The Savage Kind

by John Copenhaver

  I rushed to her, grabbing the edge of the door before she could get in: “Judy wasn’t Charlene’s child. She was Elaine’s.”

  “Yes, I know,” she said, trying to close the door.

  “And Halo wasn’t the father.”

  She sniffed. “I know that too.”

  She dropped into her seat. The chauffeur took the door, trying to squeeze me out, but I wedged myself between it and its frame. I’d come so far. “How do you know that?” I yelled. “Tell me!” The chauffeur’s arm swept around my waist and lifted me up and away from the car. I landed on my feet, but stumbled backward, falling hard on my rear end in the middle of the sidewalk. Pain shot through me, and the cold snow burned my bare palms.

  When I glanced up, I saw that, across from Moira, sat Judy, her face scrawled with concern. Why was she there? Moira slammed the door and said, “Goddammit,” realizing what I’d seen. She rolled down the window and leaned out, her poppy scarf rippling in the breeze like a flame. I detected a flicker of admiration in her eyes. Perhaps my persistence had paid off. “Get her on her feet,” she said to the chauffeur, who offered me his hand. As I took it, I gazed up into his face, which had been shaded by his hat. He wasn’t a chauffeur at all. He was one of the two goons who had followed Halo into the alley, the rangy one that Judy had called “the scarecrow.” “I was going to spare you,” Moira said, “but now, you’ll get what you asked for”—she sighed with contempt—“the truth.”

  * * *

  The snow was falling steadily by the time we arrived at our destination: the Closs mansion. A thin crust coated the surface of the drive, making the Caddy’s wheels spin on the steep incline before gripping the pavement. Dusk had receded, and light from the city burned at the edges of the trees. The Tudor home, with its three looming gables, chimney spitting smoke, and windows like lidless eyes, greeted us at the top like a monster patiently waiting for its dinner.

  During our trip across town, at Moira’s command, we remained silent. I sat beside the gaunt goon, whose unshakable focus on the road and refusal to acknowledge my presence made me increasingly uneasy. It didn’t help that I’d glimpsed the grip of his pistol in his shoulder holster as he raised his arm to turn the steering wheel. Judy was behind me, inches from Moira, so we couldn’t even exchange looks. What was Moira up to? Would she tell us the truth? Would she hurt us? My only consolation was that Bonnie knew who I was with, or, at least, could make a good guess.

  The car rolled to a stop behind a black sedan, and Moira ordered us out. We crunched through the snow and into the entry hall, its dark paneling and coffered ceiling now veiled in shadows. It was quiet, save our footfalls and the ticking of a far-off clock. Glossy in the low light, the portrait of Queen Elizabeth seemed to arch her eyes at us: “You again? Fools.”

  “This way,” Moira said, after yanking off her gloves and tossing her mink on a fussy accent chair. She strode past us, and we slid out of our coats and followed her.

  Once again, we entered her oak-lined study, which gleamed eerily with firelight. Above the fireplace glowered the owl-eyed patriarch. Everywhere in this house, something was staring back at you. I shivered, almost expecting a secret panel to slide open to expose a Greek chorus on the other side: “The two girls, with fear and trepidation in their hearts, followed the cruel queen into her throne room, only to discover, they were not alone.”

  Indeed, we weren’t alone.

  “Here they are, Judy Peabody and Philippa Watson,” Moira tossed out, cutting across the room to warm herself by the fire. “Hello there,” a man said, rising from his chair. The fire lit up his face, making his black eyes shine and giving his blocky face the monolithic cast of an Easter Island statue. He was wide-shouldered, a little fat, and wore a dark, well-tailored three-piece suit, wine red tie and matching pocket handkerchief, and stank of cigarettes. My brain spun, trying to fit it all together. Who was he and why was Moira introducing us? Another spook perhaps? He had that aloof air, and his eyes parsed but revealed nothing. “I’m John,” he said, offering his hand. His voice was warm, but it didn’t match his crooked smile, which he put on like a hat. I shook his hand, but Judy remained still and said, “John what?” I sensed that she understood our situation better than I did, or perhaps she knew the danger we were in. He looked at her, his smile freezing, then vanishing. “You’ve met Agent Lott, I see,” Three-piece John said, nodding to the rangy man, who now stood by the door, his trilby in hand. So, they were FBI agents—or government agents of some sort. Clearly, Three-piece was connected to the scarecrow and the other agent who had confronted Elaine and Halo. But how was he connected to Moira or Miss Martins or Cleve?

