by Ed Ifkovic
I opened the door and stepped out into sunlight, disoriented. I reached in my pocket and extracted the cigar wrapping and fingered it. Probably every other man in Appleton smoked Grand Avenues, a popular Milwaukee cigar, save the pipe and cigarette smokers. Many teachers at the high school did, and even the principal. Maybe even August Schmidt. And Homer Timm. I’d seen him with such a cigar, the tip of one often visible in his breast pocket. I thought of him singing that awful tune in the hallway…
“Miss Ferber!”
I screamed, spun around. There I was, face to face with Homer Timm, and for a second I thought I’d imagined it—conjured him up with my demonic thoughts. But no, the man stood there, feet away, with one of those loathsome cigars actually planted between his teeth.
“You startled me,” I stammered.
“I stepped out to enjoy the afternoon and have a smoke. I didn’t expect to see you, Miss Ferber, emerging like a moth into this abundant light.”
“I was just being. . .” I almost said girl reporter but thought the words too lame and questionable.
Homer Timm puffed on his cigar, but he never took his eyes off me. He spotted the cigar wrapper in my hand. “What’s that, Miss Ferber? Evidence?”
“Evidence?”
A wry grin. “Are you still doing Caleb Stone’s job?”
“I thought I’d trace the route of the…you know…” I faltered. His steely eyes, unblinking, alarmed me.
“A young girl getting too nosy, perhaps.” He puffed on the cigar.
“I was curious.”
“And what did you discover?”
“Nothing.” I tucked the cigar wrapping back into my pocket.
“A cigar wrapping?”
I pointed behind me. “I found it at the top of the stairs.”
“I wonder how it got there.” He stepped close.
I backed up. “I have no idea.”
“But you have a suspicion?”
“Not really.”
“You don’t lie very well, Miss Ferber. Usually you’re so forthright.”
“Well, I need to…” I looked past him toward the woods. Beyond that grove of trees lay Lovers Lane. No one was in sight.
“You seem nervous.”
I looked him in the face. “You’re making me nervous, sir.”
“I’m just here having a smoke.” He puffed on the cigar. “What did you learn today, Miss Ferber?”
“Learn?”
“This is a school, and I recall you as an exceptional student. Not in mathematics, of course; but in Speech, the power of which you seem to have lost. And in Composition, as in reporting what you see. You are a reporter.”
“Nothing,” I blurted out.
He took another step forward, and I didn’t like what I saw. There was about him a ferocity. No, that was too intense, I thought. Wrong word. No, it was an edginess—sinister at that—trying now to mask itself as innocent banter. I closed my eyes and saw lightning flashes.
I started to move away.
“Stay a moment.” He looked over my shoulder.
“No, I…”
“We need to talk. I think you have the wrong idea…”
“I have no idea.” That sounded dumb even to me.
“You seem to know something.”
“No.”
“Stay.” His voice grew more insistent.
“I’m expected…”
As I started to move, he reached out and actually touched the sleeve of my dress, a quick gesture that alarmed more than it stopped me.
I ran past him, smashing through some hedges, my dress catching on the briars, and kept running. I thought he might follow me, but when I paused, breathing hard, gasping, he was nowhere to be seen.
***
I nearly toppled down the five cement steps of the Crescent office, where Sam Ryan, sitting by himself at his desk, looked up, bewildered. “Miss Ferber, for God’s sake. You look like you fell into a bramble bush.”
I checked myself in the small mirror behind Miss Ivy’s desk. I saw a wild-eyed girl, hair undone from its combs, my velveteen box hat lopsided, and a smear of grime across my chin. Worse, I’d torn the hem of my dress, which trailed after me like an unraveling ball of string. I was trembling.
Concerned, Sam rose and poured me a glass of water and motioned for me to sit. “Tell me what happened.” I sank into a chair—it happened to be the absent Matthias Boon’s chair—and I gulped the water. Images flooded me: that hideous Homer Timm approaching me, his fingers grasping the sleeve of my dress. My new dress, I thought, the fabric shipped from Chicago. A gift from one of my cousins. Now I would have to burn it in the basement furnace.
