The Savage Kind

by John Copenhaver

  She sensed my reservation. The glitter in her eyes darkened and a wrinkle formed in her brow. “Well, I’ll go,” she said. “Have a nice life.”

  She walked past me and crossed the street. As she did, that invisible string between us pulled taut and tugged me out of my bear trap. “Yes!” I thought, “I accept your invitation, your love, whatever that means—whatever we make it mean!” My body lurched and trembled, and I shouted, “Wait! Just wait!” and began running toward her.

  She stopped. “What?” she said, her face stony. No more talking pet.

  I couldn’t tell her what was banging around in my head, and she wasn’t going to cough up her innermost thoughts—but I didn’t want her to go. I couldn’t let her go. Minutes before, I’d almost told her about Halo and Miss Martins, but I wasn’t giving up my secret yet. Telling her now might backfire, and frankly, she hadn’t earned it. I’d keep it a little longer. Perhaps I’d use it to pry apart that chink in her armor. Or maybe I’d just nurture it, cherishing its mystery. I don’t know. What I did know was that the idea of letting her go was impossible to imagine. Thinking on my feet, and knowing I had to do something to lure her in, I said, “Do you know anything about Ovid?”

  “No,” she said, squinting. “Why?”

  “It may be the key to Cleve’s and Miss Martins’s murders.”

  JUDY, NOVEMBER 29, 1948

  “I did research in the library during lunch,” Philippa said, after we’d found a bench and scrunched close, “and here’s how the myth goes…” Her warmth next to me was reassuring. The contents of Charlene’s journal were still ricocheting through me. What I’d discovered was staggering, life-altering. After I’d finished it, I had to find Philippa, or I was going to blow apart like a miniature atomic bomb. She’s the only person who’s never lied to me, who’s never kicked me to the curb, who can keep me together. I wasn’t prepared to tell her about it. It would change how she saw me. But I wanted to be close to her, to try to make it clear how I felt about her.

  “So, this Procne woman is married to Tereus, the King of Thrace,” she began, gesticulating as she spoke. “She’s missing her sister, Philomela, who she hasn’t seen in ages and who still lives with their father, the king of Athens. She asks Tereus to sail to Athens and fetch her for a visit. Tereus agrees. When he first sees charming, gorgeous Philomela, he gets hot and bothered. On the boat back to Thrace, he becomes so lustful, so obsessed, that he detours to a cabin nearby where he locks her up and violates her.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Oh, wait. There’s so much more. When he tells her not to say anything, she says, ‘No way, buddy! I’m telling my father and my sister. You’re done for.’ Fuming with rage, he grabs her tongue with tongs and cuts it off. Because that’s easy to do.”

  I wagged my tongue, trying to escape the invisible tongs.

  Philippa raised an eyebrow.

  “So, he leaves her,” she continued. “Since she can’t speak, she weaves a coded message into a tapestry and has it secretly sent to her sister, who by this time, thinks she’s dead. Once she receives it, Procne, full of righteous rage, rescues Philomela and decides the best way to get revenge on her husband is to…” She paused for dramatic effect.

  “It’s cold,” I said, watching a stray snowflake float by.

  “… To kill her son, Itys, Tereus’s child. She slits his throat, boils him, and serves him to her husband for dinner.”

  “Yum.”

  “Once Tereus has snacked on Itys, the sisters present him with Itys’s severed head and tell him who he’s eaten. Obviously, that pushes him over the edge. He picks up his sword and goes after them—and then, poof, all three turn into birds. A nightingale, a swallow, and a hoopoe.”

  “A nightingale.”

  “The name you want to be called.”

  I remembered my chat with Miss M: “Judy Finch? That’s better, right? Or wait, I have it. Nightingale, like the poem!” That’s who I was to her, a nightingale, a horror transformed. “Which bird is which character?”

  “Tereus is always the hoopoe, but different versions of the myth mix up who’s the nightingale and who’s the swallow.”

  “So, why is this important?”

