Harpo peeked into Sam’s office. Sam was gone but there was a globe on the desk so Harpo crept inside and spun it to look at Russia, no, the Soviet Union now. It was massive. He slipped out of the office, and into the big hallway.
Harpo walked past a pretty girl and leered. At first she glared, but then her eyes lit up with that look, the movie star recognition. She smiled, teeth dazzlingly bared, and Harpo saw a way forward, that familiar chess game series of moves that led right into her bedroom. He moved closer to her, now put his hand on her lower back, that lovely topography, that taper and swell, but then he was walking to the registration hallway again. He didn’t even remember turning away. There had been no in-between between there and here, he was just moving, and he’d promised himself not to chase chickens anymore, so maybe it was working. Maybe he was turning himself into a better man.
Harpo took up his post, half crushed by the heavy door, when he heard footsteps. Then Blima was by his side. “The worst times are always in the mornings,” she whispered.
“You know about the ritual too?” Harpo crouched down next to her. Then he sat. Then he wedged his foot in the doorway to keep it open a crack. Blima put her hands on his knee, and leaned forward, peering out the door. Harpo liked the tiny little pressure on him. He liked having kids around.
“Why do you like love notes so much?” he asked.
“Sometimes I hate love,” said Blima.
“What?”
“I mean I hate letters. I mean, it’s safer if I just hide them.”
“I don’t understand,” said Harpo.
“They’re dangerous. They only cause hurt. Sometimes love just causes hurt.”
“Love letters are all about love.”
“You shouldn’t write about love,” said Blima. “You should just do it. You should just love the people you have already. If you have to write about it instead, and send a love letter to somebody new, then that means there’s something wrong.”
Harpo let the ensuing silence stretch. Blima was a very loving little girl. You could see right away that she didn’t hate love. Maybe she was right about just choosing to love. Again, he thought about Susan. He’d fix this. He’d prove he was a loving person and he’d run right back to her.
“We went to this place in the old country,” Blima said suddenly. “They left me outside in the hallway. I was lying down on the bench so I could still see through the crack in the door. They were holding hands, I saw them.”
“Who was holding hands?” whispered Harpo.
“My mom and the tall man.”
“Was that Simon?” Harpo sat up straight. “Did you know Simon?”
“Mom gave me a book to read just before she went inside. So I dropped it off the couch. To make them stop. Then the boy did the same thing, with his book that his daddy gave him.”
“The boy?” Wait. There was a little boy too? “What boy, Blima?”
“He always copied me. Every single time I did anything, he did the same thing too.”
“Who was he?” Harpo shivered, like someone poured cold water down him. There was a little boy.
But just as abruptly as she’d started, Blima stopped talking. She slipped away, and Harpo watched her run out into the hallway.
Did Simon have a son?
Harpo peeked out the door. He saw Ayala shuffling behind the registration desk, and their eyes met.
Harpo ran out into the hallway. His heart was pounding. The whole place was throbbing, the colours too vivid, the sun too bright, and it wasn’t what Ayala thought. Could she think that he was spying? Well, he’d fix this, whatever the problem was, and then she’d understand his intentions. He’d have to find that letter.
Suddenly, Harpo could hear his brothers, somewhere close, he didn’t know where. He drifted toward the sound. Then he tripped on a throw rug. Rugs. Mats. Sure, everyone meant to clean under those, but nobody actually did. Harpo knelt and rolled up an oriental carpet. He searched under it. Nothing. He unrolled it again and crawled to the next one. This time, he found a tiny little sock. Second Present. It had to be. That’s exactly the kind of gift adults thought to give little kids. He crawled farther, until he came upon a pair of legs. Guest. Guests. Two of them, and the female legs weren’t bad. He looked up and saluted, and the people to whom the legs belonged shuffled away. Harpo sat down on his heels. He was getting close. He could feel it.
Then Harpo heard a whoop of laughter, Chico’s, so he let his search take him in that direction.
If Simon had a son, then it could be that he had a wife too. Probably he did. It was more likely than not. Kids had to come from somewhere. Harpo shivered. It was warm out, but still, he had goosebumps. Had Simon put his own family in danger when he’d helped Ayala? Where were the wife and kid?
Harpo crawled under one of the long couches that lined the hallway. It smelled like dust. It was overpowering. And there was nothing under there but balls of lint. He pictured little Blima lying on top of one of these couches, dropping heavy books to remind Ayala that she was still there.
After a moment, Harpo crawled out again, then kept right on going, all the way to the room of windows. He looked up. His brothers were here—Chico on the sofa pressed far too close to a girl too young to have ever heard of vaudeville, Groucho lounging on an overstuffed chair, reading a book. Harpo scrambled to his feet and tiptoed to the doorway. He had to look in here. He had no choice. This was Blima’s favourite room, so the letter must be hidden here.
Chico whispered something to the blond girl, and she twittered like a woodpecker. Then Chico put his hand on her thigh, his thumb just inside her skirt. Then he eased his hand higher up her leg. That was a patented move. They’d worked on that one for years. The girl didn’t object. She just moved closer. Harpo leaned in the doorway, lured by equal parts fascination and revulsion. He and Chico looked so much alike that nobody could tell them apart. So this is what it looked like when Harpo did this. He must look like an old man too. He felt sick.
