‘When did he kill himself?’
‘In February, the year of Our Lord 1937 a.d. Amen.’
‘It was in February of 1937? All right, that’s what I really came here to speak to you about.’
Barrett felt the poet’s suspicious eyes upon him as he unlatched his briefcase and brought out a copy of Dr Eberhart’s book. He opened it at the bookmark and showed O’Flanagan the underlined passage.
When he had finished reading it, O’Flanagan looked up. ‘What about it?’
‘Dr Eberhart says you gave him that material about Jadway’s discussing the Louis-Braddock fight and commenting on the 1939 publication of Tropic of Capricorn?
‘Maybe I did.’
‘Can you explain this, then. Jadway died in February, 1937. How could he have heard the heavyweight fight four months after his death and read the Miller book two years later?’
O’Flanagan did not reply. He stared blankly at Barrett; groped beside him for the glass, and slowly drank. He set the glass down. ‘Maybe that Eberhart took it down wrong, didn’t hear me right.’
‘Mr O’Flanagan, even if he heard you wrong, his tape recorder heard you right. He taped the interview with you. He played it back for me over the phone two hours ago.’
“Then maybe I made the mistake. I must’ve been boozing that night.’
‘Eberhart said you were cold sober.’
‘How in the hell would he know?’
‘You sounded sober to me on the tape.’
O’Flanagan grunted. ‘Maybe the sober are the drunks of the world, and vice versa.’ He straightened. T guess I got screwed up on my dates and time. My memory’s been going. That’s the only explanation. I’ll have another drink.’
Barrett caught a waiter by the arm and ordered a third double brandy for O’Flanagan and a second Scotch for himself. ‘Mr O’Flanagan, couldn’t you be mistaken about the date of Jadway’s death as well? Maybe he died later, say in 1939 or 1940, instead of 1937.’
‘No, I remember the time exactly. I remember the services. I was with Cassie all through that period after.’
The drinks came. O’Flanagan took up his glass. Barrett ignored his own drink. He decided to pursue a new line of inquiry. ‘You were with Cassie,’ he repeated. ‘Whatever happened to her ?’
‘She left Paris. There was nothing more for her there.’ O’Flanagan was speaking between gulps, and his words had begun to slur.
‘She went back to America. To the Midwest, I think.’
‘Whatever happened to her child?’
‘Judith? I had a postcard from her once, maybe ten years ago. She was moving to California to get married. That’s the last I heard from her.’
‘Any idea where in California?’
‘How would I know?’
‘There was testimony that Cassie McGraw herself finally married some other man and lived in Detroit. Do you know anything about that?’
‘I know she married someone and was widowed not long after. I know that. But I never heard from her again after. I don’t know what happened to her. Probably dead and gone for years. There was no life for her after Jadway.’ He shook his head drunkenly. ‘They were great ones, those two. He was tall and consumptive-looking, like Robert Louis Stevenson. She was a beauty, a lot of woman. She’s all in his book. We used to have great times together, arms linked, strolling along the Seine, reciting poetry. They had favorites. There was one I remember most. ‘Laying his head back against the wall, eyes closed, O’Flanagan said, ‘By Pietro Aretino, the Renaissance man.’ He paused, then recited soft,’ “Could man but fatter post mortem, I would cry: / Let’s fotter ourselves to death, and wake to fotter With Eve and Adam, who were doomed to die By that fotteren apple and their rotten luck.” ‘ He opened his eyes. ‘For fotter, and all its correct forms in Italian that I don’t remember, you can substitute “fuck,” which is less elegant. That was Aretino’s poem, and it was like four hundred years ago when he wrote it and we recited it. That was the favorite.’
‘Whose favorite ? Jadway’s ?’
‘No. Cassie’s.’
Barrett could see that O’Flanagan would not be articulate much longer. He must make haste.
‘Mr O’Flanagan, would you consider appearing for the defense-as a defense witness for Jadway - in the trial? We would pay you handsomely for your time and trouble.’
‘You couldn’t pay me enough, Barrett. There’s not enough money minted on earth to make me talk about Jadway any more.’
‘You could be subpoenaed, you know.’