Sam drew up a chair and the two of us sat—the old shriveled man and the young shivering girl who always wanted to please him—so close that I could see a shadowy yellow cast in his watery eyes. Wildly, I thought, Sam will be dead within a year or two.
“Tell me,” he repeated.
Slowly, sipping the water, I talked of my trip to the high school—Sam frowned at that—after my talk with Esther. Of Homer Timm’s undue interest in Frana, her visits to his office, the cigar wrapper, his being an authority, a man of trust. I speculated but what did I really know? Sam looked unhappy. But then I was talking, building the story: I wove a picture of terror and fear and surprise; I presented Homer Timm as a man who had something to hide.
Sam listened closely. “Miss Ferber, he should not have scared you like that, but it doesn’t mean he’s a murderer. Nothing you say…”
“Haven’t you heard me?”
Sam suddenly looked over my shoulder, his eyes wide..
A voice behind me, loud, booming. “I have.”
I swiveled to see Mac standing in the doorway of the printing room, just standing there, his face purple with anger. I screamed and thought, Lord, I do more screaming than a damsel tied to a railroad track in a penny-ante nickelodeon reel.
Mac approached me. “I heard what you say,” he roared in a thick whiskey voice. “I know something is wrong with him. I smell it like a dead animal.”
“I don’t know…”
Sam held up his hand and smiled. “You have not been aware of it, dear Miss Ferber, but Mac has been worrying about you moving through the Appleton streets by yourself, especially at night. More so after the murder, to be sure. You may not have noticed but at times he’s been following you. Guarding you, as it were.”
I looked at the hulking, simple man, now grinning with embarrassment. “There’s a killer out there,” he said, matter-of-factly.
Sam beamed. “Mac, I’m afraid your secret is out.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“How would you have reacted?”
“I’d have been furious. I don’t need protection.”
“There you go. Well, Mac’s an old-fashioned guy who’s taken a liking to you.”
Confused, I was hesitant to look at the big man filling the doorway.
“Miss Ferber, my apologies.” Mac bowed. “I ain’t mean no harm. But you travel in places where women ain’t supposed go. And at night.”
I was ready to say something but stopped. All right, play chivalric knight, if you must. Stand in the rain until your armor gets rusty.
Mac was looking at Sam Ryan. “One night at Mrs. Zeller’s I hear Homer Timm slipping out the door, quiet, on tiptoe, so no one hears. I catch sight of him, sneaking out. Up to no good, I know. So I follow him. He walks and walks. I seen you walking home from the theater by yourself. He watched you from the shadows. He spies on his brother. He walks around the high school. He even walked past the house of that dead girl Frana. I follow him, not trusting such a man.” He looked at me. “A couple times, lately, he stood by your father’s house. He watches you. Your friend, the pretty girl. He’s a dangerous man, that one. Up to no good. A shadow in the streets. Some nights when I see you about, sooner or later, he’s nearby.”
Suddenly I was flooded with frightening images: my footfall tracked, shadows in the woods,
a menacing silhouette against a cast-iron-gray sky, the dark Homer Timm in wraparound cloak, sheltered behind thick cedars, the hand that reaches out, touches the young girl’s neck…
I looked at Mac. “Thank you. But why didn’t you say anything?”
“Say what? I follow a man who sometimes walks at night? He ain’t do nothing but walk.”
“But he spies…”
“But nothing. He walks and walks, and then he returns to Mrs. Zeller’s.”
“But I don’t like the way he accosted you today at the high school, Miss Ferber,” Sam added. “That was scary. Maybe he is the murderer, maybe not. But his behavior toward you needs to be addressed.”
I winced. Perhaps I’d overstated the facts, embellishing grandly, Homer Timm as ogre writ large. But it was too late now.
Mac was talking. “I think he is the murderer.”
“What?” From Sam.
“I’ve met murderers.”
For some reason the line from the tramp printer struck me as amusing. Then I saw Sam’s quizzical look.
Sam went on. “You and I need to talk to him now. At the high school. He has some explaining to do. He didn’t act like a gentleman.”
“He’s ain’t no gentleman.” Mac frowned. “I don’t trust the man. You, Sam, he can push over like an old chair.” Sam did not like that. “And you, Miss Ferber, he can break your neck like a baby robin caught in the jaws of an eagle.”
