[Mark Twain Mysteries 02] - A Connecticut Yankee in Criminal Court

by Peter J. Heck

  Holt put his hands behind his back and looked toward the ceiling, like a schoolboy reciting a lesson. “I thought about that, once I realized your man couldn’t have done it. What I suspect is that the cook’s friends did the second murder, to make people think he couldn’t have done the first one. It makes sense, because the niggers all stick together. That’s why we white men have to look out for our own interests. I know you’ve argued the other way, Mr. Clemens—I’ve read some of your books—but these modern niggers don’t want to stay in their place the way they did in the old days. There are people in this city who mean to remind them of their place, and maybe this cook will be one of the first examples.”

  As Holt spoke, I began to sense a change in his personality. His day-to-day temperament was, from what I had seen, somewhat truculent but not really unpleasant. Now, as his passions became engaged in his subject, he began to take on the mien of a fanatic. There was an uncomfortable electricity in the air, as much from Mr. Clemens as from him. I could see Mr. Clemens struggling to keep his temper under control. I did not envy him the task; Holt’s bigoted tirade was enough to make me want to ask him to step outside.

  Somehow, Mr. Clemens managed to keep his reply calm and measured. “I can’t buy that, Mr. Holt,” he said, raising his voice only a little. “Like it or not, old Abe Lincoln made those black men free citizens, the same as you and me. And whatever the differences between the races, I can’t see how the color of someone’s skin has much to do with what’s inside their heart. But even if I’m wrong about that, we can’t go back to those old slavery days, however much you wish we could. We damn near destroyed this country thirty years ago; nobody sane wants to see that happen again. Or do you want to see another generation of southern boys go through what you did?”

  Holt stiffened, and I saw him tighten his grip on his cane. I tensed myself, ready to protect Mr. Clemens, but then Holt sighed and slumped his shoulders. “Well, I won’t try to teach a blind man to see colors,” he said. “Maybe you were brought up southern, Clemens, but I reckon you’ve forgotten what it meant. I’ve said what I came to say, which is that I don’t hold your man responsible for the poison, whatever else he may have done. And I see no point in prolonging the discussion. Good day, sir.” He made a stiff bow, turned on his heel, and went out, again barely acknowledging my presence as he passed me.

  I heard him limping down the stairs as I closed the door, then turned to Mr. Clemens. “Did you ever see the like of that?” I said. “What in the world are we supposed to make of that performance?”

  Mr. Clemens was standing, staring at the door through which Holt had left. I could see that he was still struggling to suppress his temper. Finally, he shook his head, a disgusted expression on his face, and said, “I’m sorry to say I’ve seen the likes of that far too many times, Wentworth. There are too many people, North and South, still trying to refight that damned war. You’d think a man his age would have settled his accounts with the past. But the older some people get, the harder their heads become. Present company excepted, of course.” He gritted his teeth, then took a deep breath and pointed toward the door to my room. “We’re forgetting our other guest. Go get Arthur, and we’ll find out what he has to say about Mr. Holt’s performance.”

  I would not have been surprised to find the butler in an angry mood, after Holt’s venomous characterization of the Negro race, which he could hardly have avoided overhearing. Instead, Arthur was practically in tears as I led him back into Mr. Clemens’s room. He kept shaking his head and saying, “I should have known, I should have known.”

  Mr. Clemens took one look at him and said, “Sometimes we all close our eyes to things we don’t want to be true. That doesn’t make them any less true or any less hurtful.”

  Arthur gave a wry smile, then shook himself, and I saw his back grow straight again. The sadness and disillusionment were still in his eyes, but I saw a trace of anger there, as well. He said, “I worked in Mr. Robinson’s house for twenty-two years, and I thought I was set for life. I looked after his household better than I did my own. Maybe I ought to have provided better for myself.” He sat back down at the table, a picture of dejection.

  “When I went to work for Mr. Robinson, I thought that all I had to do was work hard and do my level best, and I’d get my just rewards, whatever my color. I’ve always taken my position very seriously, Mr. Clemens, and there wasn’t anyone who found fault with me. Nobody ever called Arthur Phillips lazy, or stupid, or disrespectful, no sir! Mr. Robinson knew I could take care of his entire household, and he was always more than generous at Christmastime. And Mr. Holt always acted the same way toward me.” Here he stopped, clearly embarrassed by his former naïveté. I felt very sorry for the fellow, but did not know how to soften the blow to his pride.

