Tuesday the Rabbi Saw Red

by Harry Kemelman

  The rabbi frowned. Bradford Ames giggled nervously.

  “Three feet, you say? Yes, I suppose it is.” The rabbi’s face brightened. “Then I might even be able to offer your proof, Sergeant.” Rising from his seat, he stood about three feet away from the wall and leaned forward, his left arm outstretched, his hand pressed against the wall to support himself. He drew a pencil from his breastpocket, and jabbed it against the wall. “High up on the wall, there’s a good chance the print is still there.”

  She looked up from her knitting as the three men entered her office. “You remember me, don’t you, ma’am?” asked Schroeder politely.

  “Oh yes, you’re from the police.”

  “And this is Mr. Bradford Ames, assistant district attorney. He’s directing the investigation.”

  “How do you do, Mr. Ames. And this man?” she asked.

  “He’s our fingerprint expert, Miss Hanbury,” said Ames. “All right, Bill.”

  The man looked at the wall. “I’ll need something to stand on,” he said.

  “Why don’t you hop on the desk here,” Ames suggested. “I’ll put this paper down so you won’t scratch it with your shoes.”

  She watched with interest as Bill mounted the desk, as he peered at the wall. “Yup, it’s here,” he said, “one print, full palm and all five fingers. Perfect.”

  She smiled as she bent over her knitting. “So you know.”

  “Yes, Miss Hanbury, we know.”

  CHAPTER

  FIFTY-TWO

  Later, Ames joined the rabbi at the apartment.

  “I could use a cup of coffee,” said Ames. “Seems to me I noticed a jar of instant coffee in the kitchen.”

  And with the long practice of the bachelor, he scurried about the kitchen, boiling water, rinsing cups, setting the table.

  They were both seated at the kitchen table, their steaming cups before them, before Ames said, “In spite of that Talmudic razzle-dazzle, you must have had some idea of where you were heading. And please spare me your facile explanation to the good sergeant that it was he who first put you in mind of Dean Hanbury. What was it actually?”

  The rabbi set his cup down. “From the day I first met her, Millicent Hanbury has been in my mind. I suppose it’s our general way of looking at things: the biblical injunction to be fruitful and multiply. To us, the unmarried woman, the spinster, is a tragic figure because she has not had the chance to complete her normal life cycle. In the stetl, the small ghetto towns of Russia and Poland where every girl was required to provide a dowry for her marriage, the poor girl, the orphan, was furnished a dowry by the community so that she would not be condemned to a life of spinsterhood. Even if she was ugly, they managed to pair her off with someone. There were no spinsters in the stetl.”

  “How about bachelors?”

  “An occasional one.” The rabbi smiled. “They were not considered so much tragic figures as failing in their duty, not pulling their weight, as it were.”

  “You, too?” In answer to the rabbi’s questioning look, he explained, “I’ve got it from my family most of my life—not pulling my weight, not doing my duty. But it wasn’t because I remained single; it was because I didn’t become a bigshot lawyer. Not fulfilling my potential is the usual remark.”

  The rabbi smiled. “Well, in our modern system, where you marry for romantic love, it’s pretty much a matter of luck whether you marry or not. But I venture to say that in the older system of the arranged marriage, you probably would not have remained a bachelor, and Miss Hanbury certainly would not have remained a spinster. She is too attractive. So I found myself wondering why she hadn’t married. Was it for the sake of an academic career?” He broke off as a thought crossed his mind. “You know, the chances are that if you had married, your wife would have seen to it that you became that bigshot lawyer.”

  Ames chuckled. “Then it’s just as well that we don’t have the arranged marriage.”

  The rabbi grinned in sympathy. “Well, shortly afterward I bumped into Chief Lanigan and he told me about Millicent Hanbury. She was a Hanbury, and Hanburys didn’t associate with just anyone. But since she belonged to a poor branch of the family, she didn’t even associate with those she considered her equals. She couldn’t It was a matter of pride in her family, her upbringing. And it left her emotionally crippled.”

  “I’ve known similar cases,” said Ames.

  “Yes, I imagine so. Well, along comes Hendryx who had left Barnard’s Crossing in his early teens. And the Hendryxes were of the same social class as the Hanburys. She had known him, and it’s quite possible that in spite of the difference in their ages she could have had a crush on him.”

