"It _is_ down! I can't get it any softer."
"Then shut it off."
"Why should I? I want to--"
"I said shut it off!"
"I want to hear if Van Richie comes on with the news again."
"What kind of foolishness--?"
"Ye Gods, can't a person even breathe around here any more? You're so
mad about that lousy painting--"
"Nell." His voice was taut but he didn't shout.
"It _is_. It's lousy and you know it. That's what makes you so--"
"Nell." He started across the room toward her.
"You're not going to take it out on me. It's not my fault if you can't
paint. I don't think--_Alex!_"
She only partially blocked the blow. Holding his wrist, she tried to
bite his arm. He flung her off, sending her reeling against the bed.
"Lousy painting!" she screamed. She threw the radio at the canvas. "It
stinks! It's so bad it makes me sick! It's awful!" Her face was twisted
and flushed and her body jerked with the violence of her shouting.
She tried to run then but he caught her and spun her around. He hit her
with his fist and knocked her down. He stood above her, breathing in
great gulps, his eyes blazing.
She didn't cry. She got to her feet slowly, stumbling once when she
was erect. She walked behind him and he heard the water running in the
basin. He didn't turn around. Her footsteps crossed the room. "That's
the last time, Alex," she said in a small, lifeless voice. He heard the
door close.
* * * * *
It was a miracle, Gabriel decided. The singing was a miracle. It was to
tell him to go on, to keep studying, to stay in New York and make Miss
Alvirez proud of him. And when he could speak and read English well,
then he would get a better job. A job in an office, maybe, where it was
quiet and people were kind and he could go home at five o'clock. He
would have enough money to go to the movies every night.
And so he worked hard at the words and the sentences, while the
radiator and the singing in his head kept him warm. Every night at the
same time he heard the singing. He understood more and more of the
words.
But it was not the words that helped him through the cold and
loneliness. It was the voice. It seemed to be singing just for him. It
was inside _his_ head. Nobody else heard it. It was like a friend, a
friend he didn't have to share with anyone.
When the tests came, he got the second highest mark in the class. Only
one girl scored better. Miss Alvirez shook his hand and was glad for
him.
Later, he told her about the singing. She looked at him curiously but
she didn't laugh. He even sang the parts he could remember. She did not
know the songs.
It wasn't until he'd been working in the travel office almost six
months that she came by and told him they were from one of the big
plays downtown. She had seen it and had come all the way to his office
to tell him. That made him feel very good.
* * * * *
"Listen, if you don't get a clerk in there. You're all jumpy. That's why
you keep hearing that singing."
"Edie, I told you--that's got nothing to do with it," Harry Freed said.
"The man said there was absolutely nothing wrong with the radio. Nobody
else hears any singing. I never get it on the set upstairs."
"I know what I heard, that's all. Four times now."
"You're just getting sicker, that's all that proves."
"Honey, I don't think you should say things like that."
"Yeah? Well, I don't think you should hear voices either. Why don't you
see a doctor? My God, consider somebody else's feelings for a change.
How do you think it would make _me_ feel, having a husband everybody
knew was mentally ill? Around _this_ town? That never occurred to you,
did it? You're too busy thinking of yourself. _I_ try to get you to go
to a doctor. _I_ worry about it until I'm practically sick myself. But,
oh no, you're all right. You just hear voices, that's all. So you don't
care what anybody else is going through. Not you."
Harry sat very still. Then slowly he stood up. "Put your coat on," he
said.
"What do you mean, put--?"
"Just what I said. Put your _coat_ on."
"Oh, Harry, stop. I don't like to be talked to like that and you know
it."
"Edith." He walked across the room until he was standing very close to
her. "Edith, put your coat on and get in the car. We're going into New
York and you're going to hear Van Richie on that radio if I have to tie
you to the seat."
"You're out of your mind. You must be out of your mind! Have you been
drinking or something?"
He stepped closer. Instinctively she stepped back. They stared at each
other. After a moment, she went over to the closet. "Well, if that's
the way you're going to be," she said, taking down her hat and coat. "I
still say it's the silliest thing...."
He found the corners of his mouth were dry. His knees felt watery.
But he drove steadily and surely through the heavy traffic. She kept
repeating how silly it was.
He showed her the theatre with Van Richie's name out front. They drove
back and forth along his homeward route. Three times they heard Van
Richie sing.
On the way back, she began talking again. "Shut up," he said, without
raising his voice, without looking at her. She gasped. But she knew
enough to remain silent.
The critics called it the best musical since _My Fair Lady_. They had
special praise for Van Richie: "He has made the transition from crooner
to comedian with grace and style ... the years have left the familiar
voice intact."
"Bless our boy Ben," Feldt said. He sat on the bed, the newspapers
strewn on the floor at his feet. The cast party crashed and roared in
the next room.
"Van Richie and His Electric Voice," Richie said, dropping the phone
back in the cradle. He'd been trying to call California since midnight.
"Now, listen," Feldt said.
"I know, I know. It's a hit. Sure." Richie was looking out the window.
The senior producer's apartment commanded a view of two-thirds of
Manhattan. The blinking signals of a plane headed for Idlewild. A set
of lights far downtown told him it was 1:57. Seconds later it told him
the temperature was 39 degrees.
"What now?" Feldt asked.
"What?"
"The big sigh."
"Oh, I was just thinking. How it's all different this time."
"We're all thirty years older, dad."
"No. Something else, too. The--what would you call it--the immediacy?"
"You want to call it that, you call it that. Only what the hell are
you talking about?"
"Well, back with the band in the old days, you were right there. _They_
were right there. Swaying there right in front of the stand and you
were singing right to them. I _saw_ kids falling in love right in front
of me. Maybe they got married after that. Maybe they _didn't_ get
married. But I was reaching them, I was communicating."
"When I hear an actor use the word 'communicate', I leave the room."
"This time around I can't get any feeling that I'm reaching anybody,
that it makes any difference."
The party sounds burst in on them. The producer stood in the doorway.
"What, are you memorizing those reviews? Come on, everybody's asking
where you are."
"Here we are."
"Yeah, but come on. They want you, Van. Sibi's at the piano. You're on."
"Sing _Melancholy Baby_," Van Richie said. But, he went out into the
bright, crowded room and over to the piano.
In a corner of the room, Ben listened, smiling and tapping his foot to
the rhythm of the song. The room had quieted down while Van Richie was
singing. There was a crash of applause when he finished.
"Such a _little_ voice," a woman said to Ben. He recognized her as one
of the writers' wives. "What did you do for it, Ben? Arthur said you
did something perfectly amazing."
Ben shrugged. "Not so amazing. We had a little belt made. About--" he
stretched the thumb and middle finger of one hand "--six inches high,
maybe an inch-and-a-half thick. It was a transmitter, actually--a
miniature radio station."
"But I never saw any wires. What did he have, batteries?"
"Transistors. Like the astronauts in the space capsules. He wore the
whole thing under his clothes. We had an amplifier in the wings to pick
up the signal and beam it out to the house speakers." Ben laughed. "It
probably loused up a few radios in the neighborhood but it worked."
"I think it's just incredible. That _little_ voice!"
* * * * *
Years later, when the New York dentist replaced Gabriel's old steel
fillings, he explained to him about the music. Gabriel had been
receiving radio signals in the bits of metal in his head, he said. He
was very scientific about it, even drawing a little diagram to show him
how the radiator had helped ground him. Gabriel listened politely and
smiled but said nothing. To him it was still a miracle.