The Baby Merchant Read online

Instead she doesn’t say anything.

  “You can tell me. We’re off the record.”

  “Nothing to tell.” In a way it’s sad, the studied absence of expression. “I’m here to talk about health services for women.”

  “Emphasis on fertility problems,” he says.

  “I don’t know anything about …”

  My God he’s forgotten what lie he told to get her in here. Guesses. “And unwanted children.”

  “Don’t.”

  “My audience is going to want to know how you, as a mother …”

  “I’m not only what happened to me! I’m …” A poet. Proud.

  “A poet.” With the tip of his ballpoint, he flips to the verse Duane Xeroxed for him. His voice is gentle now, like chocolate on satin. When a guy with Jake Zorn’s rugged face and tough affect damps it down to confidential, it’s a powerful aid to seduction. The verse is performing its own little seduction. Rapt, Daria Starbird listens to her own words: “Surprised by life I fall,” he reads, “and in falling deep I lose myself …” on and on to the hush at the last line. Smiling, he looks up. “That’s very nice.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “No.”

  He keeps the voice where it is, warm and gentle. On a good day, Jake Zorn is a heartbreaker and he knows it. “Then perhaps you’ll say how what happened with your baby affected your work.”

  “No.”

  “It’s very nice work, Ms. Starbird.”

  “Thank you.” He’s definitely on target: that telltale blush.

  “It says here you used to win prizes.”

  “Where did you get that?”

  “You were doing so well.” He keeps his voice low. Lulling her.

  “I was.”

  “Before this thing happened.”

  “What thing?”

  “You had the …”

  “Baby. Yes.”

  “And then something happened.”

  “A thing. Yes. That happened.”

  “And after that …”

  Tears drop. She is falling into his hands. “After that it was harder. But I’m here to talk about …”

  “Anything you want.”

  “Resources.” Just when he thinks he has her, the woman eludes him; one more miss and he’ll lose her. “God knows women need.”

  Like a hypnotist, he repeats her, “God knows they need …”

  “All the help they can get.”

  “All the help they can get,” Jake repeats and then he adds in that same soft voice, “Like you.” Do this right and she’ll echo dreamily, “like me,” and …

  Shit. She snaps to. “Actually, that’s none of your business.”

  “We aren’t recording yet, you can be straight with me.”

  Daria glances over her shoulder.

  “No cameras, I promise. Until we move into the studio, we’re off the record. Better. If you’re comfortable where we are, we’ll get Anton in here and when you see the red light you’ll know he is shooting.” Take aim. “Did I tell you my wife and I are expecting?”

  “No.” Her face is a study. “That’s wonderful.”

  “It’s kind of why I’m doing this story, so we’ll know what’s there for us after the baby comes.” Confidence, he tells himself. Confidence begets confidence. Middleaged but Jake knows exactly how to modulate so that he comes on all boyish: garish. Kind eyes. Reassuring grin. “You know, it’s funny how you want a kid when you don’t even know if you’re going to like it.” He watches her face for sign. “A baby, at our age. Do you think we’re too old?”

  “It depends on who you are.”

  “Like, midlife, mid-career, it’s gotta be disruptive.” Yes he is watching, he is watching her with great care. “Irish coffee?”

  “It’s early for me, thanks.”

  “Great way to start the morning.” He signals. Duane darts in. Daria won’t see the kid leer when he sees how close they are sitting. “Relax you, make you sing like an angel.” Her smile slips off her face. He says quickly, “Duane, tell Anton we aren’t shooting for another hour. So Daria, are you OK with us getting entre nous?”

  “I don’t make friends very fast.”

  “Maury and I want this baby so much.”

  “I see.”

  Duane brings the coffee: whipped cream on top. She flicks the top with her finger and then licks the finger; good. God, if he could only get her to slip off her shoes. Zorn says gently, “I gather your story’s a little different.”

  “I had a baby I wasn’t sure I wanted, if that’s what you mean. Now, you got me here to list resources available to women who want to conceive and can’t. They are …” She starts reading off names.