  Again, I saw the anger in his eyes. “I never thought I’d hear that crazy Klan talk from Mr. Holt. I thought he could see what an honest, hardworking man I was, a good butler, a man they all could trust with their most important business. Why, he’s known me since he was a boy! And all this time they were just seeing a ‘black-faced devil.’ ” He put his face in his hands. “What a fool I’ve been; what a fool.”

  Mr. Clemens rose from his chair and put a hand on Arthur’s shoulder; at this unexpected gesture of intimacy, the butler looked up with a surprised expression. “I know how you feel, Arthur. I’ve seen my own plans turn to ashes, just when I thought nothing could touch me. It’s never easy to learn you’ve been wrong about someone you trusted. All you can do is go ahead and do your best to make things right again.”

  “I guess you’re right, Mr. Clemens,” said the butler. “And I guess I ought to start by helping Leonard Galloway, if I can. Give me a moment to think, and I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  “Maybe a drink would settle you down,” said Mr. Clemens. “I could sure use one.” He pointed toward the whisky and soda bottles. I took his hint and went to the sideboard to pour drinks.

  “Thank you, sir, but I’ll have to decline the kindly offer,” said the butler, holding up his hand. “I can’t hold Leonard to a rule I won’t follow myself, and I do have to go back to work for Mrs. Robinson this afternoon. For all I know, Mr. Holt could be coming by for dinner this evening. It’s not going to be easy to look him in the eye after hearing him spout that Klan talk. I don’t know what I might do if I start drinking liquor.”

  “Perhaps another time, then,” said Mr. Clemens, returning to the easy chair. “Go ahead and make me one, Wentworth. Listening’s as thirsty a job as talking.” I nodded my assent and began fixing a drink to his usual specifications.

  “I was about to tell you where Mr. Robinson had gone that last day,” said the butler, “but I wasn’t going to tell you why. Now it’s time to tell you both. When Mr. Dupree came by, just before noon, I overheard some of their conversation. I had just brought Mr. Robinson’s mail to him, and I heard Dupree tell him he had to get to Anderson’s right away, and be sure to bring enough money. Now, ordinarily I might not have thought much of it, but when Mr. Robinson turned around and looked, he was white as a sheet. I didn’t hear any of the rest of what they said, but Mr. Robinson went out right after that.”

  “I think we just struck pay dirt,” said Mr. Clemens. He was sitting up straight in his chair. I took him his drink and he nodded appreciatively, but put it on the side table without taking a sip, as he continued talking. “I’ll lay you ten to one it’s blackmail, Wentworth. A mistress in town, probably, and somebody who figured he could make money by threatening to expose it. Especially since Robinson was going to run as a reform candidate. A scandal would hurt him with precisely the people most likely to support him.”

  “Maybe not just money, but influence,” I suggested. “Someone like Anderson might have been using the threat of exposure to put pressure on Robinson and force him to adopt policies he and his cronies wanted.”

  “Yes, Anderson—that’s the very name that popped into my mind,” said Mr. Clemens, shaking his f
ist. “I didn’t trust that rascal from the minute I set foot in his saloon.”

  “He’s a rascal for sure,” I agreed. “But Mr. LeJeune knows Anderson longer and better than either of us, and he doesn’t think he’s capable of murder.”

  “Capable or not, he’s smack-dab in the middle of it,” said Mr. Clemens. He got up from his chair, strode over to the window, looked out at the sky, and then turned around abruptly. “Are you sure it was Anderson’s he went to?”

  “That’s what I heard him say,” said the butler, nodding. “Of course, there’s not a politician in New Orleans who doesn’t go there and do a little horse-trading. Some men go for other reasons, of course, but I doubt whether Mr. Robinson had any such interests. Pardon my saying so, but I think you gentlemen might be on the wrong trail with this blackmail idea.”

