A Knight in Central Park(20)

“’Twould be appreciated,” Alexandra murmured.

It was suddenly so quiet you could hear the drip of the faucet. The women stared at him, waiting for his answer, making him uneasy.

“Okay, fine,” he said. “Alexandra can sleep here for two more nights, but that’s it.” He wagged a finger at Alexandra. “And don’t think for one minute that I’m buying into this moon story. I don’t like being conned. If Richard exists, then I’ll talk to him. But after that I’m taking you straight to the women’s shelter across town.”

“Come on,” Shelly said to Alexandra, urging her from the room while he rambled on with his lecture.

Alexandra didn’t need to be told twice. She quickly gathered her stones and followed Shelly out of the kitchen.

Standing in the empty room with his finger still pointed outward, Joe realized he’d been duped. Alexandra Dunn had gotten exactly what she’d wanted. From the first moment he ran into her, she’d played on his guilt like Jimmy Hendrix played the strings of his guitar.

It was true. A sucker was born every minute.





Chapter Seven



Every man has his own destiny: the only imperative is to follow it, to accept it, no matter where it leads him.

—Henry Miller

Friday came fast and Joe did the same thing he did every morning. He showered and shaved, pulled on a pair of sweatpants, then put on a clean white t-shirt before heading downstairs.

Shelly and Alexandra had left hours ago. When they returned, he would go with Alexandra to Central Park. He felt like Don Quixote on some unimaginable quest. Only in this version “Dulcinea“ was the crazed and impoverished one who wanted to set out and revive the glory of knighthood that had been so romanticized.

Would Sir Richard turn out to be a giant windmill, he wondered...a figment of Alexandra’s imagination?

Joe hit the switch, lighting the kitchen before he set about making a pot of coffee. Soon his life would be back in order, back to normal, back to the way it was before he ran into Alexandra Dunn.

Odd, he mused, that he failed to feel the usual excited rush that generally accompanied any thought of getting back to work. He dumped three scoops of coffee into the filter, hit the ON button, and tried to transform his muddied thinking to a more studious mind frame.

He spotted the beaded cardigan Shelly had purchased for Alexandra; the cardigan hung wrinkled over one of the wingback chairs. Until Alexandra was gone for good, he wasn’t going to get any work done at all. Slippers and magazines had been tossed under the kitchen table. Did the woman ever put anything away?

While the coffee brewed, Joe gathered Alexandra’s things and carried them to the guestroom. He frowned at the sight of sheets and pillows strewn about the room. From the looks of things, she had meticulously dissected a fake fern. Amongst the plastic leaves littered about the floor were pictures torn from magazines. It took him a moment to find a place to set her things.

The woman was a slob.





Hours later, Joe sat at the built-in desk in the kitchen, skimming his notes. Straightening, he tried to get the kinks out of his neck. Alexandra and Shelly returned a while ago and were now busily packing Alexandra’s things.

He took his reading glasses off and rubbed his eyes, thinking of the day when he would be accepted in the Academy. What would his father say to him after all these years? His father, a renowned archeologist, rarely visited the States to see his only son, but by the end of the month his father would undoubtedly show up for the acceptance of the Academy’s newest member.

Joe pulled the chain from around his neck, touched the gold medallion with the pad of his thumb. Years ago, long before his mother passed away, his father had found the medallion near The Pennine Chain, the backbone of England. His father had spent most of his life trying to prove the medallion belonged to the Black Knight, one of the last knights of the Middle Ages. But his father’s theories were always proven erroneous.

Joe had just turned thirteen when his mother died. His father returned long enough to attend her funeral and give his only son his cherished medallion. Joe knew the ornament meant a lot to his father, but that didn’t lessen the pain when his father left him for good, leaving Joe to be raised by an endless string of friends, who, if truth be told, had no idea of what to do with him.

Every few years Joe received a letter from his father. The hard-to-read scribblings told of his whereabouts and generally ended with a message saying he would visit...but also with details of how he was oh-so-close to unearthing the identity of the Black Knight and thus couldn’t break away just yet.