It was noon at the Apthorp.
We’d been at it since early that morning, Farhan and I, sitting in the
study in front of a large Apple monitor, looking through the photographs I’d
taken at Grand Central yesterday.
Farhan barely spoke, but I could feel the rage bubbling inside her. She’d
lean in, stare at the screen, shake her head, say, “Not this one. Next,” and
we’d go on. And on.
Sometimes she’d ask me to enlarge a face till it dissolved into a blur of
pixels. “This is not good enough,” she k ept saying, and I wanted to r eply,
It’s a goddamn tel ephoto lens, what do you expect? But I k ept my mouth
shut. At some point, she would have to give up and stop.
Farhan hadn’t sl ept all night. From my bedroom at the back of the
Apthorp, I had heard her walking around, and the gurgling whoosh of the
coffee maker; just before dawn, I’d heard the low, urgent muttering of
television news. Now she was pressed against me, staring into the monitor
with bright, anxious eyes; she hadn’t showered, and her breath smelled of
the strong espressos she drank.
I’d given Miss Ritu and the other maids the day off. The apartment,
usually immaculate, was beginning to show signs of Farhan’s habitation:
dirty coffee cups everywhere, her high heels left in the middle of the room,
cushions piled into one corner of the couch, where she’d attempted to sle ep.
Maryam would never be such a slob. I missed her tremendously, but I did
not dare to call her — Farhan had forbidden it. “The less Maryam knows, the
better,” Farhan said. “She panics.” So, Maryam and I were restricted to
bland text exchanges: I pretended that it was just a regular work week here,
and Maryam sent me mundane updates on her conference.
Soon it was three in the afternoon.
Farhan and I hadn’t eaten all day, and I was starving, but she wouldn’t
allow a break. She got up to use the restroom, and I had a sudden surge of
rebelliousness: Farhan wouldn’t know where we were on the photo list.
I pressed a couple of keys and fast - forwarded through the images, and as
I did, I noticed a curious thing: I had taken so many photos, every few
seconds, from the same angle — that as I zipped through them, they worked
as a sort of flip - book animation and came to life. I saw swarms of
commuters enter the hall from 42 nd Street and also flow down the stairs
from the higher, balcony - level entrances; these two streams merged and
bifurcated around the information booth, then drained out into the gates for
the commuter trains. It was like watching water moving. And this led me to
a sudden realization: We didn’t have to go frame by frame. We could focus
on the unmoving islands within this flux, the individuals and groups of
people who were static, who created little knots around which the other
commuters streamed.
Which islands hadn’t we paid attention to?
I zoomed into those, discounting them one by one. Women were of no
use, or mixed - age groups or white people. And then I noticed an area of
stillness at the far edge of the frame, up on the mezzanine level, where a
group of three Jehovah’s Witnesses had set up a stand and were handing out
leaflets to passersby. Two women, possibly Caribbean or African American,
with curled hair and respectable knee - length dark overcoats. And one man. I
zoomed in closer, and the man’s shaved head was strangely familiar, though
his features were blurred. He wore dark trousers, a white shirt, and a black
overcoat, with dandyish, pointed shoes. It took me a minute to figure out
who he was, and then I knew — but I could not speak, because, if I did, it
would open a whole can of worms.
Farhan came back from the toilet. She had raided Maryam’s wardrobe
and was wearing one of her Japanese designer gray sweatsuits, the top
baggy, the bottoms tapered; on Maryam, it looked elegantly oversized, but
on Farhan, it was just schlumpy.
“What are you doing, Ali? Stop dicking around.”
Her voice was harsh, but I ignored it and took a de ep breath. “Just
checking something out.”
I went backward through the photos and saw that the group of Jehovah’s
Witnesses had been at several locations in the terminal, always in slightly
out - of - the - way areas, so as not to impede the flow of traffic, but always
located so there was a direct line of sight to the information booth, where
Farhan stood, in her bright red lipstick and her tall heels.