  “Or because of the difference in their ages.”

  “True. And now he comes to her for a job. And he is not married. She not only gets him a job, but manages to maneuver him into the position of acting head of the department.”

  “He was a legitimate scholar?”

  “Oh yes. Nothing outstanding, I gather, but he had a good degree and had even published some.”

  “Then why was he out of a job when he came to Windemere?” asked Ames. “We backtracked him and found he’d had several jobs in the last ten years or so.”

  “It could be a matter of personality,” said the rabbi. “He was proud and supercilious, given to making snide, cutting remarks. In a lot of places, one’s colleagues in the department decide on matters of tenure and promotion, and I’m sure these traits rubbed a lot of people the wrong way—as they did Fine. But I suspect that here at Windemere he at last decided to stay. He was no longer a young man. He was already in his forties, and unless you’ve made your mark it’s not so easy to get a job at that age.”

  Ames nodded.

  “I’m sure Miss Hanbury assumed they were going to be married. I just can’t imagine her—what’s the phrase, shacking up?—I can’t imagine her just shacking up with a man. Her pride wouldn’t let her accept so anomalous a situation.”

  Ames agreed. “When we questioned her, she said they were planning to get married as soon as Hendryx got tenure. Then she could leave her job, would have to, in fact, because they have a rule here against husband and wife both on the staff.”

  “Of course,” said the rabbi. “And as long as his was a temporary appointment, hers was by far the better job. So if they got married before he got tenure, he’d be the one to go and she’d be supporting him. I’m sure she wouldn’t care for that, and neither would he. So it was just a question of time.”

  “But he couldn’t wait?”

  “That’s what I think,” said the rabbi. “Hendryx decided to go for the president’s daughter as the quicker and more certain route to his goal. And it worked. But Millicent Hanbury was proud, too proud to permit herself to be used and then discarded.” He shook his head reflectively. “I wonder how he was able to manage it, courting one woman—”

  “While diddling another?” Ames chuckled. “Oh, married men manage it often enough. It’s even easier for a bachelor.”

  CHAPTER

  FIFTY-THREE

  I hope you don’t mind my asking you to come this afternoon, Rabbi,” said President Macomber, “but on Friday afternoons the building is practically deserted. We can talk in privacy and without interruption. But first, are you enjoying your teaching here?”

  “Oh yes, I had twenty-five in my class this afternoon.”

  “Indeed,” murmured Macomber.

  The rabbi realized the president had no idea what he meant and hastened to explain.

  “I’m sure it’s the result of your teaching,” said Macomber politely. He fiddled with a pencil and appeared embarrassed. Finally, he cleared his throat and said, “You shared an office with Professor Hendryx. You talked with him?”

  “Yes, occasionally. Not too often, and usually not at great length.”

  “Tell me, Rabbi,” he leaned back in his chair, “in your opinion was Professor Hendryx anti-Semitic?”

  The rabbi pursed his lips. “I would
n’t say so. He was prejudiced, all right. Most people are against one group or another. It’s a natural reaction to the stranger, to the member of a minority. We Jews have suffered it more than most, I suppose, because we have been a minority in so many countries. But I don’t call it anti-Semitism if I am not liked, even if I’m not liked because I am a Jew. I don’t consider it anti-Semitism unless the prejudice is translated into action, political or legal or social. To work, a multiple society doesn’t require that every segment of the population like every other segment. That’s Utopian. It works if every segment accords equality to every other segment, whether they like them or not. As for Professor Hendryx, he made disparaging remarks about Jews on occasion, but he also made similar remarks about Irish and Italians and Negroes. He was given to making bitter, sarcastic remarks on almost anyone and anything. I considered him a vexed, unhappy man.”

  Macomber nodded slowly. “I see.”

  “You seem disappointed.”

  The president laughed shortly. “In a way I am. It would make matters easier for me if Professor Hendryx had been anti-Semitic.” He was silent. Then, “With the end of the term approaching, we are quite disorganized. We do not have a dean, and the English department does not have a chairman. Normally, that last would be no great concern, but we’re also short-handed there. And with Professor Fine leaving …”

  “Does he have to leave?”

