Call Me Brooklyn Read online

  That’s bullshit: then who was responsible for the girl’s murder?

  Gal, you shouldn’t start drinking so early.

  I didn’t know you cared so much about my health. He punctuates these words by drinking directly from the bottle before adding:

  To me, the little pebble that keeps rolling around inside my shoe is the fate of that girl, Monika Beerle. It’s disturbing that the article barely has anything to say about her. No details about her family history, not even her age. It’s almost as if she were a footnote to the case.

  I apologize, Gal, what time you drink or don’t drink is none of my business. Anyway, I have to get to the newspaper. Thanks for letting me in, and for the coffee. If you don’t mind, I’m going to leave my suitcase in Frank’s office. If you see him, tell him I’ll come pick it up this afternoon.

  Gal responds by taking out a pen from his shirt pocket and burying himself in his papers.

  Later. A sticky wind blows down the avenue. Frank still hasn’t returned. I know because his Plymouth isn’t parked in front of the Oakland. Ernie is reading the New York Post at the bar, clenching a pipe between his teeth. Gal isn’t around. Perhaps I’d offended him that morning?

  Ernie, have you seen Gal?

  He puts his paper down and takes his pipe out of his mouth:

  Damned if I know. When I got here at three, there wasn’t a soul in the place. Haven’t seen you for a few days, now. Where have you been?

  Chicago. So you don’t know where Gal is?

  Fuck no, I just told you. This morning he was here, we left a set of keys for him, but when I got back to open the bar, he’d taken off. As you know, I don’t keep tabs on the clientele. I’ve got enough problems of my own.

  How has Gal seemed to you these days?

  I haven’t noticed anything. Truth is, I don’t understand all this concern about him.

  What if something’s happened to him?

  Something like what?

  Don’t be cynical. You know exactly what I’m talking about.

  Forget about Gal. He can take care of himself.

  Has he been talking a lot about Nadia recently?

  Ernie snorts.

  Oh, here we go. I don’t know and I don’t care. But, speaking of women, some gorgeous little number just moved in upstairs. She can’t be older than twenty.

  The remark surprises me. The motel is a taboo topic in the Oakland, and if anyone ought to know it, it’s Ernie Johnson. If Frank had been sitting there, Ernie wouldn’t have had the guts to make a comment like that.

  Watch your mouth, Ernie.

  He asks me if I want something to drink, chuckling. I ask for a Heineken. He puts an ice-cold bottle in front of me, mutters something incomprehensible, and disappears behind his copy of the Post. I go to the table where I had been seated with Gal that morning, the Captain’s Table. As I put the bottle down on the marble surface, the image of him reading the Rakowitz story comes to mind, but then it is superimposed by a much more distant memory.

  (I’m doing okay, right, Gal? Dialogue without quotation marks interlaced with action, just as you like it. And now I am going to do something that I also learned from you: insert fragments of my diary. I never had a chance to tell you how I first found out about you.)

  Dylan Taylor told me that they were putting on Norman Mailer’s The Deer Park at the old St. Anne’s church.

  You want to cover it? Maybe Mailer will show up. He lives right there. Why don’t you go by?

  Mailer lives in Brooklyn Heights?

  Yeah, right on the promenade. The last of a long line of famous names. It’s inexcusable that you still don’t know the neighborhood. Wait a second.

  He goes out of my cubicle and about thirty seconds later comes back from his with a book. He tosses it on top of my desk. It’s Truman Capote’s The Dogs Bark.

  What’s this for?

  Take a look at the piece called “A House on the Heights.” Going back to the Mailer piece, it doesn’t have to be long. Three hundred words or so is good. We can publish it Saturday.

  You can read the Capote thing in twenty minutes. Dylan is right: Thomas Wolfe, W. H. Auden, Hart Crane, Marianne Moore, Richard Wright, the Bowleses, and Truman Capote himself—among others I can’t remember now—all have lived in the Heights.

  I told Dylan that I’d take a stroll around the neighborhood after the performance.

