Immoral Certainty

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  With these thoughts rattling through her brain she entered Rice’s chambers and was gratified to find that his secretary had stepped out. She walked to the closed door to the inner office and listened. Hearing nothing, she knocked, heard a muffled response, and walked in.

  Rice was behind his big walnut desk in shirt sleeves. He smiled when he saw her.

  “Marlene! Come in! We’ve been talking about you.”

  “You have?” she said, startled, then thought “we?” and looked, and saw that in one of the two leather wing chairs before Rice’s desk there sat a thin, distinguished man in black clerical garb.

  “Yes, about this unfortunate business at St. Michael’s you turned up,” Rice went on. “Ah, I see you haven’t met. Marlene Ciampi, Reverend Andrew Pinder, Pastor of St. Michael Archangel.”

  Marlene said, “Christ!” and then threw her hand up to her lips, as a ferocious blush rose to her cheeks.

  “No,” said Pinder, “but I do try.” He stood and held out his hand, a good-natured smile appearing on his boyish face. He was about forty, slim, with thick sandy hair in a stylish cut and intelligent dark blue eyes.

  She made herself join their laughter at this sally, and sat in the other chair when Rice invited her to. Rice said casually, “I’ve been wanting to get you two together for some time. This is a dreadful thing for the center—”

  “That’s what I came to talk to you about,” Marlene broke in. “It’s really embarrassing … but I think it all may be about nothing.” She fingered Dana’s note while the two men stared at her in surprise. “That woman I told you about, Judge. Woodley? She just quit her job—went back home and left me this note. It seems her kid made it all up. Or so she says.” Marlene met their eyes with effort and swallowed hard. “I’m just incredibly sorry—I don’t know what else to say.”

  The two men exchanged a quick glance and Marlene prepared herself for a tirade; instead, Rice said, “But there was something going on, Marlene. That’s what we were just talking about. Both Andrew here and Mrs. Dean are terribly upset.”

  It was Marlene’s turn to stare. “What do you mean?” she said, her mouth drying.

  Pinder cleared his throat. “Mrs. Dean called me this morning. She said she had found evidence that suggested that one of the janitors had been abusive with some of the children on late care.”

  “Who is he and what’s the evidence?”

  “That she didn’t say. She was very disturbed, as Herb said. But she did mention your name as somebody who … knew about the case. I thought she was rather mortified at having rejected your accusation out of hand, but you have to understand—for something like this to happen at St. Michael’s—it’s like finding a cockroach in your soup at Lutece.”

  Marlene sighed and said, “I wouldn’t know, Mr. Pinder, I usually eat in the office. I guess I’m getting tired of hearing how impeccable St. Michael’s is and how we have to protect its rep.”

  Judge Rice said reasonably, “I can see how you might feel that way, Marlene. This has put you through some kind of hell. But the thing is now to act professionally and continue the investigation. What we want is to stop this man, whoever he is, from harming more children, without destroying the best day-care center in the city and, incidentally, dragging those poor children through the courts.”

  “You want me to cover St. Michael’s?”

  Rice smiled sadly and spread his hands open on his desk.

  “Just be careful, Marlene. And clever. I don’t want to see you hurt either.”

  Was that a veiled threat? Marlene looked closely at Rice, and then over at Pinder. Their faces showed genuine concern, although whether for her personally or their own reputations she couldn’t tell. She stood up, and realized she was still holding Dana Woodley’s note. “What about this?” she asked, waving it. “It seems to say the opposite of what you’ve just found out.”

  Pinder shook his head sadly. “It’s quite common, I’m afraid. Abused children often go into deep denial. If we could get her into some good therapy …”

  “It’s probably too late for that,” Marlene said. “They’ve apparently gone back to the hills. Anyway—I guess the next step is to contact Mrs. Dean and get her evidence, get a line on this guy, maybe, and take it from there. That sound right?”

  They both beamed. Rice said, “That sounds perfect. In fact, I know Mrs. Dean is waiting for your call.” He wrote briefly on a scratch pad and handed Marlene an address and a telephone number. “You can get back to her here. It’s not the Center—best to keep this whole thing isolated from there until we know more.”

