leapt from a window, she had her first acute premonition of the pavement below. She winced, she wilted, and then she took two steps backwards and gave herself up, sobbing, to the bed.

But Levy was now in the doorway, slicing the air with his cane. Everyone jumped back as he made a vicious X with his weapon. “Disgusting! Killer!” he cried, slashing away. “Scraping life down sewers! I only make my way in the world, an old shit-on old man. I only want to live, but a murderer, never! This is your friend, Korngold,” announced Levy. “This is your friend and accomplice, takes a seventeen-year-old girl and cuts her life out! Risks her life! Commits abortions! Commits horrors! ” He gagged, clutched his heart, and ran from the room.

Breathless, Paul approached Korngold and took his arm. “Now you get out too—”

“The money—”

“That’s your business.”

“But I need—”

“Just get out!”

Libby still sobbed on the bed. Korngold, a man with all chances gone but one, looked wildly about him and, in a crazy imitation of his attorney, suddenly rose up and waved his cane at Paul’s head. Paul only snarled, and Korngold dropped it; he fled then, not to the door, but to the girl on the bed. He took her head in his arms. “Oh a darling yiddishe maydele , a frail fish. Come, darling, tell me who I should call. I’ll dial your good family, let them come take you—”