Heroic Measures Read online

  “Where’s his mother?” May asks.

  “Why don’t they just shoot him,” Rudolph says.

  The hostages come to a jerky standstill just outside the store. Their backs are to Pamir; their terrified visages face Ruth and Alex. No one moves, not even to shift their weight. One woman appears to be praying. Slowly, from behind the frieze of petrified grimaces, a hand emerges waving a white bath towel.

  “He’s surrendering!” Ruth gasps, expecting helmeted silhouettes to dash over and free the hostages, but no one approaches. “Why doesn’t someone do something?”

  “They’re not doing anything?” Rudolph asks.

  “He may have a bomb,” Alex answers.

  “Please dear God,” May whispers.

  A second hand rises above the hostages’ heads.

  “Pamir has both hands up,” comments the newscaster, as if Ruth couldn’t see the second hand for herself.

  “What did he say?” Rudolph asks.

  “Pamir’s hands are up; he’s getting ready to surrender,” Alex says.

  “Does that mean he can’t press the button?” May asks.

  “What button?” Rudolph says.

  The shell of hostages suddenly cracks around Pamir, and the dazed men and women half run, half stumble toward helmeted silhouettes ready to shield them.

  “The hostages are free,” Alex tells Rudolph and May.

  Pamir’s alone on the sidewalk. Keeping his hands above his head, he drops to his knees and lets go of the towel. Ruth can’t take her eyes off the towel, so clean and white on the filthy gray sidewalk beside the kneeling figure. Pamir looks around for, Ruth assumes, his mother. In the lower corner of the screen, she notices a dog, a Belgian shepherd, sitting patiently beside its handler, a short woman in army fatigues. The soldier unclips the dog’s lead and the shepherd bounds toward Pamir, past the fleeing hostages with their shielded escorts. With fearless curiosity and relentless thoroughness, the dog circles Pamir, sniffing under his coat, in his pockets, up his sleeves, around his crotch. Pamir wears the same petrified grimace as his hostages.

  “This Israeli-trained K-nine bomb sniffer is able to detect over twenty different kinds of explosives,” comments the newscaster.

  “What’s he saying about Israel?” Rudolph asks.

  When the dog is finished, it lies still as a sphinx on the pavement beside Pamir.

  “Does he have a bomb?” May asks.

  “We don’t know. The dog is just lying there,” Ruth says.

  “What dog?” Rudolph asks.

  “If Pamir had a bomb, the handler would have called the dog back,” Alex says.

  “These K-nine bomb sniffers have a ninety-six percent success rate,” comments the newscaster.

  “What about the other four percent?” Ruth asks.

  The screen’s bottom is now darkening with armored equipment, as if the picture were going black from the bottom up. Ruth can’t distinguish machinery from men. Pamir remains on his knees, but he’s alone now.

  Where’s the dog? she thinks.

  A bullhorn blasts, but before Ruth can make out what’s being said the words break into echoes against the buildings. Pamir lowers his hands and begins struggling to open his coat, a puffy, hooded gray parka that almost reaches his knees. He tugs at the zipper, but he can’t seem to undo it. The teeth appear to be caught on something. In his panic to get the coat open, he pulls on the zipper as if it is a rip-cord and he is in freefall. Ruth can’t tell if the camera is running in slow motion, or her mind is, but Pamir seems to be fighting with his zipper for an eternity.

  Suddenly, white feathers appear to hang in the air all around him. Only when the feathers settle does Ruth realize Pamir’s ripped his parka in two to get it off. He pulls what remains of it over his head. Ruth can see he isn’t strapped with explosives. The bullhorn barks again, and Pamir tosses his coat into the street. He peels off his sweater, unbuttons his shirt, and throws them on top. Clad only in a T-shirt, he slowly rises to his feet and removes his sneakers and socks, flings them into the pile, too. “The pants,” the bullhorn barks. He undoes his belt, zipper, and steps out of his pants. Shivering, he kicks them away with his bare foot. He pulls his T-shirt over his head, and leaves his hands up in the air, but the bullhorn’s not satisfied. It barks and barks until he takes off his underwear and lies down on the ground, spread-eagle. The station discreetly covers his derriere with what looks like a smear of Vaseline.