  Marlene took the paper and after some desultory conversation, left the chambers. Returning to her own office, she called the number Rice had given her. Mrs. Dean answered herself on the second ring. She sounded anxious and made a nice apology to Marlene and hoped that she hadn’t gotten in trouble. Marlene said it was all right.

  Mrs. Dean asked if Marlene could come by that afternoon to the address Judge Rice had supplied. They wanted to keep this very confidential, and since she was known as an Assistant D.A. at the center…. Marlene resisted the temptation to say that she was coming to the Center door in a blue-and-white with sirens and a paddy wagon, said that was all right, too. End of conversation.

  Marlene felt at this point that she was no longer in control of events, and was more than willing to be carried along by the preferences of others, anything to bring this miserable affair to a close. She felt almost giddy with relief and, as she gathered up her tattered brown legal envelopes and went out, she realized that for the first time in almost two months she was not nauseous. In fact, she was ravenously hungry.

  Gingerly she tested her revived appetite. She thought of hot grease and spices, fried onions, pepperoni pizza, sour pickles, hot sausage sandwiches. Her stomach contracted at these imaginings, but not with revulsion. Clearing up her afternoon’s work with dispatch, she repaired to Sam’s Luncheonette, off Foley Square, where she ordered a double cheeseburger, fries, extra pickle, and a black-and-white ice cream soda. She ate slowly, savoring the simple, strong flavors, waiting to see if the dreaded heaves would appear.

  But there was only the usual feeling of faintly guilty repletion one got after consuming a large meal of New York peasant fare. Marlene sat back in her leatherette booth and lit a cigarette and considered her most recent megrim. She seemed to be emerging from some kind of waking nightmare, in which she had believed herself to be the victim of witchcraft, a belief in which her body had concurred. There was nothing wrong with her physically, so she must have been crazy.

  On the other hand, she had known something was going on at St. Michael’s and that was now confirmed. That wasn’t crazy, although, of course, no one had mentioned the tie-in with the trash-bag killings, and she had been too bowled over by Rice’s information to bring it up. She wished Raney was available.

  Or Karp. Funny how she pulled back from him in her mind when she thought she was really going nuts. Karp and the Job: a connection, and a negative one. She could finally admit it: she couldn’t stand working for him. It screwed up both her love life and her work life without any compensating benefit. OK, that had to change. Transfer to another bureau or resign completely? Too big a decision to make just yet, and what would she do if she quit? Practice criminal law? It was to vomit.

  She got up, paid her bill, and walked back to the Criminal Courts building. It was shaping up to be a fine autumn afternoon, the air miraculously clear and slightly damp, a reminder to the huddled masses that their grim city was still located by the sea. Marlene’s head was clearing up too. She skipped back to her office. She began to look for the files she had kept on the St. Michael’s and trash-bag killings case.

  Filing was not Marlene’s major strength. Despite her lack of storage space, she could never bear to throw anything away. She had high ceilings, however, and had used this space to build a ziggurat of cardboard boxes on top of her sole bookcase. She put a straight chair on her desk, arranged several thick l
aw books on its seat, and clambered up on this makeshift ladder.

  As she rummaged through the papers in the cartons she became aware of another presence in the small room. Looking down, she saw Guma standing by her desk, positioned for the best view up her dress.

  “Guma! What are you doing here?”

  “Just passing through. The word is you don’t wear any pants on Tuesdays. I thought I’d check it out.”

  “It’s Wednesdays,” said Marlene. “Here, you can help. Catch this!” She tossed a heavy carton down to him and then climbed down herself. She pawed through the papers in the box and pulled the one she wanted out with a yell of triumph.

  “What’d you find?” asked Guma.

  “The stuff on St. Michael’s and the trash-bag murders.”

  “I thought that was dead.”

  “Not any more it ain’t. The lady who runs the place has summoned the kid here for a discreet confession. Which I have a feeling is a prelude to a whitewash. The janitor, my ass!”

  “What are you talking about, Champ?”