“Look. These people were there the whole time. Handing out leaflets.
Whatchamacallit, proselytizing.”
“Jehovah’s Witnesses? So what?” Farhan leaned in and stared at the
enlarged image. “That man is old - looking and bald. I told you, JHK is
younger, has a huge head of curly hair. Plus, this is a Black man, not
Indian.”
“Uh - uh. This guy is half Indian, half Black. Guyanese.”
She stared at me with narrowed eyes. “What? You know him?”
“Probably just a coincidence. That happens, right? I mean, it’s a big city;
you run into people in strange places, right?”
“Who. The fuck. Is he?”
“You’ve seen him around, Farhan.” Her face turned murderous, and I
hurried to explain. “He’s a really nice guy. Funny as hell. That’s our
doorman. George. George Persaud.”
Farhan leaned in and stared at the screen, squinting this way and that. “I
can’t be sure,” she said. “Call him up to the apartment. If I see his eyes, I’ll
be able to tell.”
“His eyes? Seriously, Farhan, this guy is an employee here, a buddy of
mine, and — ”
“Get him up here. Now.”
I shrugged. “Okay. But don’t act crazy.” I dialed George on his cell
phone and listened to it ring.
George. He had access to our apartment. I’d seen him laughing and
joking with Miss Ritu, our maid. He’d left for Guyana around the time
when JHK stopped killing. And after he began working at the Apthorp, the
postcards started up.
And then parts of our conversation at the bar came back to me. I
remembered how George had started telling me about his childhood, but it
was so d epressing that I’d changed the topic — but after three rounds of
Jack, I’d rambled on about how hard it was to be in Hassan’s shadow, how I
was always characterized in relation to him: “Ali is lazy.” “Ali is wishywashy.” George had
listened to my long - winded complaints, a sympathetic
expression on his face, so when I finally finished, I was obligated to hear
his tale.
George had taken a swig of whiskey, grimaced, and said, “My parents,
you know, they were terrible.” He’d talked then, in a run that lasted for half
an hour: As a dougla — a child of mixed Caribbean and Indian descent — he
was teased mercilessly by his classmates, and as if that weren’t enough, his
Indian mother was a schizophrenic who would hallucinate and talk to dead
relatives. His Black father was the local butcher who insisted that George
learn the trade. To es cape his father’s beatings, George complied and even
became good at slaughtering cattle, but all the time, he dreamed of a life
that was not tainted by the smell of congealed blood and offal. Finally, in
his early twenties, George had secreted away enough money to fly to New
York City, and here he found “suitable employment” — in retail. “That’s
where I learned to deal with difficult people,” he’d said. But after a decade
in New York, he’d returned to Guyana to nurse his mother, who was dying
of leukemia. “A very difficult woman. Very demanding. But she was my
mother.” When she passed away, George came back to New York, but
everything was now so expensive; luckily, he’d found this well - paid
position at the Apthorp.
There were odd, eerie connections between the JHK narrative and
George, but I knew they were coincidences. This was George. Good old
George, with his snippy sense of humor.
George’s cell phone rang and rang, but he didn’t answer.
At nine that night, Farhan and I drove out to Queens.
Normally, we’d take one of the family’s chauffeured cars, but now that
was no longer an option. This one was a rental, and Farhan insisted on
driving, but she was a terrible driver. She accelerated suddenly, then
slammed on the brakes; she cut people off, yelled at the other drivers. On
the top deck of the Triborough Bridge into Queens, Farhan swerved
abruptly into an exit lane and almost collided with a huge white van, which
honked furiously at us.
“Farhan, slow down, for God’s sake. And this is not a good idea. All that
stuff I told you, it’s a coincidence. To show up at George’s apartment, barge
in, and start accusing him, it’s insane, and — ”
“The timeline fits. And during the time your friend was back in Guyana,
those women went missing in Georgetown.”