  Some images that have stayed with me: the gaslights on Hicks Street; a window through which could be seen the peaceful image of a girl playing a violin, like a still from a silent movie; the Grace Court alleyway, which reminds me of a Vermeer canvas, with its uneven cobblestone road, the enormous gates of the old carriage stables, and the hook from where the hay was once hung to feed the horses; the engravings on the medallions from the enormous dining room doors of the sunken cruise liner Normandie, now adorning the giant metal doors of the Maronite church Our Lady of Lebanon.

  I turned the corner on Hicks and Atlantic and saw a sign, Oakland, Bar & Grill, in red and white neon letters above a window made of thick cubes of frosted glass. I pushed open the black iron door with some effort. On the other side there was a narrow space with tall ceilings and red velvet curtains. On parting the curtains, I had the sensation that I was leaving the waking world behind and walking straight into a dream. I had come to a space packed with people in costumes. It seemed like a masquerade ball was taking place in an old cabaret, or in the dance hall of a cruise ship. The wall to the right was covered with a fishing net, a hatch half hidden underneath its folds.

  The bar was to the left. A wooden panel hung from the ceiling, following the contours of the counter. There were all sorts of tools and gadgets related to marine life on it: rigging, buoys, lifesavers, lamp globes, a ship’s wheel . . . In the middle of the bar there was a mirror on which the flags of Denmark, the United States, and Spain had been painted in the shape of a cross. Against the wall, rows of bottles flanked by more maritime objects: a miniature lighthouse, the busts of a mermaid and a ship’s captain, and strings of lights wound around several masts. In the back of the bar, to the right, there were two wooden phone booths next to a jukebox. The ceiling and support columns were adorned with paper garlands in vibrant colors. Two of the columns formed an archway that led to the dance floor. On the walls were photographs and posters (I remember one of them was an announcement for a bullfight at the Plaza de Toros in Sada, dated 1910), as well as shelves placed at various heights displaying model ships, some quite huge, inside glass bottles.

  Then I saw him. He was a man of about fifty or fifty-five, the only one in the whole place (aside from me) who wasn’t wearing a mask. He was seated in a corner, implausibly oblivious to everything happening around him, scribbling in a notebook. Around him there was a cloud of smoke that seemed thicker than the one that floated through the rest of the place, as if he were in a bell jar. Now and then he paused to take a drag from a cigarette or to have a sip of his drink.

  Someone wearing a feathered cape and an owl mask grabbed me without warning and dragged me to the bar. Dipping a plastic glass into a bowl of reddish liquid, he filled it and told me to drink it in one gulp. I did as I was told. It was a potent brew that made my eyes tear and I broke into a coughing fit. The man let out a laugh, gave me a mask as monstrous as the one he was wearing, and wouldn’t leave me alone until I put it on.

  When I got rid of him, I went back to the spot from where I had seen the solitary man writing, but he had disappeared. On his table was a cigarette butt still burning in the ashtray next to an empty glass. I searched every corner of the place, at each step having to throw off people who insisted that I dance, but I couldn’t find him. Maybe they had forced him to put on a mask, as they had done with me. I was dazed because of the concoction I’d been made to drink, and then this whirlwind of new experiences, and I was finding it difficult to make my way out of there. Finally, I located the exit, and after going through the red curtains and out the iron door, the silence of the night seemed lik
e a miracle.

  I started to walk, a bit unsteady, and on passing by a shop window, I mistook my masked reflection in the glass for a stranger, and jumped, startled. Taking off my mask, I walked on toward the piers, as had been my intention from the start. I was feeling strangely anxious, though I couldn’t understand why.

  It was months before I went back to the Oakland, although on several occasions a passing memory of it mingled with other things I had seen on my first trip to Brooklyn Heights. Everything had made a profound impression on me, starting with Mailer’s play, and then all the singular spots I’d discovered in the neighborhood. But of all these powerful impressions, none surpassed the one left by the masquerade ball in that strange sailors’ bar. Every time I thought back to it, the image of that one man writing in a notebook, seemingly oblivious to the strangers packed into the place around him, came to mind.

  I’m about to order another beer when Frank and Víctor arrive.

  Look at this, our friend the reporter is here, Frank says, taking off his golf cap and sitting down at the Captain’s Table. Víctor smiles a hello and goes to the bar to chat with Ernie.

  Ernie, a cold beer here, please! Frank shouts out. What do you want, Ness? I thought you were in Chicago.