  Philippa hoisted her satchel on her lap, and after struggling with its straps, she produced Love’s Last Move. “Miss Martins sent this to me. Look at the inside flap.”

  I opened it and scanned the inscription. “Do you think this is a message?”

  “Well, it led me to Ovid.”

  “But all our wants by wit may be supply’d,” I read out loud, “and art makes up, what fortune has deny’d.” I knew what it meant. I also knew where it was going to lead and what would be discovered there. Charlene’s journal, through a twist of fate, made me a fortune teller, a soothsayer. In its pages, I’d seen the shimmer of Clotho’s threads, like spiderwebs in the dew. I wasn’t going to tell Philippa the truth, but I’d nudge her. “The ‘wit’ is her sending you this clue,” I said. “Circumstances had made it impossible for her to tell the truth, but ‘art’—The Metamorphoses, in this case—is her way of communicating.”

  “Just like Philomela in the story.”

  I closed the book and turned it over in my hand. “This Ovid tale, it’s about sisters. Miss M told you to treat me like a sister.”

  A light clicked on in Philippa’s mind; I saw the glitter in her metal-gray eyes. “Before Halo stormed in and chased us,” she said, “Elaine said something about sisters, too. She wanted me to promise to be a good sister to you.”

  “There’s also a rape in Ovid’s tale,” I said.

  “And a tyrant,” she said.

  “And a murdered son.”

  She clapped her hands. “I know who did it, and I think I know why.”

  She didn’t know the half of it.

  PHILIPPA, NOVEMBER 29, 1948

  Elaine greeted us with a smile. “Well, here you are,” she said, gesturing for us to come in. “I wondered when you would show up. Hang your coats beside the door.” That wasn’t the welcome we were expecting. Neither of us took off our coats.

  On our way there, we ran through strategies for how to talk our way in. Our smartest approach, Judy thought, was to offer our condolences for Halo’s death and to apologize for our part in it. Elaine wasn’t torn up over it; after all, she’d characterized him as a bloodthirsty maniac to the police. But we didn’t want to spook her. If we played dumb, she might be more willing to let us linger. That this plan now seemed unnecessary was unsettling.

  In the parlor, she waved us toward the usual spot by the window. “Have a seat, girls,” she said brightly, her eyes darting between us. “I’m afraid I won’t be able to offer you tea or cocoa,” she said, shrugging. “Moira would be shocked at my manners, wouldn’t she? Would a glass of warm malted milk do?”

  Her lipstick was brilliant red, the red of geraniums, and her busy canary yellow dress, out of keeping for the season, fit her snugly, straining at her bust and hips. She seemed like a flower trying to bloom in a freeze. Still trying to execute our plan, I blurted, “We’re so sorry about Mr. Closs,” and fumbling, added, “About the accident.”

  Her geranium lips froze, and her eyes fluttered like little camera shutters. She just stared, her gaze straining, communicating something—fear? Pain? Anger?

  “Warm milk sounds fantastic,” Judy said, ending the awkwardness.

  “Wonderful!” she said, bringing her hands together, fingertips tapping lightly. She whirled around, dropping her arms to her sides and cocking her wrists as if she were walking the runway at one of Woody’s fashion previews. She paused at the radio console, switching it on. A jazz tune slid into the room, listless and sad. She hurried on into the kitchen, her lurid yellow dress flashing behind her.

  Judy whispered, “She’s nuts.” She looked around. “I’ll be back in a minute. I have a hunch about something.”

  “What?! You’re leaving me?” I whispered.

  She ignored me and crept across the room, peere
d into the shadowy hall, glanced back, her black eyes wide and reassuring, and disappeared.

  I settled in at the window. The parlor’s rug was littered with glass, splinters, and small metal parts—screws, washers, dials, and gears—debris from the grandfather clock, which now lay facedown in front of the fireplace like a coffin at a wake, dragged there, I imagined, to get it out of the way. No one had bothered to clean. Even the painting above the couch was crooked, its murky landscape straining at its borders as if, at any moment, it might split the frame and spill out on the floor. The only object that emitted any life was the radio, which continued to coo melancholy jazz. Beyond that, only the scrapings of silver and china in the kitchen. As I waited, my heartbeat quickened. Had we made a terrible mistake? How would we get Elaine to incriminate herself? After all, we were only operating on a hunch.

