Bruce Wagner - I'll Let You Go

“Happy, happy, yes! Happy indeed! And why wouldn’t I be? My little son of a bitch grandson is a stowaway !”

We will soon return to star-crossed father and son, remaining at their side for the duration (more or less) of our tale. But first the author must digress. Let us turn our attentions to an old — not so very old — standby, whose fortunes had fallen significantly enough in the last forty days to displace him to the rankling of Forbes ’s number thirty-seven. It can be sworn that he will never fall much farther than that.

Dodd Trotter descended upon Stradella House, having just returned from India, St. Petersburg and Seoul. He was on the phone with his mother, who was resting comfortably at her Woodland Hills cottage complex, Winter and the gilded book of obituaries faithfully at hand.

“Did you see the picture, Doddie?” asked the old woman.

“What picture, Mother?”

“In the paper today.”

“I’ve just come home — didn’t get a chance to look. Is it in the Times ?”

“So handsome.”

“Who, Mother?”

“There’s a beautiful loafer with a tassel lying there.”

“The Times ? New York or L.A.?”

“Do you remember the loafers we used to get you from Church’s, Doddie?”

“I do.”

“This loafer — it’s just lying there on the platform. Right where people wait for the subway. A couple got married. Young, handsome couple. I think he worked in public relations. They have money . They took the train to get married. Impetuous. One of those spontaneous things. Fun . And, suddenly, he doesn’t feel so well and he goes outside — the space between cars? For fresh air, Doddie. And they think he just — well, they’re not sure! Electrocuted. So handsome! You should see the picture.”

“That’s awful.”

“And, Doddie, another race-car driver died. Not a very well known one — they all die the same way now. You see, they’re very good at restraining their bodies , but they don’t have anything that holds the head or the neck , so when they crash, they just go wild in there. Those cars are like little cages, Doddie! They gush blood from their mouths and noses like a fire hydrant. Terrible. The people who get to them first — a horrible thing. Because you see, Doddie, they keep that image in their heads for years. Just like water from a hydrant; that’s how they all say it looks. In ten seconds you’re completely emptied out.” Before he could speak, she began to sing, a soft thread that tightened into steel wire. “ ‘Woodenhead Jones was uh-fat and uh-funny, dumber than sticks and stones … an’ that’s just why the kids all called him Woodenhead Puddin’-head Jones!’ ”

“—Mother?—”

“ ‘Teacher told his mother she would take him by the hand — teach him a thing or two … like his older brother he began to under- stand , he learned ev’ry- thing she ever knew !’—”

“Mother? Are you all right?”

The old nanny wrestled the phone away and assured him she just needed to be fed. Bluey shrieked like a zoo monkey, berating and mimicking Winter as she hung up.

Dodd asked the driver to take him to his office in Beverly Hills before going home.

When he passed through the lobby, the guard said his secretary was in. That wasn’t unusual, even on a Sunday (though Dodd discouraged it). Frances-Leigh, a widow, didn’t exactly need the extra income; even with the bears having raided the picnic, she still held some $7 million in Quincunx stock.

Her face fell when she saw him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Marcie Millard just called. I’m not quite sure why she called here , on the weekend …”

“That’s obvious — she didn’t want to talk to anyone. What did she say?”

Frances-Leigh took a breath. “She said the Board said they weren’t going to go ahead with the proposal. She said they made a decision to restore and rebuild and draw from city funds.”

“When did they make that decision?”

“Well, they hadn’t made it officially, but she said she’d spoken to three members over the weekend and they said that naming the school after you would be impossible — politically and legally — and that they were going to deal with everything on Wednesday. She sounded very upset.”

“That’s just so asinine — I mean, if that’s the focus. It’s just crazy. Because my name on that school has never been an issue.”

“I told her that.”

“I couldn’t have made that clearer to Marcie or the Board.”

“She said the Board was very flattered by your — your vision of— your commitment — this is what she said — and they were going to call — they wanted to talk to you about a sculpture garden — Marcie said something about a sculpture garden, her kids were screaming in the back and I could hardly hear — a sculpture garden or maybe a fountain they were thinking about having in front of the school, you know, as you go into the main entrance …”

“We’ll get the attorneys into it in the morning.”

Frances-Leigh closed her lips in solidarity. She knew how much the project meant to him; it had become his grand passion. And so noble —it didn’t seem fair. She rested her hand on the museum-board base of the maquette.

A Frank Gehry — designed gallery space crowned the rooftop park like an ecstatic, silvery wimple. Dodd’s plan was to revolve paintings through from his collection — Ruscha and Matisse in spring, van Gogh and Fischl in summer, Rothko and Chardin in fall, Pollock and Rembrandt in winter — so that students could live amidst art instead of having to do the museum dance.

“Well, maybe it’s not over — they’d be crazy not to build it, especially with the economy in the shape it’s in. They can’t afford not to.” She wasn’t even sure he was listening. “We still have a ton of options. We could quietly bring it to the media … let public opinion decide.”

“No,” he said vigorously. “I’d get ripped a new asshole, pardon my French. Why isn’t he doing this for the impoverished? Why is he lavishing money on the already rich? ”

“Your record speaks for itself. The Quincunx educational fund has already given away seventy million dollars in scholarships—”

“Oh, they don’t care about that. Here’s the better copy: BILLIONAIRE BULLISH ON VANITY SHRINE FOR SPOILED BRATS. You know — the Xanadu angle. Maybe I should just call it a Holocaust museum— cum —teaching institute — that way nobody’d bitch! They’d greenlight it right away.” He laughed, then became mindful of his secretary; he didn’t want to appear too bitter. “I appreciate your feelings, Frances-Leigh, but this was supposed to be a very personal project. You know that’s how I wanted it — from the beginning. Check your egos at the door. That’s why we needed to go under the radar.” He sighed, lightly tracing the arc of the nun’s habit with his finger. “Sometimes we live in a little world, filled with little people. And little people don’t like big dreams.”

She nodded, still feeling the affront. “It’s just so disappointing. I mean, people . People are disappointing.”

“A sculpture garden, huh. What a shame,” he said with a droll little smile. And then he left, without taking a final look at the perfect mock-up of what the design team had discreetly labeled

DODD TROTTER MIDDLE SCHOOL

†Mercifully, they would never know of a woman named Jane Scull and the sorrows she endured.