T could suffer amnesia, you know. Don’t threaten me, Barrett. Jadway and Cassie, they’re the best part of my private past. I’m not robbing their graves and my dreams for pay.’
Tm sorry,’ said Barrett. T won’t bother you about this again. Just one last point. A short time ago, an autograph dealer in this city, Olin Adams, got his hands on several Jadway letters. He told me that he offered them to you. You didn’t have the money to buy them, and so you declined. Right after that, you called Adams and said you had got money and wanted to buy them. Why?’
O’Flanagan grunted. ‘Why? Tell you why. I wanted them as part
of the O’Flanagan Manuscript Collection in the Special Collections Department at the library of Parktown College. That’s a small school just before you get to Boston. They once gave me an honorary degree when I was editing my magazine. In return I donated to them all my personal memorabilia and papers. Always wanted something of Jadway’s in my collection. I had nothing. Cassie had what little Jadway left behind. Don’t know if she destroyed his papers and letters or kept them. But when these few letters came up for sale, I wanted them. Couldn’t afford them. Then had a chance to borrow some money. So tried to get them. Too late.’ He sighed. ‘Too bad. Would have looked good in my collection at Parktown. Too bad.’
This collection of yours,’ said Barrett thoughtfully, ‘do you think I might be allowed to see it?’
‘It’s public. Anyone who rides up to Parktown College can see it. If you do, you’ll probably be the first person who’s ever asked to have a look at it. That young curator up there, Virgil Crawford, I think he’d faint dead away if someone asked to see the Sean O’Flanagan Collection.’
‘Well, I’d like to go to Parktown and have a look. Virgil Crawford? May I use your name with him?’
As O’Flanagan tried to place his elbows on the table, one elbow missed and he started to fall. Barrett reached out and rescued him. ‘Thanks,’ the poet mumbled.
‘May I use your name when I see Crawford?’ Barrett asked again.
‘Use whatever the hell name you want to use.’
Barrett took the bill, and his briefcase, and stood up. ‘I appreciate your talking to me. I’d better leave now.’
‘An’ order me another drink on the way out, will you?’
‘Sure thing.’
‘An’ Barrett, listen to me - you’re wasting your time. You’re not going to find any more about Jad anywheres. Least nothing that’ll help defend him against those witch burners. Jad - Jadway - he was ahead of his time, in his time, and he’s still ahead, and nothing’s going to help his book or reputation until another time comes when the world’s ready for the resurrection. Until then, don’t bother his poor bones, poor bastard, let him sleep in peace until the new day of the new world.’
Barrett had listened, and now he replied quietly. ‘For me, there is only this old world, the today world. In the future maybe there will be a better world. Mr O’Flanagan, I can’t afford to wait for it.’
The next had gone better than he had expected.
From Greenwich Village, Barrett had caught a taxi back to mid-town Manhattan. Once in his room at The Plaza, he had put in a longdistance call for the library at Parktown College in Parktown, Massachusetts. Knowing that it was the dinner hour, he had not
been optimistic about locating Virgil Crawford, the head of Special Collections. A female clerk had taken his call and told him Mr Crawford has already gone home and wou
ld not be available until Monday. When Barrett had insisted that he must speak to Mr Crawford at once on an important business matter, the clerk (one of those women who believed that it had to be important if the call was long distance) had given him the number without hesitation.
Within short minutes, Barrett had made connection with the amiable Virgil Crawford. The instant that Barrett had mentioned his role in the censorship trial on the West Coast, Crawford was intrigued. Then, after Barrett had spoken of his interview with Sean O’Flanagan, and his desire to examine the O’Flanagan Collection at Parktown for possible evidence, Crawford was flattered, engaged, and cooperative. They had agreed to meet in the library’s ground-floor rotunda at ten o’clock in the morning.
After a leisurely dinner in the Oak Room, and a brief call to Mrs Zelkin (Abe was out somewhere working) in order to leave word of his whereabouts, Barrett had checked out of The Plaza. He had taken the first flight he could get to Boston, and there had obtained a room for the night in the Ritz-Carlton Hotel.
