The Gift of Numbers aka The Housekeeper and the Professor

10

It was a wonderful party, the most memorable one I've ever attended. It was neither elegant nor extravagant-in that sense it had much in common with Root's first birthday party at the home for single mothers, or the Christmases we'd spent with my mother. I'm not sure whether you would even call those other events parties, but I am sure that Root's eleventh birthday was special. It was special because we celebrated it with the Professor, and because it turned out to be the last evening the three of us would ever spend together in the cottage.

We waited for Root to get home from school, and then set about preparing for the party. I worked on the food while Root mopped the floor in the kitchen and did other little tasks I assigned him. Meanwhile, the Professor ironed the tablecloth.

He had not forgotten his promise. That morning, once he had confirmed that I was the housekeeper and the mother of the child named Root, he had pointed to the circle on the calendar.

"Today is the eleventh," he said, fluttering the note on his chest as if he hoped to be congratulated for having remembered.

I had not intended to ask him to do the ironing. He was so clumsy that it would almost have been safer for Root to do it, and I had been hoping that his only contribution would be to rest as usual in his chair and to stay out of the way. But he had insisted on helping.

"How can I just sit here watching when you've got a little boy working so hard?"

I might have foreseen this objection, but I would never have guessed that he would produce the iron and offer to press the tablecloth. I was astonished that he knew there was an iron in the closet; but when he pulled out the tablecloth, it was like watching a magician performing a sleight of hand. In the six months I'd been working in the cottage, I'd never seen a tablecloth.

"The first thing you need for a party is a clean, ironed cloth on the table," he said. "And I'm quite good with an iron." There was no telling how long the cloth had been stuffed in the back of the closet, but it certainly was a wrinkled mess.

The heat of summer had finally lifted and the air was clear and dry. The shadows in the garden seemed different as well. Although the sky was still light, the moon and the evening star had appeared and the clouds streamed by in ever-changing patterns. Smudges of darkness were beginning to collect around the roots of the trees, but they were still faint, as if the night had agreed to hold off for a bit longer. Evening was our favorite time of the day.

The Professor set up the ironing board on the arms of his easy chair and went to work. From the way he managed the cord to the way he set the temperature, you could tell that he knew what he was doing. He spread out the cloth, and, like the good mathematician he was, divided it into sixteen equal folds.

He sprayed each section with the water bottle, held his hand near the iron to make sure it wasn't too hot, gripped the handle tightly, and pressed down carefully to avoid damaging the fabric. There was a certain rhythm to the way the iron slid across the board. His brow furrowed and his nostrils flared as he forced the wrinkles to submit to his will. He worked with precision and conviction, and even a kind of affection. His ironing seemed highly rational, with a constant speed that allowed him to get the best results with the least effort; all the economy and elegance of his mathematical proofs performed right there on the ironing board.

The Professor was definitely the best man for this job, we had to admit, since the tablecloth was made of delicate lace. All three of us worked together, and we took unexpected pleasure in preparing for the party. The smell of the roast cooking in the oven, the drip-drop of water from the mop, the steam rising from the iron-all blended together and heightened our expectations.

"The Tigers are playing Yakult today," said Root. "If they win, they'll be in first place."

"Do you think they'll win the pennant?" I had just tasted the soup and was checking the oven.

"I'm sure they will," the Professor said, sounding unusually certain. "Look up there," he pointed out the window. "They say it's good luck when there's a little nick out of the bottom edge of the evening star. That means they'll win today and take the pennant."

"What? That isn't true. You're just making it up."

"Up it ingmak just re'you."

No matter how much Root teased him, the Professor's iron kept its rhythm.

Root got down on the floor to clean places that were normally overlooked-the legs of the chairs and the underside of the table. And I went to the dish cupboard in search of a platter for the roast beef. When I looked out again, the garden was deep in shadow.

We were pleased with our work, and looking forward to the food, the presents, and the fun. But at the very last moment, just as we were about to take our places and begin the party, we discovered a little problem. The girl at the bakery had forgotten to put the candles in the box. The cake I'd ordered wasn't large enough to hold eleven candles, so I had asked her to put in one large candle and one small one; but when I pulled the box out of the refrigerator, they were not there.

"We can't have a birthday cake without candles. You don't get your wish if you don't blow them out!" The Professor seemed more upset than the birthday boy himself.

"I'll run back to the bakery and get them," I said, taking off my apron. But Root stopped me before I could get to the door.

"No, I'll go. I'm faster, anyway." And before the words were out of his mouth, he was gone.

The bakery wasn't far away and there was still some daylight left. I closed the cake box and put it back in the refrigerator; then we sat down at the table and waited for Root to return.