  Terrible story, now that he thinks about it, this very woman outside the Quincy Market in a snowstorm, offering her baby to the first taker, and that’s only the first time. His research kid tells him Daria never got over it. Never quite made it as a poet, either. To compensate she’s deep into good works, the woman is on a dozen boards. “And while we’re at it, let’s talk about services for unwed mothers,” he adds to stop the recital of agency names. “Like certain people here today.”

  “That’s none of your fucking business.”

  “Placement agencies, then.”

  “Oh, placement agencies. Of course. I have another list.”

  It doesn’t matter what Daria says this morning. In postproduction, Anton and Derek will edit the interview to serve Zorn’s purposes. Oh, yes they are shooting. The four digital camcorders in his office are sited so cleverly that his visitors have no idea. “Isn’t it interesting that you ended up in this line of work.”

  “I help where I can.”

  “And tell me, do you think having a baby hurt your career?”

  “Wait a minute.” Shadows of memory race across Daria’s face. She scowls. “What are you after here?”

  “No offense.” Daria does not say, none taken, so he tries, “With this baby coming Maury and I are, OK, a little scared. We’re both professionals. What happens to your life with a baby in it?”

  Like that! she groans, “God only knows.”

  Gotcha. “So now you understand why I’m so interested in the late pregnancy thing. You’re a poet and a mother too.” He manages a thin smile. In post production, it’s always digitally enhanced.

  Flattery startles Daria into frankness. “I’m not exactly famous for that.”

  “What was it like?”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  Now it’s Jake’s turn to be silent. He does not even prompt with the usual, “Go on.” The Conscience of Boston has learned over time that even smart people are intimidated by silence. They can handle hearing the most awful things— even the unspeakable. It’s silence they can’t bear. When it grows, it frightens them. If it gets big enough it just might fall like a tombstone and kill them dead. Given time here, silence will make Daria Starbird so nervous that she’ll do anything to end it. In time she will say anything just to fill the space and once she starts talking she’ll spill her guts no matter what she’s trying to hide.

  It happens this way every time. He is the man!

  Like any good reporter, Jake Zorn knows how. It’s like being a psychiatrist: don’t mind me, I’m not really here. He knows how to become invisible. Keep your head down and your eyes on the clipboard in your lap and you stop being a person in the room. You are nothing more or better than an ear. Pretend you aren’t listening, you’re making notes about something else. Look out the window. Pretend your mind is wandering. Never meet their eyes. Over his years interviewing, Zorn has learned this lesson well. Wait long enough and his subject— his mark!— will spill everything. Be still and when she starts talking, Daria Starbird will forget he’s here.

  In the beginning silence, the baby merchant’s mother stirs uneasily, studying her beautiful hands. As it expands she looks up nervously, but Jake doesn’t move. She shifts in her chair and clears her throat to get atte
ntion but he doesn’t stir. Somebody has to break the silence. They can’t just keep sitting here.

  The silence is huge.

  Finally she cracks. “You don’t know what it does to you to be going along like everybody else and then suddenly you’re pregnant.”

  Bingo.

  “You have no idea what it’s like. You’ve lost control of your life.”

  Flipping his ballpoint, Jake starts drumming on his clipboard, soft and unintrusive at first but hypnotic, making a steady, metronomic beat. He thinks, but does not say, Ready, set, lady, go!

  “I suppose this is all fun and games for you. Whatever happens, your wife does the job.”

  This is so close to the mark that Jake flinches. Fortunately his subject is studying her own scarred knuckles now, and does not see. Note to self: find out about the scars. He gnaws the inside of his mouth to stay quiet. Like orchids, silence is hard to grow.

  Finally Daria says, “If you did any research at all you know I had a nervous breakdown after my baby was born. It was not my first.” She shakes like a dog. “God, it wasn’t my last. It may seem like small change to you but the pressures on a poet are tremendous. The prize that singles you out. The early promise.”

  Say nothing. Track her with your eyes. Bring her to ground.

  “All the expectations! The financial sacrifices, your family’s.” It all comes in on her. “The lifetime wasted because you can’t measure up. You may come close, but you never measure up.”

