Murder in the Melting Pot

by Jane Isenberg

  A second look at her bookings validated her first. There really were no reservations for that night. There were three for the next night, and she’d had a full house the night before, so she tried telling herself this was a fluke, not a calamity. But it wasn’t a good sign. That cold November night would be the first since Breitner’s opened that all four guest rooms were guestless.

  She resolved to visit every restaurant, vineyard, shop and museum in the Lower Valley and leave flyers. She’d advertise in…But what was the point? Until Isaac’s killer was brought to justice, promoting her B & B seemed like an exercise in futility. According to Sunday’s Yakima Herald-Republic the police had not turned up any new leads. That meant the missing Javier Baez remained their primary suspect and the investigation was stalled.

  Frustrated and worried, she opened her tablet and clicked on American Swastika, hoping the slim creepily-titled book would shed some much-needed light on the disturbing possibility that Isaac Markowitz’s murder was, in fact, a hate crime. In between her daily round of chores and errands, she read, spurred on by amazement and curiosity. At lunch, over her egg salad sandwich, what she read rendered her stereotype of hate group members outdated. According to the authors’ research, the burly, tattooed, undereducated and underemployed, drunk and/or drugged skinhead haters Miranda and Rabbi Alinsky thought of as Aryan supremacists were still around, but they were decidedly old school. Twenty-first-century white supremacists encourage other white power enthusiasts to hide their Aryan affiliations so as to insinuate themselves into the social and work lives of their communities.

  Miranda read that, like her, they give themselves makeovers. They let their hair grow and conceal their tattoos. Instead of going to jail, they go to college, get good jobs, and raise their kids in solid, structured traditional families and homes. She cringed when the authors explained that in these homes the newly-respectable haters feed their kids a steady diet of racist ideology embedded in their home-school curriculums, reading material, the conversations of their white-only friends, kids’ birthday cakes in the shape of swastikas, and the lyrics of white power music. Miranda checked these lyrics out online and found, in addition to a melodic anthem in praise of Nazi hero Rudolph Hess, many songs such as Jigrun by a band named Bully Boys. It’s first two verses are:

  Whiskey Bottles

  Baseball Bats

  Pickup Trucks

  And Rebel Flags

  We're going on the town tonight

  Hit and run

  Let's have some fun

  We've got jigaboos on the run

  And they fear the setting sun

  To white power folks non-whites are niggers or muds. Miranda remembered Darlene telling her how her neighbors’ children had tormented Josefina, calling her nigger and mud and taking her precious doll. She also recalled Darlene’s shock at how educated people, a nurse and an engineer, could have such rude and mean kids. Nigger was a common enough epithet, but mud? Miranda’d never heard that slur before, even on TV. Like their idol Hitler, white supremacists believe that mixing with people of other races, creatures whom they believe to have been created out of mud, defiles the racial purity of whites. Darleen’s neighbors could very well be closeted white supremacists. Remembering Colestah’s chilling story about the rattlesnake, Miranda shivered. Like that inherently deceitful and venom-spewing reptile, hidden white supremacists did not change their essential identities. Even verses of their lullabies, their children’s games, and their holiday songs malign dark-skinned people.

  Even though American Swastika was a depressing and frightening read, Miranda kept returning to her tablet while she was on hold waiting to talk with the scheduler who made appointments for Rusty’s vet or for her mechanic at the car repair shop to answer his phone, or even for the dryer to finish. And that evening, upstairs in her apartment, she read while picking at a frozen lasagna she’d nuked. She’d nearly finished the book and finally understood that the “hidden spaces of hate” in American Swastika’s subtitle are the homes of under-the-radar post-skinhead haters. To Miranda, the really scary thing was that clandestine Aryan supremacists aren’t just wackos holed up in the desert or the mountains as Detective Ladin had led her to believe. One could be your doctor or your kid’s teacher or your neighbor. Or Darleen’s neighbors. A nurse or an engineer could very well be a hidden Aryan supremacist.