  Judy dashed back in and scooted beside me on the window seat seconds before Elaine emerged from the kitchen. On her tray, our hostess carried a chrome pitcher, a familiar display of shortbread cookies, and three large ceramic mugs. “Well,” she said, setting it on the small table between us, scored with a deep gouge from our skirmish with Halo. “Here we go.” She delivered a stream of warm milk into the mugs, smiling up at us after each pour. Her hair was in a tight bun, pulling at her temples. Falling short of her jawline, her orangish makeup lay like snow across the contours of her face. Rather than the expected chalky sweet smell of malt, the pungent odor of ammonia wafted up, making me wince. I now understood: When Halo smashed up the tea service, he wasn’t attacking me, he was thwarting her attempt to poison me. I glared at Judy, who glared back. She’d smelled it too. “Oh my God,” I thought, “what are we going to do?” I wanted to grab her hand and run.

  “Now then,” Elaine said, positioning herself across from us, “what should we chat about?”

  From the pocket of her coat, Judy fished out two objects. The first item was the damaged moon pin. “This one we asked you and your husband about,” she said. “We found it in Miss M’s apartment.” The second was its unscathed replica. “This one,” she said, holding it up, “I swiped from your jewelry box while you were in the kitchen.”

  I was baffled. That’s what she was doing upstairs?

  Conflicted emotions rippled across Elaine’s face: first irritation, then panic—and finally, cutting through it all, she beamed preposterously. What Judy had just shown her could’ve been a new dress pattern from McCall’s or a friend’s wedding announcement. “Now, girls,” she said, “I went through the trouble of making you a refreshment. Drink up. I insist.”

  “Why do you have a pin exactly like Miss M’s?” Judy asked.

  Elaine continued smiling. “Not exactly the same. She wore the waxing moon, and I wore the waning moon. Our father gave them to us.”

  My hunch was right: they were sisters!

  Judy turned the intact piece of jewelry over in her hand.

  “The direction of the pin on the back tells you how it should be worn, going from left to right,” I said, taking it from her. “Otherwise, it’d be impossible to notice the difference between them. They’re mirror images.” I held it over my left lapel. “This is the one Miss Martins wore.”

  “It’s the waxing moon,” Judy said. “The smashed pin is the waning moon.”

  It didn’t make sense. Why did we find Elaine’s pin in Miss Martins’s apartment?

  “When I shoved it in your husband’s face, you knew it was yours,” Judy said to her. “And when you went to the Daphne Arms to kill your sister, you rummaged through her jewelry box and took her pin to replace the one you lost, protecting you against any questions its absence might raise.”

  Elaine’s smile clicked off like a light. Her brow darkened. Then, she said, “You’re right, Judy. Is that what you want me to say? Should I also add that it was a memento?”

  I said to Judy, “How did you know?”

  Out of her pocket, Judy extracted a reddish-brown leather journal, placing it on the table as if it were a rare artifact. “I took this from Cleve’s backpack while your husband was plowing through teatime,” she said deliberately. “It’s your sister’s diary. She mentions the day your father gave you and your sister the pins. Christmas 1927.” To me, she said, “Miss M’s real name is Charlene Peters.” Her eyes lit up; she was enjoying herself. Looking back at Elaine, she said, “Your maiden name is Peters. You’re her younger sister by two years.”

  Once the initial shock faded, anger flooded in. Sure, I wanted to know how it all fit together, but first, I wanted to know why Judy had kept the diary from me. Why didn’t she tell me that Charlene and Miss Martins were the same person? That her mother was Miss Martins? I’d puzzled over the cryptic inscription in Love’s Last Move, and I’d babbled on about Ovid, when in her coat, she had the key to our teacher’s life. What other precious tidbits were buried in those pages? She had to know that Halo was her father. No need to share that news! My secret was obsolete, useless. Was she thumbing her nose at me? Making fun of me?