  DOROTHY HEARS HUMAN WHOOPS, A BRONX whistle, and a burst of applause resound from the hospital corridor.

  “You notice how quiet the dogs are?” says the orderly to the nurse as she stops by to check on her charges. “They stopped barking a minute ago. They knew he was going to surrender before anyone else did.”

  “I wonder if Bed Bath and Beyond is going to have a sale now,” the nurse says, peering in on the suddenly hiccupping Mexican hairless. Despite the racket of human jubilance, Dorothy can hear shrill asthmatic bursts coming from the back of its cage, a sound her rubber hot dog makes when she bites down on it.

  The nurse reaches in to comfort the creature. “If the hiccupping doesn’t go away in the next half hour, call Dr. Rush.”

  She stops in front the pug’s cage. Eyes half closed, sitting up like a meditating buddha, its clownish expression looks almost transcendent. “I think he passed out from all the exertion.”

  She looks in on Dorothy. Dorothy’s tail starts wildly thumping. She’s hoping Ruth and Alex have come back for her now that the danger has passed.

  “Look how happy she is,” the orderly says. “You can smell it’s over, can’t you, Dorothy?”

  “I TOLD YOU PAMIR NEVER HAD A BOMB TO begin with,” Rudolph says.

  “Thank God no one was hurt,” May says.

  “Who is this guy?” Alex asks.

  “He’s a meshuggenah,” Rudolph says.

  “Better a lunatic than a terrorist,” Alex says.

  “Who says so?” Rudolph asks. “Am I to celebrate because a lunatic, not a terrorist, rammed a tanker truck into the Midtown Tunnel?”

  “Yes!” May says emphatically.

  Ruth understands what May doesn’t; that the men’s banter is the Jewish equivalent of thank God no one was hurt. She wants to join the camaraderie, to celebrate with the people she loves that they all survived to live another day, but Lily’s pronouncement keeps haunting her, If Pamir turns out not to be a terrorist, just a nutcase, the seller might use any excuse to wheedle out of the agreement.

  “We have to go,” she interrupts the others.

  “Are you sure it’s safe to go out yet?” May asks.

  “We found an apartment. Our offer’s been accepted, but we didn’t want to give them any money while Pamir was on the loose.”

  “You still want to buy in the city after today?” May asks. “Maybe you shouldn’t rush into anything.”

  “It was a false alarm, why shouldn’t they buy?” Rudolph says.

  “Because the false alarms are as bad for our health as the real ones.”

  “How much was the offer?” Rudolph asks.

  “Nine hundred and fifty thousand,” Alex says.

  “How much was the asking price?”

  “One million one.”

  “You better hurry before the seller changes his mind,” Rudolph says.

  While Alex puts on his coat, Ruth dials the realtor to tell her they’re on their way. “Turn off the television,” she calls to Alex in the living room, “we’re supposed to be at the hospital.”

  Ruth marches double-time down St. Mark’s Place, while Alex pauses on their stoop to look around. He’s not exactly sure what he expects—neighbors hugging, strangers smiling, people opening their apartment windows and shouting, as they do after winning a world series or a world war—but Avenue A is astonishingly subdued, even for a Sunday afternoon. People must be celebrating in front of their televisions.

  He hurries to catch up with Ruth as she strides past Sahara’s. Mr. Rahim is alone, sitting at a t
able like a customer, legs crossed at the knees, old-world gentleman style. He’s relighting the cigarette he put in his pocket earlier. He must have been saving it for just this occasion. Alex waves at him as they rush by.

  On the corner of First, he sees the platinum blond Korean manicurist in the open doorway of Lulu’s Nails talking on her cell phone. He smiles at her and she smiles back. On St. Mark’s, a Chinese deliveryman almost pedals into them while dialing a number. As they hurry down Second, Alex notices that every single driver appears to be talking to himself

  “Everyone in New York is on a cell phone,” he says to Ruth.

  “Maybe they don’t want to celebrate alone.”

  The realtor’s card is no longer taped next to the bell, but Ruth hardly needs a card to remember which apartment number it is. She presses the intercom buzzer, waits, listens, and presses again. “Hello? Anyone there? My husband and I are here with the deposit!”