  This suspicion didn’t allay her growing anxiety as she contemplated taking Rusty out for his run. Even though she trusted her dog to deter another assault by Detective Ladin, if Isaac’s killer really was one of these closeted anti-Semites she’d been reading about and was still in the area, she was now the only Jew around. Miranda knew she couldn’t live cocooned with her dog in her B & B, so instead of spooking herself silly, she would protect herself. She took Rusty with her to the shed where Michael had stored painting and spackling tools. Using her phone for light, she selected a hammer and a couple of easily portable pocket-sized razor blades to have handy just in case. She made sure to lock the shed behind her. Ever since she’d found Vanessa Vargas and Rusty in there, Miranda’d kept the little building padlocked.

  Once back inside the B & B, she put the hammer on one of the easy chairs, threw a patchwork quilt over it, pocketed one razor blade, and put the others in a drawer with the flatware. Next she checked to be sure that all the windows in those eerily empty guest rooms were locked. She considered calling Pauline and Nelson and asking them if she could spend the night at their house, but decided not to. She couldn’t do that every time she had no guests. She reminded herself that she’d spent the whole summer alone in the B & B without coming to harm. Then she reminded herself that that was before Isaac Markowitz was murdered across the street.

  She pulled her Snow Trax over what she called her geezer sneaks because they closed with Velcro, put on her parka, leashed her excited dog, locked the door behind them, and pocketed her keys. Finally she took the impatient Rusty out for what she hoped would be a restorative run in the cold night air. Once on the steps, she eyed her mezuzah. Even though the little scroll identified her as a Jew, she would not take it down. Instead, she did something she’d never done before. She kissed her gloved finger and tapped the mezuzah with it, transferring the kiss. But it was not the stern donor of the Ten Commandments she was hoping to channel. No, it was the vigilant shepherd of the Twenty-third Psalm whose protection she sought as she and Rusty ran through the streets of what she had come to think of as the “valley of the shadow of death.” She was struck by the silence of the processing plant now that the 24/7 work of koshering was done. No lights shone within, but the big building’s exterior was lit so that the stacks of fruit crates cast eerie shadows in the parking lot.

  As they descended the front steps, Rusty’s ears went up, his tail went down, and he growled what Miranda thought of as his “pay attention” growl. She looked around. Outside the newly locked gate to the newly lit plant parking lot she made out the silhouette of a man. One of those stacks of crates was so high its shadow transcended the chain-link fence, offering the outsider a hiding place. Who was he? Should she call 911? But what if the big man lurking there was Detective Ladin stalking her to claim another kiss or more for his silence? She didn’t dial 911, because if the man wasn’t the detective, a call might give that creep Ladin an excuse to reappear. It occurred to her that she was more afraid of the police than of the murderer at large. Miranda stroked Rusty’s head to calm herself.

  More likely this guy was a homeless prowler looking for shelter and unable to access the secured plant. That must be why he faced the B & B. Would he see her leave and try to break in there? Or, worst case scenario, could the man lurking in the shadow really be poor Isaac’s killer looking for another Jewish victim? She fumbled in her jeans pocket and fondled the razor in its cardboard sheath. Then she transferred the blade to her jacket pocket where it was more easily accessible. When she looked up, the man was getting into a car that soon sped down the road towards Toppenish. />
  Relieved, Miranda and Rusty took off too. The cold dark streets seemed more deserted than usual. Even the inked young men who hung out at the convenience store weren’t around. And across the highway Darlene’s house was unlit because she was in Spokane visiting her granddaughter. Most of her neighbors were home though, their presence illuminated only by glows visible through the curtains on their front windows. Miranda pictured moms and dads who’d put their kids to bed and then collapsed on the sofa to snuggle and watch TV. As usual, she envied the imaginary contentment of these imaginary couples.

  The house with the pumpkins stood out not only because it was bigger than the others and its stairs were seasonally decorated, but because it was all lit up. Rusty loped past it a little faster. Miranda figured his sharp canine ears were offended by the muted blare of rock music barely audible to his owner. A few more cars and trucks were parked in front of that house and across the street than elsewhere on the block. It was definitely party time in there. But who parties on a Sunday night? Miranda answered her own question. A nurse who works the night shift most other nights and home schools her kids. That’s who.

