Mrs. Kaplan and the Matzoh Ball of Death

by Mark Reutlinger

  “No, I guess I hadn’t. Sorry,” Sara said.

  Florence did not seem too upset about it. “Not to worry. Once I’d extricated myself from the rose thorns while stifling a scream of pain from several scratches, I kept in the shadows and made my way toward the back of the building.”

  “Was it dark back there?” I asked.

  “Actually, it was darker than I thought it would be, which is good. Those floodlights on the ends of the buildings are activated by motion, but the sensors don’t have a very wide range, and I found that if I stayed very close to the building, they didn’t go on.”

  “That was fortunate,” Mrs. K said. “What would you have done if they had turned on?”

  “Oh, there are ways to shut them off, but they take time and I was lucky I didn’t have to bother.”

  “So how did you find your way in the dark?” Mrs. K asked. “Did you have with you a flashlight?”

  “Exactly. Plus, the moon was pretty bright that night, which helped. I slowly made my way along the dark windows and counted to find the first one I was supposed to enter. After counting twice to be certain I had the right window, I found that it was shut and locked.”

  “Oh, dear.” I think Mrs. K and I said this at the same time.

  “Oh, dear is right. Anyway, after cursing and wondering what the room’s occupant had against fresh air, I set to work on the window. It should have taken me only a minute or so to open it and defeat the limiting whatsis, because they use an old-style lock that just requires the right kind of tool. Which I had. And which took this occasion to break in three places at once. Careless of me not to have a spare, but there it was. Opening the window without the special tool took an extra fifteen or twenty minutes, which kind of put me behind schedule, so that once I got in I was in a hurry.”

  “But you found the earring, yes?” Mrs. K asked, even though Florence had already said she had earlier.

  “Oh, yes. It took longer than I’d expected to search the room and locate the earring, but it turned out that was actually the easy part. Just as I was preparing to put everything back in order and get the heck out of there, I heard the residents returning from the recital, coming down the hallway toward the room I was in. At any moment, that room’s resident might open the door and walk in on me.

  “What can you say to a person who enters their room, which was totally unpopulated when they left it, and finds you looking back at them?”

  “What indeed,” Mrs. K said.

  “Obviously, I had few options. Violence was out, of course. I assumed I wouldn’t be able to convince even a doddering octogenarian that I somehow belonged there. (Spontaneous late-night telephone repairs?) I supposed I could’ve yelled ‘Boo!’ and made a break for it. If I was lucky, and they didn’t die of a heart attack, the startled person would chalk it up to a hallucination brought on by advancing senility.”

  I think Florence suddenly realized whom she was talking to, because she stopped with a look like she was embarrassed.

  “Umm, sorry about that,” she said. “I didn’t mean to imply that everyone there is senile or anything. I was just…you know, making a point.” She looked at Sara for help, but Sara had started laughing and was no help at all.

  Mrs. K came to her rescue instead. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Some of us are, and the rest of us don’t mind you saying so. But we get your point. Please already get to how that happened”—indicating the cast on Florence’s foot.

  “Sorry. I’m almost there. I wanted to avoid a confrontation, so I was backing up rapidly toward the window when I accidentally tripped over a small table and fell. I didn’t make a lot of noise falling, but I also knocked what turned out to be a small metal jewelry box onto the floor. It made a hell of a racket for something so small.”

  “That must have been the noise we heard when walking down the hallway,” I said, and Mrs. K nodded in agreement.

  “So you were passing by when I made that noise? Geez, that was lucky. Anyway, I held my breath as I heard voices raised just outside the door and I assumed someone must have heard the crash. But when no one opened the door, I started to get up but found I’d hurt my ankle rather badly. All I could do was hop on the other foot over to the window and crawl out. Once on the grass, I promptly sat down and assessed the damage.”

  “I can imagine it was very painful,” Mrs. K said in a sympathetic tone. She seemed to have forgotten for the moment that it also meant Florence’s burglaring was kaput for the night, if not longer.

