a wasted life. But Nate loved being on the run. He was on the run all his life—from the establishment, and maybe from himself. Certainly”—he smiled with studied ruefulness and a twinkle in his eye—“from every woman who tried to keep up with him.” During the laugh that followed, Faith darted a glance at the woman in the rear. Her cheeks were flushed and her mouth was closed in a tight line.
“How shall we mourn Nathan Fox? Not at all. He wrote to me once that he had no regrets, and how many men can say that?”
And how many should? Faith said to herself. No regrets. They’d entered the chapel to Mozart; was “My Way” going to see them out?
“How shall we honor Nathan Fox’s memory? By reading his books and making his thoughts a part of us—living his words and by our acts, he will be with us always. He has left us this gift—and there is another yet to come. The last letters I had from him spoke of
‘the big one.’ A book that was to be published only after his death ‘far in the future, Artie,’ he wrote, advising me not to count on the ‘shekels’ for a ‘long, long time.’ Inutterably sad words now. So, I watch the mail.
It may come tomorrow, next week, next year. It will be 83
his monument, one, to quote him again, ‘That will blow the fuckin’ lid off.’ This, ladies and gentlemen, was Nathan Fox’s purpose in life. May he rest in peace, but not too much. He’ll get bored.” The music, Mozart again after all, started immediately, and everybody rose at once, cramped or moved by Arthur Quinn’s startling eulogy. It had been a performance and people immediately surrounded him, waiting to pump his hand. Faith wanted to see him, too.
When Emma had first asked her to go to the service, Faith had already realized that Arthur Quinn was someone she needed to see. The relationship between author and agent is complex—a business agreement, but of a personal nature. An agent holds an author’s ego, as well as an author’s advance, in his or her hands.
Agents find themselves functioning as critics, confi-dants, shrinks, and sometimes friends. What was the bond between Quinn and Fox? Faith guessed from the interviews she read that it was strong. Quinn’s words at the service confirmed the impression. Did he know about Emma? Forget about the “no survivors” rhetoric.
Quinn had better hope that Fox’s words survived—and stayed in print. She almost laughed out loud. Clever, clever man—essentially putting Fox’s posthumous book out for bid at the man’s funeral. She imagined what Richard would have to say about Fox’s speech, then realized she couldn’t tell him she’d been at the service.
Quinn was still mobbed by well-wishers. Faith had worked out her approach. She would pose as a graduate student contemplating a book on the radical movement as typified by Fox. Quinn, she hoped, would be interested in the book as well as the subject matter. But 84
she wanted to talk to him alone and could make an appointment by phone. She’d hoped to at least introduce herself today. She’d picked a nom de plume, Karen Brown—something easy for someone like Quinn to forget and far removed from Faith Sibley. It was unlikely their paths would cross, except perhaps at an event she was catering, but she was usually out of sight in the kitchen. She looked at the number of people between Quinn and her. It would take too long to wait.
No, what “Karen Brown” needed to do now was find out who the woman in the rear was—and how much she knew about Nathan Fox’s life above and under ground.
It wasn’t hard at all. Following at a discreet distance, Faith wormed her way out of the chapel behind the woman, who stopped only when Quinn reached out for her hand over the shoulder of someone who looked like or was Norman Mailer. “I’ll call you,” he promised, and gave a sad smile. Faith couldn’t see the woman’s face or note her response, but her shoulders relaxed visibly and perhaps her lips, which had tight-ened at Quinn’s throwaway reference to Fox’s love life, did as well.
Passing into the front room, Faith saw the two Fox cousins standing to one side with an air of patient waiting. There must be a gathering somewhere, she realized, and someone must be taking them. A postmortem on the service. She could hear the voices, congratulatory, self-congratulatory, and the whispered asides, the sotto voce digs. She envisioned drinks gulped, some spilled, and the platters of shrimp, finger sandwiches rapidly depleted. Poppy and her crowd would be there—but it wouldn’t be at the Morrises’.
“Well, of course we haven’t actually seen Nathan for 85
many years,” his cousin Irwin was explaining to someone. “Marsha might know better than I. I’m in the dry-cleaning business and don’t have much time for reading.”
What was the question?
“No,” Marsha said firmly, “Nathan Fox never wrote a novel.” She looked at Irwin. Can we get out of here?
was written all over her face. Her questioner persisted and she replied edgily, “Yes, I would know. We’re family.”
Faith couldn’t hear the rest, but presumably Fox’s cousin was continuing to reiterate her statement. And what need did cousin Nate have for made-up lives when he was so busy working on his own?
Out on the sidewalk, the crowd was thinner, scurry-ing into waiting cars or flagging down taxis. The woman in the mustard-colored parka, hood up now, was heading for the bus stop. Faith walked rapidly until they were side by side.
“Did you know Nathan Fox well?” Faith asked. It was the right thing to say.
“Better than anyone,” the woman answered, her face revealing the aching need she had to talk to someone—
anyone—about him. It almost wasn’t necessary to re-cite her story, but Faith did it anyway.
“My name is Karen Brown and I’m considering writing a book about his life. I’ve been doing some work in graduate school on the sixties and got interested in him.”
“I was a student when we met—a long, long time ago.” Suddenly, the woman seemed tired.
“Would you like some lunch?” Faith asked. “There’s a coffee shop on the next block that’s not too bad.”
“Yes, yes, I would. I don’t have to be home yet.” 86
They walked quickly, without speaking. The snow had stopped, leaving a thin, crusty layer on the ice that had built up at the curbs and around the traffic lights.
It was grimy; the soot on the top looked like a sprinkling of black pepper. The cold wind brought tears to Faith’s eyes and stung her cheeks. The woman didn’t have to be home yet, but she did have to be home sometime. A husband? Kids? She’d find out soon.
The coffee shop was tropical in comparison to the weather outside, and Faith led the way to a booth at the rear, far from the opening door. The windows were outlined with colored lights and garlands proclaiming MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY HANUKKAH, and HAPPY
NEW YEAR had been looped uncertainly behind the counter. A plastic poinsettia stood next to the cash register. Each table sported spiky evergreens, with smaller versions of the poinsettia shoved in the glass vases normally reserved for limpid carnations. But the attempt managed to impart the same air of holiday festivity that was filling every corner of the city with a vengeance as the countdown to Christmas continued.
After sitting for a moment, contemplating the decor and thinking how best to begin the conversation, Faith realized it was one of those places where you ordered at the counter and served yourself.
“Come on, let’s get some coffee right away and order.”
It wasn’t long before they were settled in. The woman—Faith realized she didn’t know her name—
had ordered pastrami—clearly not a maven. Coffee shops were not the place for pastrami. Katz’s was, the Carnegie Deli was.