  Marlene briefly explained the events of the last half hour and what she made of them.

  Guma said, “So you still think they’re running a kiddy whorehouse?”

  “I know it. Shit, I wish I could reach Raney—anyway, I got to go now. I’ll take this with me or it’ll get lost again. Wish me luck!”

  “In bocca ’l lupo, paisan,” said Guma cheerfully, at which, to his great surprise she grabbed his head, kissed him soundly on the mouth, and ran out.

  “Hey, Marlene,” he called after her. “More tongue action next time.”

  Her excitement building, Marlene ran to the Bureau office to look for Karp. She was seized by the need to talk to him, to get close to him again. But Karp was out, somewhere with the cops. Did she want to reach him? She declined—she didn’t want to talk to him by phone, or worse, over the police radio. She scribbled a note—“Off to St. Michael’s—don’t worry, all coming up roses. See you tonite.” She left it on his desk and departed for the appointment with Mrs. Dean.

  I’ll cook a meal, she thought, as she rode uptown on the IRT. I haven’t cooked for us in months. I’ll make minestrone soup from scratch, and a big lasagna with four kinds of cheese and sweet sausages. And a good bottle of something. And I’ll stop off at Zabar’s while I’m uptown and get bagels and lox and smoked whitefish. We’ll have a balanced ethnic weekend, and talk about being married and what I’m going to do with my life. Our life. And then I’ll see if I can sweet-talk my way into getting laid.

  The address Mrs. Dean had given her was on West End Avenue off Seventy-eighth Street. It was a reddish townhouse with large bay windows stuck between two condoized towers, the kind of building that was usually broken up into apartments in this neighborhood. It had the usual broad stone stairway leading to the front door, but Dean had told her to ring at the wrought iron gate under these stairs. She did, received an answering buzz that released the gate’s lock, and rang the bell belonging to the door of the ground floor apartment.

  Mrs. Dean herself opened the door for her. She looks older, was Marlene’s first thought as she shook hands with the woman. Mrs. Dean was dressed in a wide-skirted black dress with a small white collar: the return of the nun. She gave Marlene a cold, formal smile and ushered her through a long ocher-painted hallway dimly lit by sconces made to resemble candelabra and into the living room.

  This proved to be a large dark room furnished in the style of the high-bourgeois West Side—good Duncan Phyfe sofa and wing chairs in pale striped silk, flanking a mahogany coffee table, heavy brocade drapes on the windows, oriental rugs over beige carpets and, on spindly dark side tables, large ceramic statuary lamps with pale silk shades, the lamps in the shape of classical lovers or funerary urns. There were tea things on the coffee table.

  “Please sit down, Miss Ciampi,” said Mrs. Dean, motioning to a love seat in pale green silk, and seating herself in a wing chair on the other side of the low table. “I thought we could have some tea while we talk.” She poured for herself and Marlene and then sat back and looked steadily at her, as if waiting for her to begin something. The apartment was very quiet; the heavy drapes muffled the street sounds. Somewhere a mechanical clock ticked.

  Mrs. Dean seemed to be making an effort to be pleasant. It was a lovely day. This was a nice room. Marlene drank her tea and waited for the older woman to get to the point. When this failed to happen, Marlene took a yellow pad and a pen out of her briefcase and said, “Mrs. Dean, why don’t we start with this man you’ve identified. What’s his name?”

  Mrs. Dean seemed not to hear this question.

  Instead she glanced around the room, and said, “I’ve always meant to redecorate this place. It was my late husband’s apartment before we were married. My second husband. But we never seem to have time—my work keeps me so occupied.”

  She looked back at Marlene, who felt obliged to say conversationally, “Yes, running the center must be a big responsibility.”

  “Oh, not the center. My real work. As you very well understand.”

  Marlene shook her head slightly in confusion and smiled. “I’m sorry … ?”

  Mrs. Dean went on, oblivious: “You’re very subtle, but very powerful. That’s what put me off; I ought to trust my vibrations always. I couldn’t imagine you would strike directly at Him.”

  “Mrs. Dean, I’m getting lost here. What are you talking about?”

