RSS 2.0 FeedRothstein Before the Fall
Rothstein was listening on a headset to a male voice describing The Child's Bath by Mary Cassatt. Suddenly there was some static, and a woman's voice said, "Charlie, come here." He looked around the Art Institute gallery. There were a museum guard and two plump, gray-haired women, but the voice was that of a young woman.
"Where?" Rothstein whispered.
"I'm in the next room. The Rodin."
Curious, he moved into the next gallery. There was a marble sculpture of a nude woman less than three feet tall, a Monet on either side. No one was standing by it. Rothstein didn't walk directly to the sculpture. Instead, he looked nonchalantly at the Monets, while keeping an eye on the guard walking back and forth among several of the galleries.
"Over here, Charlie." There it was again, that voice. He walked to the sculpted woman and stood facing her. It was Rodin's Eve After the Fall. The woman looked ashamed of herself, her arms shielding her breasts, one hand held as if imploring God not to strike her down. "Put your hand on my ass," it told Rothstein. He looked around. There were other people in the gallery, but they seemed not to hear what he was hearing.
"My ass, Charlie," the statue repeated stonily.
He drew closer to the woman. She was all marble and completely naked. A practical joke, he thought. Or some kind of sting operation – as soon as he touched the statue's behind, uniformed police would swoop down and arrest him. Of the two, the joke hypothesis worried him more. He did not like being made fun of. It's not that he lacked a sense of humor. On the contrary, he felt he had a keen sense of humor. And he could be suitably self-deprecating when the occasion called for it. But he detested being the butt of practical jokes.
He noticed a small video camera high in a corner of the gallery. Those are in every gallery, he told himself. Part of the security system. A museum employee risked losing his job if he used that system to play jokes on patrons. And was he the only one who heard the sculpture's voice? Was everyone but him in on the joke? And how did the voice know his name? He was beginning to sweat.
He turned to leave the gallery. Walking toward the modern wing of the museum, he heard, "Don't leave, Charlie. Please. My hips – please – caress my hips." He pretended to smile. If someone was watching, he wanted them to know he was in on the joke.
"Very funny," he murmured. When he removed his head phones, there was silence. But for a few seconds, he heard the small crackle of static in the phones. It was just loud enough that he could also hear his name being called through the tiny speakers.
He walked through the gallery of some post-Impressionist painters: Vuillard, Signac, Rousseau. He put one of the earphones next to his ear. A man's voice was describing Toulouse-Lautrec's lithograph Adolphe – The Sad Young Man. He slipped the earphones over his head and tried to concentrate on the man's voice. But it was no good; he was thinking about the Rodin, about Eve and her lewd entreaties.
As he was about to enter the modern wing, there was another crackle of static and the woman's voice, "Rothstein, come back. I need you."
"Enough," he shouted, ripping off the headset. People turned to look; a guard, startled, stood up and moved toward him. Rothstein dropped off the headset and hurriedly left the museum. The joke, if that's what it was, rankled him.
On the El train back to his Albany Park apartment, he ruminated on the failure of a day that had started in such a pleasant way. He'd set his alarm for eight, a luxury only a Sunday could afford. The attractive young woman from the night before was long gone. He showered, skimmed the morning paper, and made breakfast for himself. Eggs over easy, just the way he liked them. Cora, if that was her name – it was loud at the party – was a good sport. He knew she was just as sure as he that they'd end up in the sack by the end of the evening.
After breakfast he’d walked to the park for his regular Sunday morning game of touch football. They called him the Old Man, but, at forty, he was tall and still athletic. Maybe he no longer had the legs to be a receiver or even a running back, but he remained a formidable quarterback. He had thrown four touchdown passes, but his team lost 49-28. It was a good workout nonetheless, and the brisk autumn air was exhilarating. He had planned to leave the entire afternoon for the Art Institute.
Rothstein liked to roam the galleries on his own. He could sit when he wanted to spend time with a painting and not feel the pressure of someone waiting for him. He might wander past the large Caillebotte's Paris Street, Rainy Day one Sunday, paying no attention to it, and the next stand in front of it for twenty minutes. Meandering through the galleries, Rothstein often lost sense of time. During the week, he trolled for clients for his investment business. Saturday he cleaned his apartment and shopped for the week. He saved Sunday afternoon for the Art Institute.
But now, as the train approached Kimball Avenue, he was angry about the woman's voice which had driven him from his Sunday sanctuary. Rothstein stepped onto the platform and noticed a tall brunette ahead of him; he recognized her. "Mary?"
The woman turned. "Charlie! How nice to see you." Her smile was genuine. The two had dated for a couple of months several years ago and parted amicably. Although they lived in the same neighborhood, Rothstein couldn't remember the last time he'd seen her.
"I'm getting an early dinner," he said. "Care to join me?"
Mary hesitated and then smiled. "Sure. Just don't get me home too late."
There was pleasant chit-chat at a little Italian place not far from her apartment. Rothstein felt a slight dizziness from the red wine he was drinking. Mary was talking at length about something, but he wasn't paying attention. She was the only woman he'd ever met with green eyes; this particular evening her eyes looked greener than he remembered. Going to bed with Mary, he thought, would make up for the unpleasant visit to the Art Institute.
During the ensuing week, he didn't think about the voice. But after Sunday football, on the El ride downtown, he began to worry. He decided to dispense with the headset. There were two special exhibits, and the museum was more crowded than usual. He'd stick with the Asian galleries where it was less likely to be jam-packed.
