by Lesley Kagen
I loved Bigger, but I thought she vastly overestimated her powers of persuasion and her boyfriend’s mettle. Albie might not have reported us the night before, but he was slippery and two-faced. If a time came when he needed to save his hide, he’d make us his scapegoats.
“Y’all are lucky as the devil that Cruikshank and Holloway are out of town and don’t know about you gettin’ the patients all worked up yesterday,” Bigger added with an mmm … mmm … mmm. “Albie would’ve turned you in to Walt for sure if he got called up to the office, and there wouldn’ta been a thing I could do to stop him. He’s scared of losing that job on account of owin’ Chummy. He’s way over his head this time.”
Wanting to do my part to calm her down and smooth things over, I told Bigger something that I thought she might like to hear. Everyone likes flattery, even if it comes from someone who is on the iffy side. “Lance Howard told me to tell you that he thinks you’re a mighty fine cook and he’s been craving some of your dark meat.”
“Oh, he did, did he?” When Bigger looked over at Howard, who was adjusting the musical instruments on the stage, her body rippled like the creek did after I tossed in a big rock. “When I told Albie that man had been starin’ at me and showin’ up in the kitchen for no reason, he laughed and told me he sure ’nuff had a reason. Then he suggested I be more friendlier to the handyman on account of him havin’ Cruikshank’s ear.” She shook her head in disgust. “You know that I been puttin’ up with a lot from Albie for a long time, girls, but after the coarse words he had to say about you three yesterday and him suggestin’ that I should cozy up to that man … those straws broke my back. I can’t tell Albie just yet or he might go runnin’ to the sheriff and report what you done, but I decided that I’m through with him for good, and I already got someone else in mind to take his place.” She gave us a shy smile. “I’m thinkin’ that me and Jimbo would make a fine couple, don’t you?” She knew the answer to that question because we’d been trying to convince her ever since she took up with Albie to show him the door and give sainted Jimbo a chance. She looked back up at the stage at Lance Howard. “Dark meat … pfft. Over my dead body.”
I didn’t know how to tell her that she’d need to reconsider that decision because if she didn’t give Howard what he wanted, he was going to tell Dr. Cruikshank that she was letting us come help her in the kitchen, so I didn’t say anything. But since he’d been eyeing us the whole time he was setting up the microphone for the mayor’s yearly speech, I felt sure that he’d hunt me down later to ask when he could expect his dark meat turkey and quiz me some more about the “strange” stuff he was interested in learning more about when he cornered me on Main Street.
I thought it might be smart to throw Lance Howard a bone to get him off my back, so I asked Bigger something I was surprised I’d never thought of asking her before. “You ever seen anything strange goin’ on around the hospital and the woods, the way Jimbo and Albie have?”
When Bigger looked off into the distance toward Broadhurst and fingered the cross around her neck, Viv took that as a big fat yes. “You know something don’t you. Tell us,” she begged, “but before ya do, can I please have a huge slice of your pie?”
Bigger should’ve been feeling proud of the dessert she lifted out of her ice chest. The meringue was high and fluffy and the lemon a rich, deep yellow. But after she sliced off a piece for Viv with the big knife she used in the Broadhurst kitchen that looked a lot like the one Audrey Cavanaugh owned, she sunk into herself.
“Ya mean have I seen anything strange besides patients disappearin’ into thin air, lights in the woods, and that room in the basement you call the Chamber of Horrors?” When we nodded, she looked left and right, the same way Harry Blake always did before he told us something. “Ain’t told no one about this and not sure I should be tellin’ you, but feels like if I don’t tell somebody soon I could burst.” Seemed for a moment like she was having second thoughts, but she decided to go ahead anyway. “You remember the day you first heard those drillin’ sounds comin’ up through the kitchen registers?”
That’d been some time ago, and we’d heard that noise off and on since then, but we knew who was making it and he was strange, so I guessed that’s why she was bringing it up.
