He turns in his chair and flicks a look across the room and, sure enough, here she comes the medium-medium blonde with a smile on her face. They grow more beautiful by the year. Either genetics or it’s the optics of old age.
— Yes, Mr. Mendelssohn?
— I’d like a glass of Sancerre, my dear.
— Of course, sir.
— And a Cabernet too. For the full-bodied fellow over there.
— Excuse me?
— My son.
— Oh, of course, sir.
She smiles mischievously and swishes her way towards the bar. Oh, for crying out loud, Elliot, get off the phone and stop embarrassing me, please. The temptation of the Apple, the glory of Eve, the confusion of Adam, and what is it with me and the Garden of Eden today? Let me remain with my BlackBerry, dangling on the vine, and did they have any blackberries in Eden, I wonder, to complement the apple trees, and where is it, by the way, the phone? He pats his pockets but it is not there. Must have left it in my coat. Turned up to high volume if I recall correctly. Or was it only on vibrate? That would be embarrassing if the thing starts to ring from afar. No more than six customers in the restaurant today, but that would make the noise even more acute. Please don’t let it ring, please. Turn up the music, Dandinho, please. Funny that. It’s Mendelssohn. Symphony no. 4. Filtering over the speakers. A nice clean, cool sound, though he can still hear his roiled-up son barking into the telephone. Once upon a time he was a charmer with a garrulous gift, but somewhere along the way it dissolved. Take it outside into the snow, Elliot. If your mother were here, she’d march straight across and give you what-for. And what is it we give our children anyway, except the ability to not become us? How awful the world would be if we were all carbon copies of one another. But Elliot most certainly is not his mother, and maybe I have to face it: he is more me, more’s the pity, for him, and for me, and perhaps for the rest of us too.
Here she comes, tray in hand. Sweating nicely: the glass, not the waitress. And a generous pour too: the drink and waitress both.
— You’re looking splendid today, young lady.
A speck of blue paint on the inside of her wrist. Probably an artist, they all have second jobs. Abstract, no doubt. A Brooklyn landscape, neat and precise but with a nice rounded swirl.
— Thank you, Mr. Mendelssohn. You’re quite dapper yourself.
Oh, how quickly the dark clouds disappear. From diaper to dapper. And she even knows my name. Genuine, it seems: she’s not just blowing smoke, like half the waitstaff seem to do every day, their mundanities, nice to see you, have a good day, are you still working on that, sir? I’m eating, young lady, not working. This medium-medium blonde has style and taste and charisma. Not just another throwaway. He must remember that come tip-time. He does indeed look — what’s the word? — oh, it’s fallen off the cliff face, gone, the old Yiddish phrase, there’s a few still in the vault, they bob up like Halloween apples, here and there, but what is it? Gone. Still and all, he looks dapper, yes. A Brooks Brothers shirt. A Gucci tie selected by Sally. A beautifully cut suit made for him by none other than Frankie Shattuck, the young boxer-tailor-soldier-sailor. The best damn suitmaker in New York. Good creases in the trousers. A beautifully finished collar. Silk lining. The clothes indeed make the man. When he was appointed to the Circuit Court, decades ago, he went straight down to the tailorshop to ask Frankie’s father to make him a proper judicial gown and that he did, the finest cloth, the most perfect stitches, the proper pockets, the right hang from his shoulders, the space inside to greet and gavel, farpitz—that’s the word, yes, farpitz. And he got one with an even finer cut of cloth when he got elected to the Supreme Court. Gone now, Frankie’s father. All of us fading like the morning dew. Our Yiddish too.
— Terrible weather, says the waitress.
— When I was a boy it snowed ten times worse.
Which is not true at all. He can only remember Vilnius in the summertime.
— I never saw a snowflake until I moved here, she says.
— Australia?
— No.
— New Zealand?
— No.
She’s toying with me now: South Africa?
— Zimbabwe, she says, with a flourish.
Oh, toy and tarry. What a city this is. Never ceases to amaze me. A blonde Rhodesian girl serving a Polish-born Lithuanian Jew in an Italian restaurant with, what, a couple of Mexican busboys hanging out near the edges, ready to pounce, and of course Dandinho, the Brazilian busboy extraordinaire moving gracefully from table to table, and my big bald American son yammering away on the telephone by the coat check.
— And your name is?
— Rosita.
— Why, thank you, Rosita.
An unusual name for a girl from Africa. She smiles as she backs away. He nods at Dandinho who moves swiftly across to fill up his water glass.
— Thirsty today, sir?
— It’s the heat outside, young man.
Dandinho pours with great panache, one hand kept behind his back, as if his whole body is paying respect to the water glass. Not afraid to get his hands wet. An all-rounder. A meeter, a greeter, a half maître d’. Known far and wide for the way he can wrap your leftovers. An aluminum artist. No mean skill that. Nothing to snigger at. A folder of the foil. He can create any shape the diner wants — swan or porpoise or cow or crane or giraffe. Within seconds the leftovers become a work of art. A doggie bag, indeed. The kids love it but so do the ladies who lunch and indeed so do the late-night businessmen going home with an exotic aluminum animal under the arm. There was even, a few years ago, a gallery downtown that put on an exhibition of Dandinho’s foil sculptures.
— How’re you feeling today, sir?
— A million bucks. All torn and wrinkly.
A tolerant smile from Dandinho: he’s heard the quip before.
— Anything else, Mr. Mendelssohn?
— Fine for now. Waiting in fact for my son.
— Ah, yes. Some bread?
— Thank you, Dandinho, but I’m watching my figure.
And here he comes at last, lumbering across, hardly a figure skater, bumping off the tables and chairs. Tucking away his phone as he goes. Still there is an energy about him, nothing small or meek, that’s for sure, three Mendelssohns in one movement, father, son, symphony.
— Dad, he says, with a kind swerve in his voice, and a grasp of his father’s shoulder.
A bit of weight on him, sure, but he still has a pair of fine, bright eyes, the same shape as his mother’s. Speak to me of her, son, in a pattering hail-shower of words.
— Elliot, meet Dandinho.
— A pleasure, sir.
— My pleasure, Davido.
Elliot grasps Dandinho’s hand and doles out a big handshake. He’d make a good politician, even if he keeps getting names wrong. A sharp dresser too. Gold tiepin. Straight collar. Fine-cut cloth.
— Elliot Mendelssohn, he says, Barner Funds.
As if Dandinho gives a flying fig about Barner Funds, but the Brazilian pauses a moment, then reaches behind Elliot’s chair and holds it politely, scoots it in, or hardly scoots it at all, given Elliot’s proportions. Elliot shifts on the chair like it’s a dangerous horse. The table shivers a little and the silverware clangs.
— Thank you, Davido.
An odd look on Dandinho’s face, something rattling through his mind, a bronco, a bull, a bear. Is it possible that Dandinho speculates? One never knows. The unlikeliest of people get themselves into the market these days and who knows what sort of life goes on behind another life? Maybe Dandinho has himself a fine big mansion out there in Brooklyn somewhere, gold-plated handles, swimming pool, a Jacintha wife, the whole nine yards, the NASDAQ pulsing in neon around his shaving mirror, stranger things have happened, even to an aging busboy.