The Chinese Box

Abstract

I. A man stood on the ledge, trembling. He had climbed over his rear balcony and edged out sideways, slowly; the ledge was scarcely a foot wide. Now he'd stopped, exactly halfway between his balcony and the next, where a young couple in T-shirts and cutoffs were speaking to the man, imploring him not to jump. Across the street, standing on his own balcony, Jack could not hear their conversation but he could see the couple's kind, concerned expressions; the young man had reached out his arm in a pleading gesture. Nice of them, Jack thought, excited. His heart was pounding queerly. Damned nice of them.... But Jack's attention shifted back to the man, the would-be suicide. He'd made a threatening gesture to the couple - Get back! Get away! - and now leaned forward slightly, as if ready to jump. He was a slender middle-aged man with thinning dark hair. Jack's eye darted to the man's ring finger and saw that it was bare. Of course it was. Jack felt an abrupt, surging anger toward that young couple, the man's neighbors: couldn't they see that their youth, their solidarity, would only make the man on the ledge feel more desperate? Didn't they understand that they were making the situation worse, no matter how kind their intentions? Murderers, Jack thought. He stared at the man, whose hands had floated outward, palms up, as in some final gesture to the world he must abandon. Nervously Jack glanced down to the street - an ancient, littered side street off one of the city's major expressways - and knew the man could not possibly survive such a fall. Eight stories: Jack knew this, for he and the man were at the same level. Jack's apartment building - red-bricked, poorly ventilated, a firetrap - was virtually identical to the one across the way, indeed to dozens of others in this forgotten part of the city. Yes, the man and Jack were at eye-level, though far enough apart that neither the couple nor the suicide had noticed Jack; nor would they pay attention if he called out. The couple kept harassing the man, foolishly, and Jack saw the man's sudden grimace - not of hatred or pain so much as distaste, a pure overwhelming distaste - and then the man's knees buckled and his arms flew upward as if jerked by strings and he jumped. Jack watched, his mouth and throat dry. What must have taken seconds seemed like an agonizing slow-motion expanse of time: the man tumbling end over end, soundlessly, then landing in a graceless heap below, near a fire hydrant. Several black kids had been playing near the hydrant and they jumped back, startled. One of the kids glanced up at the couple - they were gazing at the dead man, horrified - and then at Jack; on both sides of the street, the other balconies were empty. Jack resisted the ignoble urge to step back, to push his balcony door closed and then lock it. Something in the black boy's look seemed to accuse Jack. Now the boys were approaching the dead man, warily. They were joking and snickering out of fear. An unemployed psychologist, Jack understood this; he knew better than to be angry. One of the boys put out his sneakered foot and prodded at the man's arm, which was flung out at an impossible angle, and now another boy reached down and yanked at his shoulder. Each time they backed away, laughing, but then came a bit closer on their next approach. Vultures, Jack thought. Damn nigger vultures. But he chided himself for this thought. Very often had Jack told his colleagues and friends and his ex-fiancee, Mara, that he didn't mind living this close to downtown, that he didn't feel threatened as a white man living in this ran-down area whose streets were overrun by drag dealers and prostitutes and stray restless gangs.... These kids, poking at the dead man, were surely not gang members. They looked too young - thirteen, fourteen, wearing bright-colored T-shirts and blue jeans, and sneakers that looked brand-new. Ordinary boys, Jack thought generously. They meant no harm. …