  “I didn’t sit there long, because time was running out, and I knew it would take me a while to hobble back to the fence. And then I still had to make it back over the fence and to my car.”

  “Oy gevalt!” said Mrs. K. “How did you do all this with a bad ankle?”

  “I didn’t. Not by myself. Oh, I somehow made it back to the fence. But there was no way I was going to get over the fence and then drive home without help.”

  “So what did you do?” I asked. “Who was there to help you?”

  But as soon as I asked the question, I was sure I knew the answer. We all looked over at Sara, who had not spoken up through this whole megillah, and she sort of raised her hand.

  “Sara to the rescue once again,” she said, a little sheepishly.

  Florence jumped back in. “Yeah, I have Sara on speed dial. Under H for ‘Help’!”

  There was silence for a minute as we all digested what Florence had said. Then Mrs. K got back to the important point. “So where does this leave us with our investigation? I take it you are temporarily out of the burglar business?”

  “I’m afraid so. I made the ankle much worse by hobbling on it, and then getting over the fence, even with Sara’s help, really did it in. Even without the accident, I’d run out of time. It was really my fault, all that wasted time, and I would’ve considered finishing the job another day, but now…” She kind of shrugged her shoulders in a helpless manner.

  Mrs. K looked at me and said, “Well, Ida, I suppose I will have to make do without the information from the second room. It does make a small hole in my theory, but there is nothing we can do.”

  I nodded and took her hand, giving it a sympathetic squeeze. Nothing we could do.

  “Unless…”

  This was Florence speaking up again. We all looked at her, puzzled.

  “Yes? Unless what?” said Mrs. K. She did not sound hopeful.

  “Unless you’d like to give it a try yourselves.”

  29

  There was a long pause, while we all tried to make sense of what Florence had said.

  It was Mrs. K who spoke up first. “I beg your pardon, but at my age my hearing is not as good as it used to be. I thought you said we should burgle the second room ourselves. Ida and me.”

  “Yes, that’s what I said.”

  “And what kind of a meshuggeneh idea is that? Two old ladies should be climbing over fences and crawling through windows and…and—” I thought Mrs. K was going to plotz for sure. Even Sara seemed shocked at the thought, shocked or amused, because she covered her mouth with her hand and stared at Florence.

  Florence did not seem upset by this reaction. In fact, she must have expected it, because she smiled and gestured for everyone to calm down and let her explain.

  “I know it sounds crazy,” she said, “and no one is going to force anyone to do it, of course, but let me tell you what I mean.”

  After a minute we all settled back in our seats to hear what possibly this lady burglar could have in mind.

  “Here’s my thought. As I understand it, the second room is presently unoccupied, is that right?”

  Mrs. K nodded. “Yes, it was Bertha’s room.”

  “Good. That takes away one of the trickiest aspects of breaking in. And since you’re already living in the Home, no one will have to climb over any fences.”

  Well, this at least was a relief. A small one.

  “Now, opening these old-style awning windows isn’t really that difficult. I could t
each you to do it in less than a half hour.”

  “But it took you that long to open the one last night,” Mrs. K pointed out.

  “Yes, but that was only because my special tool broke. It’s one I fashioned myself and had used often, and it just wore out, I guess. I can easily make another one. It’s highly unlikely a second one would break, especially when it’s new.”

  Mrs. K nodded, but said nothing, so Florence continued. “As I mentioned, if you stay close to the building, the floodlights don’t go on. So you won’t have to worry about being seen. And I can give you flashlights to find your way.”

  “But that only gets us to the window,” Mrs. K said, “and maybe if you are correct it is easy to open the window. What then?”

  Florence stopped smiling, because clearly this was the more difficult question to answer. Her brow was furrowed; you know, like she was picturing this in her head. I know I was, and it did not look at all pretty.