  “So,” Three-piece went on, “I hear you’re fledgling detectives, seekers of justice in training. Or so Moira tells me.”

  Neither of us responded. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted yet another man. His legs were jutting out of a shadowy nook off to the side of the paneled fireplace. Although I couldn’t see his face, I could feel his eyes on us. The Greek chorus was chanting, “Beware, beware! Philippa, beware!”

  “Girls,” Moira said, turning to us, “have you forgotten how to make pleasant conversation?”

  “Pleasant conversation?” Judy growled and stepped forward. I glimpsed her face. Perhaps it was the glow from the firelight, but she seemed—I don’t know—sober, like she understood the score. A Calvin McKey look. How could she be so self-assured? Wasn’t she afraid?

  “Do you girls want to be FBI agents?” Three-piece said, flipping his smile on again. “It’s not unheard of. Most women don’t like that sort of work. They usually end up in the secretarial pool.”

  Ignoring him, Judy pointed to the man peering out from the nook and, in a low hostile tone, said, “Why is he here?” She’d been able to make him out, I guessed. A smoldering log popped and hissed.

  “The question you should be asking,” Moira said, “is why you are here.”

  Judy stuck out her jaw. “You want to frighten us.”

  “Yes, we do,” Moira smirked. “It’s for your own good.”

  “You’ve upset a lot of people,” Three-piece said, doing a poor imitation of a father figure. “Put this tragedy behind you. Leave Moira alone. Go play detective somewhere else.”

  “We’re not playing detective,” I said, my hackles up.

  “No, I guess you’re not.” He chuckled. “I like your spirit.”

  “You still haven’t answered me,” Judy said, seething.

  Three-piece’s face fell, almost as if she’d disappointed him. “Sit down,” he said, nodding at the leather couch. Neither of us moved. “Sit,” he commanded. “Now.” I glanced over at the mystery man, hoping for a better look. A ribbon of light fell across his face igniting one intense blue eye, but still, I was at a loss. Who was he? And why was his presence unsettling Judy? We made our way to the couch. On the low coffee table in front of us lay a manila folder. “Go ahead,” Three-piece said, waving his hand at the folder. “Take a look, Philippa.” Moira stood by him, crossing her arms. Judy seemed more drawn to the lurker in the corner than the folder’s contents. “It’s a family album,” he said. I flipped it open, and inside were a series of photos of Judy and Iris Baker strolling on the street. It was nighttime, but their faces were clear in the glow from a lighted window display. It looked like Iris was studying the scars on Judy’s arms. “It’s Judy and Iris,” I said, baffled. “They’re friends. We’re friends. Is this a joke?”

  “No joke,” Moira said with a trace of pleasure. “Is it, Judy?”

  I looked at Judy, whose attention was now fixed on the photos. Her face was slack with surprise—or wonder. She reached out and touched the edge of one of them.

  “I don’t get it,” I said. “What do you mean this is a family album?”

  “After you pelted accusations at Halo,” Moira said to Judy, “I asked John to have one of his associates follow you. After all, he has a stake in the game. Mr. Lott spotted you with Iris Baker, took these photos. Iris, you see,
is the daughter of Ellis and Alice Reynolds Baker. Alice Reynolds worked for Crestwood Children’s Orphanage for many years, and she kept a good eye on you, which considering the circumstances, was a remarkably Christian thing to do.”

  I couldn’t quite grasp what I was hearing. What does Iris have to do with this? And what “game” did Three-piece John have a stake in? Judy’s eyes were activated, as if she, like me, was attempting to thread all of this together. I turned to Moira and her well-dressed FBI pal, trying to read their smug expressions. “I don’t understand this,” I said, exasperated.

  “Of course, you don’t,” Moira said, almost sympathetically. “The only reason Charlene Peters—your beloved Miss Martins—took the child, Judy here, from my daughter-in-law was because she wanted to use her to blackmail my son.”

  Miss Martins would’ve never blackmailed anyone. I knew that.

  Moira registered my doubt. “That’s when I realized you hadn’t read her diary. She would’ve mentioned it.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I don’t, that’s true. But the first time I set eyes on that child I knew something was wrong. Her complexion, her black eyes, her hair. No, she wasn’t Halo’s and Elaine’s. Leo Paulson, an old fling of mine, had just made detective. Guess what he discovered…”

  I shook my head.