The following morning, a sunny Friday morning, he had rented a Mustang and started for Parktown College, which was fifty miles outside Boston on the road to Worcester. He had been tempted to cover the distance in as little time as possible. He was curious to see the O’Flanagan Collection. Yet, tempted as he had been to speed, to get his hands on the poet’s papers, he knew that he was early enough to take his time. Moreover, the balmy Massachusetts morning was one of Nature’s infrequent caresses. There were meadows and lakes and brooks, birch and willow and pine, and every so often the clean white spires of a Congregational meetinghouse or the moss-covered burial stones in a Pilgrim graveyard, and all of this made time timeless, and so he drove at a reasonable speed.
Parktown College proved more modern and more sprawling than he had expected. Leaving his car in the lot next to the student union, he asked directions of a campus guard, and then he walked to the gushing fountain and beyond it he saw the two-story college library.
Now, at two minutes before ten o’clock, he was shaking hands with Virgil Crawford.
To Barrett’s surprise, Crawford turned out to be lively and boyish. He was slight, trim, bouncy, enthusiastic, and eager to please.
As he led Barrett up a flight of stairs to the second floor, he explained, ‘Most small schools don’t have a Department of Special Collections. It takes money, not so much for the floor space or staffing, but to buy meaningful acquisitions. We’ve been fortunate enough to have an interested and aggressive Friends of Parktown Library group, and they’ve been tireless in their efforts to raise
funds to support us. We’re quite proud of our holdings of New England writers and poets. Last month we purchased two lots of John Greenleaf Whittier’s papers - a treasure trove, drafts of poems, correspondence, journals - and I don’t mind telling you we’re close to getting a priceless collection of papers by various New England abolitionists. You know, Wendell Phillips, Charles Sumner, other antislavery people.’
‘Where does Sean O’Flanagan fit into that?’ Barrett wanted to know.
‘Oh, he was born in Provincetown. I don’t suppose he spent more than a year or two of his life in New England, not that that matters, either. He’s a poet, and that matters. I’m trying to build up our avant-garde holdings. Oh, we go pretty far afield. We’ve got some Burns and Swinburne letters, and several manuscripts by Apol-linaire.’
They were passing through an upstairs corridor, and Crawford pointed out his office to the right and a room containing microfilm readers to the left.
They entered a spacious room furnished with oversized tables and glass-fronted bookcases.
‘Here we are,’ said Crawford. He gestured toward a doorway beside the library counter. ‘The holdings of the Department of Special Collections are in wire cages behind there. I don’t suppose you have time to see some of our prizes?’
‘I’m afraid not,’ said Barrett.
‘Now, as to the Sean O’Flanagan Collection you’re interested in seeing, we have it catalogued item by item. Is there anything specific I can show you?’
‘Well, actually, it’s not O’Flanagan himself I’m curious about. It’s his friendship, while in Paris, with J J Jadway that brought me here. It is Jadway I’m after.’
‘Jadway,’ said Crawford with surprise. ‘You’re only looking into Jadway?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I guess I misunderstood you on the phone, Mr Barrett. I thought you were using O’Flanagan in your trial, and you wanted …’ He shook his head unhappily. ‘But if it’s just Jadway, I’m afraid we’re not going to be as useful to you as I had hoped. Jadway died too young to have left any meaningful corpus of work. Also, I understand that his original papers relating to The Seven Minutes were not saved. It is the bane of our profession, this destruction of working materials of a promising author. I doubt that you’ll find anything by Jadway in O’Flanagan’s collection. If you’ll wait a moment, I’ll make doubly sure. Let me check our catalogue.’
‘Fingers crossed,’ said Barrett.
Crawford hastened to the drawers of catalogue cards, while Barrett wandered aimlessly around the reading room, pausing only to study the contents of the bookcases.
‘Mr Barrett.’ Crawford was advancing toward him. ‘I’m terribly sorry. It’s just as I suspected. Not a single item by Jadway.’
‘Might there be any material about Jadway ? After all, O’Flanagan claims to have been his closest friend.’
‘Oh, there might possibly be that, perhaps a reference or two to Jadway in O’Flanagan’s notes or correspondence. But you’d have to comb through the entire collection to find out. Actually, it wouldn’t take you much time. Aside from the poetry quarterly that O’Flanagan published and edited, and the inscribed books he’s donated to us, there are only three manuscript boxes of his papers. Would you like to see them?’