  “Really?” said Mr. Clemens. His eyebrows went in the general direction of the ceiling. “Perhaps you’d better explain yourself. If the blackmail idea doesn’t hold water, then I’ve misunderstood Robinson’s character entirely.”

  The butler lowered his head, as if to deny responsibility for having contradicted a white man. “A butler hears talk and sees things. Sometimes people even forget I’m standing there, as if I were a piece of furniture. If Mr. Robinson had been chasing women, I’d know it. And now that he’s dead, there wouldn’t be any reason to hide it, especially if it helped catch the man that killed him, though I’d hate to see Miz Eugenia get hurt by it.”

  “Look here, Arthur, I don’t want to put you through an inquisition, but let’s get down to brass tacks. What do you know about the French Quarter apartment Robinson was renting?”

  This question caught the butler by surprise. His eyes opened wide, and he swayed back, almost as if to dodge a blow. “Why, Mr. Clemens, how do you know about that?”

  Mr. Clemens leaned forward, pressing the issue. “Does it matter? We know he rented it, and we know the address. We have a report that a woman was seen entering it. If Robinson wasn’t supporting a mistress there, what was it for?”

  Arthur’s face took on the same expression as just before Reynold Holt’s knock on the door. “It’s not what you think, Mr. Clemens. I know he paid the rent on it, but to the best of my knowledge, he never set foot in the place except for the first visit to determine if it was suitable. But if I were in your place, I wouldn’t pay it too much mind. I don’t believe it has anything to do with the murders.”

  Mr. Clemens was clearly not satisfied with this answer. He stroked his mustache again, thinking. “I see,” he said after a minute or so. “You say he went there once to determine if it was suitable. Suitable for what?”

  “He didn’t confide that to me. To tell you the truth, I’ve never seen the place, myself.” The butler had recovered his composure, and his expression was unreadable, now.

  “I wouldn’t want you to betray a trust,” said Mr. Clemens. His expression was serious, and he looked Arthur straight in the eye. “But I’ll ask you once again to remember that a man who thought you were his friend is in Parish Prison, and unless we can find some way to clear him, he’s a good bet to hang for murder. Reynold Holt would like nothing better than to see that, Arthur. Could you live with your conscience if that happened?”

  Arthur hung his head, then looked up with a determined expression. “I could live with my conscience easily enough, if Leonard is guilty,” he said.

  “And if he’s not?”

  “I don’t know that he’s not,” said the butler. Mr. Clemens stared at him, not saying anything. The butler met his stare for a moment, then nodded. “All right, I don’t know that he is, either. I’ve been taking Mr. Holt’s word for it, and after what I heard him say today, that word doesn’t carry as much weight as it used to.”

  “A reasonable doubt is grounds enough to free a man,” said Mr. Clemens. “It sounds to me as if you don’t have near enough reason to convict him. What has he done to make you want to see him hang?”

  Arthur slumped down in his seat, shaking his head again. “Nothing. Lord help me, Leonard Galloway hasn’t done a thing to me, and here I sit equivocating. But the law won’t free him on my word alone. What can I do? What can I do?”

  “You can tell us the whole truth,” said Mr. Clemens, pointing his finger at the butler. “You said that Robinson went to Anderson’s that day, but then you said it wasn’t that unusual—all the politicos go there. You said he had to take money with him, but then you said it wasn’t blackmail, and you deny he had a mistress downtown. None of that makes sense. You’re dodging around something, and I think it’s something I need to know. What is it, Arthur?”

  Arthur was silent for a long while, but finally he looked up at Mr. Clemens and spoke. “I already told you I worked for Mr. Robinson for twenty-two years—and for Miz Eugenia’s family before that. That’s a long time to stay with one man, Mr. Clemens. I thought the man deserved not to have his intimate business hauled out, even after his death. A lot of folks thought he was a good man, and he was a good man to me, Mr. Clemens. As good a man as anybody could ask to work for. But he didn’t always do right by other folks who might have had reason to expect it.” He paused, perhaps thinking of his employer of so many years. “But none of us is without sin.”

  Mr. Clemens’s expression was all sympathy. “Who didn’t he do right by, Arthur?” he asked in a quiet voice.

