Читать книгу Koko - Peter Straub - Страница 27

A short time later Harry stood at the pay telephone next to the men’s room in a narrow downstairs corridor. He first tried finding his ex-wife at the Maria Farr Gallery, which was on the ground floor of a former warehouse on Spring Street in SoHo. Pat Caldwell Beevers had gone to private school with Maria Farr, and when the gallery had seemed to be failing, took it on as one of her pet private charities. (In the early days of his wife’s involvement with the art gallery, Harry had endured dinner parties with artists whose work consisted of rusting pipes strewn randomly across the floor, of a row of neat aluminum slabs stood on end, of pink wartencrusted columns that reminded Harry of giant erections. He still could not believe that the perpetrators of these adolescent japes earned real money.)

Maria Farr herself answered the telephone. This was a bad sign.

He said, ‘Maria, how nice to hear your voice again. It’s me.’ In fact, the sound of her voice, all the consonants hard as pebbles, reminded Harry of how much he disliked her.

‘I have nothing to say to you, Harry,’ Maria said.

‘I’m sure that’s a blessing to both of us,’ Harry said. ‘Is Pat still in the gallery?’

‘I wouldn’t tell you if she were.’ Maria hung up.

Another call, to Information, got him the number of Rilke Street, the literary magazine that was Pat’s other ongoing charity. Its editorial offices were actually the Duane Street loft of William Tharpe, the magazine’s editor. Because Harry had spent fewer evenings with Tharpe and his impoverished contributors than with Maria Farr and her artists, Tharpe had always taken Harry more or less at face value.

‘Rilke Street, William Tharpe speaking.’

‘Billy, my boy, how do you do? This is Harry Beevers, your best flunky’s best ex-husband. I was hoping to find her there.’

‘Harry!’ said Tharpe. ‘You’re in luck. Pat and I are pasting up issue thirty-five right this minute. Going to be a beautiful number. Are you coming down this way?’

‘If invited,’ he said. ‘Do you think I might speak to the dear Patricia?’

In a moment Harry’s ex-wife had taken the telephone. ‘How nice of you to call, Harry. I was just thinking about you. Are you getting on all right?’

So she knew that Charles had sacked him.

‘Fine, fine, everything’s great,’ he said. ‘I find myself in the mood for a celebration. How about a drink or dinner after you’re through tickling old Billy’s balls?’

Pat had a short discussion with William Tharpe, most of it inaudible to Harry, then returned the receiver to her mouth and said, ‘An hour, Harry.’

‘No wonder I’ll always adore you,’ he said, and Pat quickly hung up.