by Amanda Cross
“What did he say? Father, I cannot tell a lie, especially when it looks as though I may be found out?”
“He was quite frank about the whole thing. He didn’t think anyone knew they knew each other; and, what with his little trouble about the malpractice suit, he didn’t like to risk being entangled with the police. You have to admit he wasn’t in an enviable position, the girl killed next door, and he having known her. He quite simply hoped we’d never find out there was any connection between them; and, in fact, if it hadn’t been for the will and the picture, we probably never would have. And Miss Dribble, of course.”
“Of course. Someone was bound to have seen them, one time or another. If the police had investigated him more, and Emanuel less, they might have found someone else who had seen them by now. Didn’t the fact that Miss Dribble had been dug up by me, another suspect, make them suspicious about that evidence?”
“You’ve more or less been demoted from the list of suspects—the active list, anyway. They did quite a little investigation of you, as you will doubtless be hearing from your friends and associates. Your colleagues considered the idea that you would steal a piece of work from a student ridiculous, and they went on to point out, with some heat, I understand, the various complications of scholarly research. Also—please try not to get upset—the idea that you were still in love with Emanuel, if you ever had been, was proved untenable by the fact that you had been, more recently, in love with someone else.”
“I see. Did they discover his name?”
“Oh, yes, they saw him. Kate, this is a murder case. I’m sorry to have to mention it—but I’d rather you heard about it first from me, and were prepared. You’re not, I understand, at the moment planning to marry? Sorry—I shouldn’t have asked that. Anyway, there didn’t seem much reason why you should have done it, and, of course, there were other things apart from motive which made you unlikely. You aren’t angry, are you?”
“No, not angry, and not planning to be married. Now, don’t get all nervous and fumble with your dispatch case. I appreciate your honesty, and I want to hear more about Barrister. What did he say, exactly? Had they been having a grand passion?”
“He met her at about the time the picture was taken—he needed it for some official reason or other. I think he would have liked to be vague about when he knew her, but we’ve had a man working on Janet Harrison’s history—you do underestimate the forces of law, my dear—and he discovered that Janet Harrison had gone on an extended trip to the wilds of Canada. I guess Barrister knew that we would soon discover, if we hadn’t—and as a matter of fact we hadn’t—that he too had been in the same wilds, so he told us they were together there. I gather it was one of those romances, as with people who meet on a cruise or in Italy, lifted out of the daily round of life and unlikely to endure after the return to the daily round. After that Barrister came to New York, and as far as he was concerned it was finished, at least as a serious attachment. But Janet Harrison decided to become a nurse, apparently the better to be a doctor’s wife, and then she had to go home when her father died. After one thing and another, and the passage of years, even though she hadn’t heard from him especially, she came to New York. She needed some sort of excuse, so she decided to study English literature at your university. We don’t know why she picked that over history, which had been her college major.”
“I can guess at one possible reason, though she may just have thought it was easier to read novels than learn dates. The history department demands that its applicants take something called a Graduate Record Exam; the English department doesn’t. Therefore she would have less trouble getting accepted by the graduate English department—her college record would do it.”
“You’re probably right. At any rate, there she was. She was naturally a most unconfiding sort, he says—which God knows we’ve discovered—and he managed to keep the relationship quiet and to see her only occasionally, though she was a nuisance. He admits it. Apparently she decided to go to an analyst in order to get over her infatuation, though Barrister didn’t call it that, and the fact that she hit on Emanuel was coincidence—though Barrister did know that she admired you very much, which is why she asked you to recommend someone. He hoped she’d be cured, and even offered, he told us, to help pay the fees. He was very frank, Kate, and, I’m afraid, very believable. Like you, he underestimates the police, and thought, if they had a nice motive like that, he’d be for it. The shock when Nicola called him in to look at the body was considerable—I can well believe it. It’s to his credit that he called the police immediately. Incidentally, he could have said he had to examine her, shut the door, and looked through her bag, in which case he might have found that picture. He did no such thing.”
“That picture must have given him a jolt.”
“No question that the police slipped up there. But of course they thought it was a recent photograph, so I suppose they are to be forgiven. As I say, he told all this quite openly, throwing himself on the mercy of the police. He admitted he was telling it now because the police seemed close to finding it out. He also said that men don’t kill women who are inconveniently in love with them, and he hoped we realized it.”
“Were they lovers?”
“He was asked that, although the police call it having an intimate relationship. He hesitated over that one—that is, he said ‘no’ at first, and then said they had been, in the wilds of Canada. He smiled and said he supposed she might have told Emanuel that, so he’d better admit it; he was younger, etcetera, etcetera, but he was emphatic that they had not been ‘intimate’ in New York. He said openly he had not the slightest intention of marrying her, and to have made love to her would have made him both a cad and a fool. A fool, because what he wanted was for her to go quietly away.”
“What about Messenger?”
“He admitted that puzzled him. He had spoken to her about Messenger, in Canada, with great admiration apparently, but why she should make a will leaving her money to Messenger years later Barrister didn’t know. Messenger is going to have to bear a certain amount of looking into, there’s no question of that.”
