“Where are you? Baby? Baby! Are you all right?”
“Yes!” She took a moment to pull herself together. “I’m — I’m OK.” She started to whimper. “The man says it was my fault and he — he wants to talk to you…”
“Hullo?”
“Hullo?”
“Hello, who’s this?”
“This is Arnold Mathers, who’s this?”
“Marjorie Herlihy. I’m her mother. Is she all right—”
“Well, I’m the guy whose car your daughter just hit! My wife is having a fuckin miscarriage! Your daughter hit my wife! I think she’s drunk, or on drugs!”
“I’m sure she didn’t mean—”
“We are very badly shaken up. The paramedics are here and my wife is bleeding from between her legs!”
The man started choking back tears.
“We’re going to lose the baby!” cried a woman.
“Take deep breaths, darling. It’s gonna to be OK.”
“What can I — how can I—”
“Hello? Who is this?”
“This is Marjorie Herlihy! May I please speak to my daughter?”
“This is Antonio Borgosa. I’m a lawyer — I saw the whole thing. Your daughter was clearly at fault. It’s Joan Herlihy, correct?”
“Yes—”
“We’re calling from the County of Marin. Did you know your daughter was up north?”
“Yes…”
“Well, she’s in trouble, big-time. The woman she ran into was 6 months pregnant.”
A man said over and over, “I have to go with my wife! I need to go with my wife to the hospital!”
“Listen,” said the lawyer. “There’s something you can do and the gentleman said he won’t press charges.”
“What is it? Tell me—”
“Hullo?”
“Hello? Who is this?” said Marj.
“The father of the baby your hopped-up daughter just snuffed!”
“Oh God!”
“That’s right—killed. Now you listen to me—”
Joan cried out, “Mommy, do what he says, do what he says!”
“Oh Lord Lord Lord Lord.”
Marj sat on the floor, the shit pouring out of her. She was cramping and blanching, her eyes watery from pain. She put a fist in her mouth and bit down.
“Just listen to me. I don’t want to deal with the insurance companies. I hate insurance companies.”
“Mommy!” Her daughter grabbed the phone. “Mama, I think my insurance lapsed. I don’t even think I have insurance! Oh God, am I going to lose my job? The job up north? And the condo? Mama, if I can’t get on the plane I am going to lose everything!”
“But they said you already — that they were calling…”
The nasty man got back on the line.
“I want you to get your jewelry and put it in a little suitcase—everything you have. That means wedding and engagement rings, necklaces, pins, all the crap that dead prick husband ever gave you, understand? Put it in a bag, get in your car and bring it — now!”
“Please! I don’t know where — I don’t I can’t I—”
“Bring it to me now, you hundred-year-old monkeycunt, or you will regret the day you were born! My wife is bleeding internally and our baby is dead! Because of your fucked-up daughter! You spawned her! A junkie pig who turns tricks in Porta-Potties!”
“Mister, please! She’ll do it! She’ll do it! Mommy!”
“Get the jewelry.”
“Mama, I’m so scared! There’s blood, everywhere!”
“Get the jewelry and don’t forget the opal! You are human garbage, do you understand? Get the rings and the diamonds and the everything, put em in a bag, and sit your skinny terminal gullible ass in the car and wait. In the fucking driveway. And don’t fucking talk to anyone or I will dig the eyes from your daughter’s head and fuck her skull with doggie-dicks. Am I making myself clear?”
“Mommy!”
“The baby’s dead! The baby’s dead!”
“I will lock little Joanie in jail with maggots and animals. Do you hear me, you deaf and dumb geriatrical cunt? I’ll be there in 5 minutes, OK, senile shithole? 5 minutes—or I will kick your daughter in the stomach till she bleeds from her ass and her eyes!” He started to sob. “My baby is dead! Do you understand, Mrs Herlihy? Your daughter killed my little girl!”
“Mommy! Help me! Help me! Help me!”
“Let me talk to my daughter! Let me talk to her!”
“Hi! This is Antonio Villaraigosa again! I am a personal injury attorney with many, many years experience. Listen, this gentleman is agitated, he is very emotional, but I think it is best from the legal point of view that you do as he says.”
There was a muffle of laughter and sirens and shouting before a breathless Joan got on the line. “Mommy, are you going to help me? Are you going to do as they say?”
“Yes! Of course,” she said, already struggling to remove the ring, the ring she hadn’t taken off in more than 30 years. Her finger was swollen and she went to get soap. “I will, baby! Hold tight! Hold tight!”
“Hurry!” screamed Joan.
The line went dead.
LXV.Joan
SHE deliberately hadn’t packed the vintage hippo-hide Velextra suitcase he bought her at auction, the one that belonged to Maria Callas. She said, You’ve really got a thing for carry-ons, huh. Well, it wasn’t actually hippo but “the skin of Ari O’s testes”—typical gross-out-mode Lew.
Her plan was to stay overnight then rush home to Mom. Maybe Pradeep could help with a referral, but the woman at the bank seemed on top of it. She wasn’t exactly sure what a lawyer would do other than steal more money.
Everything Barbet had said was beginning to feel like the truth. The trip seemed a ruse, more of a rendezvous to talk about the pregnancy than anything else. She was determined not to play that game, or capitulate to her own insecurities; she’d made a solemn promise to give it her best. Anyway, there was plenty to distract her. Aside from the thermodynamics of manipulating Lew Freiberg into saying yes to the commission, she needed to oversee the final details of Full Fathom’s chapel unveiling (Barbet’s impotent little PT Barnum extravaganza). She didn’t really have the energy. Her mother’s ordeal had sapped her; putting the nightmare on hold didn’t make it go away. One of the major comforts — that Mom wasn’t dependent on her for financial help — had been yanked from under her.
So she got out her voluminous Prada duffel and threw in a favorite Miss Sixty smock, the Bless skirtrousers, the Loro Piano cashmere hoodie and Van Steenbergen shift, the Judith Lieber minaudière, the Narciso Rodriguez devil-red housecoat, the Project Alabama T-shirts, a D&G tulle/lace babydoll pearl and crystal-encrusted dress (Lew got her that), the Marc Jacobs silk organza ruffle skirt (Pradeep) and Marni taffeta slip, along with Louboutin espadrilles, Comme des Garçons ballet flats, Manolo zebra-print pony slingbacks, MJ mary janes, a pair of black-and-white Converse; antioxidants, exfoliants, extracts, amino acids, and wrinkle reducers; L’Eau d’Issey, Dior J’Adore, and Le Couvent des Minimes creams, balms, and gels. She was a sucker for any kind of overpriced unguent purported to be made for hundreds of years by ascetic nuns or monks. The world was such a load of bull. Even the Pope wore Prada. They called it papal product placement. (Papal Bull.)