Nicholson Baker: Vox

“I did?” she said.

“What happened was, you went to a program in a university, and you got a masters in silversmithing, with some postgraduate work in pendant mounting and bead drilling, and you found that you had a very good eye, and you really were able to make bracelets and earrings and especially necklaces that looked good on people, not that looked good in the display case, in fact sometimes your work even looked a little strange, a little knobby and unsure of itself in the display case, but on the human form — divine. So you graduate from the program and it’s time to make a living, and you take your best work around to various jewelry places, and you get a mixed reaction, frankly, the world isn’t quite ready for you, and finally you take it to Harvey’s Semi-Precious, which you’ve avoided because in a way it’s a little down-market — it started as a head shop in fact, and Harvey’s this fairly old guy now with a big collection of fancy cigarette cases from the twenties that you find saddens you, and he’s got what you might call an old-world smell, but you interview with him, and he seems nice, and he’s very encouraging about your work, and you decide what the hay. But the only stipulation is, if you work for Harvey, you have to work in the store, in this small glass enclosure that kind of projects from one of the windows so that people walking by on the street can watch you work. You’re a little hesitant about that, but he draws the curtain open, tells you to take a seat, and it’s this nice little room, with many many small wooden drawers that are handy on either side, and a whole set of silversmithing tools that are mounted on little spring clips, and a nice flame there, a nice blue flame, with a yellow tip, and it really seems very cozy, and yet of course visible from the street, and so you start work. And Harvey could not be nicer — he treats you with kindly irony, and when you make a piece he especially likes, he is very appreciative. He sets up a special display case for just your work in the store, and he doesn’t mind when you come in a little late. And over the first few months you start doing this series of bracelets, simple elegant silver bracelets, which Harvey puts in the case. Naturally many of the customers who wander into the store are young men buying jewelry for women they love, and they’re uncertain, they want to be sure they’re right to buy that particular piece, and so Harvey gets in the habit of poking his head through the curtain and asking you, very hesitantly and politely, if you might want to come out and show the prospective buyer what the bracelet looks like on a real woman. And you find this a trifle embarrassing, because, after all, you made the piece, but you take off your welder’s glasses and you run your hands through your hair and there you are walking out into the store toward smiling Harvey and the open display case with the key in it, and this nervous man who’s in a hurry to get something for his wife or mistress is standing there, and you extend your arm, and Harvey puts on the bracelet, and the man’s mouth moves, and his checkbook falls open, and there, so easy, it’s sold. You sell about ten, fifteen bracelets this way, and with this success, you start to get ambitious, and you design and make a necklace, a very simple necklace, but with three stones that Harvey’s procured for you, a tiny chrysolite in the center, and then, on either side, two lovely lustrous pieces of unpolished strumulite, which are, as you know, fossilized drops of dinosaur ejaculate. Nothing could be more tasteful — you surprise yourself with how well it turns out — nothing you did in school equals this necklace. Harvey is in rapture — he holds it draped over his fingers, which are all dry and discolored from silver polish, and he just shakes his head, and you feel very happy, happy at having found your metier, and happy at having found as good a person to work for as Harvey. Well, so, the necklace is hung up in the display case, not in as prominent a position as you think it ought to be, perhaps, and Harvey insists on putting a very high price on it, too high to sell, you think, but Harvey is, for once, adamant. Some weeks go by, and you sell several other small pieces, a ring, some earrings, but the necklace does not sell. You’re curious, you peep through the curtain and watch Harvey taking customers over to your case, and you notice that he seems to be avoiding calling attention to the very fine piece, he’s distracting buyers when they comment on it. You realize, not without a certain pleasure, that Harvey is probably somewhat in love with you, though he’s too gentle ever to raise the issue. He now averts his gaze whenever you extend your wrist to put on one of your bracelets for a customer. And you begin to sense that he doesn’t want to sell the glorious strumulite necklace you made because he is afraid that when he does he’s going to lose you. And you feel that he’s probably right. He’s started asking you if you’re happy, if you have all the tools you need. There have been other jeweleresses in the window of Harvey’s Semi-Precious in days gone by, of course, and they have all gone on to bigger things, bigger commissions, but none of them has gotten to Harvey the way you have, you suspect.”

“I’m a little full of myself, aren’t I?” she said.