  “Elaine had been stepping out on my son and cavorting with Negros at some dive bar called Club Caverns. Apparently, she’s a jazz enthusiast!” She flapped her hand in front of her like it was all just too much. “She met a man at the bar and had an affair. His name was Ellis Baker, a philanderer with a wife and daughter of his own, Alice and Iris.”

  Still stunned, I glanced at Judy, who didn’t seem shocked by this news. “So,” I said, “Iris is… is Judy’s half-sister?”

  “Hence the family album, dear.” A smirk lurked on Moira’s face.

  “And Judy is—”

  “A half-breed.”

  Judy shot up from her seat, bright with fury, but said nothing.

  Moira lifted her chin. “You said you wanted the truth.”

  Was this what Judy had been keeping from me? Was it the “everything” that Elaine had mentioned? Had Judy discovered the truth in Charlene’s diary? But why hide it from me? Either she was ashamed of it—which was possible but unlikely—or she thought I would reject her, which is what Moira was counting on.

  I expected Judy to say something, but she just stood there, glaring. Her anger was visible, but distant, like flames behind glass. Moira regarded her and said, “Please, there’s no need to make a scene.” Judy blinked and lowered herself to the couch. Fumbling a bit, I attempted to defend Charlene. “She wouldn’t have used Judy to, to blackmail you. That’s not who she was. We knew her.”

  “Well, it happened.” Moira shrugged. “When I discovered the child wasn’t hers, I didn’t waste time in setting the baby on a new course in life. Elaine and Halo were re-engaged by that point, and I didn’t want a scandal. I never told Halo the truth, but Elaine blurted it out a few months ago. At first, he believed her, but I convinced him she was lying, that she was trying to punish him, that he shouldn’t listen to the ravings of a madwoman.”

  He’d believed her all right. It was the tipping point, why he snapped and attacked her. But he didn’t at the end, or he wouldn’t have pursued us—or maybe that’s why he followed us. He was trying to decide who he believed.

  “Anyway,” Moira continued, sitting in the wingback chair across from Three-piece and crossing her legs, taking time to smooth her fine wool dress over her knee. “Ellis begged me to give the child to him, but I explained that she could pass. ‘Wouldn’t you want a life for her as a white woman instead of a Negro like yourself?’ I asked him. He moaned and called me names, but he came around. His wife—the better part of that couple if you ask me—went to work at Crestwood to be close to her. I can’t imagine why she’d want to watch over another woman’s child, but there she was—your very own fairy godmother. Well, until she got a little too close for comfort, and we had her fired for stealing.”

  “What about Elaine?” I said, glancing at Judy, who sat straight-backed and still, head tilted forward a fraction. I didn’t read shock or even anger on her face. Her eyes were roving, directed inward. “Didn’t she care about the baby?”

  “Elaine was as horrified by her indiscretion with Ellis Baker as I was,” Moira went on. “Besides, if she had tried to find the child, I would have made her life miserable.” Her upper lip twitched, and her eyes fell to her lap. “What I didn’t count on was Charlene popping up again with a new name, and a desire to rekindle the flame with my son. I didn’t count on Halo being a fool, either. I underestimated how insane Elaine was—is.” She paused, distracted, perhaps by a flash of regret. “I imagine most of the story—and perhaps more—is in the diary.” She looked at me directly. “That’s why we’re all here, to make sure we’re crystal clear with each other.”

  Judy shifted her attention to Three-piece: “Why are you here?” He adjusted the lapel on his suit and glanced at Moira, but before he could speak, she added, “Because of him?” She nodded toward the shadow beside the fireplace. There it was: the single eye twitching in a beam of light, which now I realized was a reflection from the brass fireplace tools. The mystery man leaned forward and slowly rose to his feet. At first, I didn’t realize who he was. The room was dim, and I’d only seen him in grainy newspaper photos. As he approached, I saw that Adrian Bogdan was quite handsome, in a swarthy way. But ruining the illusion, his body odor—the stink of beer and sweat—wafted over me. He smiled, revealing a set of rotten teeth. “Da,” he said, “because of me.”