  Hold your breath, man. Bite your tongue.

  Musing, she launches a speed-rap. “The career that founders no matter how fast you run. Poets aren’t like rock stars, Mr. Zorn, but they are. Think Sylvia Plath, and think hard. She had two children, and look what she did to herself. It’s the pressure, but what did I know? I thought I owed it to the future. I thought being a mother might unleash my best work!” Her voice breaks in two.

  Gulping, she goes on. “I didn’t rush into it, I looked for the right man, somebody solid to love us and take care of us. See, I landed in the Riggs Clinic after Smith. I wanted to make this gift to the future but I knew I needed stability, so I chose Peter. With my talent and his strength …” Daria is staring at something he can’t see. Shhh. Wait.

  “I should have used one of the Boston Glyphs, we gave readings and made love in a dozen coffee bars. Or David, at Riggs he was my nurse. He would have taken care of us!” She sighs. “Not the man I chose. When I had my baby I was unmarried which was no big deal except it was. I was alone. Alone and pregnant. I couldn’t even manage my life! How was I supposed to manage a kid?”

  The gaps between silences are getting shorter. This is the best interviewer’s trick of all. Let your subject unburden until she topples. Then she can’t stop.

  “My sisters begged me not to keep him. They offered to adopt him. How could I let them when I loved him so much!”

  Jake is thinking: that’s not the way I heard it. He tries to scope this— where she’s coming from— but her face is locked up.

  “Of course I never told him how scared I was. I never let down. How can you lead an expedition when your baby knows the leader is afraid? I had another nervous breakdown about it. No. You can’t make me go there. At least not now. We got past it, Tommy and I. That’s all anybody needs to know. I loved him so much! See how much I love my Tom. I love him so much that he thinks I don’t love him at all. I pretended, to make it easier. I had to, so I could set him free. I said I didn’t want him. I did it for him, get it? When you’re one woman alone you go crazy with the responsibility. You have to do it right. You alone. You will be judged! You go through the days stone cold terrified of doing it wrong.”

  She is either lying or she isn’t. Even Daria doesn’t know.

  She says, as if Jake has asked, “No I don’t know where he is right now but I should, right? Isn’t that what mothers do? We are in touch, but not often and not all that much. As for what he’s made of himself since college? Hard to say. He did very well in college. Like me, he won prizes, but his were for logic and rhetoric, things that help you instead of hurting you. See, logic and rhetoric move you beyond feeling to knowing how to think.”

  She chokes. “All poets have is feeling, and now look at me!”

  They are approaching the end of the arc. No need to lay on Irish coffee, Jake has what he wants. All he has to do is wait.

  “Then Tommy got a job and he’s done well. I don’t know what he’s doing but he’s doing very well, he sent me checks until I started sending them back and then he quit. I can’t say how Tom makes his money but he makes a lot. Every birthday he finds a new netsuke for my collection and some of them are extremely fine, maybe his job takes him to Japan. He’s always been secretive about his work, just like a poet, but I think he knows exactly what he’s doing whereas poets— poets never know. Sometimes I think he must be in some very secret service. Interpol or CIA or one of those extreme secret agencies that we don’t know about. As I said, he did very well in college. After that I simply do not know.”

  There’s more to the recital, but none of it matters. In the way of good interviewers Jake nods and murmurs the occasional mmm hmmm while he scrawls: bla bla bla. At the end he buzzes Duane. Anton comes in with an antique camcorder and pretends to videotape the Resources for Women interview: a half-dozen Barbie doll questions and answers about health care and reproductive rights and— Jake is grateful even though he’s not sure exactly what he has here— at the end he lets poor Daria, rigid with purpose, repeat the names on her list.

  “So those are some of the resources available to women in the Greater Boston area. Now if you’ll just turn that thing off.”

  “You understand,” Jake says, “this is only a preliminary interview. You’ll need to come back to the studio when we do the show. The most important segments are done live.” He is already drafting his indictment. Judgment by the audience. When he goes national he won’t be just another talking head on a TV magazine.