  The authors of American Swastika explain that home-based gatherings offer these hidden haters a rare chance to express their real feelings in a safe environment where they can get support and affirmation among like-minded friends. Sweatshirts emblazoned with Heil Hitler! and swastikas don’t cut it at the office Christmas party, the church picnic, or the PTA meeting. As she ran, Miranda began to take her suspicion that the people in the pumpkin house were hate group members even more seriously. It wasn’t all that far-fetched. And if those people partying in there were hate groupies, it was just possible that one of them might have killed Isaac Markowitz.

  She ran on, her second wind putting wings on her feet and her eagerness to find Isaac’s killer lighting a fire in her belly. She wanted to see for herself if the inhabitants of the pumpkin house really were Sunnyvale’s hidden haters. Adrenalin, endorphins, and not a little chutzpah kept her running until she’d formulated a plan. Then she turned around and they headed back the way they came.

  As they ran, Miranda reconsidered what she was about to do. In a way it was nothing she hadn’t done before. No one but her would be hurt, and she’d recover. But it was crazy, a little kinky even. It was every bit as crazy as Colestah’s shoot-‘em-up car chase, and that had worked out just fine. Besides, unlike Colestah’s caper, what she was going to do probably wasn’t really illegal, although maybe her lawyer Harry Ornstein would disagree. So what? He obviously didn’t care for her, thought she was some kind of self-slashing nut job anyway. She had nothing to lose. The worst thing that could happen was that her planned foray would prove useless like the cops’ bogus leads. She took it as a good omen that most of Darlene’s neighbors had turned off their TVs and gone to bed. She was too preoccupied to imagine, let alone envy, what they might be doing there.

  She and Rusty ran right past the pumpkin house, turning into Darlene’s gate to her tiny front yard and front steps. There they stopped abruptly beneath the willow where that tree’s web of low-lying leafless branches partially screened them from the street. Miranda extricated the razor blade from its cardboard sheath. Next she took off her gloves and stashed them at the base of the tree. She spat several times in both palms and bent to rub the salt-strewn path to the front door until her moistened hands picked up some grit and grime. Then with a practiced twist of her wrist she deliberately slashed the skin of the palm of her non-dominant hand just opposite her thumb. Aware that she was charting new territory on her scarred body, she noted that for the first time, the burning sensation brought no relief. It only increased her sense of urgency. Working fast, she intentionally brushed her cheek with her wounded hand, leaving a streak of grime and blood. That done, she and Rusty resumed running under the streetlights. A glance behind her showed that, like bread crumbs in a fairy tale, a trail of crimson dots on the snowy sidewalk marked their route back to the pumpkin house.

  Miranda bounded up the stairs to the front door and rang the bell. The doorbell was no match for the loud music, so when no one answered, she tried turning the door knob, but it didn’t yield. She banged on the door and rang the bell over and over until finally a big white man with a semi-circle of ear-length brown hair surrounding a gleaming bald spot and whirling an old-fashioned glass empty of all but ice cubes opened the door and greeted them with a step back and a scowl. He recoiled at the sight of her dirty bloodstained face and the bloody hand she waved like a banner. Or it could have been the large dog alert at her side that spooked him. Miranda also thought that maybe her host simply registered the fact that she was a stranger crashing an invitation-only party.

  To be heard, she shrieked over the blare of sound blasting through the open door. “Oh! Thank the lord! I just fell, and since you all’re still up, I wonder could I wash this off and get a Band-Aid real quick?” She figured it was only his fear of Rusty’s barking waking his sleeping neighbors that made him usher them in and slam the door shut. She kept shouting. “I left my gloves and my cell at my boyfriend’s house, and I don’t want to go all the way back now….”