The tablecloth looked beautiful. The wrinkles had vanished completely, and its delicate lace pattern had transformed the kitchen. The only decoration was a yogurt bottle with some wildflowers I had plucked from the garden, but they brightened up the cottage nicely. The knives and forks and spoons didn't match, but they were neatly laid out on the table, and if you scrunched up your eyes the general effect was magnificent.

By comparison, the food was rather plain. I had made shrimp cocktail, roast beef and mashed potatoes, spinach and bacon salad, pea soup, and fruit punch-all Root's favorites-and, for the Professor, no carrots. There were no special sauces or elaborate preparations, it was just simple food. But it did smell good.

I smiled at the Professor and he smiled at me; we were both a bit lost with nothing to do. He coughed, tugged at the collar of his jacket, and squirmed in his chair, anxious for the party to begin.

There was an empty place on the table, just in front of Root's chair-the space I'd saved for the cake. Our eyes fell on it at the same moment.

"Does it seem like he's taking a long time?" the Professor murmured, a hint of hesitation in his voice.

"No, I don't think so," I said, surprised to hear him mention the time and see him look at the clock. "It hasn't been ten minutes yet."

"Is that right?"

I turned on the radio to distract him.

"How long has it been now?"

"Twelve minutes."

"Doesn't that seem long?"

"Don't worry. It's fine."

I wondered how many times I had said those words since I'd come to work at the Professor's house. "Don't worry. It's fine." At the barber, outside the X-ray room at the clinic, on the bus home from the ball game. Sometimes as I was rubbing his back, at other times stroking his hand. But I wondered whether I had ever been able to comfort him. His real pain was somewhere else, and I sensed that I was always missing the spot.

"He'll be back soon. Don't worry." This was all I could offer him.

As it grew darker outside, the Professor's anxiety deepened. Every thirty seconds or so he would pull at his collar and glance at the clock. He was so agitated he didn't seem to notice the notes falling from his chest with each tug.

There were cheers from the radio. Paciorek had a base hit in the bottom of the first and the Tigers had scored.

"How long has it been now?" he asked again. "Something must have happened to him. It's taking too long." The legs of his chair scraped on the floor as he twisted this way and that.

"Okay. I'll go look for him. But you mustn't worry. I'm sure he's fine." I got up and put my hand on his shoulder.

I found Root near the row of shops by the station. The Professor was right, there was a problem. The bakery had been closed. But Root, resourceful as ever, had already come up with a solution. He had found another bakery on the other side of the station, and when he explained the situation they had given him some candles. We turned around and ran straight home to the Professor's.

When we got there, we realized almost immediately that something was wrong. The flowers were as fresh as ever, the Tigers were still leading Yakult, and the food was still laid out for the party, but there had been an accident. In the time it had taken to find two candles, the table had been ruined. The birthday cake lay in a lump in front of Root's place, the very spot where the Professor and I had been staring just a moment ago.

The Professor stood next to the table, still holding the empty cake box. The darkness at his back seemed about to engulf him.

"I thought I'd get it ready. So we could eat it right away," he mumbled without looking up, as if apologizing to the empty box. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what to say. It's ruined…"

We sat him down and did what we could to comfort him. Root took the box from him and tossed it on a chair, as though it hadn't held anything so very important. I turned down the radio and turned on the lights.

"It's not really ruined," I told him. "It'll be fine. Nothing to get upset about."

In a businesslike manner, I set about repairing the damage. The trick was to get everything back to normal as quickly as possible, without giving the Professor time to think.

The cake had fallen from the box, crushing one side. The other half, however, was more or less intact, with most of the chocolate-frosting message still legible: The Professor & Root, Congr- I cut it in three pieces and used a knife to fix the whipped cream. Then I gathered up the scattered strawberries, jelly bunnies, and sugar angels and spread them around as evenly as I could. Finally, I put the candles in Root's piece. "Look!" I announced at last. "Good as new!"

Root peered into the Professor's eyes. "And it'll taste just as good," he said.

"No harm done," I chimed in. But the Professor sat there in silence.

To be honest, I was more worried about the tablecloth than the cake. No matter how much I'd wiped, there were still crumbs and smudges of whipped cream down in the eyelets of the lace. All my scrubbing had only succeeded in filling the room with a sickly sweet smell; but the intricate design of the material had been completely spoiled.

I hid the stain under the platter of roast beef, warmed the soup, and found a match to light the candles. The announcer on the radio said that Yakult had come from behind in the third and was leading the Tigers. Root had the Enatsu card, decorated with a yellow ribbon, hidden in his pocket.

"There, look. Everything's set. Here, Professor, have a seat." As I took him by the hand, he looked up at last and noticed Root standing beside him.

"How old are you?" he murmured. "And what was your name again… your head, it's just like the square root sign… We can come to know an infinite range of numbers with this one little sign, even those we can't see…" Then the Professor reached across the table and rubbed Root's head.