I was repulsed yet oddly proud when you went to Israel. The Israelis have earned my respect. They are more like Germans: They kill to preserve themselves. I wish you had remained there, enlisted in the army, and perished for your beliefs, as Israel will someday perish.
I saw you once more when we passed each other at the 3rd Street Promenade. You trailed a step behind your attractive wife. She is no doubt the lead dog. It is an affront to me that you have no children.
The first time I killed a man, I felt the superiority and triumph of my will. Murder and sex are inextricably tied together: Murder is a denial of creation and sex is the act of creation. True men live through our seed. The truest men understand the need to kill to persevere. Throughout history the powerful have taken the best women. I have taken many. After they have been taken, they are cast aside to lesser men. You are a lesser man who could neither kill nor procreate.
You have eight siblings. Two I left in Germany as I left you. Others live with me in Brazil.
Laban explained your disease and that you desired my help. I considered, but decided against introducing you to your half brothers and half sisters. They do not know you exist. I only agreed to see you to placate Laban, and because, at the time, I never believed you would survive more than a year. Yet, because of your brother, you are still alive.
I have no desire to meet you. But I do have one wish for you: Reward yourself with your newfound life and birthright. Be hard. Be my son.
44 THE SONGS OF SALOME
Still Born, Again
I was in the studio Dad had built for me gathering photos of Orient and of Kyle. I found one when she, Art, and I were secretly smoking cigars outside Donnie Boyle’s. Alchemy was playing wiffle ball in the backyard with a friend when I heard him scream, “Mom!” Hilda was passed out on the back porch. Alchemy ran inside and dialed 911. I wrapped Hilda in my arms. I sensated this was her time to transmigrate to another world. I kissed her forehead, and even though she couldn’t hear me, I said, “I will miss you so damn much.”
The paramedics rushed her to Eastern Long Island Hospital. She’d suffered a mild heart attack. The doctors predicted full recovery but wanted to keep her for observation. I extended our stay by three weeks, for her sake and mine.
The night before her release, she died from “cardiogenic shock.” I had sensated correctly. I felt myself untethering. I called Ruggles and he talked to me for almost two hours. He asked if I wanted to come to Collier Layne. I didn’t. His words seemed wise: “If it was going to happen, and it was, isn’t it better you and Alchemy were there? This way you were able to spend quality time together.”
Nathaniel flew back for the funeral. He protected me from the odors of miniminded pieties whispered by Hilda’s friends while they conveyed their phony condolences. Billy Jr. said he would sell the house and put the money in the trust. We took a few mementos, packed up books, records, photo albums and stored them in a neighbor’s barn. The rest would be donated to charities.
One last time I climbed to the roof. Two great white egrets gracefully patrolled the bay, and I bid a final goodbye to Kyle, Art, Dad, and Hilda.
On the way to JFK, an irrecoverable sorrow gnawing at my insides, I asked the driver to stop at the cemetery. Alchemy jumped out and ran ahead of me and stood in front of Hilda and Dad’s headstones. I wished I could’ve reassured him that although their heaven is a lie, there is DNA travel and Hilda existed somewhere where we could all meet again. Only Hilda and Gus weren’t of our DNA and possessed no psychopomp powers. With his long, loose curls flopping over his reddened eyes, his hand touched the nameless headstone next to Dad’s. “Who’s under there?”
“Your brother,” I said, as even-keeled as possible. “I was very young, only two years older than you are now, when I got pregnant. He died during childbirth. I never named him, but I wanted him to have a proper burial so he would be remembered.”
Alchemy started to quake. So did I. I feared he was experiencing a mystical connection through me with his brother. We held hands and knelt in front of the headstone. He rubbed his eyes and runny nose against his red T-shirt.
“Was his father my father?”
“No. I met your father many years later. He lives in England now.”
“I want to see him.”
You could say that my impetuous stop at the cemetery was a coincidence that happened to change the course of our lives. Bullshit. Just as finding Teumer’s photo was no coincidence. Both had to happen. I had to accept Alchemy’s unwavering decisiveness, even as the ferocity of his determination startled me that morning. It always did, no matter how often I witnessed it.
Berlin reeked of death. Over the summer, Z had been diagnosed with AIDS and was interred in Auguste-Viktoria-Krankenhaus. He had barred visitors, preferring to be remembered as the smooth-faced man-boy rather than a leprous escapee from Kalaupapa. People listened to him because paranoia and AIDS were synonymous then; too many cowards thought even being in a room with an HIV-positive person was akin to a death sentence. I visited him almost every day.
I arranged a meeting between Alchemy and Bent. The bastard would see him only in exchange for £1,000. Nathaniel, who was attending a mid-September meeting of No Nukes organizers in London, flew with Alchemy and escorted him to Bent’s Earls Court hovel, which he had actually cleaned up. The three of them ate lunch at a local fish and chips place. Although Nathaniel believed Bent was not high, he returned the next morning to check on Alchemy, just to be safe. No one was home. That evening, he returned to find Bent strung out, mumbling that Alchemy had taken off and not come back. Foolishly, we’d given Bent the money before the visit ended. Nathaniel taxied back to the hotel in a quandary, fighting his anticop instincts. Luckily, he found Alchemy, who’d run away, sitting in the lobby flirting with a desk clerk.
They were evasive when I asked for details. Alchemy simply shrugged. “I didn’t like him. He said mean things about you and told me to ask if you had much fun in any loos lately.” I held him close to me, wishing I could exsanguinate the blood of Bent from him.
Gibbon called from New York. He was coming to Cologne, and the skinflint even offered to pay for me to meet him there. A collector had offered $60,000 for a commission with the caveat that we meet first. I wanted Nathaniel to come with me, but he had classes and an appointment in the East. Reluctantly, I went alone. I checked into the hotel decorated in a fin de siècle gaudy opulence straight out of one of Greta’s movies. I almost expected Wallace Beery to lumber across the lobby. Dressed in a white bodice tied in the back, a copperish chenille scarf, and a black leather miniskirt, I wandered downstairs to the dining room to meet Gibbon and his buyer.
“Salome, I’d like you to meet Mr. Malcolm Teumer, who has collected your work since your Do Not Disturb exhibition.”
“Fucking holy fucking shit!”
Everyone in the dining room gaped at us. I collected myself. “Gibbon, please go. Leave Teumer and me alone. Wait in the lobby. This won’t take long.”
“What?” Gibbon jumped up and down in place. “No, I won’t.”
“Murray, I said go! Ask no goddamned questions.” Teumer waved him away.
Once we were alone, I sat down and ordered a tea and cognac. “I guess Lively talked to you.”
“Yes. This seemed convenient, as I have other business here.”
“Attending an SS reunion?”