‘Absolutely.’
‘You make yourself comfortable at one of those tables. I’ll fetch the manuscript boxes.’
Five minutes later, Barrett was seated at a long table with one gray box resembling a file case before him and two others at his elbow. Crawford had left him to go about his work, but promised he would be nearby if he was wanted.
Opening the first box, Barrett found it filled with numbered manila folders containing various drafts of O’Flanagan’s poems. Carefully at first, then more impatiently, he examined these manuscripts for annotations that might include Jadway’s name, or references to Paris or to the period between 1934 and 1937. The manuscripts offered nothing, except incredibly pedestrian and incomprehensible verse.
Returning the folders to the first box and shoving it aside, Barrett opened the second box. For the most part, this held more of the same. Draft upon draft of handwritten and typewritten poems, and last, three folders of correspondence. Hope flickered again, but was quickly smothered. All of the letters were post-Paris, and almost all were correspondence between O’Flanagan and contributors to the quarterly. None of them carried even the most oblique reference to Jadway.
Discouraged, Barrett opened the third and final box. It was only half filled with folders. There were folders stuffed with clippings and advertisements in which either O’Flanagan or his periodical were mentioned. There was a folder of loose scratch sheets or pages torn from memorandum pads on which O’Flanagan had, over many years, jotted down ideas for poems, stray stanzas, and favorite phrases or quotations.
Although two folders remained, Barrett’s depression was growing.
He opened one. Inside it were photographs - photographs of O’Flanagan’s parents, of O’Flanagan himself as a boy, of himself as a publisher and editor in Greenwich Village, of T. S. Eliot and e e cummings, autographed - and One last picture, mutilated, and Barrett gripped it and his heart almost stood still.
It was a snapshot, slightly yellowed, and it had been taken at the
base of the Eiffel Tower. There were three persons in the snapshot. From left to right: a younger - by more than three deca
des younger - clear-eyed, rakish Sean O’Flanagan; a small, amply endowed, pretty and smiling colleen, squinting into the sun; a lanky male figure in baggy slacks and sweater and headless. The corner of the snapshot had been ripped off, leaving the third figure headless -and faceless.
Quickly, Barrett turned the snapshot over. On the back, in a slanting, delicate feminine hand, was written the caption ‘Dear Sean. Thought you’d like this remembrance of the three of us for your scrapbook. Jad says you look the novelist, and he the poet. What think you? Affectionately, Cassie.’
Cassie McGraw, at last! And ladway - dammit, Jadway, almost.
Barrett turned back to the photograph again. The Cathleen of the snapshot appeared anything but the naked, sensual female in the novel. She looked - but what can looks tell, especially in a discolored snapshot? As for Jadway, what there remained to see of him from the shoulders down hardly appeared the unkempt and dissolute rebel and pornographer that Leroux and Father Sarfatti had described. But then, perhaps this photograph had been taken before his book and his downfall.
The discovery excited Barrett, and question marks followed his thoughts. Exactly when had this photograph been taken? When had Cassie given it to O’Flanagan? Who had torn off Jadway’s face? Had it been O’Flanagan? Cassie? Jadway himself? And -why had it been done?
Barrett had no idea what value the snapshot might have, but he discerned the reasons for its exciting him. For weeks Cassie McGraw and J J Jadway had eluded him, had become increasingly unbelievable, less real than characters invented for a work of fiction. They had become myths. Now, blessedly, their reality was reaffirmed by this find. They had hearts that beat and blood that flowed, and somehow, at once, they had become human beings of this earth with more substance than shadow and were persons worthy to defend.
He was no longer counsel for an apparition. Yet, beyond this, what did he truly have? A likeness of Cassie McGraw in her twenties. A likeness of the body of Jadway in his Paris years. A sample of Cassie’s calligraphy. Would this excite the less romantic Abe Zelkin? Or blunt Elmo Duncan’s attacks? Barrett knew the answers. Nevertheless, he did not return the snapshot to his folder. Gently he laid it aside.
(1969) The Seven Minutes Page 53