  The butler did not reply instantly, but stared at the tabletop, as if trying to find his cue written there. At last, he looked up and began to speak, almost without emotion. “He gave his wife a fine house, and a mighty fine style of living, and at first there was a lot of love between them. They were going to have a child—a son, they thought, to carry on the name. And she lost the baby. Dr. Soupape did everything he could, but she lost it. And something went out of the marriage then.”

  “How long ago was that?” Mr. Clemens’s voice was gentle, and his face showed sympathy and concern.

  “It must be near ten years, now,” said Arthur. “Mr. Robinson didn’t change all that much at first, but it seemed like he started to drift away from Miz Eugenia. He was always downtown on business, but when he got interested in politics, he spent even more time down there, way late at night sometimes. Well, a man’s wife might not notice everything he does, but his butler will, for sure. I knew there was something wrong between them way before she did. But eventually, even she noticed.”

  The butler’s eyes narrowed, and his voice changed; perhaps it was a bit more calculated now. “Then Miz Eugenia started to go out in the afternoons herself, when her husband was downtown. I can’t say exactly where she was going, but I do know she’d get very excited sometimes, before she went out. It seemed to me she was looking forward to something more than tea and whist. But I never really knew just what it was.”

  “You think she was untrue to him?” Mr. Clemens’s voice was carefully neutral, but in his eyes I could see that he was disturbed by the notion.

  Arthur shook his head. “I’d just as soon not say any more about Miz Eugenia. Whatever troubles she and poor Mr. Robinson might have had, she’s treated me as well as any man could ask.”

  “Understood,” said Mr. Clemens. “But do you think she could have killed her husband?”

  “No!” said the butler, clearly shocked. “Worst I can say about him is that he didn’t pay her all the attention she might have wanted, and the worst I can say about her is that she may have decided to look for attention somewhere else. As the Lord said, ‘Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.’ ”

  Mr. Clemens frowned. “I guess that’s as far as I’m going to get along that road,” he said. “One more question, unless you can think of anything else I ought to know about. We’ve learned what kind of poison killed both Robinson and Staunton: jimsonweed. I hear tell some of the herb doctors use it in potions. Can you think of somebody who might have had a grudge against both Robinson and Staunton, somebody who could have given them an herb potion brewed from jimsonweed? Because that’s my best gue
ss how the two victims were persuaded to take the poison. Maybe they wouldn’t have eaten it in a salad, but people aren’t surprised if medicine has an unpleasant taste.”

  “No, sir.” The butler was emphatic. “That stuff is the devil’s work. Some of the ignorant Negroes may believe in those potions, but no respectable person would touch them.”

  “That’s strange,” said Mr. Clemens, casually. “I’ve heard on pretty good authority that none other than Mrs. Staunton is a firm believer in all sorts of spirits and hoodoos.”

  “I can’t testify to Mrs. Staunton’s beliefs,” said Arthur, pursing his lips. “But I’m not betraying any confidences if I tell you that Mr. and Mrs. Robinson laughed about her fads and enthusiasms. None of the family took her seriously.”

  “Pity they didn’t,” said Mr. Clemens. He belatedly remembered his whisky and soda sitting next to his chair, and sidled over to pick it up and take a sip before continuing the thought. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out she was the one the rest of them should have taken the most seriously.”

  We talked to the butler a little while longer, but it was soon clear that his well of useful information had run dry. Mr. Clemens finally shook his hand and asked him to get in touch if he saw or remembered anything that might be of further use to us. Arthur ventured a little smile and promised to keep us informed. We saw him out the door, and then Mr. Clemens sat back down in his chair and took another long sip of his drink.

  I stood by the door and listened to the butler’s footsteps recede down the stairs. When I was satisfied that he had really gone away, I turned to Mr. Clemens and said, “What a mess! Are these Southerners playing by their own rules of logic? Mr. Holt paints a picture as crazy as anything I’ve ever heard. A conspiracy of Negroes, murdering their masters on the least provocation, then murdering another man to cover up the first!”

  “I don’t know,” said Mr. Clemens, sipping his drink. “Maybe Arthur hasn’t told us the whole truth. And maybe Holt isn’t completely lying.”