“And Barrister didn’t steal the porter’s uniform and burgle her room?”
“The police asked him about that, in a roundabout way. He threw up his hands and said that if he would lie to the police in order to avoid a scandal, he was certainly not, as a women’s doctor, going to get himself caught wandering around a women’s dormitory. He admitted to being relieved as hell that she lived there, since it meant he didn’t have to make excuses for not going to her room, and there’s no question he avoided the place like the plague.”
“It’s still odd their relationship was so secret.”
“I know that, and so does he. It’s one of the things that puts him on the spot. But, Kate, you’d be amazed the queer things that turn up in people’s lives, once you start rooting around. I could many a tale unfold. And when the police start asking questions because someone’s been connected with a murder case, at least half the time that someone has something he isn’t too proud of, or doesn’t want known, and he’ll lie and muck up the investigation. For example, Nicola once got fed up enough with her husband to fling off and have an affair with another man—did you know that?”
“No.”
“All right, and remember, you don’t know it now. Nicola didn’t tell us, nor Emanuel. We found it out. Well, Barrister is found out, too. But while it sounds illogical, because he did try to keep the relationship secret after the murder, he still would not necessarily, or even probably, have figured that he could keep it quiet if he were deciding to murder her, at least the way I see it. And the motive just won’t do. If you think about it calmly, you’ll admit it.”
“I’ve already admitted it, damn it!”
“When there’s a murder, the police lift up a rock that’s been in place a long time. And if you’ve ever lifted up such a rock, you know that there are all sorts of slimy, crawly things underneath. Human beings, by a
nd large, are not a very commendable lot.”
“So we’re back with Emanuel?”
“They haven’t been able to prove that Emanuel ever saw Janet Harrison outside of the office, but then you see how long they took to establish the connection with Barrister.”
“How many men was she supposed to have been seeing, in her quiet way?”
“You never know, with that type. If the police could get one outside witness, one piece of corroborating evidence, I’d think they’d risk an arrest. Of course, the District Attorney’s office is not happy to see arrests if they think they’ll lose the case when it comes to trial.”
“But the way I’ve heard it, they’ll push the case if they’ve got enough evidence, even when they know in their heart of hearts that the accused is innocent.”
“Sometimes. But the police don’t have hearts of hearts. They don’t work on flair. They work on evidence; the more circumstantial, the better. As it is, between you and me, I think they might risk it with Emanuel. It was his couch, his knife, his patient, and he was the only one likely to be sitting in his chair, with her lying down. There have been cases with no more evidence than that. But his office was, so to speak, wide open, of which a good defense lawyer could make plenty. If they can establish motive, they’ve got him, though.”
“Is that what you think will happen, Reed?”
“No. I believe you, and I believe your judgment of him. But, Kate, where else are we going to look? The police don’t think it’s likely that a homicidal maniac was at work, and I agree with them. Of course, Messenger’s a possibility, but an awfully farfetched one.”
“Why can’t they arrest Barrister as well as Emanuel? Barrister had the motive. I know it’s not the world’s greatest motive, but, speaking of smart lawyers …”
“The motive without the evidence isn’t enough. Anyway, not a motive like that. Well, at least things are breaking. At least we’ve got the detectives started on Sparks and Horan, and something may come from there. What, by the way, has happened to your Jerry?”
“I sent him out to see Messenger.”
“Kate, I really think, after what I said …”
“I know—rave on. If Jerry comes up with any startling facts, I promise to tell you. But judging from his report over the phone, Messenger is another innocent babe. You know, Reed, it would be a hell of a blow to psychiatry if they arrested Emanuel. I mean, he’s not a fly-by-night crank, or someone who had just taken up psychiatry. He’s a member of, and therefore backed by, the most austere institute of psychiatry in the country. Even I, who argue with Emanuel constantly, cannot believe that they would admit as a member, after the extended analysis they require, a man who could murder a patient on a couch. And I’m sure they didn’t. Even if he weren’t convicted, his arrest would be a hell of a blow. Perhaps there’s someone around who loathes psychiatry, and he’s going to murder patients at regular, widely spaced intervals, in order to discredit the profession. Maybe you’d better ask all the suspects what they think about psychiatry.”
“I’ll make a note of it. Now I must go and get some sleep. I’ve got a trial coming up tomorrow—grand jury, question of pornography. Perhaps we ought to blow ourselves up, all of us, and start again, after the earth has cooled a few hundred years, and try to make a better job of it.”
With which happy thought, Kate went to bed.
In the morning Jerry, looking downcast, arrived with his report. He sat angrily flipping the pages of a magazine while Kate read his notes. Jerry had reported his conversation with Messenger in the form of dialogue; this was followed by an exact, unflattering description of the doctor and completed by an account of Jerry’s impressions. He might not have felt there was much substance in the report, but he had taken care with its form. Kate congratulated him on his neatness, but he sneered.
“You were literary,” she said.
“Weren’t we, though? Do you recognize that thing from Lawrence he was gabbing on about?”
“Oh, yes, I think so. It must have made quite an impression on Barrister. It’s from the beginning of The Rainbow—nobody ever did children better than Lawrence, which is probably because he didn’t have any. I take it Messenger was a man you would have felt inclined to trust.”
