The Lonely Hearts Hotel(47)
I don’t like the way you wear your hat.
I can’t stand the way you hum to tunes.
I don’t like the way you laugh.
I never liked the way you sing.
So how come I get all crazy when you come around?
All over the city, in living rooms and kitchens and bedrooms, and on factory floors, people burst out into the chorus:
Boom, boom, boom goes my heart, boom, boom, boom.
Boom, boom, boom goes my heart, boom, boom, boom.
Boom, boom, boom goes my heart, boom, boom, boom.
25
THE CAT THIEF IN THE NURSERY
Poppy always paid for the heroin. By the time he was twenty-one, Pierrot couldn’t afford to get high every night with the pittance he was making being an usher and playing the piano on random nights. Poppy knew this too. The more he was dependent on heroin, the more he was dependent on her. Poppy’s pet projects and prostitution alone certainly couldn’t support Pierrot’s growing addiction. She sometimes had trouble making any money at all. Men preferred the brothels. There was something about Poppy that made them all feel a little bit sad. They couldn’t forget that they were paying for sex. She never seemed to have repeat customers. Whoever made love to her always seemed overcome by guilt that lasted, like a hangover, for three days.
Pierrot decided he would be a thief. He didn’t have an elaborate inner debate over whether it was right or wrong. He had spent the last few years up in the mansions in Westmount, and he knew very well that they were loaded with fantastic items, most of which the owners didn’t have a need for. There was such an enormous discrepancy between the rich and the poor that he felt he was in some ways providing society with a much-needed redistribution of wealth. He ought to be thanked for his actions. Of course, it was only he and Poppy who benefited from this redistribution, but that seemed like a rather minor hole in his economic theory. He had never been to university, so nobody could expect him to be Friedrich Engels.
Pierrot would leave his shoes outside the windows of the houses before he crawled inside. He preferred to creep into the houses while the occupants were at home, as they were less likely to have locked up. He would stand in his stocking feet, looking at the paintings in the long hallways as though he were a connoisseur in a museum appraising a traveling exhibition.
He was fond of taking paintings. They were quite light. All the French aristocrats with their big wigs looked like they had just stepped out of bubble baths. He chose what he believed to be the best painting and took it home. He would place the painting—and whatever trinkets had tickled his fancy—into his suitcase, put his shoes back on and saunter off down the street.
In his remarkable tailored suit he never attracted attention to himself, despite it being worn out and mended by Poppy. No one could imagine that his home was anywhere but this elite neighborhood. He was also a familiar face to the police officers. They didn’t know his name, but they felt quite sure that they had seen him growing up around there.
The pawn dealer was always impressed by Pierrot’s perspicuity when it came to selecting the paintings. He always plucked incredible works of art, the most valuable pieces in the collection. Yet he was unaware ahead of time of the priceless possessions in the houses he entered.
He crawled up a trellis one evening and climbed gently and quietly into an open window on the second floor. Pierrot put his black-stockinged toes on the carpeted floor, stood up against the wall and took a moment to ascertain where in the world he had found himself.
To his surprise, he was in a room whose walls were covered with a mural of mountains with sheep running across them. There were numerous astral bodies floating around his head. How peculiar to have Jupiter floating just inches away from him. He could reach out and touch it with his finger.
He looked down at the green carpet at his feet. He was surrounded by a flock of miniature sheep and cows and horses. How was it that he had found himself a giant?
Then he looked across the room and saw a very small bed in the middle. Ah, he was in a nursery. He was immediately calmed, then alarmed again when he noticed a small boy had sat up in the bed and was looking right at him. What could he do? His fate lay in the hands of an emotionally volatile and unpredictable child.
He smiled at the child. The child smiled back. He stood on his hands and walked across the room. The child rolled out of the bed as nimbly as Pierrot could do any trick.
Pierrot froze in one spot. Then he began to walk around the room with awkward, stilted steps. He looked like a mechanical doll. He moved as though each of his joints was stiff. There was no fluidity in his movements. But there was an awkward grace to it—as seen in giraffes that ambled about on the plains. The child laughed and laughed.
The boy brought him a tiny top that had on it yellow horses with flowing manes. When the top was spun, the horses became a shooting star whizzing through space at an extraordinary trajectory.
The child insisted that Pierrot take it. “It is for you, Peter Pan,” the child whispered. Pierrot took the boy’s hand and led him back to bed. And tucked him in. He juggled three colorful beanbags until the child squeezed his wee eyes together, his cheeks grew into round peaceful globes and he fell fast asleep.
? ? ?
IT TURNED OUT that the top was a treasure from the Byzantine Empire. The fence knew that although Pierrot had an extraordinary esthetic sense, he was clueless when it came to money or economic worth. And so for the Byzantine treasure, which had been twirled by the hand of empresses and would be cherished by any museum in the world, he gave Pierrot three dollars. Pierrot couldn’t believe that he had been given so much money for a simple top. When he went home, he and Poppy rejoiced. It was enough money to remain high for two weeks. At one point one of Poppy’s socks slipped off and they were unable to find it. That was the most eventful thing that happened during those weeks.