Well, thank you. Another graphic image of my demise.
Sam looked up at the tall man. “Mac, you got a paper to print. Miss Ferber and I…”
Mac’s thick beefy fist crashed to the table. “I’m going.”
Sam and I both nodded.
Chapter Nineteen
I felt a bit foolish as my army of two protectors moved with me down College Avenue, across streets and onto the high school lot. We were a curious trio, me with my tattered dress flopping in the breeze, my hat slightly askew; Sam, so ancient, shuffling with old-man steps; and the mighty Mac, whose long legs kept moving him yards ahead, anxious as he was, so he had to periodically pause, waiting for the lesser mortals to catch up. At the entrance to the high school Mac stopped, nervous. He seemed unsure of himself, like some errant bad boy summoned to the principal’s office.
Miss Hepplewhyte, startled by the trio of interlopers, was in the process of locking up the school. She announced that everyone was gone, Principal Jones a while back, and Homer Timm—“He looked like a man frightened by a horse”—had bustled by her, rushing out in a hurry, without saying goodbye. No, she said, he didn’t say where he was headed. Hadn’t we heard what she’d just said. He spoke not a word of goodbye as he left.
We looked at one another, and I suggested he’d returned to the rooming house or, perhaps, he was hiding at the Lyceum, sheltered by his brother.
Homer, indeed, was at the Lyceum, sitting in a front office with Gustave and Mildred. Sitting behind Gustave, however, was Cyrus P. Powell, who’d obviously been interrupted in some discussion with Gustave and Mildred. His face set, lips razor-thin, he held a sheaf of papers. Facing the doorway, Homer spotted me, jumped up, alarmed, and pushed past us into the deserted lobby. He stumbled, crashing into a wall, but then stood against the glass display case that still contained the full-sized portrait of Harry Houdini, menacing in chains and locks. Mac planted himself in front of Homer as Gustave appeared, his face puzzled.
“Miss Ferber.” Gustave greeted me, and nodded at the others. “What’s going on? Homer stumbles in here all agitated. He’s been telling me some wild story.” He walked toward Homer, who looked both satanic (I thought) and frightened (I hoped), but Mac’s big body blocked him. “He says he may have frightened you.” He never took his eyes off Homer.
I gasped. “He did.”
Looking both peevish and furious, Mildred Dunne stood in the doorway, one hand holding a brochure, a refreshing photograph of Niagara Falls on the cover. Her eyes were icy. This was not a woman comfortable with interruption. Her father’s fortune had made her a tad imperious.
“My brother?” Gustave asked. He shook his head. “That seems impossible. Homer may be a little severe, but he’s a gentle soul.”
Homer was frozen against the display case, and I feared he’d smash the glass. Behind him, Houdini fixed us all in that penetrating stare, the eyes hard, and Homer looked like a scrawny schoolboy held in place by the class bully,
Mr. Powell walked out of the office and announced in his pebbles-on-a-tin-roof voice, “This is madness, all of it. I’m in a meeting with Gustave, and Mildred Dunne flounces in to wave Niagara Falls brochures at him. And just when I tell her to leave, Homer flies in, a maniac. Has everyone lost their minds? I have businesses to run.”
Sam Ryan ignored Mr. Powell. “Mr. Timm,” he addressed Homer, “Miss Ferber says you were less than gallant at the high school. You alarmed her, sir. To the point where we thought it best to talk to you about your behavior.”
Homer moved but Mac’s hand held him pinned to the display case. I waited for breaking glass, Houdini’s cardboard image crashing down on Homer.
Gustave stood next to Mac. “I don’t understand this. Homer rushed in here, a little crazy, saying Miss Ferber seemed to be suggesting something about the murder of that poor little girl.”
“I never accused him,” I insisted.
Gustave actually grinned. “Homer?” As though the idea were preposterous.
Mildred Dunne’s free hand grasped the doorjamb, her knuckles white.
I breathed in. “Your brother tried to hold me there. And I wonder why.”
Mr. Powell approached Homer, ready to speak, but thought better of it.