“When you asked me what that racket was, I told you that it was just the handyman working a repair on the furnace or messin’ around with something else in the basement,” Bigger said. “But two nights ago, I heard that drillin’ sound again. I had to stay late and deliver the dinner trays to the third floor ’cause Mitch took off time to help his wife with their colicky new baby. When the elevator came up from the basement and stopped on the main floor, I thought the handyman had come to pester me some more. But when the door slid open it was …”
“It’s okay,” I said because her face had clouded. “You can tell us. Who was in the elevator?”
Bigger’s voice cracked when she said, “It was Holloway and poor Roger Osgood.”
Just like us and Jimbo, Bigger cared about the patients, and Roger Osgood, who tended his flower garden, yearned to rock invisible baby Carl, and liked to bat for the other team, was her favorite. But she despised the head nurse of the hospital, thought Holloway treated the patients meanly and spoke to the staff like they were nothing more than servants there to do her bidding.
“Roger looked so helpless lyin’ on that gurney,” Bigger said, choked up. “He was unconscious, with a big bandage upside his head. One of the corners had slipped off, and when Holloway saw me lookin’, she rushed to stick it back up. She told me that he had an accident but that Doctor Cruikshank had seen to it and that I should take next week off with pay.”
Viv scratched her head and gave voice to the same thing I was wondering. “So what’s so strange about that?”
“’Cause Holloway was bein’ nice to you, for a change?” Frankie guessed.
“Nice? That gal don’t have a nice bone in her body,” Bigger spat out. “That was just her way of tellin’ me to forget what I saw on Roger’s head, and that ain’t never gonna happen.”
Imagining all sorts of dreadful things, I said, “What was under the bandage?”
“Yeah, what did ya see?” Viv said.
Bigger’s eyes had gone shiny, but there was fierceness in them, too, so I reached over and patted her hand until she said, “What I saw was a hole in that poor man’s head about the size of a quarter. Not just any hole, mind you. The kind of perfect hole a drill bit makes.”
It took me a minute to piece together what she was saying and if it was what I thought it was, it was so bizarre that I believed Bigger might be having a heat stroke. I was about to ask her if she felt lightheaded or clammy, but decided to seek a different kind of clarification instead.
“Are you tellin’ us that when you heard the drilling sound comin’ up from the basement a couple of nights ago that you think someone was down there putting a hole in Roger Osgood’s head?”
A gob of pie came sailing out of Viv’s mouth when she guffawed and said, “You’re such a dumb chump.”
Bigger shot her a look and said, “I know what I heard and I know what I saw, and ya know what I think? I think you girls came up with a real good name for that secret room ’cause there’s something real horrible goin’ on down in that basement.”
Frankie digested what she said and asked, “But why would Lance Howard drill a hole in Roger’s head? Couldn’t he get fired for doin’ something like that?”
“The handyman ain’t the only one knows how to work a drill,” Bigger said. “I think it was Cruikshank that put that hole in Roger’s head.” She really was fond of him and looked like she was about to cry. “Why’d he want to do that to a man who never hurt another soul in his life? Ain’t he supposed to be fixin’ holes in patients’ heads, not makin’ new ones?”
Of course, the girls and I were completely taken aback. What she had told us was not only shocking, it was highly unbelievable. I probably would’ve put it down to an overheated
brain or working such a long shift at the hospital that her eyes played tricks on her the night she saw Roger and Nurse Holloway in the elevator, if I didn’t have a second opinion.
Shortly after the heat wave had descended on us, my bedroom had felt so swampish that I’d come downstairs to stick my head in the refrigerator for a breath of air. That’s when I’d heard Doc telling Aunt Jane May in the kitchen, “Arthur Cruikshank calls his treatments innovative, but to my way of thinking, some of them do not adhere to the Hippocratic oath.” At the time I thought he might be referring to the cattle prods and straitjackets, the hot baths and powerful drugs that were forced on the patients, but what if he’d been talking about them getting holes drilled in their heads? I couldn’t believe that if he knew that was happening in the Chamber of Horrors that he’d allow that to go on.
“I’ve learned to ignore the bad things I’ve seen at the hospital over the years, but when Reverend Archie preached this morning about the Bible tellin’ us that we’re our brothers’ keepers, I took that as a sign from God and made up my mind to do something,” Bigger said. “There’s only a few workin’ tonight, so after the fireworks I’m goin’ over to the hospital and look in that secret room for some proof that Cruikshank is doin’ what I think he’s doin’.”
