Free Paradise Man by Jerome Charyn Page B

American boy. Holden and his dad were polite to all the priests and nuns who settled on the palace stairs. The priests were taking pictures. And Holden wanted one of his dad, so he could remember him in his uniform and the white gloves a sergeant major was allowed to wear. He posed with his dad for a number of priests and scratched his address on a sliver of sandwich paper, so the priests wouldn’t forget to send the photographs.
    The nuns had floppy capes and their stockings gathered round their knees like stalks and Holden asked his dad if these nuns were his people. Holden Sr. said God didn’t wash His own underwear. He gave it to the nuns to wash and that’s when Holden opened his eyes, after he heard his father’s raucous laugh. “Daddy,” he muttered until he realized his father wasn’t there. Holden was in Muriel’s north room with a fancy turban on his head. The room had become a hospital station while Holden went to Avignon. An oxygen tank like a huge green bullet stood near the bed. Another machine monitored the rhythms of Holden’s heart. Jeremías, that miserable bodyguard, sat in a chair next to Holden, like some Cuban angel of mercy. Jeremías seemed glad that Holden had come out of his sleep.
    “We were worried. The boss had to go and look for his hospital team. He likes you, Holden. He said, ‘Brothers, don’t let this man die.’”
    Edmundo must have had his own anti-Castro medical corps, refugee doctors from the Bay of Pigs.
    “Where’s Carmen?”
    “The little hammer girl? She broke your head.”
    “Did Edmundo hurt her?”
    “I can’t say.”
    And Holden clutched at the quilt. He had paraphernalia attached to both his arms. The heart machine made erratic cries.
    “You crazy?” the bodyguard said. “Don’t move.”
    “Get Edmundo.”
    “’Mundo doesn’t have time for you. He’s taking a bath ... with Melissa.”
    “Then I’ll meet him at his tub.”
    “Wait a minute,” the bodyguard said. “Have some respect.” And he telephoned downstairs to the tub room. “Edmundo, Holden’s back from paradise ... he wants to see you.”
    Don Edmundo came upstairs in a purple robe. His body was still wet.
    “What did you do with the girl?”
    “Holden, do you always growl like that when you wake from the dead? You had a terrible concussion. We had to take pictures of your skull.”
    “What did you do with the girl?”
    “I took her home.”
    “I thought she was living here.”
    “Not a chance. She was a part-time maid. Muriel hired her last week. How could she tell the girl was a Pinzolo? ... Carmen was waiting for you, Holden. She must have memorized your routes.”
    “And Muriel wasn’t suspicious? All her maids are beautiful like that?”
    “Holden, it’s a classy house. Lots of girls come through the door. Did you want us to keep mug shots on Red Mike’s sisters, eh?”
    “Don Edmundo, get me my clothes.”
    “Clothes, who wears clothes in bed?”
    “I do.”
    “Jeremías, help me. Holden’s delirious.”
    Holden shook the paraphernalia attached to his arms. “Edmundo, I swear it. I’ll knock your whole little hospital down. I’m getting dressed. I want to see how alive Carmen really is.”
    “Ungrateful one, who sat with you six days?”
    “And took baths with every girl in the house. My clothes, Edmundo. And untie me from this bed.”
    Jeremías fetched the doctors, three antiquated men, who buzzed around Holden and untangled every tube and wire. Holden felt like Frankenstein. A girl was summoned to give him a bath. She had short brown hair and a boy’s chest. “Who’s this?”
    “Melissa,” Edmundo said.
    Muriel had discovered one more twig. Melissa washed Holden with a big soapy glove, the same mysterious expression on her face that Andrushka always had. Perhaps it wasn’t a mystery, but nothing, nothing at all ... or some dark dream of Caravaggio. Melissa didn’t say a word. She had all the proper flourishes of her finishing school. She soaped his