The elevator doors open,
slowly. A heavy thud resounds as they
disappear into the wall. Several small,
jittery clinks follow, as if the doors are adjusting themselves in their sockets. From the dimly lit, empty hallway, no one is
visible within.
Craig,
is old and tall, and holds a plastic bag in which rests a manuscript—his final
manuscript, if his doctor is correct.
Craig steps from
the uneven hallway floor to the even elevator floor, from thin carpet to cold,
peeling, ceramic tile. It is only after
he steps into the elevator and turns to his right that Craig sees the other
man, standing very close up against the grey control panel. Craig starts back; then smiles quickly,
politely, and turns to face the doors.
He sets down his briefcase against the wall opposite the stranger. He glances up at the dimly glowing off-white
numbers above the door. The number five
might be a slightly less dull yellow-cream, but Craig’s eyesight is not what it
was.
The elevator doors
close, slowly. They slow further as they
near each other, as if reluctant to touch.
When they do touch, they send a hollow clank bouncing around. To
Craig’s ears, the noise sticks out, slightly jarring.
Craig coughs heavily. He shifts his head slightly so that he can
see the other man again. His fellow
rider is still standing up against the grey control panel. Despite the dimness of the building, he is
wearing black plastic-framed sunglasses, almost Blues Brothers. Narrow nose. Short forehead. Leather coat; patched. Jeans; stained. Stubble.
Thin fingers of left hand brushing each other, near hip. Right hand balanced in mid air, as if poised
for something. Battered dark grey
fedora. Small-framed. Smell of alcohol. The gaze behind the dark sunglasses seems to
point at Craig. Craig imagines what they
see; knows his own appearance well: Silvery hair, like iron
shavings, strong once. Loose skin
beneath his round chin. Tall. Forehead lined. Nose dull.
Eyes a pale hazel, and always moving.
Ears too big. Mouth ringed in
smile-creases. Brows thick. Shoulders bony; weary. Back a little stooped. Head forward.
Wrinkled shirt, old jean coat, worn beige pants. Scarf.
Briefcase. Smell of tobacco
smoke.
The elevator
stirs, lumbering. Craig pulls out of his
cataloguing; snaps his fingers deliberately and grimaces at his forgetfulness;
turns to the other man.
“Excuse me, I
forgot to look: are we going up or
down?”
The man in
sunglasses shakes his head.
Craig repeats
himself, a little slower. “Eh, the
elevator – are we going up or down?”
Pauses. “I didn’t check.”
The man shakes his
head again. Then he hits a switch on the
panel and leans forward slightly, obscuring it from Craig’s view.
The elevator
lurches violently and stops. Craig
stumbles backward; catches himself on the bare iron railing behind him. He coughs raggedly. The doors creak. The dingy overhead lights flicker.
Craig looks at his
fellow passenger. “What’s
happening? Which way were you going?”
“I’m here to,
well, to meet you, Mr. Faraday,” says the man.
Something familiar about his voice.
“Now we’re stuck.” He didn’t say
‘but now we’re stuck,’ Craig notices.
“We’re stuck? It looked like you did that.”
The man’s mouth
draws into a tight line. “Well, I did,”
he says, apologetically. He reaches with
his right hand into the depths of his coat; slowly, awkwardly, feelingly.
Craig lets out a
breath slowly. “Do you want me to sign a
book or something? You want my
autograph?”
“No no no,” says the
man hurriedly. He pulls out a small
revolver. “My interest is in a book you
haven’t signed for anybody yet, except maybe your editor. Backstage. You have it with you, don’t you? In your coat?
Briefcase?”
Craig draws in a
quick breath. His neck muscles go
tense. He puts his hands slowly in the
air. “Careful now,” he says slowly. “Those things, they go off every now and
then.”
The other man
gives a snort and a smile that is half a wince.
“Got your attention. Didn’t it?
Didn’t it? Okay, the manuscript.” His sunglasses allow no view of his eyes;
little reflection.
“I don’t have it
with me,” says Craig very evenly. The
gun points at his mouth.
The man
laughs. “Sure you do.” The fingers of his left hand begin to tap on
the metal of the elevator panel. “Why
did you come here?”
Craig puts his
heel up against the briefcase behind him; pins it to the wall of the
elevator. “What do you mean?”
“Why did you come
to this particular apartment building?”
Craig closes his
eyes for a moment. “I got a note,” he
says. “Left for me at my editor’s
office.”
“Yeah,” says the
other man. “He said you’d be in there
today to go over things. Said he’d give
the note to you. You were just at your
editor’s office; you must have it with you.”
“It was signed Tom
Schenk,” Craig continues. His brows
furrow. “Are you Tom Schenk?”
“It’s in the
briefcase, isn’t it?” says the man; angles his right wrist so that the revolver
points at the briefcase, approximately.
“It said you’d do
the interview after all, Tom,” says Craig.
“Your two cents.”
“Isn’t it? It has to— I’ve got more than two,” Tom
interrupts himself. The voice matches.
“Cents.” His fingers tap faster.
Craig is watching
the revolver waver. “So you want to have
our talk in an elevator with me at gunpoint?”
He puts his hands in his pockets.
Tom’s hand
tightens on the revolver; trembles slightly.
“No, you’re not interviewing me.”
“These are your
terms? Okay, we’ll do it on your terms.”
“No no no
no!” Tom takes a big step forward. “I repeat now what I told you last
week.” His left hand clenches and
unclenches.
“Over the
telephone,” clarifies Craig; keeps his voice even.
Tom takes a small
step back. “Over the telephone,” he
agrees; nods his head quickly twice. “I
said, and I say again, I’m not doing an interview. I don’t, I don’t, I don’t approve. What you’re doing.” His fingers resume their tapping.
Craig takes a deep
breath in; lets it out slowly; air out of a balloon. He measures his words. “Not an interview, then. In that case, what are we to do here?”
“Give me the
book.”
“Backstage.”
“Yes.”
Craig puts out his
left arm; supports himself on the back wall of the elevator. Tom hears the noise; shifts the gun quickly
toward the spot of contact, then back.
He does not look. Craig nods to
himself. The sunglasses make sense
now. He carefully lowers his hands.
“It is my only
copy,” he says.
Tom slams his palm
into the wall next to the panel. “Of course it’s your only copy. Don’t you get it? That’s the point. Don’t you get it?”
Craig bites his
lip. “No,” he says quietly. “Not really.”
He coughs. The revolver still
points at him; wavers a bit. “Is this
about you, or this about Maria Velden?”
Tom’s thin fingers
go back to tapping on the steel of the panel.
He snorts, nostrils flared. “Like
we’re completely separate,” he says, head bowing slightly. “You say that, you ask that, you say that,
like we’re completely separate. Like we
have nothing to do with each other!”
Craig leans back;
holds his hands up defensively. “I’m
just confused.”
Tom clenches his
teeth. “I’m just her husband. First.
Her first husband.”
Craig opens his mouth; closes it.
Craig opens his mouth; closes it.
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