“But how you gonna get in?” Frankie said. “Jimbo told us nobody’s got a key ’cept for Cruikshank and Holloway.”
Bigger hadn’t thought her plan all the way through and she looked crestfallen, but Viv could help her out with that. “And me. I got a key,” she said and withdrew from her shorts pocket the ring of three the town locksmith had made for her. “They haven’t let us down yet.” She got down on her knees in front of Bigger. “Can we come with you? Please? I’ll peel extra potatoes this week.”
Bigger thought about that for what seemed like an awfully long time, then said, “I’d ask ya for those keys, sugar, and make Jimbo or Albie go down there with me tonight, but those third-floor patients are too dangerous to leave unattended. The only other ones working tonight are lazy Eddie King on the second floor, some new nurse watchin’ the patients on the first floor, and Cruikshank and Holloway ain’t been around in days, so nobody is gonna stop us from takin’ a quick look in that room.”
“But, what about the hidden cameras?” I said. “Won’t they see us?”
“Hidden cameras?” Bigger turned to me. “I don’t know nothin’ about that.”
Just as I thought, Albie must’ve made that up to scare the girls and me into being more careful when he gave us permission to visit with the patients.
“Truth is, I wouldn’t mind the company, and it’d be good to have you girls as witnesses,” Bigger said with a little shiver. “But you got to give me your word that if we find something that proves I’m right, we’ll go and tell Doc. He’ll know what to do.”
I liked her idea about trying to get into the Chamber of Horrors, but I’d already decided that what she had told us was too preposterous. Her eyes must’ve played a trick on her, or she’d imagined what she’d seen that night in the elevator. Or maybe she hated Holloway so much that she made the story up to try and get the head nurse in trouble. But what finally convinced me that Bigger was mistaken about what was under the bandage on Roger Osgood’s head was her mention of Doc. He would’ve noticed a drill hole in a patient’s head during an examination, and no way on earth would he let Cruikshank get away with that.
But judging by the thrill running across Frankie’s face and Viv bubbling to Bigger, “We promise to tell Doc if we find something” it looked like the two of them couldn’t wait to cross off number one on our list: Visit Broadhurst and try to sneak inside the Chamber of Horrors.
Although I didn’t share their enthusiasm, I certainly understood it. That basement room had always been forbidden fruit and now it was low hanging. “Count me in,” I ended up saying, but mostly because I couldn’t let the other Tree Musketeers go up there without me.
Bigger said, “All right, then. Meet me up there after the fireworks. I’ll leave the Greer door open for ya and be waitin’ in the kitchen.” She looked over our heads and stiffened. “Here comes Dell back with my cola. Don’t you dare say a thing to her ’bout none of this. She has enough troubles on her mind.”
Our socks had been knocked so far off by what Bigger had told us that I’d forgotten to ask her about Leo, but if we were going up to the hospital later that night, we’d probably see Albie and Jimbo, and I could ask them. If we played our cards right, maybe they’d even let me talk to the patient I believed was Leo. If he confirmed what I thought he would, that’d mean that Harry was as sane as the girls and me, which, to my way of thinking, also meant the note he’d passed me was true. I wasn’t sure if I should tell Leo that somebody wanted to kill him, though. I’d have to think about that.
Dell handed Bigger D her cola and said, “Drink fast. It’s time.”
“For what?” Viv asked around a mouthful of meringue.
Dell winked and said, “You’ll see.”
“But I got somethin’ I need to talk to you about,” Frankie said to her mom.
“Hold that thought,” Dell said as she helped Bigger up from her chair. “Be back soon.”
The park was teaming with people, and worried that we’d be overheard, we didn’t dare discuss what Bigger had told us. But Viv, who had the talent of knowing when others were acting as naughty as her, did say after Bigger and Dell rushed off, “Those two are up to no good. Something’s fishy.”
