Hells Kitchen Read Free

with a wet cloth. She paused—debating, he guessed, whether or not to clean him herself—and chose to hand off to the patient. Pellam took the cloth and wiped away until the washcloth was black.
    “You, uh, want some coffee?” she asked.
    Pellam’s stomach churned. He guessed he’d swallowed a pound of ash. “No, thanks. How’s my face?”
    “Now you just look dirty. That is to say, it’s an improvement. Got pans to change. Bah now.” She vanished.
    Pellam stretched his long legs out in front of him and examined the holes in his Levi’s. A total waste. He then spent a few minutes examining the Betacam, which some kind soul had given to the paramedics and had been admitted with him to the emergency room. He gave it his standard diagnostic check—he shook it. Nothing rattled. The Ampex recording deck was dentedbut it rolled fine and the tape inside—the one that contained what was apparently the last interview that would ever be conducted in 458 West Thirty-sixth Street—was unhurt.
    “Now, John, what’re we gonna talk about today? You want to hear more about Billy Doyle? My first husband. That old son of a bitch. See, that man was what Hell’s Kitchen was all about. He was big here, but little everywhere else. He was nothing anywhere else. It was like this place, it’s its own world. Hmm, I got a good story to tell you ’bout him. I think you might like this story. . . .”
    He couldn’t remember much else of what Ettie had told him at their last interview a couple of days ago. He’d set the camera up in her small apartment, filled with the mementos of a seven-decade life, a hundred pictures, baskets, knickknacks, furniture bought at Goodwill, food protected from roaches in Tupperware she could barely afford. He’d set the camera up, turned it on and just let her talk.
    “See, people live in Hell’s Kitchen get these ideas. They get schemes, you know. Billy, he wanted land. He had his eye on a couple of lots over near where the Javits Center is today. I tell you, he’da brought that off he’da been one rich mick. I can say ‘mick’ ’cause he said that ’bout himself.”
    Then, motion from the bed interrupted these thoughts.
    The elderly woman, eyes still closed, picked at thehem of the blanket, two dark thumbs, two fingers lifting invisible pearls.
    This concerned Pellam. He remembered, a month ago, the last living gestures of Otis Balm as the 102-year-old man had glanced toward the lilac bush outside the window of his West Side nursing home and began picking at his sheet. The old man had been a resident of Ettie’s building for years and, though hospitalized, had been pleased to talk about his life in the Kitchen. Suddenly the man had fallen silent and started picking at his blanket—as Ettie was doing now. Then he stopped moving. Pellam called for help. The doctor confirmed the death. They always did that, he explained. At the end they pick at the bedclothes.
    Pellam leaned closer to Ettie Washington. A sudden moaning filled the air. It became a voice. “Who’s that?” The woman’s hands grew still and she opened her eyes, but still apparently couldn’t see too well. “Who’s there? Where am I?”
    “Ettie.” Pellam spoke casually. “It’s John. Pellam.”
    Squinting, Ettie stared at him. “I can’t see too good. Where am I?”
    “Hospital.”
    She coughed for a minute and asked for a glass of water. “I’m so glad you came. You got out okay?”
    “I did, yep,” he told her. Pellam poured a glass for her; Ettie emptied it without pausing.
    “I kind of remember jumping. Oh, I was scared. The doctor said I was in surprisingly good shape. He said that. ‘Surprisingly good.’ Didn’t understand him at first.” She grumbled, “He’s Indian. Like, you know, an overseas Indian. Curry an’ elephants. Haven’t seen a single American doctor here.”
    “Does it hurt much?”
    “I’ll say.” She examined her arm closely. “Don’t I look the mess?” Ettie’s tongue