  I got back this morning, and I don’t know why it got into my head to come directly here from the airport.

  Ernie puts two Heinekens pearled with frozen sweat on the table.

  Ah, and today they handed Raúl the keys to his new house. Gal told me. Good thing he was here. Oh, and I left my suitcase in your office. Hope you don’t mind.

  The Oakland is your home, man, you know that.

  Thanks, Frank. Gal was in a weird mood this morning. Did you see him?

  He was around, but we were in such a hurry, I didn’t pay him much mind. Why? Something wrong?

  He started drinking too early, at noon, something he hasn’t done in a while. And it’s also strange that he’s not around now. Because lately this is his favorite time to write. Unless things changed while I was in Chicago.

  You’re right. It’s the first time in a good while that he hasn’t been here around now. Who knows, maybe there’s an interesting fight at the Luna Bowl, although I doubt it. Víctor would have asked for permission to go. Víctor! he yells out. Do me a favor, call Jimmy and ask him if he’s seen Gal.

  It was at the Luna Bowl, Jimmy Castellano’s boxing gym, where Gal had discovered Víctor, Frank’s aide-de-camp (as he calls him sometimes), a little while after the Puerto Rican, recently arrived in Brooklyn, had begun to work out there. One afternoon, the trainer of one Ricky Murcia, a mastodon from the professional circuit who weighed over 260 pounds and had come to New York to take part in an exhibition match in Madison Square Garden, offered Víctor fifty dollars to spar for eight rounds with his fighter. Murcia pounded the young man mercilessly until he lost consciousness at the end of the fifth round. It seemed strange to Gal that Víctor would have let himself be put in a position where he would take such a beating, because he was at least two weight classes below Murcia. Cletus explained to Gal that Víctor needed the money, and besides he didn’t have a manager. Intrigued, Gal decided to approach the young man. Their conversation convinced him that the Puerto Rican was no good for boxing. It wasn’t about his physical aptitude, but his personality. The boy was a dreamer. He was too sensitive for such a profession. Gal told him that a friend of his was looking for an assistant and gave him the Oakland’s business card.

  His last name was Báez. He was tall and thin, twenty-five years old, a mulatto with curly hair and greenish eyes. Although he’d been boxing for some time, his face was untouched, except for a light scar on his right cheek. He’s quick, throws a good punch, his legwork couldn’t be more agile; he’s a good fighter, Gal told me. Technically, there’s not a thing wrong with him, but he’s just not very competitive. He is completely devoid of malice. When Gal introduced him to Frank, Frank understood him completely. He has the soul of an artist, Frank told Gal, only he was born poor and black. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of him. In about week, Víctor had become irreplaceable. It took some doing, but eventually, between Gal and Frank Otero, they were able to get the idea of becoming a professional boxer out of his head. What they couldn’t quite put an end to was that now and then he would sign up for amateur fights.

  Gal isn’t at the Luna Bowl, boss. Old man Cletus claims he hasn’t heard a peep out of him for weeks.

  Do you think he’s at the Shipyard? it occurs to me to ask.

  Frank and Víctor exchange an alarmed look. Gal only goes to what he calls the Shipyard during his darkest moments. The last time he disappeared, they found him unconscious in some debris at an empty lot.

  Let’s hope not, Frank says.

  I’m going to go check, just in case, I say. If I don’t see him, I’ll probably just head on to Manhattan. Do you mind if I leave the suitcase in your office till tomorrow?

  Frank is so lost in thought he doesn’t hear the question.

  On the way to the Shipyard, I think back to the first time Gal took me to the Luna Bowl. I remember exactly how his eyes lit up when the boxers climbed into the ring. Disconcerted, I asked myself what he was looking for in such a place. It was evident that the thrill of the sport fascinated him. But why? What sense did it make for him to watch such violence? We’d come for one of Víctor’s fights. By the time the bell rang for the first round, however, I was no longer there for Gal. When it was all over, what most surprised me was the number of people who came to say hello to him after the fight. The aspiring boxers, punch-drunk old men, the employees, everyone liked him. When we first got there, I also noted that Cletus Wilson, the black doorman who was almost eighty, refused to charge us admission. Maybe it’s my imagination, but I think there’s something in Gal that makes people feel he’s living in the shadow of some unspecified threat. That’s what I’d felt the first time I saw him: a vulnerable creature weirdly separated from his environment by a bell jar. Perhaps what people pick up on when they approach Gal is his own sensitivity to the suffering of others. I’ve never met anyone else so careful not to hurt other people. Gal is only capable of hurting himself. I’ve never heard him say anything mean-spirited or offensive about anyone, not even when he’s drunk. He never loses his dignity. He has an amazing ability to hold on to it even at the most extreme stages of drunkenness. Even physically. To me it’s a sort of miracle how he manages to coordinate his movements even as he’s about to lose consciousness.