Chico kissed the girl’s cheek, and Harpo looked away. Chico had a wife who loved him, had a child at home. His family was alive and safe. They could be happy too, should be happy. Their biggest worry must be where Chico went to at night. He had no idea how lucky he was. He had no right to hurt other people this way.
Then Harpo just couldn’t take it anymore. He burst into the room. Chico looked up at him, smiled and winked. He must have glared back, because the girl blushed cherry red, stood, excused herself, then pushed past him and fled into the hallway.
Chico looked unfazed. “Howdy, stranger,” he drawled.
Harpo sat down on the opposite couch.
“Where have you been all this time?” asked Chico. “I haven’t seen you at cards. I’m on a winning streak. You should join.”
Harpo looked away.
“Why do you always look so busy?” asked Groucho.
“I’ve been looking for something,” said Harpo. And he had been, it was true, he’d just temporarily forgotten about the letter. He stood again, looked around.
“I’m hot,” said Groucho. He’d put down his newspaper and was taking off his jacket. “Harpo, you look hot, and it’s making me even hotter. Do you mind unbuttoning your shirt?”
“Did you have hidden things when we were growing up?” asked Harpo.
“I think you should take off your socks.”
Harpo crept around the room. He’d already checked the sofas and the cushions, the underneaths of the chairs and inside all the drawers. There must be more hiding places. “Did you have special things?”
“I had this bun once,” said Groucho. “Except my brother stabbed me with a fork and stole it.”
“That was me,” said Harpo.
“Yes it was.”
“Except, did you have anything that you hid from the family?” Harpo had hidden pets, a cat once, three dogs and a moth, all in empty tenement basements. He’d creep downstairs to feed and play with them. But the neighbourhood kids always stole them. He’d hidden money too, all the things and buttons he’d found in the alleyways. He’d pulled a doll’s head out of the Hudson once, and put it in Chico’s pillowcase. He knelt down and rolled up the rug. Nothing.
“I had forty-seven cents I never told anyone about,” said Groucho.
“Where did you keep it?”
“The sock drawer.”
“I would have found that,” said Harpo. “I always looked in there. I would’ve taken it.”
“I know you would have.” Groucho fanned himself with his newspaper. “So I tied it to the top. I had a very advanced system with twine and a pulley. It should have been foolproof.”
“Did it work?”
“Chico found it.”
Chico opened his eyes. “Hardly worth looking for. The way you snuck in and out, I was expecting a hundred bucks.”
“So to answer your question,” said Groucho, “no. The sock drawer was not a good place to hide things. He even stole the twine.”
“Finder’s fee,” muttered Chico.
Harpo tried the cabinet in the corner, opened the top drawer, then felt along the inside. Nothing.
“I hid things in my socks,” said Chico. “I didn’t take them off. That’s how I kept them safe.”
“You should take off your socks now,” said Groucho. “That might make up for it.”
“Socks wouldn’t work for a letter though,” said Harpo. You could always tape it to your leg. But not forever. That wouldn’t work for more than a day or two, a week tops if you were a little kid, or just didn’t take enough baths.
Groucho ripped a page out of a magazine and folded it into a fan. “Do you need to hide a letter?”
“How would you hide one if you wanted to?”
“The vent?” said Groucho. “Listen. Could you hide all those Duck Soup reviews while you’re at it? No. Don’t hide them. Burn them.”
“Burn them…” Harpo found a vent mounted in the wall, dragged a chair to it and jumped up. He peeked in and saw nothing, an empty hole, gnarled fingers of dust stretching out toward him. He quickly closed the cover.
“Are you stripping?” asked Chico. “Harp, is he stripping?”
Harpo wheeled around and saw Groucho’s rolled up pants and bare ankles.
“What’s the point of being in Canada if it’s going to be so hot all the time?” said Groucho.
“It’s not so hot,” said Chico.
“I like the warmth,” said Harpo.
Groucho eyed him. “I’d feel better if you’d take off your socks too. I’d be cooler if you didn’t look so hot.”
“I remember taping something under the table leg once,” said Harpo, still balanced on the chair. “I don’t think that worked. It was a dime that Uncle Al gave me, but it was gone the next day. Frenchie was gone at the time, selling door to door I guess.” He remembered because as he was looking for the lost loot, their tiny little apartment had felt cavernous.
“Hey.” Harpo hopped from the chair to Groucho’s loveseat. “I just thought the word cavernous.”
“Good,” said Groucho as Harpo slid in beside him. “Now spell it.”
“Not on your life.”
“Take off your socks,” said Groucho, and Harpo kicked him. It felt so good that he did it again. Then he nudged Grouch’s bare ankle with his foot.
“Are you scratching my leg?” asked Groucho. “You’re probably getting my skin all over your socks. You’d better take them off in that case. It’s more hygienic that way. Now spell hygienic.”
“If I get cooler, then you won’t get cooler,” said Harpo. “I don’t think that’s how it works.” Then Harpo put his head on the arm of the loveseat. He wanted to talk so badly. And now Groucho had even asked what he’d been doing all this time. But he had no idea how to start to tell him.