Eishi's A Courtesan Reading a Letter struck his fancy, and he sat on the wooden bench in the center of the gallery admiring it. Rothstein recalled sitting in the lobby of a posh hotel in Sydney some years earlier, watching as a young Japanese man procured a prostitute for his aged grandfather. The grandson put both of them into an elevator and stood watching as it rose to the seventh floor and stopped. The young man then joined his family in the coffee shop. Rothstein admired a culture honest enough to provide for the sexual needs of the elderly. To him, it seemed civilized. This got him thinking about whether he'd ever have children, let alone grandchildren. And whether he could expect a grandchild in America to round up a prostitute for old granddad. As he mulled this over, he heard a voice call out his name. It was the same voice!
He stiffened and looked quickly around. There was the guard, of course. And three teen-aged girls who seemed to be passing through to some other part of the museum.
"My ass, Charlie. I've been waiting." The voice reverberated in the indoor ether, but was it only for him to hear? This worried Rothstein. He feared he might be losing his mind. But why this voice, why only in the Art Institute? "I miss you," it said more softly.
"Leave me alone," he said. The guard walked over and asked Rothstein if anything was wrong.
"No. No problem," Rothstein said. He left the museum without stopping at the Rodin. When he got home, he called Mary to see if she'd have dinner with him. He needed to talk with someone about the "voice," someone who could assure him he wasn't going mad.
At dinner he explained what had happened earlier that day and the week before. Mary laughed. "You're not the kind who hears voices, Charlie. At least I don't think so. Must be some kind of idiotic joke. Do yourself a favor: Stay away from the Art Institute for a few weeks. See what happens."
Rothstein agreed. He made plans with Mary to have a picnic the following Sunday at the Foster Avenue beach. It was a nippy, early Fall day, and they spread their blanket far from the sand and water. Mary had made sandwiches, and Rothstein brought the wine. It should have been a pleasant outing, but he couldn't get the Rodin out of his mind. "Grab my ass," she had said.
When Mary took his hand and said, "Penny for your thoughts," he was startled. They were there, he knew, only because he was staying away from the Art Institute. It felt more like therapy to him than a date.
"I'm okay," he said. "Guess I've got a lot on my mind."
He decided it had been a mistake to confide in Mary. He could tell she felt sorry for him, and this made him angry. No one had to feel sorry for Charlie Rothstein, he told himself. He went through the motions before taking her home and giving her a kiss on the cheek.
"Thanks," he said.
"Any time."
The following week, he skipped football and arrived at the Art Institute a few minutes before it opened. It was raining hard, and he joined a young woman in an archway.
"You're a regular here," the woman said. "I recognize you."
"Yeah, I usually come on Sundays."
"You missed last week."
This unnerved him. "You're checking attendance?"
The woman laughed. "Hardly. There are just some people I notice. I watch for them. I came early today to avoid the crowd. I see you did, too."
"Yes." Rothstein admired the woman's brazenness. Unusual, but not, in his experience, unique. He knew he was good looking, kept himself in shape and liked fashionable clothes. He understood from an early age that women found him attractive.
The museum doors clicked open. "Shall we?" he said. The woman smiled and entered ahead of him. Together they climbed the wide marble stairs to the second floor. Rothstein wondered if she was following him or he her. They both stopped momentarily before the Caillebotte.
"Cheers," she said, turning to the gallery on her left.
"See ya." Rothstein waved, moved around the Caillebotte to Eve. He'd decided to confront the sculpture first thing. He found her, still between two of Monet's watery landscapes. Charlie sat on the wood bench and stared at her with an intensity he usually reserved for stock tables. He could feel his heartbeat and realized he was waiting for her to speak. There was only silence. He took several deep breaths and tried to see this Rodin as simply a work of art. He let his eyes move to the Monet on her right.
"Hi, again." It was a woman's voice. Rothstein tightened and turned around. It was the young woman he'd just left. She was standing next to the headless, armless Walking Man, another of Rodin's masterpieces. Rothstein didn't know why he hadn't noticed it before. There was the headless man in mid-stride, facing Eve. So was she turning away from God or from him? Rothstein wasn't sure.
"You’re following me," he said with a broad smile. He was relieved that the voice belonged to a real, live person.
"I love this Walking Man," she said. "For some reason it speaks to me."
"It talks to you?"
"Just about," she said, returning his smile. "I find it exhilarating. I must see it every time I'm here. I see you're a fan of Eve."
"Yeah, I guess she speaks to me." He was amazed that he could make a joke of it.
"Don't you wish you could touch her?" the woman asked. Rothstein must have looked startled, because the woman immediately apologized. "Sorry. I didn't mean you should actually touch her. It's just that Eve seems so human. To me, at least."
Rothstein relaxed. "I understand," he told her. Early thirties, he estimated by the freshness of her skin, the way she dressed. "Care to have lunch?"
She smiled. "Sure."
He took her arm and guided her toward the staircase. Once outside, he wondered briefly what he was doing. She's not your type, he told himself. Too short. Too young. But her auburn hair looked silky. And when she looked up at him, he knew they would share a bed before nightfall.
They were sharing a sandwich across the street when Rothstein heard, "Charlie, my ass is nicer than hers. Come to me." He looked quickly at the young woman, but it was clear she had heard nothing. No one in the cafeteria was looking at him. "Charlie?" The voice was driving him mad. He knew now that it wasn't a trick. The voice had the tone of a command. Staying away was not an option. She wanted him.
He fumbled in his wallet, gave the waitress a twenty and told the woman he had to go. "An emergency," he said. "Stay and finish." He hurried back to the Art Institute, ran up the stairs and back to gallery 243. He moved close to Eve After the Fall, and waited.
"So," he whispered, looking directly at the sculpted woman on her pedestal. There was no response. The gallery was filled with mendacious silence. Rothstein eased closer. He bit his lower lip and leaned in. Ever so slowly he reached around to the back of the statue.