I had no way to counter that accusation. Looking up murdered women
had been Farhan’s idea, and we’d found an article in the Guyana Graphic
that detailed the vanishing of three young women — all Indo - Guyanese —
during the period that George was home. Their bodies had never been
found.
“We’re almost there. Pass me my purse.”
I reached for her tiny designer bag and heard the clink of metal. “Oh no.
You didn’t bring the gun, did you? Oh, fuck.”
“It’s just insurance. Calm down.”
Soon we were zipping along Grand Central Parkway in Queens. All
around us sprawled modest one - story brick houses with postage - stamp
yards. We passed a vast cemetery, the tombstones and crosses in neat rows,
just feet from the highway.
This trip was a mistake. There must be some ordinary explanation for all
this. I’d called George several times, but he wasn’t answering his cell, and
when I called downstairs to the concierge desk, Ivan, the big Russian guy,
had answered.
“No, Mr. Azeem, George didn’t show up for work today. Hasn’t called
in, either. This guy is a loser. Won’t cover for the other guys. Won’t even go
out for a drink with us — what, he thinks he’s better than us?” And then Ivan
had lowered his voice. “Between you and me, he’s not long for this world.”
“What?” I said. “He’s sick?”
“No, no, no. Not long for this job — that is what I meant. You know,
when they hire us, they do a background check? Well, with George, they
hired him in a hurry, while his background check was going on, and it took
a while, and the security agency must have messed up, because
management just got the results.” Ivan paused dramatically, enjoying the
tale. “And guess what? George never worked at any of those other
apartment buildings he listed. All fabricated. The guy used to sell saris out
in Jackson Heights — Oh, got to go, a resident just arrived. You call me if
you need anything else, Mr. Azeem.”
I hung up and Farhan stared at my panicked face. “What’s wrong, Ali?”
“Ivan said that George worked in a sari shop. And when I followed
Epps, out in Jackson Heights, the old man snooped around a fabric store. A
sari store.”
“Give me the fucking phone.”
Farhan called the Apthorp management office and got an assistant VP. At
first, he refused to give us George’s home address, citing employee
confidentiality, but Farhan started yelling, and a few minutes later, she got
what she wanted.
So now we were heading to George’s apartment, out in Queens. Farhan
wanted to meet him face - to - face — and with each mile, we were closer to his
place. The evidence was staring me in the face, but I didn’t want to believe
it.
I picked up Farhan’s handbag and rattled it.
“Look, if we’re right, we should call the cops, okay? No cowboy stuff,
okay?”
Farhan ignored me and drove faster.
George Persaud was cleaning. George, bless his soul, was systematically
scrubbing his kitchen. He wore shorts and a dirty white T - shirt and, bereft
of his splendid doorman’s outfit, looked pitifully pigeon - chested and
spindly - legged. George was a meticulous cleaner — he wore big yellow
gloves and used Windex for the stainless steel sink; now he was on hands
and knees, scrubbing the linoleum floor with a brush.
We could see him clearly, Farhan and I, because he lived in a garden
apartment in one of those middle - class housing clusters. “Garden
apartment” was a euphemism for a basement — and this one had brightly lit
windows all around, at ground level. Farhan and I crouched in a flower bed
and peered in, hidden by the darkness.
“See?” I whispered. “He’s a meticulous dude. Harmless. Eccentric but
harmless.”
“Shh. I need to concentrate. This guy doesn’t look like the boy from the
bar...” I could hear the disappointment in Farhan’s voice. “This guy is a
real wimp.”
I felt a surge of relief. Okay, George — weedy, shaved head — did not
resemble the man that Farhan remembered. Our trip to Queens had been a
waste of time. But if Farhan wanted to be sure, we could call the cops. She
was a Khan. She could throw her weight around and insist that they look
into George’s background.
“Look.” Farhan grabbed my forearm. “He’s done.”
