THE PHILANTHROPIST  

Out of breath on the fourth floor landing, I had no choice but to stop walking and catch my breath. A middle-aged cleaning woman wearing a wrinkled, checkered housecoat headed down the hallway as she vacuumed dust balls from the runners. Most of the hallway lamps were blown, but by the haphazard way she was doing her work, the poor lighting suited her fine. When she saw me, she shut the vacuum cleaner and motioned with her head toward the door at the end of the hall.

“The old man's in there.”

“What old man?” I asked, still huffing from the ascent.
“Wentworth. That who you come for.”
“How do you know?”
“They all be up here today looking for him. He got them all coming,” she scoffed. “If you so outta breath, why you walk them stairs?”
“It's not working.”
“Says who?”
“The desk clerk.”
“Ha! He’s playing with you, child. He just don’t like anyone looking at his TV.” The echo of her laughter followed me down the hall until I stood outside the room she pointed to. The door was wide open. Inside was a man sleeping face down on a bed. It was a small room cluttered with old books and reeking of dead rodents. Seeing no one else in the room and not wanting to disturb the stranger, I turned away, but the cleaning woman said, “He in there. That’s Wentworth. You go right on in. Like the rest a them.”

What could this lifeless figure on the bed of a welfare hotel possibly have to donate to Children’s House? I wasn’t really so eager to find out, but my office, a few blocks down on Fifth Avenue, seemed miles away, and I knew I would have to explain my visit to Mr. Hershkowitz. So I walked into Mr. Wentworth’s room. As I crossed the threshold, a black shadow sprung across the room and darted between my legs. I threw myself back instinctively, crashing against the door. The cleaning woman behind me cursed, “Damn cat! Come back here! I told you to lock her in the bathroom, Wentworth!” Her voice trailed off as she chased the cat down the hall. The commotion wakened the old man from his sleep. After a sudden jerk, he slowly regained consciousness, shaking his head and rubbing his gray whiskers. His eyes were still shut, crusted by a long, hard sleep. He appeared so old that I wondered if his opened eyelids would reveal hollow sockets.
“Mr. Wentworth?”
“Speaking,” he said, gasping through a bronchial cough.
“I'm Paul Almonte from Children's House.”
“Who? Where's Abigail?”
“The cleaning lady?”
“My cat. Did she run out? Is Miss Smith out there?”
“Is she the cleaning lady?

The old man finally opened his eyes. I was relieved to see his eyeballs in place, a pale blue pair surrounded by the redness of age and weariness. “Oh no. Do not refer to her as the cleaning lady. She is the housekeeper. And a wonderful singer, too. That’s why I call her Miss Smith. After Bessie Smith. You should hear her rendition of ‘It’s Nobody’s Business If I Do.’ But Smith isn’t her real name. It’s…”
“Mr. Wentworth,” I cut him off, feeling far bolder with this vulnerable, dead lead than I did with Mr. Hershkowitz. Somehow I couldn’t imagine that fat cleaning woman in the old housecoat doing anything other than chasing an elusive cat down the hallway. “I’m in a rush.”
“Yes,” said the old man, “everyone has a secret talent. Miss Smith’s is singing. What is yours, my dear young man?”

“I believe you called my organization about a donation you'd like to make.”

He trembled as he rose from the bed. I took him to be at least ninety, maybe a hundred years old. His trousers were wrinkled and his white polyester shirt was smudged with the same food stains that were pasted on his lips. “Oh, yes. And to whom do I owe this significant honor?” he said with a protocol befitting a royal subject and betraying the squalor which was devouring him. He extended his quivering hand to me and flashed a weak smile, exposing his driveling mouth devoid of teeth or dentures.
“I already introduced myself. Paul Almonte from Children’s House.” Our hands met. His was cold, almost frozen, and it quaked gently and steadily in my grasp. I felt chilled and wanted to sit down.

“Of course. And undoubtedly, Miss Smith will retrieve Abigail. I certainly hope she doesn’t wrench her back in the process like she did last time. Won’t you have a seat?” I released his hand and looked around the small room for a seat. There was a wooden desk chair in the corner, but it was covered with cereal boxes and rotted fruit. Beneath the desk were paper bags with more groceries. A rat squeezed from a minute hole in the wall and, feeling bold in the cat’s absence, helped itself to a loaf of stale bread. I turned to sit on the bed, the only choice left, but molted cat hairs covered the bedspread, and I didn’t want to mess my suit. I remained standing with shaky knees.
“I think I’ll stand, thank you.”

Mr. Wentworth shuffled slowly past stacks of dusty reference books that rose five feet from the floor. A large, corrugated carton covered the top of a rickety dresser. He lifted it and turned toward me, tripping over a pile of binders. His fall was cushioned by the bed. I did not have the presence of mind to help him because I was keeping watch of the rat boring through the bread, indifferent to the noise around him. The old man regained his balance and opened the carton. He removed a few sheets of poster board and a small, black antique camera. “As you may well know,” he said, “I am Chester Wentworth, an engineer, science columnist, university professor, corporate administrator, community leader, church benefactor, and inventor with two hundred registered patents.” His head rattled in rhythm with his speech patterns. I wondered whether I was prepared to help him if he went into a convulsion common among Parkinson’s patients.

“Sit down, Mr. Wentworth. Please.”

“That's quite all right, lad. I prefer to stand when making my presentation.” He assumed a pose far too formal for the situation, as if he were addressing a board of directors at their annual meeting. He propped one of the poster boards against the box. A message was scrawled on it in thick, red, crooked letters. It was impossible for me to read the handwriting, but he had no trouble with it. From the appearance of the poster board, he probably had made this presentation a thousand times. “As it says on this storyboard,” he said, his tremulous finger pointing to it, “success in our time will depend on our vision of the future. And we achieve nothing without compassion for those whose personal vision was limited by accident of birth.”

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Philip Vassallo, Ed.D., a corporate communication consultant, is working on his first two books, "Like the Day I Was Born: Forty Poems of Forty Days" and "The Art of On-the-Job Writing." He dedicates this story to the memory of his dear friend Harry Kamish.

Contact Philip Vassallo at: vassallo@aol.com

December 6, 2001
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