  Nothing.

  “Are you sure you have the right apartment?” Alex asks.

  “I’m positive,” she says, ringing again. “Hello! Anyone there! Your realtor told us to meet her here.”

  Deep inside the intercom’s throat, Ruth thinks she hears faint breathing. The speaker is quiet, but it’s not dead. “Do you hear that?” she whispers to Alex, but he looks puzzled. She listens again to the muffled exhalations coming through the wires. “Someone’s there, Alex.”

  Alex takes charge of the buzzer. He presses twice, holding down the button an extra measure on the last ring. “Hello! Hello! We’re here to buy the apartment.”

  “I know who you are,” the intercom finally answers. It’s a woman’s voice, icy and clear. “The realtor isn’t here yet. You can wait outside for her.”

  The speaker goes dead.

  “Why isn’t she letting us in? Do you think they have another buyer? I’m calling the realtor,” Ruth says, opening her purse.

  “Wait. Someone’s coming out of the elevator,” Alex says.

  Ruth peers into the vestibule glass. The spiky black and white fox terrier trots across the lobby toward her. Two steps behind, in slow motion by comparison, ambles the owner on his cell phone. He’s so absorbed in his conversation that he doesn’t notice Ruth and Alex walk right past him as he opens the front door. “Thank you!” she calls after him once they are safely inside; the co-op members still need to approve them.

  They ride the elevator up to the sixth floor. In the silent hallway, Alex’s knocking on the apartment door sounds like hammering. A wink of light appears in the peephole, but the doorknob doesn’t turn. Alex raps one last time as a sharp reminder that they’re not giving up.

  “Let me try,” Ruth whispers to him, and then faces the peephole and smiles, as if her picture is about to be taken. “Hello,” she says in her warmest speaking voice, as if a door isn’t between them. “One of your neighbors, a gentleman with a fox terrier, kindly let us into the building. I hope you don’t mind. May we come in? Please.”

  The door slowly cracks open and a very tall, very pregnant woman, middle-aged and furious, blocks the entry. “Your timing is awfully convenient,” she says.

  Ruth doesn’t recognize her: she must not have attended her own open house.

  “They’re finally here,” the wife shouts to her husband in the living room.

  Alex spreads his fingers, like a starfish, against the open door lest the wife try to close it on them.

  “Please, may we wait inside?” Ruth asks. The backlit pregnant shape doesn’t move. “We would have been here sooner, but the police wouldn’t let us leave the animal hospital. It’s just around the corner from Bed Bath and Beyond. We were visiting our little dog, didn’t the realtor tell you?”

  “Don’t pretend you were at the hospital. We called the hospital. I bet you don’t even have a dog, let alone a crippled one.”

  “Of course we have a dog,” Ruth says. “She’s a little dachshund named Dorothy who just had back surgery.”

  “I spoke to the hospital receptionist,” shouts the husband from the sofa. “She never heard of any lockdown.”

  “It’s a big hospital,” Ruth says. “We were on the surgical floor. Maybe the receptionist was in another wing.”

  The elevator opens and the realtor steps out, briefcase in hand. “Sorry. Traffic’s worse now than when Pamir was on the loose. I hope no one was waiting long.”

  “We have the check,” Alex says.

  “Good. Let’s get down to business.” She strides past the wife into the apartment. Ruth and Alex follow. Ruth knows she shouldn’t smile when she sees the window seat, but she can’t help herself. The husband, a dainty-boned fifty-year-old in a red cardigan, refuses to shake her or Alex’s hand when the realtor introduces them. Alex opens his wallet and takes out the check.

  “What if we refuse to accept their deposit?” the husband asks the realtor.

  “They’ve been holding us hostage all afternoon,” the wife says. “Sure, now that everything’s over, they’re here.”

  “What if we want to open the bidding again?”

  “We can prove they weren’t at the hospital.”

  The realtor interrupts. “You all signed a contract to abide by the auction rules. It’ll be up to the courts at this point. It could drag on for months, years. In the end, everyone loses but the lawyers. Is that what you want?” she asks her clients. She opens her briefcase and takes out a form, Acknowledgment of Earnest Money Deposit, and a pen advertising the name of her company, City Cribs.

