Bruce Wagner - Memorial

They wound up talking about another job coming down the pike, a Demeulemeester boutique in Belgium. When Barbet said he’d make sure Fathom was on its way back safe and sound, Joan told him Lew loved the model so much that he wanted it “on permanent exhibition” in the gallery Richard Gluckman was building in Mendocino. Barbet laughed out loud.

“Let him have it! For a hundred-and-50,000. It’s no longer a maquette, now it’s art, right? Keep it, baby! But send the check! We’ll invoice Guerdon.”

WHEN she got to Marj’s, the old Imperial was in front, the window on the driver’s side wavily broken.

It looked like there was blood.

Joan ashened.

Cora approached, holding the King Charles in her arms. It yapped and she shushed, nuzzling its half-shaved crown. Shocky and breathless, Joan asked what happened and the neighbor said Marj was at the hospital.

Which hospital.

“Midway.”

When.

“Last night.”

Is she —

“I talked to her on the phone this morning.”

That was the extent of it.

Joan got back in the Range Rover. Cora ran after to exclaim through the passenger side that she had been the one to find her mother, right here in the driveway. What happened. She said Pahrump was “acting funny” and she was going to get Marj’s opinion about whether to call Stein or just take him to the vet but no one answered the door, and on her way home she saw, or thought she did, someone sitting in the car like a mannequin — it was Marj. She’d been assaulted. What do you mean. Cora said she was careful not to “disturb” anything before running to the house to dial 911. Then she returned with a damp towel, but didn’t know what to do with it, and suddenly thought that the people who were responsible for this unspeakable act might still be “lurking.”

She jerked the car into the street and headed up Robertson, speeddialing Barbet to tell him what was going on — he didn’t answer and she left a message — then started to call Chess, before pressing END. Why bother?

The usual mindlessly galling, passive-aggressive encounters with testily indifferent functionaries and grinning eunuchized volunteers ensued, a tangle of nerves, short circuits, and wrong information, before mother and daughter reunited. Marj looked so awful. She smiled valiantly then collapsed in tears; the women held each other and Mom whispered, “I was so afraid they had hurt you!” Joan, uncomprehending, said she was fine and stroked the old woman’s hair as they wept. An RN came to check vitals. She casually said that whoever had done this had broken the jaw and it would need to be “wired.” Marj was half-naked. Joan reworked the cheap gown to cover her. She said she wanted to be alone with her mother and when the nurse ignored her, Joan insisted on speaking to a doctor. The Angel of Mercy, suddenly churlish, said she “would have one paged but they’re very busy.” Joan noticed wet bedsheets and the nurse assured her she was aware of it and would have them changed as soon as an orderly was free. Joan said if she would bring linen, or show her the linen closet, she would change them herself. The RN said she would have to wait and Joan said, Do not fuck with me, I want those sheets changed, do you understand? At that moment the nurse didn’t have what it took to go up against her.

She was trying to digest it all. She sat holding her mother’s hand. The orderly came with fresh sheets. He spoke to Marjorie as if she were a child, and it was tender and comforting to behold. Joan helped him put Mom in a chair. She told Marj she was going to make a few phone calls but the helper gently cautioned not to leave her because she might fall. The orderly said he could “loosely” tie her to the chair but Joan said no, she’d wait till the sheets were changed, and they could put her back in bed, with the rails up. At least he was a human being.

When it was done, she caught her breath outside the room. Who to contact 1st? She found the number of the FBI agent but it had been disconnected. (Joan didn’t have the chance or even the inclination to check in from Mendocino. She’d been so blackjacked.) That gave her a funny feeling. She was digging in her wallet for that lady Cynthia’s Wells Fargo card when a different nurse came in and handed her the name and number of a cop. Joan dialed and got right through — a direct line. Short introductions were made. The detective said he had just been heading to the hospital for a chat with Mrs Herlihy. He asked how her mother was doing (shorthand for Do you think she’s up for an interview? ) and Joan said not too well. He said that was understandable and wanted to know if Joan would be there when he arrived — that would be helpful — she said of course. The detective told her it would be 45 minutes or so depending on traffic. Joan wondered if it’d be OK to go to the house and pick up some things for her mom, and he said that was a great idea. See you soon.

She told Mom she was going home for her robe and toiletries and was there anything else she needed. Marj said, with a feeble smile that stabbed Joan’s heart, that all the jewelry was gone, even the wedding ring Hamilton designed. Joan said not to worry, not to worry about anything but getting better, everything was insured, and that she was here now, her daughter was here, and wouldn’t leave her, all she wanted was that Marj use her energy to get better, that was the only thing that mattered. OK, Mom? So is there anything else you need? Anything you can think of? Marj said there were a few books by the bed, one about Jesus and his visit to India, another about Christian missionaries. Also, if she’d keep an eye out for her addressbook because she wanted to phone Cora and check on Pahrump but couldn’t for the life of her remember the number. Joan said she had it in her Treo, she had Cora’s number, and Stein’s too, and anyway she’d just seen Cora and would give her the message when she went back to Beverlywood. But did she want a special blanket or quilt? Something homey? Marj just smiled and shook her cracked, distended head, thanking her. You are the most wonderful daughter. Joan knew that she wasn’t and it broke her heart all over again. They cried and hugged. Marj said to be careful with the addressbook because tucked inside was a fortune cookie message “with important numbers” that she used whenever she bought a lottery ticket at Riki’s. Joan smiled and said, “Your secrets are safe with me, Ms Morningstar.”

THE house was musty. She opened a window. Then, suddenly mindful of the violent, mysterious intruder, slammed it shut; the glass trembled and paint flecked off the old wooden frame. She would get the detective’s take on all of it — who was this person, and was he likely to come back? Shouldn’t they be dusting the car for prints? That sort of thing.

A dress was on the bathroom floor, crumpled and soiled. There were new bags from Neiman’s and Barneys, with extravagant receipts inside. That seemed uncharacteristic. The tub was filled with dirty water. Stockings and underthings floated like ratty, lifeless swamp creatures. Everything smelled of excrement. Joan wrung them out and drained the bath.

She wandered from room to room, each one somehow permeated by her mother, as if she were walking through Marj’s body itself, and even though Joan had been there recently, it was such a long time since she’d actually looked with her eyes and her heart, so long since she’d stepped outside the castle of Self to consider Marjorie Rausch Herlihy née Donovan as a separate, living being, fading balletomane, frail and mortal, with longings, dreams, and desires, who’d suffered abandonment by one husband and death by another and the abandonment/death of her children too. Shame washed over her; Joan no longer recognized who she was. She may as well have been the thug who had violated the woman who bore her. Here and there were things from India she’d grown up around and still remembered from girlhood. Here and there were photographs, her father, Raymond, carefully excised, the technique divorced women sometimes favored, memories halved or quartered, images of Joan and her brother at an early age without either parent, when the proper editorial couldn’t be surgically achieved. There were unopened boxes of incense, and little wood-and-copper Buddhas that she liked to give away as “friendship” gifts.