Rules of Civility - Amor Towles [89]
—Tell me about your personal situation, Kontent, he said at last.
—I’m sorry, Mr. Tate. What is it you would like to know?
He leaned back in his chair.
—I can see you’re unmarried. But do you like men? Do you have children stashed away? Siblings you’re raising?
—Yes, no, and no.
Mr. Tate smiled coolly.
—How would you describe your ambitions?
—They’re evolving.
He nodded his head. He pointed to the draft of an article that was on his desk.
—This is something of a profile by Mr. Cabot. Have you read any of his pieces?
—A few.
—How would you characterize them? Stylistically, I mean.
Despite its wordiness, I could tell that Mr. Tate generally appreciated Cabot’s work. Cabot had a good instinct for the intersection of gossip and history and he seemed to be an unusually effective interviewer—charming people into answering questions that were better left unanswered.
—I think he’s read too much Henry James, I said.
Tate nodded for a second. Then he handed me the draft.
—See if you can make him sound a little more like Hemingway.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Read All About It
Two nights later, an unseasonal snow fell in my dreams. Ashlike and serene, it settled over a city block lined with tenements and Coney Island amusements and the brightly colored minarets of the church where my grandparents were wed. Standing on the steps of the church, I reached out to touch the doors—so blue they could have been fashioned from planks of heaven. While somewhere on the periphery, all of twenty-two, her hair in barrettes, a safecracker’s satchel in hand, my mother looked left and looked right and then turned the corner at a sprint. I reached out to knock on the door, but it knocked first.
—Police, a weary voice called. Open up.
. . .
The clock read two in the morning. I put on a robe and cracked the door. In the stairwell stood a top-heavy cop in a plain brown suit.
—Sorry to wake you, he said not sounding it. I’m Sergeant Finneran. This here’s Detective Tilson.
It must have taken me a while to hear them, because Tilson was sitting on the stairs interrogating his nails.
—Do you mind if we come in?
—Yes.
—Do you know a Katherine Kontent?
—Sure, I said.
—Does she live here?
I pulled my robe tighter.
—Yes.
—Is she your roommate?
—No . . . I’m she.
Finneran looked back at Tilson and the detective looked up from his nails as if I’d finally roused his interest.
—Hey, I said. What’s this all about?
The station house was quiet. Tilson and Finneran led me down a back stair into a narrow passage. A young cop opened a steel door that led to the holding cells where the air smelled of mold and ammonia. Eve was laid out like a rag doll on a cot without a blanket. Over a little black dress, she was wearing my flapper’s jacket, the same one that she’d worn the night of the accident.
According to Tilson, she had passed out drunk in an alley off Bleecker Street. When one of the beat cops found her, she didn’t have a purse or a wallet, but in the pocket of the coat they found—believe it or not—my library card.
—Is that her? Tilson asked.
—That’s her.
—You said she lives uptown. What do you figure she was doing around Bleecker Street?
—She likes jazz.
—Don’t we all, said Finneran.
I stood by the door waiting for Tilson to open the cell.
—Sergeant, he said, get a matron to put her in the showers. Miss Kontent, why don’t you come with me.
Tilson took me back upstairs into a little room with a table, chairs, no windows. It was obviously an interrogation room. Once we both had a paper cup of coffee in front of us, he leaned back in his chair.
—So, how do you know this . . .
—Eve.
—Right. Evelyn Ross.
—We were roommates.
—Is that right. When was that?
—Until January.
Finneran came in. He nodded at Tilson and then supported the wall.
—So when Officer Mackey roused your friend in the alley,