  Moira flinched almost imperceptibly. She was frightened of him. “Adrian,” she said as if she was admonishing him—and perhaps warning us. How was he connected to her? Was there a final thread we’d failed to pick up? He had to be furious with her, right? She and Halo had tried to pin Cleve’s murder on him—writing AHKA on Cleve’s body and then the stupid yearbook trick. What was the equalizer between them? The FBI? “Meet Judy Peabody and her friend Philippa Watson,” she said to Bogdan, glancing at Three-piece, as if to implore him to step in. Bogdan squinted at me, disinterested, then gazed down at Judy as she sat there frozen, his irises preternaturally blue. He was only a couple of feet from her. With an eerie calm, he reached out and took her by her chin, his large fingers gripping the slope of her jaw, his grimy cuticles black crescent moons. “You don’t look much like a nigger,” he said. The word stabbed through the room, as ugly and corrupt as his teeth. Judy tried to pull away from him, but he wouldn’t release her. “The joke is on the Peabodys—and Jackie was such a sweet little thing. White as snow.”

  Adrian Bogdan had killed Jackie. I had no doubt.

  “That’s enough, Bogdan,” Three-piece said. “They get the idea. Don’t you, girls?”

  Judy yanked her chin away, and Bogdan reached for her again.

  “Don’t!” Moira barked, standing.

  Behind us, the hammer of a gun clicked.

  JUDY, DECEMBER 5, 1948

  I leaned my head against the cab window and, through snowflakes, watched DC roll by—the National Gallery, the Capitol, the Senate. The light of the day was dying, and it was only 4:00 P.M. Edith had roped me into going downtown for another lunch date, followed by a trip to the passport agency. She’s still determined to drag me through the Caribbean before they send me to Agnes March. The whole thing has a last meal air to it.

  I lifted my head off the chilled glass. I studied her profile, her wave of auburn hair, her strong nose, the olive undertone of her skin. I see why Moira thought we were a good visual fit for one another. Stamped with the Peabody name, I’d be beyond scrutiny to casual observers unaware of the adoption. Of course, close friends and family would know, but the broader social circle wouldn’t question it: “Oh, her complexion is so dark,” they would say. “It must be the Georgiou coming out in her. That Mediterranean blood.” Not wanting to linger on the unpleas
ant, they would forget, like Edith wanted them to, that Jackie had ever died. The names Judy and Jackie would blend into each other, becoming interchangeable. Moira probably thought she was doing me a favor. No wonder she resented my prying. It didn’t matter. Charlene wrote it all down in her journal.

  As a girl, I had stood in front of a mirror a thousand times, studying myself and fantasizing about my birth parents, but it had never occurred to me that I was mixed race. Not once. But there it was, in Charlene’s fine hand: I’m the result of a fling, Elaine’s and some Negro musician’s error in judgment. Charlene never mentioned my father’s name. Perhaps she didn’t know it. Perhaps she thought that some things shouldn’t be written down. Or perhaps she was too horrified by it. No, if she were, she wouldn’t have sought me out, right? Why did she find me? A sense of responsibility? Guilt? I wish I could talk to her about it. I wish I could talk to the Miss M version of her. Maybe my teacher would offer words of wisdom. Hell, who am I kidding? What did she know about it? It’s not like she would’ve learned about it reading Romantic poetry.

  What I do know is that I have no direction. Just information. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not embarrassed. That’s why it’s a secret, why Elaine, Halo, and Moira feared it, and maybe that’s how I’m supposed to feel, but I don’t. I do feel foolish. Foolish because the universe had been dropping hints, and I was too blind to see them. I’ve always believed Jim Crow was bullshit. It doesn’t square with our country’s war against fascism—or “the communist threat.” How can we fight for freedom but deny it to each other? The logic is flawed. I’ve always known these things deep down. That’s why Iris and I are friends.

  The problem is that I’m the same person I was days ago, but I’ve ceased feeling like me. It’s an invisible transformation. It’s about me trying to change my idea of myself to myself. I look the same in the mirror, but I’m not white anymore, or not just white. And the Negro part of me… What does that even mean? It’s a sea of question marks. And tell me, how do I translate that for other people? It’s not like losing weight or getting your hair dyed or taking a new name. You’re new to yourself, but not to anyone else—well, until you say something. And I do want to say something. I want Philippa to know. But I have no doubt: it will level her. She may eventually understand, but it’s too risky. If she rejects me, I don’t know what I’ll do. Shatter into pieces?