  Stiff with exhaustion, Daria stands. “If I can do some good.”

  “Oh, you can.” He hits that warm professional note geared to reassure. “And you will.” Then the devil takes him and he adds carelessly, “If we can work out the timing and make a satisfactory arrangement, maybe we can bring you on together with your son.”

  “Tom.” Daria’s face breaks open. “I have so much to tell him!”

  “Mother-son reunion. Sweet.”

  “But will he be glad to see me? What will he say?”

  “He’ll understand. This is your chance to explain to him.”

  The woman is yearning like the Man Without a Country craning at the coastline from his prison ship. “That would be wonderful.”

  “I wouldn’t count on it. But I’ll do what I can.”

  23.

  If life in this dimension was as clean and logical as a computer’s operating system, Starbird would indeed shut down and reboot, but it isn’t and he can’t. He’s got too much going on.

  The encounter has left him disrupted and brooding. He retreats to the genteel confines of the sleepy, venerable Marshall House in old Savannah, which he chose for the sleepy and venerable part. Who does this kind of work in a magnolia drenched landmark where azaleas bloom in profusion and personal attention is S.O.P? Shady business is supposed to go down in bland, featureless motels operated by chains so big that nobody notices who comes and who goes.

  God, when did he start thinking of what he does as shady?

  Nothing looks the same to him. He keeps flashing on her face: torn mouth, smudges under the eyes like bruised petals. If he had to talk to her, he had to talk to her, but he never should have looked her in the face. The woman was frantic, he isn’t sure why. Was it the stalker guy or this new baby? Will her life clear up if she gets shut of it, he’s doing her a favor, right? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know and that’s the hell of it. To do what he has to, he has to believe that he is doing all parties a service. Otherwise he’s totally fucked.

  St
arbird is so wired that he has to remind himself what you do when you come into your hotel: smile and if the girl behind the desk says hey, be sure and answer back, easy and Southern. Hey. Remember to ask if there are any messages. Like it’s expected that you have friends in this town. So what if you messed up today, it’s cool. You’re cool. Head for your room before she sees otherwise.

  “Mr. Laird,” she calls after him.

  Is that my name today? “Ma’am?”

  Smiling— nice girl, accent from somewhere south of Tara— she waves a plastic bag he doesn’t recognize. “You forgot your things.”

  Today’s paperback. Latest Vanity Fair: where did I get those? Her fingers brush his and linger; all he can find to say is, “Sorry. Thanks.” He checks his watch and is surprised by the time. Distracted, he guesses, heading for his room. No. Absorbed. Bad when you start losing time and don’t know where it went. Very bad. If he messed up on an ordinary operation, he’d abort.

  This time he can’t. He doesn’t have the liberty to retool. It takes weeks. You don’t just plunge your arm into any old cradle and grab the first thing you find. You research. Background your supplier and your subject. Triangulate. Scan for the chip because you need to be sure the subject is ripe for a rescue; if you accidentally lifted a wanted child, it would be a disaster. This is how disturbed and edgy Starbird is; he never used to think about it. Now he is staring moodily into his laptop without remembering when he opened it, scrolling through hundreds of downloads, making …

  An advanced search for another match. He skims screen after screen. Makes a wireless connection and goes trolling for more. It’s not that he expects to find alternatives, really; he isn’t even sure what he’s looking for. He just needs the comforting contact with the computer, where what you type is what you get. The cool beauty of the flowchart. The precision of the analog mind.

  How long has he been sitting here? He doesn’t know. When he looks up his stomach is sour and the light has changed. Sighing, he goes to the window and stares down into the shady street. All the outlines are softened by humidity as moisture rolls in off the salt marshes ahead of the Southern twilight. This part of Savannah is a miracle of restoration, contrived to lull you into believing you’re back in the day. Cars crouch in soft shadows, waiting to fade into night. Only the skateboarder with one DayGlo green earphone lifted so he can hear music and still talk on his cell reminds Starbird that this is Savannah now, and not a hundred years ago.