Death Dance

13

"Aha! What's the matter with you two? You look like you've seen a ghost," Joe Berk said, propped up against the pillows in his private room at Roosevelt Hospital. "Cats was the longest-running show on Broadway. Fifty million people around the world saw it and what? You jerks didn't make it? Couldn't buy a ticket? Nine lives, baby- just like a cat-and Joe Berk still has five or six to go."

Mike had called me at five in the morning to tell me that the paramedics had revived the self-proclaimed wizard in the ambulance on the way to the emergency room. The cops who had originally notified Mike of Berk's collapse on the street had gone off duty an hour later and never learned that the EMTs had saved the man's life minutes after picking him up. It was only after we'd been home a couple of hours that Mike-struggling with insomnia since Val's death- heard the news story about Joe Berk's rescue on the radio.

Dr. Lin-So Wong, who admitted Berk to the hospital, was standing with us at his bedside at seven a.m. on Monday, explaining to us the effects of electrocution as his patient listened intently. Wong patted the older man's hand and checked the readings of his pulse and blood pressure.

"Mr. Berk is quite fortunate not to have suffered very severe burns. It's the vital organs that are so susceptible to disruption by the flow of the electric current."

"So how come he's alive?" Mike asked.

"Because the EMTs had just finished their pizza in one of those joints on Broadway," Dr. Wong said, pursing his lips into a smile. "Because they were there within ninety seconds after he went down, and they had a defibrillator on board. A minute more without oxygen to the brain and we'd have a different result."

"I'm walking across the street with my kid, going up to Baldoria for something to eat," Berk said, giving his own version of the events. "You know that scene in the Frankenstein movie where they juice up the monster? You see those lightning bolts flashing when they bring him to life? Lemme tell you, I saw stars when I landed on that manhole cover. I take a few steps, I think to myself, No way Joe Berk is gonna die by frying on top of a goddamn sewer. I deserve better than that."

Mike asked the doctor, "He really kept walking? I thought they'd declared him dead at the scene."

"Very common reaction for an electrocution victim to keep moving for several seconds. Yes, his son said he actually walked a few feet farther and then collapsed. Apparently he'd sustained ventricular fibrillation and went into cardiac arrest. The paramedics were right to think he was dead. If it weren't for the defibrillator on the ambulance, well-"

"Finish the sentence, doc. The lights would be dimmed all up and down the Great White Way tonight, no? Banner headlines everywhere."

Berk looked paler and weaker than he had on Saturday, but hadn't lost much of his moxie.

"He'll be staying with us awhile. He's not out of the woods yet."

"Now they'll really try to kill me. Hospital food."

"What's the danger?" I whispered to the doctor, taking him away from the bedside while Mike looked at Berk's medical chart, copying down his date of birth and some of the legible medical notations.

"Blood offers less resistance to the electrical current than other body tissues. Usually there's a large amount of current that flows through blood vessels, and that can cause damage to the lining. Increases the risk of thrombosis. Stroke is always possible."

"What's your guess? How long will you keep him in?"

"If he doesn't fight it, I'd like him here for the rest of the week."

Wong walked back to Berk's bedside. "I don't want him agitated, detective. He needs plenty of rest."

"Agitate me? What do they care, doc? They're looking to beat up on an old man, they came to the wrong place."

"We're not here to do that," I said, stepping closer to calm Berk, knowing Mike would want to ask a few questions and hoping he would ease his way into them. "It's a good thing your son was with you last night."

"Thank God for Briggs is damn right. You meet him? He still hanging around?"

"No. No, we haven't met him yet."

"Handsome kid. Takes after his mother. But I'm the one who gave him the name. Briggsley."

"That's his real name?" Mike asked.

"Briggsley Berk. Found it in a book, something about the peerage. Imagine what a favor I did him. Yussel Berkowitz. Try growing up here with a name like that."

"Does Briggs work for you?" I asked.

"So I go to court, here in Manhattan. Supreme Court. Must have been the late fifties," Berk said, not interested in paying attention tome. "I made an application to change my name. Who's the judge? You're a lawyer, listen to this. You ever know Judge Schmuck?"

I laughed. "Before my time, but I've heard of him."

"Why should I grant your motion? the guy asks me. What's wrong with being Yussel Berkowitz? he wants to know. What's wrong? I hated the damn name. I wanted to sound like I was an American, not some hustling immigrant. The judge, he says to me, 'You know what my name is? I'm Peter J. Schmuck. My father was a Schmuck, my grandfather was a Schmuck, and I've lived all my life being a Schmuck.' Bang! He slammed down the gavel and kicked me out of the courtroom."

"So you waited a bit and went back to a different judge another day."

"Waited, my ass. I asked around, found a friendly clerk who liked the color of my money, and next thing you know I'm Joe Berk. Whole thing took five minutes. Figure the one sure thing I could do for my kids was give them good old Anglo-Saxon names."