There was some commotion up on the stage then, lights popped on, and Mayor Kibler appeared in front of the microphone. He looked even more disheveled than he had when he had plucked Harry’s note out of my pocket earlier, but proud and thrilled to be there. “Hello again!” he said. “I know how much you’re all looking forward to my yearly speech about our founding fathers, and I hate to disappoint you, but I have a little surprise for you this evening.”
Frankie leaned over to me and asked, “Can you see if his barn door is zipped?”
“He’s probably gonna say something really weird and Mulrooney will use it to prove how addled he is,” Viv moaned.
“Please welcome to the stage the Emmanuel Baptist Church Choir, the Earl Spooner Five, and Miss Jane May Mathews!” the mayor said, confirming Viv’s worse fear. He might as well have called Mulrooney up to the stage and handed her the key to his office in the town hall.
But then the stage lights went off, and there was some rustling and murmuring and footsteps, and when the lights came back on—boy oh boy. Aunt Jane May hadn’t been kidding when she’d promised us earlier that she had something special in store for us that we’d never see coming.
She was standing in front of the Emmanuel Baptist Choir, who were not in their usual white choir robes. The gals were wearing the kind of pretty dresses Dell and Bigger had on, and the men were in pressed white shirts and black pants. Aunt Jane May wasn’t as done up as the rest of them, but she looked like a force to be reckoned with in a modest navy-blue dress and matching high heels that I knew had cleats. The girls and I had heard them on the cobblestones when she snuck out of the house that night, humming something low and bluesy. I couldn’t put my finger on the tune at the time because it was out of context, but with the park awash in red, white, and blue, and Old Glory waving, I realized what it was and couldn’t wait to hear her belt it out. I also knew that not everyone in the park that night would feel the same way.
The crowd made a collective gasp then went mute at the sight on the stage. I could almost hear them wondering what the hell was going on when Aunt Jane May nodded at the musicians and broke into the opening bars of her favorite patriotic song, “God Bless America.”
We liked to do things the way we always had in Summit, but to many of our neighbors’ credit, they allowed her creamy alto voice, the choir’s uplifting backup vocals, and the band’s soulful rendition of the song win them over. Many of them got to their feet or cheered them on from their lawn chairs, but there were exceptions. Most
notably—those Germans who didn’t like Mud Towners.
I thought black and white folks coming together to perform at one of the biggest town gatherings of the year, one that Mulrooney had probably known nothing about, was probably what she and Aunt Jane May had been fighting over earlier, which meant that our lip reading had been right on the money.
Aunt Jane May would be blackballed from the Auxiliary for bucking Mulrooney’s desire to close Earl’s Club down, and Frankie and I were never prouder. Viv was too, of course, but she took learning why we’d been forbidden to ride over to Mud Town and Earl’s place after the sun set pretty hard. The star of that night’s performance must’ve been rehearsing with the band and the choir at the club, so the man she’d been sneaking out to meet late at night wasn’t Uncle Walt, but preacher and choir director Reverend Archie. Viv did take some comfort in knowing that she’d been at least partially right because our aunt’s so-called mystery man was tall, very dark, and handsome. But they could not be trotting hotly together. That sort of mixing might go on in a big city like Milwaukee, the way it had with Frankie’s mother and white father, but it would never cut the mustard in Summit. And besides, the reverend had been trotting hotly with his lovely wife, Letitia, for over thirty years, and they had a family of seven to prove it.
Funny thing was, I almost felt sorry for Evelyn Mulrooney that night. She had no choice but to plaster a smile across her face when so many in town showed their appreciation as Aunt Jane May hit the last note. That the band accompanying her was the one that performed “jungle music” at the club that so-and-so and her cohorts had been angling to shut down, and that the choir standing behind our aunt was Baptist, not Catholic, had to have added salt to Mulrooney’s wounds.
But, you know, watching just about everyone in town breaking tradition to enjoy folks from both sides of the tracks making beautiful music together on the birthday of the land of the free and the home of the brave, I couldn’t help but feel that I was witnessing a small miracle. I even dared to hope that things might be different around here from now on after the performers filed down from the stage, because the girls and I had to stand in a long line to wait our turn to heap praise upon them.