George’s tiny galley kitchen was spotless. He gazed around and seemed
satisfied with his work. He stripped off the yellow rubber gloves and threw
them into a black garbage bag. Then he turned off the light in the kitchen
and walked into the corridor, still holding the bag. A minute later, a dim
bedside lamp clicked on in the bedroom next door, and George reappeared,
standing next to a four - poster bed. He stripped off his shorts and T - shirt and
threw them into the garbage bag — and I must say, it was painful to see him
naked: His back was covered in thin white scars, which extended down to
the backs of his legs; someone, long ago, had beaten him very badly.
“I think he’s leaving,” Farhan said, because George had pulled on jeans,
a faded Ramones T - shirt, and sneakers. And then he’d taken a battered
leather valise from inside the closet. He plonked it on the bed, clicked it
open, and peered inside. I strained to glimpse what was inside, but the
upright lid of the valise hid its contents from our view.
George closed the valise. He looked around the room, evaluating it, and
then switched on the overhead fluorescent light. It flared into life, and
Farhan gasped and pointed: In this bright light, we could clearly see the
bedroom wall, across from us. It was covered by a collage of pictures cut
out of magazines: arms and legs, torsos, all Indian women in saris and
salwar kameez. Some of the women’s heads had been cut off, and the faces
that remained had been violently slashed with scissors.
“It’s him,” Farhan said.
George’s profile, as he contemplated the collage, was dreamy, and I felt
a sudden chill. The man I knew — sharp, funny, bitchy, even — had been
drained out. What was left was — it is hard to describe — a shell, filled with
something else, a vacant, sle epwalking spirit.
We watched George carefully take the collage off the wall — it had been
affixed with tape — and stuff this gruesome assembly into the garbage bag.
He hefted the valise in one hand and picked up the garbage bag in the other.
“He’s definitely leaving,” Farhan whispered, as much to herself as to
me. She pulled the pistol from her handbag and slipped off the safety catch.
“Now — just listen, don’t argue — go to the front door. Bang on it and talk to
him. I’ll go around the back.”
This was the crucial moment. Looking back, I wish that I’d disobeyed
Farhan. I wish that I had dialed 911 and alerted the cops — but I didn’t, did
I?
Instead I followed Farhan’s instructions. I went down the stairs to
George’s front door, banged on it, and shouted, “Hey, George, are you
home? Buddy? It’s me, Ali, from the Apthorp.”
Those were the exact words I used to address George, my onetime
friend, and I heard, through the door, the sound of footst eps retreating,
hurrying away in the opposite direction.
It must have taken me, what, three, four minutes to run around to the back
door? And the whole time I expected to hear the crack - crack - crack of
Farhan’s lethal little pistol.
Instead, it was completely silent — and what I saw next, I will never
forget.
I rounded the corner of the building and skidded to a halt. George’s back
door was a lit rectangle; he must have st epped outside to throw away the
heavy black garbage bag, because he now lay on a concrete pad by an open
trash dumpster: His legs were crumpled under him at an odd, twisted angle,
and he looked up at me, shocked, as if to say, Look what she did to me.
Farhan stood over him. She held a thick metal fence pole, two - handed,
and must have smashed George’s legs as he exited the apartment. I instantly
understood where Farhan had found the pole; they were restringing the wire
fencing at the back, and a pile of these poles were stacked right there.
“Ali. Mr. Azeem.” George looked up at me and, heartbreakingly, tried to
smile. “This is all a terrible mistake. Why did this woman hit me?” The
expression on his face said, This is all a bad joke, isn’t it?
“Don’t go near him.” Farhan was breathing hard. She addressed George
as if he were a farmyard animal “You. What did you do with the old man?
Epps?”
George was trying to sit up, but he made little progress and could only
prop himself up with his arms. “You are mistaken. I am a doorman at the
Apthorp. Tell her, Ali.”
“Let’s take this down a notch.” I put out my hands beseechingly and
moved forward.
“Don’t come between us, Ali. Don’t.”