  “Tammy, come here!” The man bellowed this order over his shoulder, but even his bellow didn’t make it through the earsplitting amplified rock music, because Tammy didn’t appear. To Miranda, still standing at the door, he hollered. “Follow me. My wife’s a nurse. She’ll fix you up. Is he, uh, you know….” The man jerked his head in Rusty’s direction and then glanced down at the shoes and boots piled on a towel near the door and at the immaculate pale blue carpet. He looked at the blood dripping from her hand.

  Miranda pulled off her knit hat and covered her wound with it. She slipped out of her running shoes and Snow Trax and added them to the heap while yelling, “He’s friendly and he just peed. He’ll bark if I leave him outside.”

  The man gestured to her to follow as he hustled through a disappointingly ordinary living-dining room where a few men, fewer women, and at least four kids of assorted ages stood around watching a video of a really loud rock band. Her host moved too fast for Miranda to make out the logos on any of the guests’ sweatshirts, but a few of the lyrics with their references to “muds” and “niggers” would stay in her head forever. These slurs set to music reassured her that in spite of the neat but bland décor, she’d come to the right place. She noted the mostly empty platters and casserole dishes on the table. Between the living room and the kitchen was a short hall, its walls lined with photos, and a door to what she assumed was a bathroom. Before she could get a look at the photos, the door opened and a curvaceous forty-something blonde emerged. She flinched at the sight of the two party crashers. Her husband reassured her. “Relax, Babe. The dog already peed outside. This lady needs a Band-Aid. Fix her up and send her on her way.”

  Tammy nodded and gestured for Miranda to follow her back into the bathroom. “Your dog can come too. There’s no carpet in here.” She closed the door behind them, effectively lowering the decibel level a little and imprisoning them in a cell of sea-blue tile. Even the soap bottle was blue. Rusty headed straight for the toilet where he guzzled water until Miranda reprimanded him. Tammy ignored him as she retrieved a first-aid kit from the cabinet beneath the sink. Setting it on the counter, she took Miranda’s hand in hers and studied it. “That salt and sand mix on the sidewalks is nasty stuff. I’ll just clean this out.”

  Tammy turned on the water in the sink and began to push up her sleeves and then, apparently thinking better of it, tugged them down again. Miranda, who hadn’t worn a sleeveless T-shirt in decades, recognized the behavior of someone else eager to censor a body part that told too much. For a second she felt Harry Ornstein’s hands reading her own body’s braille, decoding its most secret messages. The rush of cold water on her wound returned her to her current sea-blue reality. Tammy, who’d pulled on latex gloves, was flushing Miranda’s cut under the tap and then took her other hand and rinsed that too and swabbed the blood o
ff her face with a gauze pad. Satisfied, she soaped each of Miranda’s hands, and Miranda rinsed them under the cool water. Tammy dried her patient’s uninjured hand with a blue towel and the other with a gauze pad. With the deft nonchalance of a nursing professional, she wrapped gauze around the bleeding hand while Miranda babbled about leaving behind her gloves and her cell. She tried not to stare at the writing on Tammy’s faded blue sweatshirt, “Martyrs Day 1984.” She remembered seeing something about Martyrs Day in American Swastika, but she’d been reading so fast she couldn’t remember what it was.

  “Here, take this. I’ve got plenty.” When Tammy stuck the remaining roll of gauze in one of Miranda’s jacket pockets, Miranda stopped breathing, fearing the nurse’s adroit latex-covered fingers would find the razor. But hiding the tool she’d used to cut herself was an old habit, the kind that dies hard, and in a second or two Miranda recalled stashing the bloody blade with her gloves under the tree at Darlene’s. Only then did she resume breathing.

  “There, you’re good to go. Keep that cut clean with soap and water and keep it covered. You don’t want a scab.”

  “Thanks. Just let me pee and we’ll be on our way. Not to worry. We’ll let ourselves out. And I really mean it, Tammy. Thanks so much. It’s some kind of miracle that I fell in front of a nurse’s house, right?”

  Tammy smiled graciously. “Glad to help. You take care now. If it gets red, see your doctor. And hold that flusher down for at least ten seconds, okay?”