  Elaine pantomimed astonishment: “Cleveland had it under this roof?” But I didn’t buy it. She seemed to be playacting.

  “How did he get it?” I snapped.

  “He probably stole it from Miss M’s desk at school,” Judy replied and glanced at me, registering my anger. “But I don’t know.”

  “What he must’ve thought,” Elaine said, shaking her head in the pretense of concern. “Poor boy. He must’ve hated her as much as I did. He should’ve told me. It might have made a difference. I might have…” Like a mechanical toy, she seemed to wind down, becoming eerily still.

  Judy also remained motionless, but she was alert, eyes drifting over Elaine and the mugs of lethal milk. She was planning her next move, but what that was, I had no idea.

  The radio switched to another jazz tune, something harsher, rawer, marring the stillness. It triggered something in me, and I spoke: “Before Mr. Closs crashed through our tea, Mrs. Closs, you told me to be a good sister, that secrets between sisters spread like a disease.” Judy shifted uneasily beside me, perhaps the parallel had struck a chord. “You were talking about you and Miss Martins, weren’t you?”

  She blinked as if I’d just blown dust in her eyes. “Call me, Elaine. Please.”

  “You killed Cleve and framed Halo for that reason, didn’t you?” I said, leaning forward. “It’s like the myth, isn’t it? Cleve is Itys and Halo is Tereus, and you—who are you? Procne? Or Philomela?”

  Her tight-stretched veneer seemed to tear a little, then suddenly rip wide: “Well, you are smart girls!” She emitted a single bitter “Ha!” and attempted to force her face back in place, but her eyes grew hot and damp. “Oh, I’m not sure how to explain…” She touched the back of her hand to her quivering lips. “You see, my husband, like Tereus, he…” She struggled to find the words. The geranium gloss was now smudged along her upper lip. Briefly, I had the bizarre impulse to reach over and wipe it clean. “He forced himself… on me.” She sniffed and looked at me, her eyes watery green and shot through with an unnatural light. “You saw me that evening in my sister’s apartment, not my sister. You walked in on my husband attacking me”—her voice cracked—“and, and you did nothing. You just stood there, gawking in wonder.”

  I saw Halo on top of Miss Martins, his hat cocked back, his belt snaking, his hips thrusting ridiculously. As the vision surfaced, new details bubbled up: the sheen of sweat on his buttocks, his heavy, impassioned grunts, the funk of his body odor, the smell of lilac perfume. But that lovely hand—its palm cupping the light, its fingers beckoning to me—belonged to this hateful woman, who now wanted my sympathy, who might, in some way, deserve my sympathy. It was impossible to hold all of it in my head. I felt dizzy. I couldn’t tidy it up; I couldn’t fix it in place. A sharp pang of shame shot through me. Suddenly, I understood. I didn’t try to stop Halo because I didn’t want to stop him. I wanted Miss Martins to be reaching out, to be groping for me, to need me. I wanted her to be wounded by him, to hate him, and t
o turn to me. Under Elaine’s mad gaze, I could admit it.

  “Why would he do something like that?” Judy said, simmering. “Why… why rape you?”

  “To finish me off.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He came looking for Charlene, and he found me. I was there to confront my sister, to tell her to quit carrying on with my husband, to tell her to leave us alone. To leave you alone, Judy. But no one was home. I’d swiped Halo’s key, so I let myself in. I’d find out later that she was delayed at school, meeting with the principal about my son’s behavior. Of all things! So, I snooped. I sampled her perfume, I listened to music on her radio, and I tried on a dress or two. After so many years, I wanted to know who she was. The Charlene I grew up with wouldn’t hang a scarf over her lampshade like a whore. That must’ve been when I lost my pin. I don’t know who damaged it, perhaps my husband when he was—” As if sprinkled with fairy dust, she tittered. “Oh, I just realized something! I’m wearing one of her dresses now. I took it that night.” She turned a shoulder toward us and, modeling, touched her hand to her throat. “Lovely, isn’t it?”