The taxi dropped them on the corner of 2nd Avenue and Fourth Street. A corner place, Ratstein’s was open. Inside it was big—it must have had over a hundred tables, all empty except for two men at a front table, arguing over coffee and blintzes.
“We’ll sit in the back, at the Philosopher’s Table,” Solomon said, and led them to an oval table with chairs for eight.
“Schlepstein from NYU often shows up here,” Solomon said. “And sometimes Hans Werthke from Columbia.”
Ritchie had never heard of these men. And he didn’t much like vegetarian food. He settled for a plate of egg cookies and a celery tonic. Grelich ordered strawberry blintzes, Esther took rice pudding, and Solomon ordered the rice and vegetables dish.
Their waiter was a short, plump, middle-aged man with a fringe of pale thinning hair and a vaguely European look. He moved slowly on what appeared to be painful feet.
“I’ll need this table by 7 pm,” he said. “It’s reserved.”
It’s only 3 o’clock now,” Grelich said. “God forbid that your famous philosophers should have to sit anywhere else. We’ll be out of here long before they start their discussions.”
“Our customers are used to seeing them here,” the waiter said. “I am Jakob Leiber and I am here to serve you.”
The talk was general for a while, with one after another relating incidents of their day. From their conversation, Ritchie got an impression of an older New York, filled with old law tenements, push carts, micvahs, and study rooms for young scholars. He wondered if they weren’t talking about a New York of a hundred years ago, not today.
In the taxi down Second Avenue he had noticed the Hispanic food stores, perfumeries, lunch counters and laundries. What once might have been a Jewish neighborhood had become a Hispanic barrio or whatever they called their slum neighborhoods.
He commented on this to Esther. She told him, “Everything’s changed. I’ve heard Ratstein’s only stays open because of the support of some wealthy Jewish mafia types who live in New Jersey and need a place for lunch on their trips into the city.”
“That reminds me of this movie I saw,” Ritchie said. “There was this Jewish mobster and his daughter, and this other mobster, a young guy, falls in love with the first mobster’s daughter and goes back in time to kill the man who became her husband but didn’t treat her right. I forgot how they got the time machine, but it seemed pretty logical at the time.”
“Did he get the girl?” Esther asked.
“Sort of. But there was a complication.”
“There’s always a complication in invented stories,” Grelich said. “But life isn’t like that. Life is terribly simple.”
“I don’t agree,” Ritchie said, recognizing Grelich’s propensity for climbing out on an unstable premise and inviting someone to knock him off. “I was writing a story about a similar situation—it’s an old theme, you know—and all I found were complications. Christ, even my complications had complications.”
That got a mild laugh from Esther, and a chuckle from Solomon. Even Grelich gave a sour grunt of approval.
“Boychick,” said Grelich, “I didn’t know you were a writer.”
“Well, scarcely a writer,” Ritchie said. “But I have published a few things in a magazine. An online magazine, no pay, but they get some good names.”
“You’re a writer?” Jakob the waiter asked. He had been listening to the conversation while serving the dishes.
“Well, I do write,” Ritchie said. His recent experiences with real professional writers, who posted messages and comments on his Message Board from time to time, had convinced him that his best policy was to make no public claims for himself, at least not until he had a few professional sales.
“A writer,” Jakob mused, drying his hands on his apron. “I’m in the publishing business myself.”
“You’re a publisher?” Grelich asked.
“No, I’m a translator. From the Rumanian. I have a Rumanian science-fiction writer I translate for.”
“You translate into English?” Grelich asked.
“Of course, English, what else? Urdu?”
Ritchie said, “What is this writer’s name?”
He couldn’t make it out even after several repetitions, so he decided to learn it later, and write it down, see if the name turned out to be of any importance.
“Has he published?” Ritchie asked.
“In English, no. In Rumanian, plenty. It’s only a matter of time before I sell him here.”
“You’re his agent, too?” Ritchie asked.
“I have that honor.”
Ritchie wanted to ask Leiber how good his agent contacts were, and whether he was taking on any new clients. But he couldn’t find a way of slipping it into the conversation. He decided he’d come back to Ratstein’s on his own some other time, go into the matter again, without Solomon and Esther, and, with a little luck, without Grelich. For a beginning writer it was always worthwhile checking out an agent, no matter what else he did.
“Anyhow,” Grelich said, “we’re here to discuss this situation I’ve got, with this goy lodged in my head.”
No one had any ideas about it. They considered Ritchie’s suggestion that they all return to his apartment. But Solomon was tired and had an appointment in the early evening; Grelich had had enough argument for the day, and Esther was looking forward to her late afternoon television.
They all agreed to meet tomorrow evening, first at the East Broadway cafeteria, then, after Ritchie said he’d pick up the tab, at Ratstein’s.
Exhaustion ended the night for both Ritchie and Grelich. Ritchie had a long, dreamless sleep in his own bed.
In the morning, after Ritchie made coffee, they agreed that it was time to go downtown to the MMT sales office and find out what had gone wrong.
Grelich was feeling a little funny about this. His desire to kill himself had abated remarkably. In fact, his suicidal urge had vanished. Replacing it was an unexpected zest for life, the strongest he had ever known.
It was difficult to account for this. Maybe the medical procedure, even though it had not killed him, had driven philosophical despair out of his head. These problems, which had recently driven him to suicide, seemed academic to him now, even puerile. Why kill yourself because you can’t decide whether God exists or not?
Ritchie for his part wanted to own his own headspace uncluttered with Grelich. But he liked Grelich’s friends. Esther looked like she had been a classy lady. Solomon was interesting. Ritchie hadn’t known there were any black Jews. He wanted to find out how this had come about.
And there was Leiber, a possible agent contact.
Of course, Leiber was not a friend of Grelich’s, but Ritchie owed the meeting to his association—or amalgamation? —with Grelich.
Ritchie also had a well-developed sense of fairness. It didn’t seem right for him to bring about the death of the man whose presence had helped him meet Leiber, a man who, if he was a real agent, could change his life.
Despite that, he hated the idea of Grelich being in his head with him. Was he maybe even snooping on Ritchie’s memories?
Grelich was acting correctly, however. He didn’t stop them from going to the MMT office to find out about his aborted death, even though with his superior control of the body—after all, he was the original occupant—he could have prevented the move, could have made them both stay in the apartment all day, or walk in the park, or see a movie.
Instead, they taxied down to 23rd Street.
Grelich, with Ritchie aboard, entered the offices of MMT and told the receptionist that he wanted to see Sven Mayer, the president.
They waited while the receptionist whispered into the phone. Ritchie was expecting they’d be told Mayer wasn’t in, they would have to talk with some flunky who would tell them he knew nothing about this but would get back to him “as soon as possible.”