  “Yes,” Florence said, “that’s where it does get tricky. If you think you or Ida could climb into a window—and out again, of course—then you should consider giving it a try. I’ll be honest—when I realized I wouldn’t be able to finish this job for you, I was really disappointed. I felt that I was letting you down. Then it occurred to me that maybe, if I gave you some pointers and whatever tools you needed, just maybe you could do it yourself. But when, in my mind, I came to this part of the process, getting in and out of the window, well, I just wasn’t sure. It depends on how, uh, how…”

  “How bendy we are?” put in Mrs. K. “How heavy? How wide? We are not spring chickens, you know. But then we are not alter kockers either. How far did you say these windows would open?”

  I almost plotzed myself when I heard this. I had assumed Mrs. K was just letting Florence explain her fershlugginer idea out of courtesy. I could not believe she was actually considering it seriously. I knew she was anxious to prove her innocence, but I also remembered how she resisted even the idea of hiring a burglar.

  Now to consider being one herself—and me also—oy vey iz mir!

  —

  “Rose, are you completely meshugge?” I said. “We should become burglars? And at our age?” I am afraid I did not sound very calm. Sometimes Mrs. K can be so exasperating.

  Mrs. K took my hand and said, “Now, now, Ida. I did not say anything of the kind. I am just letting Florence here explain her idea. We should always be willing to listen.”

  “Listen, schmissen—you have never been willing to consider even the slightest indiscretion, much less one that could land you—and me—in jail.” I hoped she would come to her senses before we both ended up ahf tsuris—in big trouble!

  Mrs. K smiled and said, “First of all, I should remind you that it was you, not me, who first suggested we hire this nice lady to get our information by breaking into several rooms.”

  I had to admit this was true. We would not be sitting here discussing learning to be ganovim were it not for me. Me and my bright ideas!

  “But, Rose,” I protested, becoming maybe a bit frustrated, “I did not mean that I wanted us to do such a thing ourselves. It was Sara who had a best friend who was a burglar, not me!” Until now, at least.

  Mrs. K continued, “Further, although it is no doubt against some law to enter someone else’s room without being invited…”

  “And through the back window,” I added.

  “Yes, and through the back window, I doubt it is technically burglary that we would be doing, since we would not be taking anything. Or breaking anything, I hope.” This she said smiling at Florence, who smiled back—a bit ruefully, perhaps. “We would just be looking.”

  True, looking is not taking, although I was not so sure the police would see it that way.

  “But even if it is a burglary, I was also remembering that on more than one occasion, Mr. Sherlock Holmes himself, who as you know I hold in very high esteem, found it necessary to break into places to which he was not invited. Always in a good cause, of course, and not to steal anything. And…” (here she looked directly at me) “if I remember correctly, at least once or twice Dr. Watson accompanied him.”

  “No doubt under protest,” I responded.

  As I have said, Mrs. K is a big admirer of Mr. Sherlock Holmes, having read all of the books about him, many more than once, and she has a wonderful memory. So if she says Mr. Holmes was sometimes a burglar, I have to believe it. And to tell the truth, while I do not say that Mrs. K is as brilliant a detective as Mr. Holmes, I have seen how her mind works in the same way, and it would be a close thing between them. As for me, I am content to be Mrs. K’s helper and to be telling you this story.

  Mrs. K now turned back to Florence and Sara and said, “So, Florence, you should please explain better what you have in mind. I’m sure you are now aware of our…our limitations.”

  Florence laughed. “Yes, certainly. To tell the truth, I hadn’t completely thought it through; generally, I thought I could give you a short lesson in how to open one of those windows, assuming it was locked. I noticed many were open last night, and if so everything becomes much easier. Then you and Ida might take a short stroll on the back lawn tomorrow, just to look at the layout and decide whether it seemed doable. If you felt comfortable about it, then as soon as there was a time when most of the residents would be out of their rooms—maybe another recital or something—you could…could do the thing.” I guess she was reluctant to say “could commit the crime.” But we knew what she meant.

