Stanley Elkin - Van Gogh's Room at Arles

On the principle that it takes a thief, et cetera, et cetera, these were the questions he put to that other old nurturer, his former student, Miss Simmons.

“What do you mean do I think she called them up to tell them her plans?” she said. “What do you mean do I think she didn’t call anyone up and that she left that for you? What do you mean when they show up at the door she hopes you’ll be so humiliated you won’t know what to do?” “Yes,” he said. “That’s just what I mean.”

“Well, I don’t know. How would I know?”

“How did you know about the empty refrigerator? All right,” he said, “that’s a bad example. But you knew about her planning to leave me.”

“I never said she planned to leave you. I suggested it was a possibility.”

“You knew she left me. Bill must have told you in the van. You can’t deny that.”

“I don’t deny it,” she said. “People gossip about people. It’s human nature.”

“You knew to the penny what we have in the trust-fund account. When you were up in my room, when you were up in my room, you probably saw my urinal. You’re practically my confidante. You took pity on me and gave old Bill the high sign that enough was enough, that he needn’t pad the equipment, you told him my credit was good. If all that doesn’t make you my confidante, I don’t know what does.”

“What’s more likely,” she said, “is that it makes me old Bill’s confidante.”

“Oh,”said Schiff, “oh.”

“Hey,” Miss Simmons said, “hey now.”

“That’s all right.”

“You bet,” she said. “Because if that’s what you’re driving at, you can just forget it, you can just put it out of your mind.”

“What,” asked the helpless cripple with the useless legs, “what?”

“You know what,” she said. “I’m not standing in as your hostess. It’s been at least fifteen years since you were my professor, at least fifteen years.”

“That’s right,” he said, astonished, amazed. “At least fifteen years. That’s right. So don’t tell me you’re not my confidante. Now that Claire’s gone that makes you one of maybe only half a dozen people in this town who knew me when.”

“I’m here on a job,” she said, all business.

“Of course.”

“Another few minutes I’m through. I’m almost through now. Here,” she said, “I need you to put this on for me.”

She handed him a sort of necklace with, for pendant, a button and light on a little plastic box like a switch on a heating pad or electric blanket. He recognized it from the S.O.S. commercial on TV. “Just put the chain over your head,” she said. “It should fit. If it doesn’t there’s a way of adjusting it.” Now the moment of truth had arrived Schiff felt some qualms about actually wearing such jewelry. It was another giant step toward his invalidism, like having the Stair-Glide put in or going into a wheelchair. Miss Simmons, misreading his reluctance for mechanical uncertainty as to how the equipment operated, took it back from him and fastened the collar about his neck like a kind of electronic bib. “There,” she said, “is that comfortable?”

“Is it ever,” Schiff said miserably.

“Why don’t we test it to see if it’s working?”

And see, he thought, he was right, his identity already subsumed in plural baby talk.

“Test it out,” she said again. “Press the button. That dials the service for you. Wait six or seven seconds, then just speak into the air. If everything’s been connected properly, they should be able to pick you up at the service.” Schiff pressed the button and spoke into the air. Miss Simmons took the little console out of his hand and hit the button a second time. The light went off. “You didn’t give it time to dial. You have to wait a few seconds before you start talking. By depressing the button a second time I aborted your call.”

“Whoa,” Schiff said. “This thing’s a lot tougher than it seems.”

“You’re not used to it yet, that’s all. You’ll get used to it.”

“Shall I try again?”

“Sure. Just give it a chance to dial the phone before you speak.”

He pressed the button. He waited half a dozen seconds. He glanced up at Miss Simmons. She nodded. “Help,” Schiff said quietly into the air. “Help me, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.” It was the message he’d heard the old woman deliver on television. The only difference was Schiff’s bloomers weren’t up around his ears.

“What,” someone shouted back at him down at S.O.S, “what’s that? Speak up, I can’t hear you.”

“Is that you, Charley?” Miss Simmons called out. “Charley, it’s Jenny Simmons. I’m at 727-4312, 225 Westgate, in the Parkview area— Jack Schiff’s residence. Dr.

Schiff’s new on the service and I’m walking him through the procedures.”

(Well, Schiff thought, walking.)

“Hi, Jenny. Hi, Dr. Schiff.”

“Hi, Charley,” Schiff said.

“You’re coming in fine now, sir. You don’t have to shout, though. Just speak up, that’ll do it.”

“I’m sorry,” Schiff shouted.

“That’s all right, you’ll get used to it.”

Everyone kept telling him he’d get used to it. A good sign and a bad sign both. He didn’t need all that accident in his life, but it was comforting to think S.O.S. would pick him up each time he fell down. This is what it comes to, he thought. If you just hung on and managed to live long enough you turn into a bowling pin.

Now he knew he was expected to do a fair share of falling he was reluctant to be left alone. It was Schiff’s suggestion they go through the rest of the house, check out each of the base stations Miss Simmons had rigged. She had to push him in his wheelchair, help lift his feet onto the little platform of his Stair-Glide, help raise his pants up (he wore only pants with elastic waistbands these days, shirts whose buttons, except for the top button and the one beneath that, had been already buttoned so that all he had to do was slip it on over his head, his shoes were fastened with Velcro tabs, and he dressed not so much for comfort — when was the last time he’d been comfortable? — as for sitting down on toilet seats and getting up from them again, so he wore no underwear, and tended, the elastic waistband reconfiguring itself about his body each time he moved, casually to moon the world each time he stood) for him again as he got out of it and leaned into his walker. It took another forty minutes for them to do the rounds of the second floor and he was satisfied that all systems were go. Each area was a little different from the others and required, as if he were reciting from the stages of separate theaters, a slightly different projection of his voice. By the time they were finished, however, Charley was complimenting him on his levels. He sounded, Charley said, like someone who’d been doing pratfalls for years.

There was nothing left for her to do. He could stall her no longer, he’d have to let her go.

“Oh,” she said, “I forgot to get your key from you.”

“My key?”

“For the house. The service will need it if it has to get

in.”

“Gee,” Schiff said, “my key, I don’t know.”

“We take an impression, we duplicate it on our premises and get it back to you.”

“No,” Schiff said, “I mean I don’t know. Where it even is. I can’t remember the last time I used it.”

“Maybe it’s in the tchtchk,” Jenny Simmons said.

“Gosh,” he said, “you pronounced that perfectly.”

She seemed to blush. Which would make it once for him and twice for her. Were the two of them falling in love?

“I’ll look and see,” she said, and left him in his bedroom, sitting on his bed.