“Yes, he was, if that’s worth anything. I’m sure it isn’t. In fact, if you want to know, he reminded me of you.”
“Of me? Do my ears stick out?”
Jerry flushed. “I didn’t mean physically. The impression I have of him was like the impression I have of you. Don’t ask me what I mean—it’s just that, both of you might be dishonest, but you’d know you were doing it.”
“That’s a nice compliment, Jerry.”
“Is it? It’s probably pure, unadulterated crap. What do I do now?”
“He didn’t give the impression that he was being dishonest and knowing it?”
“No, he didn’t. I’d swear he was honest. Yet people will swear that confident men are honest.”
“I think,” Kate said, “that we’ll assume he’s honest. At least until we have any reason to doubt it. There has to be a constant in every equation—up to now we’ve had only variables. I think we’ll put Messenger in as the constant, and then see what X turns out to equal. Jerry, would you mind awfully much just hanging around? I think I may send you to Michigan. The trouble is, if you want to know, we have been approaching this whole problem with fettered imaginations.”
She began to pace up and down the room. Jerry groaned.
Seventeen
IT had been Thursday morning when Kate had spoken to Jerry. It was now Friday evening. Kate had that day again asked someone to take her lectures. She faced Reed, who sat on her couch, his legs stretched out before him.
“I don’t know if I can tell you what happened, properly, from the beginning,” she said, “but I can tell you where I began yesterday morning. I began with an idle joke, from one doctor to another, months ago. I began with a dated photograph. I began with one of the great modern novels, and a scene in it, indelibly impressed on the mind of a man because it recalled to him a vital moment of his childhood. I began with a punning association in a dream, an association not of love or infatuation, but hate or fear. I began also with an old lady, and the wilds of Canada.
“I had decided to believe Messenger—you read Jerry’s report just now. Messenger said Barrister wasn’t capable of murder, and while that statement might be doubted, I decided not, for the moment, to doubt it.
“There were a few other facts whirling around also. A suit for malpractice. Sparks, who never forgets a face. Nicola, and her willingness to tell a sympathetic listener, or even an unsympathetic one, almost anything he may want to know about her life. A window cleaner, who turned out never to exist, but who suggested to me the ease with which anyone, with access to the court outside Emanuel’s office and kitchen, could study those rooms. My visits to see Emanuel and Nicola, in the good old days before the crime. A question put to me, ‘Professor Fansler, do you know a good psychiatrist?’
“These were all whirling around, as I say, but suddenly on Thursday morning they seemed to fall into place. I then did, or caused to be done, three things.
“The first involved Nicola. I called her up, and urged her to get herself, as subtly as possible, into a conversation with Barrister. This wasn’t hard for Nicola. She simply appeared at his office door after his patients had departed, reminded him that he had said he was eager to do what he could to help, and announced that what she needed was someone to talk to. When I was a kid, we used to play a game I thought rather silly. One person would be given, on a slip of paper, a ridiculous phrase, such as ‘My father plays piano with his toes.’ The point was to tell a story to your opponent, who, of course, had not seen the slip of paper, and to work your ridiculous sentence into it. Naturally, what you did was to tell a story full of outrageous statements, since your opponent had three challenges to discover which was the one on the slip of paper. Of course, the opponent almost never got
it, because all the statements you made were as outrageous as ‘My father plays piano with his toes.’ This, in effect, was what Nicola had to do. I wanted to know Barrister’s opinion of D. H. Lawrence, particularly of The Rainbow, and particularly of one incident in The Rainbow. Nicola had reread the appropriate section of the novel—fortunately, it came in the first seventy-five pages. She had to introduce this, however, along with lots of other literary discussion, so that it would not stand out from the surrounding material.
“Nicola did it beautifully.
“The second thing I ‘did’ was done by Nicola also. She fluttered, in her delightful way, around Barrister’s office, and managed to discover, partly by asking him, but mostly by telling him—you miss a lot by not knowing Nicola’s style—a bit of his routine.
“The third thing cost money. I sent Jerry out to a little town called Bangor, Michigan. He’s on his way back now, but I spoke to him on the phone last night. Jerry had quite a time. He was looking for an old lady, but she was dead. Fortunately, it’s a small town, and he managed to find the people the old lady had lived with before she died. They weren’t related to her; she paid them for her room and meals, and for her care. This arrangement had been made by Michael Barrister, who, of course, comes from Bangor, Michigan.
“It was Michael Barrister who supported the old lady; it was not a great amount of money he paid to the couple in whose house she lived, and as she grew older, and needed more care, he increased the amount. When she died, Michael Barrister made a quite suitable gift of money to the people who had cared for her over the years, and had given her, I suppose, the kind of affection that can’t be bought.
“All this was straightforward enough, but I was after something else, and Jerry, with his boyish charm, managed to get it. He asked if the checks had ever stopped. After this build-up, you may perhaps not be overcome with astonishment to hear that they had. Barrister had sent a check every month, all through college, medical school, his internship, and his residency. Then they stopped.