  “Of course, when you sent your agents against me I had to act. You’ll be saddened to learn that the little fool got the wrong doll.”

  Marlene felt a flush start across her face. She had forgotten about Junior Gibbs. Was it possible that he had burgled the Dean place, been caught, and ratted her out? She gave herself some good legal advice and kept her mouth shut. Mrs. Dean stood up abruptly and began pacing back and forth in an agitated manner. “No,” she continued, “you were clever, but not clever enough, my dear. One of the few advantages of age, I think, in our profession.”

  She’s flipped out, thought Marlene. Completely loony tunes. This was certainly a new wrinkle on the case, and Marlene was content to sit back and let the lady rave on. In fact, except that her feet were quite cold, she felt remarkably comfortable just sitting and listening and drinking tea, as at a childhood visit to an aging aunt not quite right in the head, but harmless.

  What was she talking about now? Something about her marriage to the Prince of Darkness and the Son of the Dark Union. Actually, her feet were very cold, almost numb. There must be air conditioning on, which was crazy, it was such a nice fall day outside.

  “All for Him,” Mrs. Dean was saying, “as was foretold—first the rituals, then the blood, then He shall come into His power and rule in the name of Lucifer all the kingdoms. And woe to any servant of the powers of earth who does not bend her knee in homage.”

  “I’m going, Mrs. Dean,” said Marlene, reaching for her briefcase. “I hate to say this, but you need psyo … phys … psychological help.” That was odd—she seemed to have trouble talking. Her briefcase was impossibly far away, Marlene thought. Why did I put it way over there? She had to get out of this cold, too. It had crept up to her thighs; her calves and feet felt like frozen meat. Mrs. Dean kept talking and her voice seemed to be getting louder, even though she seemed much farther away.

  “Yes, I knew that he was one of the Powers of the Earth the minute I laid eyes on him. And he in turn knew me for an adept. I was seventeen, and he took me away from that stifling little town that very night, and we rode through the stars together. There was never such a love. He blazed with an immortal fury and we did things that had not been thought of since Egypt was new.

  “He crushed our enemies with his power and then … until … he said I must leave you for a while, leave this sphere, I am called by our Father below, but I leave you a babe who shall be greater than I, the greatest the ages have known. I shall live again in him, and you shall live forever with me in him.

  “In Him. Who you
have profaned, and chained. But great workings are under way, never fear. I know your power and I know how to stop it. Now listen to your fate. In ten days it will be the full moon. I will take you out and place you on naked earth, and pierce your heart with a sword of iron. I will eat your heart on a table made of a sacrifice, a child without blemish. In ten days, your power will flow into me and He will be released.”

  I’ve been drugged, Marlene was thinking as this went on. One part of her mind accepted this while another part was screaming in terror like a rat in a slowly contracting cage. Mrs. Dean sat down across from her and patted her on the cheek. Marlene’s face felt enormous under her touch, as it did at the dentist’s.

  “That’s right, relax,” said Mrs. Dean. “We find it works so well with the children. Of course, we give them a lower dose, so that they’ll wiggle a little for the uncles. Money for the cause, money for the cause.

  “Yes, it was my second husband who taught me about that. His tastes ran that way. Not that I minded. After all, I was wedded for eternity to my Francis. No mere earthly bond could interfere with that. And he was so rich. Francis would not have wanted me and the boy to be degraded by poverty.

  “Of course, he wanted a son of his own. I told him that my womb had been enobled by carrying the Son of the Son of the Morning, but he would not listen, being a crass man of money and a creature of no spirit.

  “In the end, I bore him a son, of a kind, one that would be but a foot-stool to Him, the firstborn one. And then he died for his impertinence. Mr. Dean, I mean. And the son never grew; I had to keep him at home with me, although I said that he was in an institution. But he is useful for some of our work. Very useful. Our services make a nice exhibition for the children. They never tell.” Mrs. Dean giggled.

  Marlene heard the door open, but she couldn’t turn her head to see who it was. She heard heavy steps approaching. Mrs. Dean said, “I don’t believe you’ve met my younger son. This is Alonso.”