"How many children do you have?"

"Five. You really interested in this personal stuff about me or you still nosing around where you don't belong? You catch whoever killed Natalya?"

"Not yet."

"You do, I got a manhole cover you could sit him on."

"Does Briggs work with you?"

"Nobody works with me. They work for me. They'd all be living in a trailer park somewhere if I didn't put this empire together for them."

My elbows were resting on the metal railing on the side of the bed. Berk lifted his arm, which seemed to be trembling, and took one of my hands in his.

"All by yourself?"

"Me and my brother. Izzy, he was my older brother. Smartest man I ever knew." His eyes were closed now and he seemed overwhelmed by the realization of how he had escaped death so narrowly.

I looked to Mike and he cupped his hands, waving his fingers toward himself. He wanted me to keep Joe Berk talking.

"Did Talya tell you that she was going to be leaving her husband?" I asked.

"What? You don't want to know about Izzy? You just asked me whether I built the business myself. You know what we got?" He was patting my hand now, anxious to show off. "Real estate. We own more commercial real estate than there are square acres in the state of Rhode Island. It's true. Don't look at me like that, young lady. I'm telling you the truth. You like hotels? The Berkleigh chain. Makes the Hyatts look like they ran out of properties on a Monopoly board. Jet plane leasing? BerkAir's got the biggest private fleet in the world."

I tried to disengage my hand from Berk's grasp. He opened his eyes and reached out for my wrist. "We're going to have to go, Mr. Berk. You need to rest."

"I'll rest when I'm good and ready."

"Mike and I have to get to work."

"You mean if I don't answer your questions, you're gonna leave me alone in this place? Don't go until my son gets back. It won't be very long. You want to talk about Talya?"

"That would help us."

"First I gotta explain how Izzy and I got into the theater business, right? I wouldn't be having anything to do with fancy dancers and Tennessee Williams and all that jazz if we hadn't moved the organization into the stage world. Can't make sense of my relationship with Talya until you understand what my business is about."

The man didn't want to be alone. He didn't have the least interest in cooperating with us, but he didn't want to be on his own in the alien and uncontrollable world of the sterile hospital room.

"I think I'm more interested in your personal relationship with Talya than your professional one."

Again he ignored me. "Real estate. Simple as that. We were buying up so much commercial land in midtown when the market went to hell in 'seventy-six, we found ourselves competing with the Shu-berts and Nederlanders for property. We wound up with four legitimate theaters. The stage-I told Izzy-that's where the magic is. Forget television and the movies, people still want to come out at night and touch the stars."

I looked to Mike and now he was shaking his head.

"We've got to go, Mr. Berk. Is there someone you'd like me to call to come sit with you? One of your children?"

"Briggs'll be back any minute now. He promised me. The others are scattered all over the country. We got offices in L.A., in Chicago, in Miami. I only got the youngest kid here with me."

"How about nephews or nieces? Izzy's kids."

"Same story. Spread out all over the place. I'll give you my secretary's number. Let's get her over here, okay?"

"We can do that," I said. "How about Mona?"

"Who?"

"Mona, your niece. Izzy's daughter."

"Oh, so now she's Mona? Desdemona Berk, Ms. Cooper. The first Broadway show Izzy ever saw was in 1943. Othello. Paul Robeson as the Moor. Trust me, that's an actor who'd never have done bull-shit ads for the telephone company like-like-what's his name? What a talent Robeson was. Uta Hagen, she was Desdemona. Izzy was a kid, but he was entranced. Another marriage and four sons later, he finally gets the baby girl."

"Mona's office is here in town, though, isn't it? Would you like me to call her?"

Berk dropped his hold of my arm, turned his head to the other side of the bed, and pretended to spit on the floor. "Bite your tongue. I'd rather eat nails."

Mike walked to the foot of the bed. "Briggs called your niece last night, while the ambulance was on the way to the hospital. She came over to the theater right away. Maybe he can tell you why he wanted her to be there."

"Where? In my office? My home?" Berk was trying to pull himself up. "I'll tell you why she was there. She wanted to be the first one to drive a nail in my coffin. Nobody let her in, did they? Did they?"

He was shouting now and a nurse opened the door and displaced me at the side of the bed. This was a giant step beyond the level of agitation that Dr. Wong didn't want us to provoke.

"We're not the ones who let her in," Mike said, omitting the fact that she hadn't needed anyone's help in gaining access through the secret elevator in the apartment.

"Talk to my lawyers, detective. That little vonce-that cockroach-shouldn't be anywhere near my place. She's filed a lawsuit against me. She's trying to break up the business organization and my family. Desdemona Berk-my brother Izzy should rest in peace-she's a greedy little bitch."