  “Well, that’s just the point.” Macomber picked up a long white envelope lying on his desk. “Before his death, Professor Hendryx made grave charges against Professor Fine to Dean Hanbury, charges which she brought to me and which led to my decision not to renew his contract. I venture to speak of this because Mr. Ames intimated that you were familiar with the circumstances.” He looked questioningly at the rabbi.

  The rabbi nodded.

  “Well, I just can’t ignore these charges, even though Dean Hanbury could be considered—er—discredited by the events that have since transpired. It’s the sort of thing that a college president simply can’t ignore. Not if he has a conscience.”

  “Let me understand, President Macomber, you would like to keep Fine on because you are short-handed—”

  “And because I think he’s a good teacher.”

  “But because you have reason to believe that he committed the sin of leaking an exam to a student, your conscience won’t allow you to overlook it?”

  “Ye—es, I’d say that’s about right,” said Macomber unhappily.

  “But if I had said that Hendryx was anti-Semitic, you would have considered that the charges had stemmed from bias and could dismiss them.”

  “Considering that I knew of the situation only through Dean Hanbury. I didn’t talk to Hendryx.”

  “But now you feel she’s been discredited.”

  “Yes, but there’s this envelope, unfortunately. It contains proof of the charge,” he said. “It’s sealed as you see, with Fine’s name written across it, but I know what’s inside since I told Dean Hanbury just how I wanted it worded. I wrote it out for her to copy, in fact.” He pulled open a drawer and drew out a folder. It contained a single sheet of notepaper. He passed it across the desk. “Go on, read it.”

  “It’s not signed.” The rabbi read, “No date.” He looked up inquiringly.

  “That’s so we could add a recent date in the event Professor Fine went back on his promise,” he explained.

  The rabbi read on: “I hearby admit of my own free will that I arranged to show a copy of the final examination of the course English 74 to a student taking that course, thereby permitting said student to get a higher mark at the end of the summer term. I regret this action and promise that I will not be guilty of a similar offense during the remainder of my tenure here.”

  “The one in the envelope is of course signed by Professor Fine,” said Macomber.

  The rabbi was silent for a moment and then said, “The traditional function of a rabbi is to sit in judgment. Did you know that?”

  Macomber smiled. “Bradford Ames said something to that effect when he discussed—er—things with me. Are you suggesting that if you were the judge you would view the charges differently?”

  “If I were hearing the case, I would not admit this as evidence at all. It is contrary to Talmudic law.”

  Macomber smiled. “Since Roger Fine is a Jew, I suppose there would be a certain justice in judging him by Talmudic law. Judging a man by his peers, you might say. All right, how would you proceed?”

  “I would first hear from his accusers.”

  “But that’s impossible. They’re both—”

  “Precisely.”

  “But there’s his own admission.”

  “But I could not admit it as evidence. By our law, ‘No man may call himself a wrongdoer.’ This is a fundamental principle with us in criminal law.”

  “Come to think of it, I guess it is in our Common Law, too,” Macomber remarked.

  “But there’s a difference,” said the rabbi. “In Common Law a man cannot be forced to testify against himself. In our law, he can’t even if he wants to.”

  “I sec, so if you were sitting in judgment on this case?”

  “I would dismiss it,” said the rabbi promptly.

  Macomber smiled. “It’s a way out, to be sure. And yet—”

  “And yet you are dissatisfied.”

  “Well, yes I am.”

  “I am too,” the rabbi admitted. “I suppose it’s because we’re involved not so much with law as with conscience. Yours and mine. I believe I first referred to it as a sin rather than as a crime. This sin of leaking an exam—as a college president you regard it as unpardonable?”

  “Well, no sin is unpardonable, I suppose,” said Macomber.”

  “Then how would someone go about getting his sin pardoned?”

  “I guess that’s more in your province than mine, Rabbi. I suppose by confession—and repentance, and by promising not to repeat the offense.”

  The rabbi brightened. “Well, isn’t that what Fine has done?”

  “When? Now?”

  “Right here in this paper. ‘I admit of my own free will’—that’s confession. ‘I regret this action’—that’s repentance. ‘And promise that I will not be guilty of a similar offense’—that’s the third element.”

  Macomber considered. Then he smiled. “Yes, I think that will do it. And that will take care of our problem with the English Department at the same time.” He sat back in his chair and beamed. “Tell me, Rabbi. I don’t suppose you’d like to try your hand at being a dean, would you?”