‘I’m going upstairs,’ she says.
‘Okay.’ Raj makes a fish face at Ruby, who giggles. ‘Wave goodbye, Ruby. Wave goodbye to your papa. Wish him good luck.’
The woman who runs the day care cracks the door when Klara knocks. The suite behind her is filled with the children of stagehands and performers, receptionists and line cooks, managers and maids.
‘Nuts tonight.’ She looks like a hostage, her face haggard behind the bolted chain. ‘Happy fucking New Year.’
Klara hears the crash of glass and a series of whooping noises.
‘Good God,’ shouts the woman, turning. Then she faces Klara again. ‘Mind if we make this quick? Hello, you.’
She unbolts the door and wiggles a finger at Ruby. Klara clutches the baby. Everything in her that is rational resists letting go.
‘What, you’re not dropping her off tonight? Don’t you have a show?’
‘I am,’ says Klara. ‘I do.’
She smooths Ruby’s cowlicky black hair, cups her soft fatty cheeks. She only wants the baby to look at her. But Ruby squirms: the other children have distracted her.
‘Goodbye, my love.’ Klara puts her nose to Ruby’s forehead and inhales the milky sweetness, the sour sweat – the essential humanness – of her skin. She drinks it in. ‘I’ll see you soon.’
When she gets in the elevator again, it’s as though Simon’s been waiting for her. She sees him in the glass, his face waving rainbow like an oil spill. She rides to the forty-fifth floor. She only wanted to see the view from the top, but luck’s on her side: when she steps into the hall, a housekeeper comes out of the penthouse suite. As soon as the woman enters the elevator, Klara lunges for the door. She catches it with her pinky and steps inside.
The suite is bigger than any apartment Klara’s ever seen. The living room and the dining room have cream leather chairs and glass tables; the bedroom sports a California King as well as a TV. The bathroom is as large as the RV, with an extra-long Jacuzzi and two marble sinks. In the kitchen, there’s a steel refrigerator with full-sized bottles of alcohol instead of minis. She takes a bottle of Bombay Sapphire and Johnnie Walker Black Label, a Veuve Clicquot. She rotates between them, coughing on the champagne before she starts the cycle again.
She’s forgotten to look at the view. The thick, folded curtains, also cream, are closed. When she touches a round button on the wall, they slide open to reveal the Strip, glowing with electricity. Klara tries to imagine what it looked like sixty years ago – before twenty thousand men built the Hoover Dam, before the neon signs and the gambling, when Las Vegas was just a sleepy railroad town.
She walks to the phone and dials out. Gertie picks up on the fourth ring.
‘Ma.’
‘Klara?’
‘My show is tonight. My opening. I wanted to hear your voice.’
‘Your opening? That’s marvelous.’ Gertie’s breathless as a girl. Klara hears laughter in the background, a stray cry. ‘We’re celebrating here. We’re –’
‘Daniel’s engaged!’ Varya’s voice; she must have picked up the other receiver.
‘Engaged?’ A moment before it registers. ‘Engaged to Mira?’
‘Yes, silly,’ says Varya. ‘Who else?’
Warmth seeps through Klara like ink. A new member of the family. She knows why they’re celebrating, why it means so much.
‘That’s wonderful,’ she says. ‘That’s so, so wonderful.’
When she hangs up, the suite feels cold and abandoned, like a party everyone has just vacated. But she won’t be alone for long.
Magicians have never been very good at dying.
David Devant was fifty when tremors forced him off the stage. Howard Thurston collapsed on the floor after a performance. Houdini died of his own confidence: in 1926, he let an audience member punch him in the stomach, and the blow ruptured his appendix. And then there’s Gran. Klara always assumed she died during the Jaws of Life in Times Square because she fell, but now she has her doubts. Gran had recently lost Otto, her husband. Klara knows what it’s like to hang on to the world by her teeth. She knows what it’s like to want to let go.
She opens her purse and retrieves the rope, which is coiled like a snake. It’s the first one she ever used for the Jaws of Life, back in San Francisco. Klara remembers its rough, strong weave, its sudden snap. She stands on the living room table and ties it around the neck of the massive light fixture above.
She’s been waiting for something to prove that the woman’s prophecies were right. But this is the trick: Klara must prove it herself. She’s the answer to the riddle, the second half of the circle. Now, they work in tandem – back-to-back, head-to-head.
Not that she isn’t terrified. The thought of Ruby in day care – toddling across the room on her plump legs, shrieking with glee – wrenches every cell in her body. She halts.
Perhaps she should wait for a sign. A knock – just one.
She’s so sure the knock will come that she’s startled when, after two minutes, it hasn’t. She cracks her knuckles and remembers to breathe. Another minute passes, then five more.
Klara’s arms begin to shake. Sixty more seconds and she’ll give it up. Sixty more seconds and she’ll pack her rope, return to Raj and perform.
And then it comes.
Her breath is uneven, her chest shuddering; she cries thick, sloppy tears. The knocks are insistent now, they’re coming fast as hail. Yes, they tell her. Yes, yes, yes.
‘Ma’am?’
Someone is at the door, but Klara doesn’t pause. She hung a Do Not Disturb sign on the knob. If it’s housekeeping, they’ll see it.
The living room table looks expensive, all glass and sharp corners, but it’s surprisingly light. She pushes it toward the wall and replaces it with a stool from the kitchen bar.
‘Ma’am? Miss Gold?’
More knocking. Klara feels a flash of fear. She crosses to the kitchen and takes a swig of whiskey, then of gin. Dizziness comes on so suddenly that she has to bend over and drop her head to keep from vomiting.
‘Miss Gold?’ calls the voice, more loudly. ‘Klara?’
The rope hangs, waiting. Her old friend. She climbs onto the chair and ties her hair back.
One more look outside, at the stream of people and the lights. One more moment to hold Ruby and Raj in her mind; she’ll speak to them soon.
‘Klara?’ shouts the voice.
January 1st, 1991, just like the woman promised. Klara takes her hands, and they tumble through the dark, dark sky. They flutter crisply as leaves, so small in the infinite universe; they turn and flicker, turn again. Together, they illuminate the future, even from so far away.
Raj is right. She’s a star.
PART THREE
The Inquisition
1991–2006
Daniel
20.