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From the The Tenement Series of non-fiction essays by Harry Buschman
© by Harry Buschman
The Ring
"She wanted
me to have that ring, I sat up up with her for three nights just before she
died and she said 'I want YOU to have this ring'." My mother went on and
on about the nights she and her sisters sat up with my grandmother dying of
cancer. They took turns, and there were five of them to sit with her until she
died.
The ring was my grandmother's only possession of value. She told each of them in turn that she was the favorite daughter and she left the ring to each of them in turn. I think it was her way of getting as much as she could from each of her five girls in her last agonizing hours. Though it's hard to admit, without a treasure to dangle in front of each of them she wouldn't have lasted as long as she did. Let them fight over it when it was over -- Lord knows they fought over everything else.
My Grandfather gave it to her on their twentieth wedding anniversary after the five girls were born. It was a diamond, a really big one and it made you wonder where the old man got the money to pay for it -- money that might have been better spent on his children. But he would have none of it -- "Rachel," he told her, "That's your ace in the hole, you're gonna need it some day." So it sat in her ratty old mahogany jewel box in a blue velvet bag tied with string, and except for special occasions it never saw the light of day.
The girls checked it out, each of them in turn on their rotating tour of duty, and even in the dim light of the sickroom it sparkled like a living thing. It was hard not to slip it into a purse and take it home, but the old lady held it tightly and said it was hers while she lived. Each girl was smart enough to have a slip of paper signed in my grandmother's shaky hand saying it was hers when she passed on, and each was smart enough to keep it a secret until she did. I can hear her now -- "Emma, I'm thirsty, get me some apple juice .... or, Bea, fix my pillow, it's slipped down again." The ring was her ace in the hole all right, and it kept the girls running and fetching for six solid weeks.
Well, when the old lady breathed her last there was hell to pay, each daughter had a bona fide document saying the ring was hers, and each one, (by God) was going to get what was coming to her.
"She must
have been crazy, she'd never leave that ring to you -- what did you ever do
for her?"
"You must have forced her to sign it!"
"That doesn't look like her signature anyway!"
It went on and on. Even at the funeral there were harsh words, and Pastor Sweetwater,
sensing an impending clash of confrontation, cut his homily short. At the laying
in, the five husbands were at the point of fisticuffs. The children, even with
a day off from school, were restive and cranky. My father, ever the pacifier,
seemed to have a sensible solution. He suggested they split the damn thing five
ways. "After all," he said, "we can hire five lawyers and they'd
wind up with everything."
On the very next day, the five sisters cast aside their mourning clothes and agreed to meet in the city. The eldest of the five held the ring and stood on the corner of 47th street and Fifth Avenue. The other four, coming from different parts of the city, gathered around her and jostled for position. En Masse, they headed for the Diamond Exchange just west of the Avenue.
Have you been there? There are hundreds of diamond merchants -- each in his private brilliantly lit cubicle. Each with a loupe suspended from his neck. Each sifting through his precious stones with tweezers and looking nervously at his neighbor. They walked up -- all five of them to Felix Weingarten who seemed to have two cubicles to himself, and therefore a more reputable dealer. Bea, the oldest of the daughters, who had been entrusted with the blue bag, unzipped her purse and withdrew it. She placed it on the white table top in front of Mr. Weingarten.
Clearing her throat
forcefully, she said, "We have this here very valuable family heirloom
and we wish to have it appraised."
Felix found it unnecessary to bring the loupe to his eye, and told her this
was no valuable heirloom, the ring was glass .... "See, madam," he
said, "the prongs of the setting are embedded in the glass -- to keep it
from falling out," he added.
There was nothing to appraise, nothing at all. "No charge, Madame ....
I see such things every day -- you have my deepest sympathy."
A profound transformation came over the five sisters. The cherished inheritance each of them felt was theirs was a gimcrack thing. Something a child might wear at a masquerade. They had been had! Had by their dying mother! Not only had they been had, but their mother, most likely had been had as well.
The ring was worthless.
But as they slowly walked out of the brilliantly lit Diamond Exchange, the realization
slowly dawned on them that their father had done something quite extraordinary.
He had given their mother a carrot to dangle in front of five voracious daughters
-- a carat-less diamond so far as diamonds are concerned, but worth its weight
in gold.
"Well, son-of-a-gun!" Bea said. "As long as we're here, let's
do lunch."
©Harry
Buschman 1996
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