Farhan raised the metal pole again, and I noticed that it was darkened
with blood.
“I cannot feel my legs.” George looked mildly puzzled. “A very odd
feeling.”
“Ali. Snap out of it!” I jumped, and Farhan continued, “The valise. Over
there — open it.”
I realized that George’s battered leather valise — it must have been an
heirloom, with old - fashioned brass locks — stood to the side.
“That.” George coughed. “Is mine. I’d appreciate it if you did not invade
my privacy.”
The valise was surprisingly heavy, and from inside I heard a clink of
glass. “Okay, Farhan, I’m doing as you say. I’ll look inside — and then, I
think we should call an ambulance. You’ve broken his legs. Maybe
damaged his spine.”
“Get on with it.” Farhan still held the pole, like a baseball player, alert
for a dodgy pitch, and George could not move, that was clear. Okay, so this
was a bad situation, but better than Farhan shooting George with the pistol.
I lay the valise flat and clicked open its brass locks.
“Ali, if you don’t mind...” George’s voice was mild. “Those are my
personal possessions. Of not much interest to anyone else.”
The valise had a layer of clothes on top, all neatly ironed and folded,
including George’s dark doorman’s overcoat, with its double row of brass
buttons. The webbing on the lid held a few copies of Jehovah’s Witness
publications: The Watchtower and Awake. I carefully moved aside George’s
overcoat — I didn’t want to crush it. Even then, I was maintaining my
standards of decency; even then, I was telling myself that I was a decent
man.
Underneath the coat were two rows of bundles, eight total, wrapped in
old clothes — T - shirts and jeans and checkered cotton boxers. I picked up a
bundle, laid it down onto the cold concrete, and removed the clothing
carefully, as if I were unwrapping a Christmas present. Inside was a jar, and
it gave off a chemical stink that I recognized from biology lab in high
school, and the word just flashed into my brain: formaldehyde.
Inside the jar was a specimen, floating in the clear fluid. I lifted it up to
the light, puzzled: a chunk of purple meat, with odd tubes sticking out from
the top.
“That is my personal property.” George reached out a hand, as a parent
would to prevent an errant child from dropping something valuable. “Please
put it back.”
Farhan was by my side now. She gazed into the jar, and she said, “What
about the others?” I uncovered the rest: They all contained slabs of purplish
muscle of varying sizes, and they all had those rubbery tubes up top, as if
they could be lifted out of the formaldehyde and reconnected.
“Eight of them. All eight victims.” Farhan’s tone was matter - of - fact.
“Yes, exactly.” I wanted to be agreeable. I wanted the situation to be
resolved.
Farhan walked back to where George lay. His legs were still crumpled
under him, his face pale, but he looked de eply wronged, as if we were doing
something unjust to him.
“George,” I said, “it’s all over. You see that now, don’t you? There is no
way out of this.”
“Shut up, Ali,” Farhan said casually. “Why did you ke ep the hearts,
George?”
“Yes. Those.” George smiled ingratiatingly, even though he was clearly
in tremendous pain. “They ke ep me company. I’m so lonely otherwise.”
“I see.”
Farhan grunted and raised the metal pole, using two hands, so fast that it
was a blur. The metal caught the streetlight and glinted, and then she swung
back down, at a lethal velocity, heading for George’s forehead, but he did
not seem to notice: He was gazing with an exasperated air at his valise, as
though he had tolerated all this nonsense for too long, and now he was
going to have to ask for his possessions back.
Before George could utter a word, the pole smacked into the side of his
head, and he slumped back against the dumpster. Farhan, panting now,
whirled and st epped back, giving herself room, and swung the pole into
another arc.
And again.
And again.
And again.
A voice was calling out, “Stop! This is madness,” and I realized that it
was my voice, but it didn’t seem to make much difference: Farhan, it
seemed, was counting out loud, between blows ... “Four. Five. Six.”
Finally, she gasped out, “Eight.” And then she stopped.