About Schmidt - Louis Begley [91]
You bet I have time. Don’t forget the mummy I have at home. She teaches you to count in units of eternity.
After Schmidt had finished, he asked Gil: Do you think I have gone off my rocker, or are they all insane, the shrink included?
No, I don’t think you’re nuts. I think you have been abused and all things considered have behaved very well. I would make a couple of observations though. How old is Charlotte? Twenty-six? Twenty-seven? She is a young adult, and you should hold her responsible as an adult for what she does. That’s different from the way one sometimes tries to hold children to account. The other is that you shouldn’t underestimate how strongly Jews feel about anti-Semitism—even when it’s innocuous, one might almost say irrelevant, like yours. Take me as an example. I have heard myself say lots of times, I may have even said it to you, that I don’t care whether people are anti-Semitic so long as they don’t interfere with my work, or where I can live, and, above all, don’t try to put me in an oven. That’s only half true. Maybe only one-fourth. In reality, it hurts a lot to be disliked or denied some part of the respect you think you should get, without your having done anything to provoke it. It’s like being treated as though you’re ugly, when in fact you are not. You know that Louis Armstrong song—“All my sin is in my skin.” One never forgets those hurts.
I am sorry, said Schmidt. Have I hurt you that way?
Long ago. But at the time practically everybody was like you or much, much worse. You stood out less. Anyway, now that I am who I am, and everybody is busy licking my backside, I really couldn’t care less.
The kids want to do it their own way, a wedding in the city, he told Carrie late that night. At first it sort of stopped me dead in my tracks. Then I thought, Let them. So long as it’s what they want. And they don’t want to live here. They like some place upstate better; it will be near Jon’s parents’. I think I will buy Charlotte’s part of this house. Afterward I will probably be too poor to keep this house, so I will sell it and move into a much smaller place, but there is no hurry.
That’s cool. You know, Bryan does construction too. If you want to look at some houses he’s worked on he’ll show them to you.
That gave Schmidt something to which he could look forward. One thought led to another. He wondered aloud how the man was doing.
Mr. Wilson? Why do you keep calling him the man? It kind of got heavy for him trying to hang out. I don’t know. Probably he’s in New York. What a mess!
I have a feeling he knows about you and me.
Yeah, he’s smart! She giggled.
But how? Did you tell him?
He would’ve killed me. He figured it out when I walked you to that parking lot. He was somewhere around.
But there was nothing then!
I told you: he’s smart. He could tell I liked you. He sure was pissed.
And Bryan? You told him about Bryan?
That’s different. He doesn’t give a shit about Bryan. Let’s sleep, OK?
The next morning, after Carrie had left for work, he called Dr. Renata. She was with a patient. He asked to leave a message on her answering machine.
Renata, this is Schmidtie. About the house. Will you please tell Charlotte and Jon that I am ready to buy Charlotte out? They should talk to Dick Murphy at W & K. He’s my lawyer.
XIII
ON THE FOLLOWING WEDNESDAY, Carrie’s day off—she had mumbled, No, no, no, and burrowed deeper under the covers when, after nine o’clock, he kissed her ear, asking in a whisper whether she wanted breakfast—Schmidt went to the post office as usual, at nine-thirty sharp, to pick up his mail. The daily expedition was a ritual; since he expected only junk and bills, he might just as well have gone only once a week, perhaps on Monday. It wouldn’t have made any difference. He certainly didn’t pay bills every day. This time, however, the assiduity was rewarded: waiting for him was a letter from Charlotte. He didn’t think he wanted to read it while