  Mrs. K shook her head. “No, there is no recital that I know of, and we cannot wait for one. It will have to be done very soon if at all, because the policemen are supposed to come back…it is by Friday, I think. But I believe there is a movie being shown in the lounge tomorrow evening, is there not, Ida?”

  I nodded my head. “Thursday is usually movie night at the Home,” I explained to Florence and Sara, “and most of the residents attend. There is a big screen they set up and it is a lot like going to the theater. There is even popcorn.” I realized I was adding much more detail than was necessary. It was from being nervous, I think.

  “So,” Mrs. K continued, “it is tomorrow night or not at all.” Then turning to me, she said, “What do you say, Ida? Shall we become burglars for a day?”

  How could I refuse?

  —

  We all moved to a table in Sara’s kitchen, and Sara brought out a pad of yellow paper for Mrs. K and one for Florence and two pencils. She also refilled our teacups.

  “Okay, here’s what the window looks like,” Florence said, drawing a picture on her pad. And she proceeded to explain about the lock and the gadget that keeps the window from opening too far. Mrs. K and I watched and listened and asked a few questions until we both thought we understood.

  Florence then gave us some ideas about what we should be carrying with us and what we should wear.

  “I’ll prepare one of these dandy little tools that’ll help you open the window,” she said, “and Sara will drop it off in the morning. As for clothing, you’ll recall what I said I was wearing…”

  “If you are suggesting we should put on one of those black jumping suits or whatever it is called and paint our faces black, like I see in the movies, it is not going to happen,” Mrs. K told Florence.

  Florence laughed at this and said, “No, I’m only suggesting you wear something dark, and pants would be much better than a dress or skirt.”

  Mrs. K shook her head. “I do not think either Ida or I own a pair of pants. It is not what would be considered dignified at our age, and especially with our…our dimensions. And there will not be time to buy any. So we will have to do our best with wearing something dark.”

  “Okay, but no flowers or polka dots,” Florence said kindly, and Mrs. K agreed.

  “You can also borrow a lightweight stepstool I sometimes use. One of you can carry it, to make it easier for the other to get in the window. Sara can bring that over too.”

  We nodded.

  “Once you’re
inside and have seen what you came to see, just climb back out and close the window. Don’t worry about locking it again, which you probably couldn’t do anyway, even with my special tool. No one will notice, and if they do, since nothing will be missing, they’ll just think they left it unlocked. And that’s all there is to it.”

  All there is to it? Maybe it is no big deal for her, but it sounded like a pretty big deal to me. I looked over at Mrs. K, but she was looking closely at Florence’s drawing and did not seem to be disturbed by what we were planning. In fact, she seemed quite invigorated, as if this was going to be some kind of game that she is looking forward to playing.

  If it was going to be a game, I thought, I hoped it was more like matzoh balls than like bridge: I hoped this time she was definitely playing to win!

  —

  When we returned to the Home, Sara dropping us off with her big blue car, and after Mrs. K and I had had a cup of tea, we went out to the back lawn and strolled up and down, trying to look casual and looking at the windows, how many of them were open, whether they were our size.

  “Ida,” Mrs. K said as we re-entered the building, “I think we can do this. Are you willing to give it a try?”

  I was not going to leave her to do it by herself, was I? I just hoped we could get kosher food in jail.

  30

  Thursday morning. We had to wait until after dinner, when the movie would be shown, to make our break-in, meaning we had a whole day ahead to be nervous. So it was just as well that we found something to completely take our minds off of burglary.

  In all the excitement over Bertha’s earring, I had completely forgotten to ask Mrs. K whether Benjamin found out anything interesting about the nogoodnik Eddie Christensen. So I asked her as we were sitting in the lounge waiting for lunch to be served.

  “I know you said you are not supposed to reveal what Taubman told you…”

  “I’m sorry, Ida,” she said, “I meant to tell you. I spoke with Taubman and explained that it was very important, for Doreen’s benefit, that I be able to talk about Eddie’s…situation. He said he understood and that I should just use my discretion.”