“How much?”
“Two thousand dollars. Daddy, will this sound strange?”
“What, Jennie?”
“If I had two thousand dollars, I’d put it up for bail. Because, Daddy, he looked so sad. He looked so damn sad.” She paused. “Does that make any sense to you?”
“A little,” he said.
Jennie nodded. “Will they be letting you out of here soon?”
“A week,” he said. “Maybe a little longer.”
“They hurt you pretty badly, didn’t they?”
“Yes.”
“How does it feel? To get beat up, I mean.”
“Well, it doesn’t feel good,” he said, and he attempted a smile.
“Daddy, whichever way this case works out, isn’t... isn’t there the possibility that you may be beaten up again?”
“I suppose there’s that possibility.”
“Are you afraid?”
He met her eyes with his own, and he saw that she was seeking honesty, but he lied nonetheless. “No,” he said, “I’m not afraid,” and he knew instantly he’d made a mistake by lying.
Jennie turned her head away from him. “Well,” she said, “I guess I ought to be scramming. Mommy said to tell you she’ll be here tonight.”
“Will you come again, Jennie?” he asked.
“Do you want me to?” she said, and again her eyes met his.
“Yes, I’d like you to.”
“I’ll try,” she said.
“Maybe... maybe we’ll be able to talk.”
“Maybe.”
“I meant without nurses or anything interrupting.”
“Yes. I know what you meant. The way we used to talk when I was a little girl.”
“Yes.”
“Maybe,” she said again. “But it’ll have to be after next week sometime. Mommy’s sending me to Rockaway to stay with the Andersons.”
“Oh? When was this decided?”
“Last night.”
“How long will you be gone?”
“A week.” Jennie hesitated. “I think Mommy’s afraid something might happen to me if I stay in the city.”
“I see,” Hank said.
“Do you think something might happen to me?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well...” Jennie shrugged. “I’ll be going now, Dad.” She bent over the bed and kissed him hastily. “Take good care of yourself.”
She walked to the door, and he watched it close gently behind her. And then she was gone.
The next week went by very slowly, despite Karin’s daily visits. He thought of the attack often during that long, lonely week, and he wondered if he would ever be well enough to forget that Wednesday night, ever be well enough to forget the silent savagery of the boys who had attacked him. He had learned quite a bit from the beating. He had learned, to begin with, that a beating reduced a man to nothing more and nothing less than an open wound shrieking its pain to the night. A man was powerless when attacked by a gang intent on administering a merciless, methodical beating. The gang was a cold jury, a harsh judge, an emotionless hangman. And, lacking emotional content, the beating took on even more horrifying meaning. A man who’d been beaten, Hank knew, would never forget the pain, and the humiliation, and the empty terror of his helplessness.
And yet, the gangs in Harlem conducted warfare on a regular basis. Didn’t each gang skirmish have, by simple logic, a winning side and a losing side? And hadn’t each gang member experienced at one time or another the pain of defeat in battle? A battle, he reminded himself, is not a beating. But still, didn’t they enter each fight with fear? How could they face guns, and knives, and broken bottles — and tire chains — without fear? How could they rationalize the knowledge that if they fell they would surely be stomped into the pavement? Were they fearless heroes, men of steel, nerveless men of action?
No.
They were afraid. He knew they were afraid. And yet they fought. For what?
For what?
He did not know the answer. The question plagued him all that week. On the day before his release, the question still echoed in his mind. He wondered if this last day would ever pass, if he would ever truly leave this damned clean, sterile, antiseptic isolation booth. He was thankful for the respite from his thoughts and his loneliness when, at two that afternoon, his nurse, a woman in her fifties, walked into the room.
“Do you feel like talking to someone, Mr. Bell?” she asked.
“Any time,” he said. “What can I do for you?”
“Oh, not me,” she said. “There’s a visitor outside.”
“Oh? Who?”
“A man named John Di Pace.”
“And he wants to talk to me?”
“Yes.”
“Send him in, won’t you?”
“Provided you don’t get all excited,” the nurse said.
“Dear,” he told her, “I’m getting out of here tomorrow. How are you ever going to survive without me to fuss over?”
The nurse smiled. “We’ll miss you sorely,” she said. “You’re the nastiest patient we ever had on this floor. I guess the beating didn’t teach you anything.”
“It taught me the pleasures of an alcohol rub,” he said, and he winked lewdly.
“You’re impossible. I’ll send in Mr. Di Pace.”
He adjusted the pillows behind him and waited for Di Pace’s appearance. He felt rather odd. He was about to meet the man who had taken Mary from him so long ago, when Mary had meant so much, and he felt no rancor now, only an absorbing curiosity. Nor did the curiosity have anything to do with Mary. He realized with a start that he was not interested in meeting the husband of Mary Di Pace; he was only interested in meeting the father of Danny Di Pace.
A knock sounded on the door.
“Come in,” he said. “It’s open.”
The door swung wide, and John Di Pace entered the room. He was a tall man who seemed embarrassed by his own height as he walked hesitantly toward the bed. His hair was dark and his eyes were brown, and Hank wondered what quirk of nature had provided Danny with his mother’s recessive coloration. The man provided an instant impression of gentleness. Not knowing Di Pace, never having heard him speak, Hank instantly knew that he was one of the gentle people, and he was suddenly glad he was here.
“Sit down, Mr. Di Pace,” he said, and he extended his hand. Di Pace took it. Fumblingly, he sat.
“I didn’t know whether I should come or not,” Di Pace said. His voice was low, almost a whisper, and Hank instinctively knew again that this was a man who rarely raised his voice in anger. “But I read about what happened, and I... I thought I should come. I hope you don’t mind.”
“It’s a pleasure to see you,” Hank said.
“How do you feel?”
“Okay now. I’m getting out of here tomorrow.”
“Oh. Then I just caught you in time.”
“Yes.”
Di Pace hesitated. “Was it as bad as the newspapers said?”
“I guess so. Yes.”
“Eight of them,” Di Pace said, and he shook his head. “I can’t understand it.” He paused. “Can you?”
“No. Not exactly.”
“Was it the... the Puerto Ricans? Or Danny’s friends?”
“I don’t know. It was dark.”
“Not that it matters,” Di Pace said, and he laughed nervously and then stopped, and in his eyes there was the greatest sadness Hank had ever seen on the face of a man. “I just don’t understand it,” he said. “Maybe people behave this way, I don’t know. Maybe in war or something? But — Were you in the service?”
“Yes,” Hank said.
“Oh sure. That’s stupid of me. Of course you were...” The voice trailed off. “I missed it,” he said. “I had a punctured eardrum. I was four-F.” He paused. “A friend of mine used to send me Yank magazine.”