  Night has begun to fall. Venus glitters all alone above the cranes of the port. The sky darkens so slowly that I notice the luminous points of the stars appear one by one. I go over the events of the day: the taxi race from LaGuardia to the Oakland; Gal telling me the Rakowitz story; six hours at the newspaper; the conversation with Frank. It’s not just that I’m worried about Gal. I’m also on my way to the Shipyard because I need to see him. Something he said this morning has been haunting me. Someone has to take care of the demons. He was talking about his own, but if I find him, I’ll ask him to take over mine as well.

  Cletus Wilson comes out of the ticket booth to say hello. Before I open my mouth, he tells me it’s been weeks since he’s heard from Gal. I tell him that I know, that I was with Frank when Víctor called from the Oakland. Then what the hell are you doing here? he asks. I tell him that I’m going to have a look around the Shipyard. Cletus’s eyes open wide when he hears this. Just to be sure, I clarify. Before I go down, I chat with him for a while under the green awning at the front.

  It’s just turned dark. Next to the water tank is a roofless telephone booth. A few steps away, I see a jumble of iron with the sign for the phone intact, as if someone had ripped it out taking care not to damage it. Surprised, I confirm that the phone is working. I decide to call the house, as much as I know there’s no sense in doing it. I know Diana won’t be there. I’m certain that she left the same day I flew to Chicago. I have nothing to reproach her for. I know she did it to make things easier. I’ll loo
k for a note but I won’t find one, because no note is needed, just as my phone call now is unnecessary. Everything has been settled. And still, in Chicago, the first thing I did after I checked into the hotel was to call her. As expected, the machine picked up. I would repeat that same futile gesture every night after work. The only thing different today is that I am back in New York. I’m half an hour away from our apartment, a few stations on the subway after crossing under the river that separates Brooklyn from Manhattan.

  I’m about to punch in my number when a strange melody rips the night air. It’s a woman’s voice. It takes me a few seconds to realize that it isn’t live. Someone must have put on a record, but where? There’s nothing around the Shipyard but abandoned lots and ruins. The sweet voice sings a sad lament with an Eastern air. Trying to locate its source, I reach the conclusion that it must be coming from an alley whose entrance I can barely see from where I’m standing. There’s a bar frequented by Albanian immigrants there. I decide to go, enthralled by the melody. I watch my shadow ahead of me on the brick-paved alleyway. Almost at the end, there’s a narrow opening that casts a square of yellowish light onto the sidewalk. When I get there, I part the colored plastic straps that cover the entrance. Inside is an old man with a red wool cap seated in a rocking chair. I remember him from the times I’ve come here with Gal—I also remember the woman tending bar. She’s around sixty, wears a headscarf, and has a vertical blue stripe tattooed on her chin. At a table, some men around my age playing cards turn for a moment to look at me. The old man signals for me to come in. I say hello and approach the jukebox, still hypnotized by the song. When it’s finished, I leave a couple of dollars on the bar and return to the phone booth.

  I pick up the receiver, seeing the stars tremble through the rectangle cut above my head; it feels strange to be within four glass walls looking at the sky. A swath of misty, pulverized light blurs the outline of the constellations. I feel the cold of the receiver in my ear, the querulous buzz of the line. I dial, imagining the acoustic signal travelling under the bed of the East River, through the length of a tube of bundled cables, carrying all my anguish along with it. The signal gets to Manhattan in a matter of seconds; after two rings, I hear a long beep and then my own distorted voice, suggesting I leave a message, and then nothing. As I hang up, I see the tail of a comet glitter fleetingly.