meeting Ilka’s eyes, until Maggie’s eyes met the eyes in all the faces stapled, glued, and paper-clipped to all the notes and letters, and correctly attached in the upper right corner of the applications waiting for Claudia Haze’s perusal, determination, and appropriate action.
On her way out, Maggie went to thank Mr. Warren. He urged her in the direction of the door. “You just missed her! She’s been in with a representative of the new administration. If you hurry …”
Maggie had come out into the corridor in time to catch the tall, the towering back over-topped with hair so high and so black Maggie thought it must be a wig, of what might or might not have been Ms. Claudia Haze stepping into the elevator, which had closed its door behind her.
Lucy was glad to see Dr. Haddad walking toward her, but the doctor was coming to speak to the young woman in the inside-out red sweater. The doctor said, “You can go ahead and take your mom home.” Dr. Haddad and the young woman walked away together, and Lucy saw Al Lesser hesitating in the doorway.
Al saw Lucy among the patients on the chairs and avoided her eye. He saw a fat girl asleep with her head on the shoulder of a fat mother and a teenage boy sucking on a Coke bottle. An old man who held a bloody napkin to his temple asked Al what time it was.
“I’m supposed to interview …” Al checked the name on the Intake Form for Seniors, “Francis Rhinelander?”
The nurse had the look people must mean when they said someone had a horse face. She picked up the left arm and checked the wrist of the other old man. This one might have been a movie extra made to look as if he’d been beaten up. “Take him in the second cubicle,” said Nurse Trotwood. “I’ll get him a gown.”
Francis Rhinelander
The old man dangled his legs over the edge of the gurney and tried in vain to pull the hem of his hospital gown down to cover his naked knees. Al asked him did he know where he was, and he did. He knew that he lived in the Hotel Strasburg on Madison Avenue. His sentences tended to end on the rising or “feminine” note as if they awaited confirmation.
Al wrote in the month, day, and a year of his birth in the second decade of the nineteen-hundreds. “Nearest relative?”
“My brother, George, in Godford, Connecticut? I just came back from a visit.” The Intake Form for Seniors hadno line for the brother’s wife, the several nephews, or the fact that the patient had that day returned from a visit.
“Marital status?”
“I’m single.” The patient did not add that he still, once in a while though never very strenuously, imagined that some pleasing, tall, and more than ordinarily forceful woman might come along and marry him.
“Education?”
“Godford High.” The patient said that their house had stood on School Street so that all he, his brother, and their dad, who, he said, taught Godford Middle School math, had to do was to just cross over. “I took piano at Juilliard,” said the patient.
Al said, “My mom plays the piano,” and blushed, wondering whether it was okay for an interviewer to have a mom.
“And composition,” Rhinelander said.
“Oh, wow.” The interviewer was interested. “What did you compose?”
For a moment the old man was silent. He said, “Did you know Verdi wrote Otello when he was seventy-four? He was seventy-eight when he wrote Falstaff .”
Al did not know this. “Employment history?” he asked the patient.
Until his retirement, Francis Rhinelander had taught math at Joan of Arc on Manhattan’s West Side. He had never grown accustomed to the global shriek that accumulates from theindividual shrieks out of young throats in confined spaces. But he had learned to suffer the small panic with which he had always opened the door to his next class. Francis Rhinelander would stand at his tall height in front of a room of leaping, circling, howling dervishes and call for order. “Will everybody come to order,
On her way out, Maggie went to thank Mr. Warren. He urged her in the direction of the door. “You just missed her! She’s been in with a representative of the new administration. If you hurry …”
Maggie had come out into the corridor in time to catch the tall, the towering back over-topped with hair so high and so black Maggie thought it must be a wig, of what might or might not have been Ms. Claudia Haze stepping into the elevator, which had closed its door behind her.
Lucy was glad to see Dr. Haddad walking toward her, but the doctor was coming to speak to the young woman in the inside-out red sweater. The doctor said, “You can go ahead and take your mom home.” Dr. Haddad and the young woman walked away together, and Lucy saw Al Lesser hesitating in the doorway.
Al saw Lucy among the patients on the chairs and avoided her eye. He saw a fat girl asleep with her head on the shoulder of a fat mother and a teenage boy sucking on a Coke bottle. An old man who held a bloody napkin to his temple asked Al what time it was.
“I’m supposed to interview …” Al checked the name on the Intake Form for Seniors, “Francis Rhinelander?”
The nurse had the look people must mean when they said someone had a horse face. She picked up the left arm and checked the wrist of the other old man. This one might have been a movie extra made to look as if he’d been beaten up. “Take him in the second cubicle,” said Nurse Trotwood. “I’ll get him a gown.”
Francis Rhinelander
The old man dangled his legs over the edge of the gurney and tried in vain to pull the hem of his hospital gown down to cover his naked knees. Al asked him did he know where he was, and he did. He knew that he lived in the Hotel Strasburg on Madison Avenue. His sentences tended to end on the rising or “feminine” note as if they awaited confirmation.
Al wrote in the month, day, and a year of his birth in the second decade of the nineteen-hundreds. “Nearest relative?”
“My brother, George, in Godford, Connecticut? I just came back from a visit.” The Intake Form for Seniors hadno line for the brother’s wife, the several nephews, or the fact that the patient had that day returned from a visit.
“Marital status?”
“I’m single.” The patient did not add that he still, once in a while though never very strenuously, imagined that some pleasing, tall, and more than ordinarily forceful woman might come along and marry him.
“Education?”
“Godford High.” The patient said that their house had stood on School Street so that all he, his brother, and their dad, who, he said, taught Godford Middle School math, had to do was to just cross over. “I took piano at Juilliard,” said the patient.
Al said, “My mom plays the piano,” and blushed, wondering whether it was okay for an interviewer to have a mom.
“And composition,” Rhinelander said.
“Oh, wow.” The interviewer was interested. “What did you compose?”
For a moment the old man was silent. He said, “Did you know Verdi wrote Otello when he was seventy-four? He was seventy-eight when he wrote Falstaff .”
Al did not know this. “Employment history?” he asked the patient.
Until his retirement, Francis Rhinelander had taught math at Joan of Arc on Manhattan’s West Side. He had never grown accustomed to the global shriek that accumulates from theindividual shrieks out of young throats in confined spaces. But he had learned to suffer the small panic with which he had always opened the door to his next class. Francis Rhinelander would stand at his tall height in front of a room of leaping, circling, howling dervishes and call for order. “Will everybody come to order,
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