A rattled Harvey Schwartz raced toward Mr. Bernard, helping him to his feet, a shivering blinking Mr. Bernard, whom he nervously pointed at the banner that flowed from wall to wall in the lobby:
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MR. BERNARD
SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS YOUNG TODAY!
The banner was revealed to Mr. Bernard just as one-hundred-odd office employees of James McTavish Distillers Ltd., his corporate creature, burst into “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow.”
His eyes brimming with grateful tears, if only because his body remained unpunctured, Mr. Bernard scampered forward to accept a sterling silver tea service from a delegation of his employees. Applause, applause. Dabbing his eyes, surreptitiously hawking phlegm into his handkerchief—a surprisingly hot wad—Mr. Bernard extended his tiny spindly arms to offer his benediction. “God bless you. God bless each and every one of you.”
Two office girls wheeled out a cake on a trolley—massive—shaped like a bottle of Canadian Jubilee, their most popular rye, and crowned with figures of Mr. Bernard and his wife, Libby.
“I don’t deserve such love,” Mr. Bernard protested. “You’re wonderful, absolutely wonderful. Not my employees,” he cooed, blowing wet kisses as he retreated to the elevator, “but my children, my family.”
Only a bemused Miss O’Brien and Harvey Schwartz, carrying the tea service, rode with Mr. Bernard in the express elevator to the forty-first floor. “Everybody chipped in,” Harvey said, beaming. “From vice-presidents to office boys.”
“But some people didn’t think it was such an inspired idea,” Miss O’Brien said.
“Their idea, not mine. I was enormously touched on your behalf, Mr. Bernard.”
Mr. Bernard began to clack his dentures. “I have to piss,” he said. “I have to piss something terrible.”
“But weren’t you pleased?”
Cursing, Mr. Bernard backed into the elevator wall, gaining purchase before he charged forward to kick Harvey in the shin, sending the tea service flying.
“You little runt, I could have fractured my hip out there. Now pick up that stuff; I hope nothing’s bent.”
Mr. Bernard, a short man, no more than five foot four, bald except for a silvery fringe, had the body of a carp. The wet brown eyes protuberant, his cheeks scaly, bleeding red whenever he was in a temper. Darting into his office, he pinched his nose with two fingers, snot pinging into the florentine tooled leather wastepaper basket. Then he pitched his homburg on to his Queen Anne walnut settee which was upholstered in velvet and had been built in Philadelphia for William Penn. Over the settee there hung a Jackson Pollock, one of his daughter’s fershtinkena acquisitions. Mr. Bernard was fond of using the painting, which reminded him of curdled vomit, to jab petitioners or job applicants who were visiting his office for the first time. “You think it’s good?” he enjoyed asking. “I mean, hoo boy, you’re a Harvard MBA. Tell me. I’d value your considered opinion.”
“It’s first-rate, sir.”
“There’s nothing wrong with it? Take your time, sonny. Have a good look.”
“Wrong? I think it’s lyrical, sir.”
Then, his eyes bright with rancour, he would pounce. “It’s hanging upside down. Now what can I get you?” Mr. Harvard Tuchus-Face MBA.
Only Moses Berger, that drunk, had outmanoeuvred him. Of course that had been years ago, when Mr. Bernard had first discovered that Moses was poking his nose into Gursky family affairs, asking questions about Solomon.
“You don’t think there’s anything wrong with the painting?”
Moses had shrugged.
Shooting forward in his desk chair, Mr. Bernard had barked, “It’s hanging upside down.”
“How can you tell for sure?”
“Hey, you’re some smart cookie,” Mr. Bernard had replied, brightening. “Come work for me and I’ll pay you double what you can get at some shitcan university.”
“I’m not looking for a job, if that’s why you sent for me.”
“I sent for you because I don’t care for strangers trying to dig up dirt about the Gurskys to feed anti-Semites, as if they’re going hungry these days. But if any trouble-maker dares to cross my path I’ll squash him like a bug.”
His face hot, his mood vile, Mr. Bernard ate lunch in his private dining room with his brother Morrie.
Mr. Morrie, who never forgot a cleaning lady’s name, a secretary’s birthday, or the illness of a filing clerk’s wife, was adored by just about everybody who worked for McTavish. He occasionally ate in the employee’s canteen, refusing to allow anybody to fetch for him, but lining up with his tray like the rest. It was amazing, really amazing, that he and Mr. Bernard were brothers. One a saint, they said, the other a demon.
Nobody had seen Mr. Bernard speak to his brother for years. Ever since Mr. Morrie, prodded by his wife, had dared to go to Mr. Bernard’s office to plead Barney’s case.
“I appreciate that eventually it’s got to be Lionel who sits in your chair,” Mr. Morrie said.
“Don’t count Nathan out yet.”
“Or Nathan.”
“What are you talking, Nathan? That boy’s a washout. The things that come out of your mouth. Christ.”
“But what harm would it do for Barney to be a vice-president?”
“I’m not putting a rat in place to scheme against my sons once I’m gone.”
“He won’t scheme. He means good.”
“That boy was once bitten by a bug called ambition and now he’s infected from head to toe.”
“Bernie, I beg you on bended knees. He’s my only son.”
“You want more, make more. I did.”
“I never even told him I signed those papers years ago.”
“Listen, why don’t you go back to your office and do a crossword. I could finish it in half the time it takes you. Or go pull your petzel, you’ll only need two fingers for the job, I’ve seen it, and that should keep you busy until it’s time to go home to that yenta you married like a damn fool.”
“Bernie, please. What do I say to him?”
“Out of here before I lose my temper.”
Also joining Mr. Bernard for lunch were the still-fetching Miss O’Brien, his secretary of twenty-five years, and Harvey Schwartz.
Freckled and pink and plump Harvey was, inordinately vain about his full head of curly ginger hair, even though Becky was fond of announcing at dinner parties that baldness was a sure sign of virility. A short man, but still some two compromising inches taller than Mr. Bernard, Harvey wore shoes especially made for him with paper-thin heels. Only forty-three years old, he also affected a septuagenarian’s stoop, his knees slightly bent.
M. Delorme, the chef, offered steamed Dover sole and boiled new potatoes for lunch. Mr. Morrie, as was the rule, was served the smallest portion last. Somewhat taller than Mr. Bernard, a full five foot five, the Chippendale chair Mr. Morrie was obliged to sit on differed from the others at the table. Two inches had been shaved off the legs.
“Harvey,” Mr. Bernard said, his manner menacingly sweet, “I’m sorry I kicked you in the elevator. I apologize.”
“I know you didn’t mean it, Mr. Bernard.”
“Fetch me the Wall Street Journal,” Mr. Bernard said, nudging Miss O’Brien under the table. “I left it on my desk.”
No sooner did Harvey limp out of the dining room than Mr. Bernard fell on the salt shaker, trailing it over Harvey’s fish again and again, shaking vigorously.
“Naughty, naughty, Mr. B.”
“He’s not allowed. He’s worried about his heart. Watch.”
Harvey returned with the Journal, and Mr. Bernard, all but bouncing with glee as he pretended to be absorbed in the market pages, watched him gag on the first bite. “Anything wrong?”