He sat back and looked out the window, thinking about Jon’s words: “My mother is your mother, too.”
“You know, it’s funny, Jon. I think of you as my half brother. And the others-your brothers and sisters-I feel related to them as well. But your mother… who is as much my mother as yours… I haven’t made the connection yet. I probably never will.”
Jonathan nodded. “I can understand that. There is this small issue called my father.”
“Maybe that’s it. I’m sure I make her very uncomfortable-”
“Not really. She knows her secret is safe with all of us.”
“Psychologically then.” Decker laughed. “I like your mother. I really do. But my own mother is still alive. It’s unfair to expect a man to have more than one mother at any given time.”
“Not to mention a couple of mothers-in-law,” Rina added. “My mother and Mrs. Lazarus.”
Decker frowned. “Yeah, that too. Two mothers, two mothers-in-law, two daughters, and a wife. I’m surrounded by all these estrogen-filled beings. Don’t you feel sorry for me?”
“I would,” Rina answered. “Except right now I’m cranky because of PMS.”
Her face was deadpan. Decker couldn’t tell if she was serious or not. But he didn’t question her. Never rouse a sleeping lion.
3
The sign said $16.83 an hour to park the car: Decker wasn’t sure if he’d read it right, but then Rina said something about space in the city being at a premium. Space or no space, the rates were usurious. Since a typical leisurely paced business meeting could last two to three hours, Decker now knew why New Yorkers talked so fast.
Hershfield had the requisite Fifth Avenue address, and Jonathan miraculously found parking on a side street because it was still early. As soon as Rina unbelted Hannah, the girl woke up as cranky as a coot. Decker held her as they walked, the monolithic buildings blocking out what little light the sky had to offer. Rubbish cans and Dumpsters lined the sidewalk. With any luck, there wouldn’t be a garbage truck blocking the van when they had to leave. Hannah whined as they walked into the granite lobby of the skyscraper and checked in with the security desk, manned by six gray-jacketed sentries. She complained she had to go to the bathroom.
“No public rest rooms,” the guard announced.
“What do you mean there’s no public rest room?” Decker countered. “This is a sixty-story building.”
“Security precaution. It’s key only. Mr. Hershfield’s office is on the forty-third floor. You can take the express elevator up.”
Rina grabbed Peter’s arm and brought him over to a bank of elevators. “Don’t start.”
“Guy’s an idiot. Do we look like terrorists-”
“Shhh. He’ll hear you.”
“That’s the idea.”
“I have to go to the bathroom-”
“In a minute, pumpkin,” Decker growled.
Moments later, as they were whisked up to the forty-third floor, Hannah moaned that her ears hurt. By the time they reached the first secretary, Hannah was saying that her bladder was about to burst.
“Can we use the bathroom?” Rina asked.
“Three floors down,” the secretary answered. “Take the internal elevator and go to the right. Ask for Britta.”
“But there’s one right over there,” Decker pointed out.
“Employees only. Fortieth floor, sir. That’s where Mr. Hershfield’s offices are anyway.”
“I finally found a place more bureaucratic than the LAPD.”
“Come on, Peter.” Rina tugged at his jacket. “Getting her angry won’t help.”
“Listen to your wife.” Then she turned her back to them.
They waited at the elevators as Hannah whimpered in Decker’s arms.
“Cry louder, pumpkin,” Decker told her.
“Peter-”
“Scream a little. Wailing’s okay, too.”
Another elevator ride. By now, Hannah was complaining of nausea. She reached out to her mother. Rina took her and marched over to the first person she saw. A fifty-plus woman with short clipped brunette hair and hoop earrings. She had round brown eyes and wore bright red lipstick. Over her black sweater was chunky jewelry. Half-size reading glasses sat on the bridge of her nose.
“I’m looking for Britta,” Rina announced.
“That’s me.”
“They’re looking for Mr. Hershfield.” Rina cocked her finger in the men’s direction. “I’m looking for the bathroom. She’s got to go, and apparently this floor has the only public bathroom in the entire building!”
“Lenore didn’t let you use the forty-third-floor one?”
“No, she did not!”
“What a peach!” Britta stood and extracted a ring of keys. “I’ll take you, sweetheart. Poor thing.” She looked at the men. “Is one of you Rabbi Levine?”
“I am,” Jonathan said.
“Third door on the right. Mr. Hershfield’s expecting you. Just knock. I’ll get you coffee in a moment.” To Rina, Britta said, “Come, dahling. I know what it’s like to be captive to a small bladder. After I had my last child, I ruined outfits every time I sneezed.”
Decker watched the women disappear behind the sacred door known as the women’s rest room. Then he and Jonathan found the office. A gold doorplate told them that Hershfield was a legal corporation. Jonathan knocked. A stentorian voice bade them enter.
His office was the size of a secretary’s reception room. Then Decker realized it was the secretary’s reception room. The desk held a nameplate that said MS. MOORE. The person behind the desk definitely wasn’t a female. He was Ichabod Crane, alive and well and practicing law in the city of New York. His cheeks were so sharp that they almost poked out of the thin skin. His forehead was high and bare, with thinning dark hair combed straight back. His lips were two slash marks, his eyes were sunken in his brow. Still the orbs held a spark of mischief. He was superbly dressed-black wool crepe jacket, white shirt with French cuffs, and patterned tie of horses and gladiators-probably a two-hundred-dollar Leonard tie.
Hershfield looked up at the standing figures. “This is my receptionist’s office. I get my best work done here at six in the morning when no one’s bothering me… buzzing me every twenty seconds. Of course, that’s her job… to buzz me, and to organize my professional life. I don’t know why, but I find her desk much more conducive to work. Maybe because it isn’t filled with my own garbage.”
Gathering up his papers, Hershfield stood, then took out a key ring. He opened an adjoining door. “Come in.”
Good-size place, Decker thought. Not cavernous, but the plate-glass window view opened things up-an endless snapshot of steely, gelid air and rooftop machinery. The office itself was paneled in warm red mahogany. Sharing the wall space with the abstract oils were lots of diplomas and certificates. He had a small bookcase in back of his desk, the shelves holding just as many Hebrew books as tomes on American jurisprudence. Of course, the firm had its own law library, so the references he had were the ones he probably used the most. His desk was rosewood and brass, his desk chair tufted oxblood leather. Two client chairs sat opposite the desk, upholstered in a subtle hunter green and maroon floral. In the middle of the room sat a sofa in the same pattern and two more client chairs, the arrangements separated by a sleek rosewood coffee table framed in brass. A corner leather wing chair rounded out the atmosphere. The parquet wood floor was almost entirely covered by a fringed, ornate Persian rug.
There was a knock at his door. Hershfield answered it, and Rina came in. She had applied some fresh makeup. She was wearing a navy sweater over a navy skirt, and black boots. Hannah was in her arms.