Gustave, eyebrows arched, “Miss Ferber, this is hardly the stuff of court testimony. My brother said you startled him coming out of that doorway, and you…What was that all about a cigar wrapper?”
Almost on cue Homer extracted a cigar from his breast pocket, waved it in the air. “I smoke what most Wisconsin men smoke.” He’d found his voice, tough and sure now. “I apologize for startling you, and I certainly didn’t want to keep you from leaving. You seemed…hysterical…and…”
“Sir, I have never been hysterical in my life.”
“I only mean…”
“I’m not imagining things. I was following the path taken by the murderer of Frana.”
Gustave squinted. “Why would you do that?”
“Why not? The answer to the murder is in the idea of that locked storeroom.” I heard echoes of my father’s voice.
“What?” From Mr. Powell. He moved closer to us.
“Think about it, Mr. Timm.” I addressed Homer. “Your conduct just moments ago did lend itself to suspicion. Wouldn’t you agree? Suddenly you spot a reporter at the very door where the murderer and Frana emerged, and you act peculiar.”
“Peculiar isn’t guilt.”
“But peculiar seems alien to your normal behavior.”
“Well, thank you.”
“I wasn’t intending it as compliment.” I was emboldened. “So far as suspects go, Mr. Timm, you have to admit that you are near the top of the list.”
More confident now, Homer shifted his position to the left, and all eyes focused on the poster of Houdini. Homer followed our eyes and seemed uncomfortable next to the imposing photograph. He sucked in his cheeks and glanced at Gustave. “Indulge me, please. Explain your nonsense. Tell me. To me, an innocent man.”
I suddenly was reluctant to accuse, but staring at the brothers, I went on. “Here’s what I know or, at least, suspect. Frana was seeing an older man, someone obviously familiar with the layout of the high school. That storeroom, though unused, wasn’t so difficult to spot or maneuver. Lord, it’s just a room, not a medieval vault. The sports teams and student actors lounged around in that hallway, up and down those stairs, as you know. In and out of the janitor’s room. The cigar wrapping on the landing is nothing, admittedly. That could be years old, in fact, or from yesterday; or even from Amos Moss or August Schmi
dt. I mention it only because it seemed to bother you, got you agitated.”
“I told you. You startled me.”
“I gather you called Frana into your office often.”
“That’s my job, Miss Ferber. Frana flaunted rules. Of course, I talked to her.”
I faltered. “But maybe things were said.”
“Yes, reprimands, not…not enticement…”
I ignored that. “Frana was seeing an older man who made her promises, a man who gained her trust, someone she met in some position of authority. Someone who used her naiveté to…to seduce…”
“Good God,” Homer breathed in, blanching.
“Frana was carrying some man’s baby…”
Mildred gasped and Sam Ryan tsked. My remarks were unseemly but necessary.
“I’m not naming you a murderer, Mr. Timm.”
“But you’re coming mighty close to doing so,” Gustave spoke in defense of his brother. “Really, Miss Ferber.”
Mildred echoed, “Really.”
I had been watching Homer’s face as I outlined the pitiful, meager evidence, and something of his bluster seemed to dissipate, the color draining from his cheeks. For a second he closed his eyes, his shoulders sagging, and he lost energy. He looked beaten. A whipped child on a playground, slapped down one too many times. I feared he might slip to the floor.
“What?” I asked him.
He shook his head and started to tremble. Gustave whispered, “Homer.”
Mac had stepped back from Homer but now he rested a long arm on the man’s shoulder, stabilizing him. Homer’s eyes were vacant, wide with fright.
What had I done?
Silence in the room.
I felt faint, dizzy. As I stared at Homer, he seemed far away, seen through a telescope, a man stuck against a shimmering black background; then, as I watched, everything seemed to reverse itself, like an hourglass upturned and plunked down before me. His tiny distant face loomed large and ballooned, closer and closer, up against mine.
Then everything cleared. I found myself staring at Homer, who hadn’t moved. Everyone was silently watching me, all of us bunched together in that lobby, Houdini’s eyes watching us. A clock tick-tocked on the wall, a heartbeat. Sam expressed concern. “Miss Ferber, are you all right? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”