“You are, yes, and yet you’re uncertain too. And so one morning, you’re in your glass enclosure working away, and you look up and there’s this guy standing quite close to the glass, peering in at you. You nod, you’re used to this, and he nods. He’s wearing a suit, and he’s carrying what looks to be a fork, wrapped in a piece of paper towel. He looks up at the sign over the shop and you hear him go in and you hear him talking to Harvey. Harvey sounds a bit testy. You hear him say, ‘She can’t take her time up with uncreative work like that.’ Then the guy says something, a note of urgency in his voice. Harvey says, ‘No, I’m not kidding, really, no.’ And you pop your head out of the curtain. The two men look at you. Harvey goes, ‘I’m trying to tell this gentleman that you’re an artist and you are not able to do something like repair his fork. He doesn’t want me to do the repair, he wants you to do it.’ The guy in the suit looks embarrassed, he holds up his hands. You walk out into the shop. You take off your insulated soldering gloves and put them carelessly down on a display of rare campaign buttons. You’re wearing a shirt with small green and black stars on it, and black pants, and black sneakers. You hold out your hand for the fork, the guy gives it to you. You say, ‘An incident with the dishwasher?’ and he nods yes. And you say, ‘Harvey, it won’t take me a second.’ Harvey goes, ‘Fine! Go ahead!’ and sits down near the register, staring straight ahead. He’s pissed. You say to the guy, ‘I’ll have it for you by noon.’ And you go back into your area in the window. You take up the piece you’ve been working on. It’s some kind of brooch, and it isn’t turning out very well. You’ve lost your inspiration to some degree, since Harvey hasn’t sold your best effort. You look at the fork sitting there, and then you become conscious of a presence outside the window, and you look up, and it’s the same guy. You give him a questioning expression, and he moves his arms to say, ‘Don’t mind me.’ But he doesn’t walk away. You look down at the brooch again, but you don’t like it, you don’t want Mr. Fork to see it and think of it as representative of your work. And so you set it aside and you clamp the injured fork in several delicate vises, and you put on your insulated gloves, and you start playing the flame of the torch over the nicked parts. Repair is Harvey’s area, so you don’t get much of a chance to do this, but you find now that in small doses it’s a very satisfying and soothing activity. Naturally you can’t restore the fork to mint condition — you melt the roughnesses until they subside, and what you’re left with is a lovely irregular mottled very shiny surface. You’re glad you have your dark welder’s goggles on: you look up covertly, with just your eyes, not lifting your head, and you see the fork man standing there sort of slumped, looking at you do those things to his fork. He’s melting, he’s smitten, he’s silversmitten. You plunge the fork into a tray of water. He smiles. He goes back into the shop. You come out of your enclosure. Harvey looks up. You hand the fork to Harvey and Harvey looks at it and says, ‘Twelve dollars.’ Mr. Fork pays the twelve dollars and takes the repair job and says thank-you to Harvey. Then he says, ‘I was just curious how it was done. I’m sorry to have taken up her time.’ And then he asks, ‘You say she’s an artist. Can you show me some things she’s done?’ Slowly, slowly Harvey walks over to the display case, unlocks it, sighs. The guy leans very close to the jewelry, his head is practically in the case. You’re watching all this. You notice for the first time that he’s got his hair in a kind of ponytail. And then he points to the necklace and he says, ‘May I take a look at that?’ Harvey looks at you, he’s got this almost pleading look, but you don’t say anything. So Harvey seems to decide something, and he says sadly, ‘That’s the best thing in the store.’ And he unhooks it from its little mounts and he hands it to Mr. Forkman, who again looks closely at it, holds it up in the air. Harvey says, ‘For a fiancée or something? What’s her complexion, dark or light?’ And Forkman vagues out, saying, ‘I don’t really know who it’s for.’ Again Harvey looks at you, and you don’t say anything, and so Harvey swallows and he says, he almost whispers, ‘Really you can’t get a good sense of it unless you see it worn.’ And the fork guy says, ‘Gee, yeah, too bad.’ And he asks what the stones are and Harvey tells him and the guy just nods. Finally Harvey, almost in exasperation, says, ‘Look, she made it, she knows all about it, she’ll tell you everything you want to know, I’m going to get a bite to eat.’ He turns to you and says, ‘Show him the piece, all right?’ He grabs his jacket and goes out, pulling the door shut with unusual force, so that the sign saying open flips down to say closed. And so …”