Stanley Elkin - Van Gogh's Room at Arles

The cooperative teller asked if Schiff had gotten that and, before he could answer, broke down the sums for him again.

“Oh,” said Miss Simmons, “is that you, Professor? I didn’t know you were still making your calls.”

“I got a wrong number,” he said, and disengaged.

The three of them were downstairs.

“Yep,” Bill was saying, rubbing his hands, “you got it right the first time. Turns out we didn’t really have to check. We could almost go with the plan we specified on the telephone. Jenny found one or two places the signal may have to be reinforced, but you could do a voice level, she’ll meter you and, who knows, you might just be able to get away without us having to change a thing in the original specs. Even if we do have to make an adjustment it wouldn’t run you more than an additional two or three hundred dollars.”

“I have to go upstairs?”

“No, no,” Bill said, “she marked off the distances. You can do the reading right down here, can’t you, Jenny?”

“Sure,” said his former student. She took something that looked rather like a light meter from one of the deep pockets in her coveralls and held it up. “Go ahead,” she said, “pretend you’ve fallen. Just speak into the air.”

“What should I say?”

“Anything. I’m just getting a level.”

“Calling all cars,” Schiff said in a normal voice. “S.O.S. S.O.S. Save our Schiff.”

“What do you think, Jen?” Bill said.

His former student looked at her old professor whose worth she knew — as a teacher, as a husband — she looked at his weakened limbs, may even, when she was upstairs, have seen his urinal — as a man.

“It’s all right,” she said.

“Is it?” said Bill, surprised. “How about that?” he said. “You got it right the first time, but then that’s your business, isn’t it, Professor? Floor plans, knowing the territory.”

In spite of himself, Schiff basked in what, in spite of himself, Schiff knew wasn’t really a compliment. But he did, he did know the territory.

“Yep,” Bill said, “Jenny tells me you used to be some kind of geography professor.”

“I still am,” Schiff said, “I still teach.”

“Do you?” Bill said. “Well, good for you.”

He knew the territory, all right. He should have thrown the S.O.S. s.o.b. out of the house. He told himself it was only because Claire had left him and he needed the service that he didn’t. But it was because of what Claire had said, too. His fear of tradesmen, of almost anyone who didn’t teach at a university. At least a little it was. So he knew the territory.

“Well,” said Bill, “all we have to do now is a little paperwork, fill out a few forms.”

He was asked questions about his medical history, stuff out of left field. Not just about his neurology but about childhood diseases, allergies, even whether he’d ever had poison ivy. He listed his medications. It was for show, not for blow, but again, and still in spite of himself, he took a certain pleasure in this medical inventory. It was the first time in years anyone had taken such an interest in him, even a faked one. Bill was more thorough than any of his physicians, and Miss Simmons seemed to hang on his answers as much as the salesman.

“That should about do it,” Bill said.

“Oh,” said Schiff, a little let down.

“Well, except for a few housekeeping details the corporation has to have for its files. Nothing GMAC or any financial institution wouldn’t need to know if you were applying for a loan on a car.”

Schiff couldn’t have said why he was so steamed. He’d expected it. Wasn’t this the reason he’d been trying to get through to his banks? Wasn’t it why he’d attempted to be so circumspect?

“Will you be paying by check?”

“Yes,” Schiff said, thrown off, expecting some such, but not exactly this, question. “The corporation takes checks, doesn’t it?”

“These systems are fairly big-ticket items. It takes cashier’s checks.”

“Well, that poses a problem, doesn’t it?” Schiff said. “Me being crippled and all? My wife having lit out for the territory and leaving me up shit creek without a paddle with a car in the driveway to get to the bank but not quite enough strength in my legs to press down on the accelerator let alone the brake pedal?”

“Don’t get so excited,” Bill said. “We’re flexible. We’ll work with you. Hey,” he said, “we’re nothing if not flexible. If you can demonstrate you have enough money in your account to cover the check, we’ll work with you.”

“Ask Miss Simmons if I have enough money in my account to cover it,” Schiff said.

“No offense, old man,” the salesman said. “Hey,” he said, “take it easy. No offense. Often, a spouse quits on a partner who’s been dealt a bad hand she Hoovers out their joint accounts before she goes.”

“This happens?” Schiff, oddly moved, said suddenly, in spite of himself, interested, narrowly studying the man, a sort of political geographer in his own right, a kind of bellwether, some sibyl of the vicissitudes.

“Well, a lot of resentment builds up,” Bill explained. “I mean, put yourself in her place. At least some of the trouble between you had to have been physical, right?”

Schiff stared at him.

“Sure,” Bill said, “and it’s my guess that until you were struck down you two probably had it pretty good in bed together. Go ahead, write the check. It’s the amount we agreed on. You’re good for it.”

“Am I?”

“Well, sure you are,” Bill said. “She ever have to lift you up off the floor?”

“Yes,” Schiff said stiffly.

“She ever have to carry you?”

“Once in a while,” he said.

Bill clucked his tongue. “You enjoy that? You come to enjoy that?”

“Well,” Schiff said evasively.

“Well, sure you did,” Bill said.

“I didn’t want her to hurt herself.”

“Of course not,” Bill said.

“She’s pretty strong, but let’s face it, she’s no spring chicken.”

“Let’s face it,” Bill said.

“I don’t have my checkbook.”

“Want me to go get it? Want Jen to?”

“I think it may be in one of the drawers in the tchtchk.”

“Say what?”

“The cabinet in the hall. We call it the tchtchk.”

“That’s a new one on me. You ever hear that, Jen? The choo-choo? Heck, I can’t even pronounce it. How do you say that again?”

“Tchtchk. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“Just a pet name, eh? From your salad days.”

“I guess.”

“Well, sure,” Bill said. “It’s just something you ought to bear in mind.” Schiff didn’t follow. “Well, that you had salad days,” Bill said.

“Oh, right,” Schiff said, who didn’t need the lecture but wanted to placate the man just long enough to write the check and be rid of him.

“That’s why the good Lord usually lets us hold on to our memories,” Bill said. “So we can remember the times before our wives had to carry us around piggyback.”

“She never carried me around piggyback,” Schiff said.

“No? How’d she manage you?”

“She held me around my waist.”

“Off the ground?”

“Thanks,” Schiff told Jenny, “thank you.” She’s brought his checkbook. She could have brought him the one from the money-market account, even the tiny credit-union one. It was the account with money from the trust. “May I use your pen?” he asked coolly. It was hard to get a good grip on the pen with his weakened hand, difficult for him to write the check, almost impossible to form the numerals, some of which he had to trace two or three times and which were an illegible muddle when he finished. He didn’t even bother to sign it but pulled the ruined check from the book and started another. Miss Simmons looked elsewhere. Bill watched Schiff closely, bearing down on him with a knowing stare. “My small motor movements are shot,” Schiff explained. “I didn’t forget how to make out a check.”