  Ruth doesn’t even read the form. She signs it with the same penmanship she used to sign her students’ report cards and hands the pen to Alex. He writes his name with a flourish, as if he’s signing one of his paintings, and then hands the pen to the husband. He reads every word on the form, shaking his head as if they are all lies. He signs his name as if he is signing a false confession, and then holds out the pen to his wife. She looks at him as if he’s betrayed her, grabs the pen, and signs it as if she is signing his death warrant.

  “When are you expecting?” Ruth asks, trying to break the insufferable tension in the air. “Is it a boy or a girl?”

  “Twins.”

  As they wait for the elevator, Ruth still feels the other couple’s rage permeating the air, like a musky odor clinging to her clothes. “Can you believe the wife accused us of making up a crippled dog?” she asks Alex.

  “Why did you lie about the hospital in the first place? For God’s sake, Ruth, we could have lost the apartment.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  In the elevator, she takes his cold hand. “I said I was sorry. With all that was going on, it never occurred to me that they’d call the hospital.”

  “I bet they never did,” he says.

  “You think?”

  When the elevator door opens in the lobby, the fox terrier looks up at them.

  Ruth reaches down to pat the dog’s head. “What’s his name?” she asks the owner.

  “Garth.”

  “We’re going to be neighbors. We have a little dog, too. A dachshund named Dorothy.”

  “I’m afraid Garth can be a beast with smaller dogs. We’ll have to introduce them on neutral territory.”

  “I understand completely,” Ruth says. “Dorothy is a bit canine phobic, too.”

  She knows she should stop petting Garth now and let the poor man be on his way, but stroking Garth’s fur is like a balm. Until the wife signed, Ruth was certain her needless lie had cost them the apartment.

  They stand beside the cemetery wall, their backs to the graves, looking up at their new home.

  “How should we celebrate?” Ruth asks. “Want to get a drink somewhere? Try one of the new wine bars?”

  “No,” he says.

  “How about the Bavarian pastry shop May told us about?”

  “No.”

  “Where would you like to go?”

  “Home. I’d like to celebrate by taking a nap.”

  “A nap does sound good,” Ruth admits.

&n
bsp; On the stairs, trying to keep up with Alex, she says, “You really think they never called the hospital in the first place?”

  “They were glued to their TV set just like we were. They never called any hospital.”

  “Then why were they so angry?”

  “Because we didn’t pay their asking price.”

  As soon as they walk in, Ruth checks their answering machine. “Lily hasn’t called. Should we worry?”

  Though it’s only four-thirty, their east-facing bedroom is already in twilight. Ruth turns on the lamp, and then takes off her shoes and socks, sweater and skirt, and brassiere. She slides under the covers. Alex stretches out beside her atop the bedspread, supine and fully dressed, save for his shoes. He immediately falls asleep, but not Ruth. It’s the hour when a sixty-watt bulb can usurp the power of the dying sun and turn windows into mirrors. Why did she lie? She reaches for her Portable Chekhov and opens to the story that was so much on her mind today, At Christmas Time. Curious to see why it had haunted her, she rereads it—the old peasant’s visit to the scribe, the bewildered wife dictating the letter to their daughter, and then kicking herself afterward for not mentioning that grandpa is ailing, the flour bins are empty, and the cow sold. Chekhov’s irony is that it wouldn’t have mattered if the old woman had told her daughter the truth because the daughter is even worse off than her parents, living in squalor with a wife-beating husband and three babies.

  Ruth closes the book and douses the light. What good would the truth have accomplished?

  “WHEN DID SHE DIE?” ASKS THE NURSE, LOOKING down at the Mexican hairless’s body laid out on a metal table in front of Dorothy’s cage. “What happened?”

  “One minute she was hiccupping, the next dead,” says the medical student. “Dr. Rush and I tried to revive her, but she never woke up.”

  “She died from all the hysteria,” diagnoses the orderly. “It was too much for her.”

  “Poor baby.”

  “How do you tell someone their dog is dead?” asks the medical student, picking up the wall phone. “I’ve never done this before.”