Read Online Virgin by Mary Elizabeth Murphy - Free Book Online

glass-and-granite office towers.
    A mere forty
blocks from the Waldorf, the Lower East Side might as well be another country.
No skyscrapers here. Except for aberrations like the Con-Ed station's quartet
of stacks and the dreary housing projects, the Lower East Side skyline rises to
a uniform six stories. Window-studded facades of cracked and patched brick
crowd together cheek by jowl for block after block, separated occasionally by a
garbage-choked alley. They're all brick of varying shades of red, sometimes
brown or gray, and every so often a daring pink or yellow or blue. With no room
behind or to either side, a mazework of mandatory fire escapes hangs over the
sidewalks, clinging to the brick facades like spidery steel parasites,
ready-made perches for the city's winged rat, the pigeon.
    Everywhere Dan
looked, everything was old, with no attempt to recapture youth. Graffiti formed
the decorative motif, layer upon layer until the intertwined snake squiggles
and balloon letters were indecipherable even to their perpetrators. The store
signs he could read advertised old bedding, fresh vegetables, used furniture,
and the morning paper, offered food, candy, magazines,
cashed checks, and booze, booze, booze. And some signs he couldn't read--
Koreans and Vietnamese were moving in. He passed pawnshops, bodegas, boys'
clubs, schools, churches, and playgrounds. Children still played, even here.
    He looked up at
the passing windows. Behind them lived young, hopeful immigrants on their way
up, middle-aged has-beens on their way down, and too many running like hell
just to stay in place. And out here on the streets dwelt the never-weres and
the never-will-bes, going nowhere, barely even sure of where they were at any
given moment.
    He wore his
civvies this morning--faded jeans, flannel shirt, sneakers. He wasn't here on
Church business and it was easier to get around without the Roman collar.
Especially in Tompkins Square. The collar drew the panhandlers like moths to a
flame. And can you believe it--every single one of them a former altar boy?
Simply amazing how many altar boys had become homeless.
    Tompkins Square
Park was big, three blocks long and running the full width between Avenues A
and B. Black wrought-iron fencing guarded the perimeter. Oaks, pale green with
new life, stood inside the fences but spread their branches protectively over
the surrounding sidewalks. Homeless shantytowns used to spring up here every so often,
and just as often the police would raze them, but closing the park between
midnight and six a.m. every night
had sent the cardboard box brigade elsewhere.
    Dan walked past
the stately statue of Samuel S. Cox, its gray-green drabness accentuated by the
orange, red, and yellow of the swings and slides in the nearby playground, and
strolled the bench-lined walks, searching for the gleaming white of Harold
Gold's bald head. They'd met years ago when Dan had audited Hal's course on the
Dead Sea scrolls. They'd got to talking after class, found they shared an
abiding interest in the Jerusalem Church--Hal from the Jewish perspective, Dan
from the Christian--and became fast friends. Whenever one dug up a tasty little
tidbit of lore, he shared it immediately with the other. Dan was sure Hal had picked up some real goodies during his sabbatical
in Israel. He was looking forward to this meeting.
    He didn't see
Hal. Lunch hour was still a while off but already seats were becoming scarce
around the square. Then Dan spotted someone waving from a long bench in the
sunny section on the Avenue A side.
    No wonder I
couldn't spot him, Dan thought as he approached Hal's bench. He's got a tan.
    As usual, Hal
was nattily dressed in a dark blue blazer, gray slacks, a pale blue Oxford
button-down shirt, and a red-and-blue paisley tie. But his customary
academician's pallor had been toasted to a golden brown. His nude scalp gleamed
with a richer color. He looked healthier and better rested than Dan had ever
seen him.
    "The
Middle