TWENTY-THREE
ON LOWENTHAL’S SUGGESTION, POPPY TOOK A TAXI TO HIS HOUSE, HER STORY tucked into a file in her briefcase. All the way there, she thought over what Inspector Loring had told her when she had ‘phoned him upon her return from the Moncriefs’ house: there was no new information on the Moncrief case, but talking with Stacy might change that, and the Knott case was just getting underway; the coroner had not yet released any details other than it was a homicide, which, Wyman had said, was obvious to a blind man. This had brought her nothing more than a grunt from Lowenthal, the demand that she present her story and herself at his home as soon as possible, and added the expectation that she would have more for Monday’s edition, with the unspoken warning that there had better be some kind of break in one of the cases.
“Sure, boss,” she had told him; sitting in the taxi, she felt she was treading on very thin ice, and by the time she arrived at Lowenthal’s house, she was nervous. This would be a test that she was not confident that she was prepared for, and she had so much at stake. As she paid the cabby, she gave him fifty cents extra, and asked him to wait for twenty minutes at the most.
The cabby squinted up at her, taking his measure of her and the nature of the neighborhood around him. “Make it a dollar and I will,” he said, speaking around his cigarette. “Twenty minutes, but not one second longer.”
“That’s fine,” Poppy said, taking her briefcase and her purse before getting out of the cab, and approaching the house in the fading afternoon light.
The porch was small, railed in decorative cast iron from seventy years ago, and painted a dull-red; Poppy surmised that this was the house bought by Lowenthal’s immigrant grandparents, an example of family ties that she found unlike Lowenthal at the office. Taking stock of the rest of the house, she saw that it was carefully maintained, with red shutters on the windows, and relatively recent paint of a dark-buff shade. The door was the same red color as the shutters, and boasted a large, brass knocker, which Poppy used, mentally rehearsing her explanation of what she had written.
“You made good time,” Cornelius Lowenthal declared by way of welcome as he opened the door; he was in a lounging jacket that was a bit too small for his barrel chest, and for a moment, Poppy was apprehensive; Lowenthal’s next order stilled her worries. “Come in and let me have a look at your piece. I don’t want to be late for the deadline. I’ve told them to hold three inches for you.” As reassuring as this was, there was an air of skepticism about him that drained most of her closely held courage.
She stepped into a small entryway, and noticed that the parlor on the right had two lights shining already. “Where would you like me to go?” From her two previous visits, she knew that the front parlor was off to the left, but she thought that a smaller setting might be Lowenthal’s preference this afternoon. He had spoken about a study, but she had no notion as to where it was.
“In to the parlor, of course; on the right. I’ve got a fire going in there, and no one will disturb us,” said Lowenthal, and did not enlarge upon what he meant by no one. “Eunice will bring you coffee, if you want. She’s working on the leg of lamb in the kitchen, for our dinner.”
Poppy knew that Eunice was his wife — they had met at the last Christmas party — but she shook her head. “I think I’d like to get this settled before I have anything. ” She tried to summon up a smile, but could not quite manage it; the taxi was waiting outside, and she did not want to have to ‘phone for one and then wait for it to arrive. She held up her briefcase. “I have the file in here. Three hundred twenty-nine words. There isn’t much about the police investigation because there isn’t much progress to report.”
“Yes, so you said,” Lowenthal agreed, half-escorting Poppy into the parlor; it was a medium-sized, L-shaped room with a tile-fronted fireplace in the west wall where three cut logs were burning in the grate behind a linked-metal screen. The draperies had not yet been pulled over the windows, and the soft purplish afternoon light suffused the room. “Take the occasional chair. I’ll use the loveseat.” These two pieces of furniture, matchingly upholstered in dark-blue damask, were set at right angles to each other, with a round mahogany coffee table in front of both.
“Whatever you like,” said Poppy automatically, a little disconcerted by this display of polite regard; she went to the chair Lowenthal had indicated, and sat down, crossing her ankles next to her briefcase. “Before I wrote the piece for you, I spoke to Loring earlier. I’ll see him again tomorrow, and — ”
“Yes, yes; call me after you talk to your Inspector; just keep in mind that he’s going to be pumping you as much as you’re pumping him; don’t be too obliging unless he’s helpful,” said Lowenthal impatiently, going to the loveseat and plunking himself down in it, settling back against the cushions. “So where are your three hundred twenty-nine words? I want to run my eyes over them.” He held out his hand.
Poppy moved her briefcase onto the flowered carpet and opened it in order to bring out the manila file, which she offered to him. “I’ve tried for a more-to-come tone, as — ”
Lowenthal waved her to silence as he opened the file and took out the two wide-margined pages. “Hush up, Thornton.”
She obeyed, only nodding before going still as well as silent, and focused her attention on the nearest lamp, and was almost disappointed when it did not flicker. So, she thought, I’m on my own. She folded her hands on top of her purse and stared out the front window; she followed the progress of an airplane across a swath of thin clouds, and thought about her Aunt Esther, who, according to her letter from Vladivostok, had recently learned to fly.
Lowenthal continued to read carefully, frowning from time to time, and occasionally pausing to reread small portions of Poppy’s work while he twiddled his hair. Finally he put the pages down on the table. “It’ll do,” he announced, which, for him, was high praise. “I’ll make a few minor cuts in it and messenger it down to the Clarion.” He leaned back. “You’re skimming the rim on some of what you have here, but it isn’t enough to have the mouthpieces put the kibosh on it, or that’s my take on how it looks. You won’t get spiked.” He showed her a vulpine smile. “There may be a future for you in crime, after all, Thornton. I got to admit, I didn’t think so when I put you on the case, but you’re rising to the challenge.”
Poppy was startled by his remarks, but she only said, “Thank you, boss.”
He smoothed his hair. “So where do you go from here?”
“That depends on the cops, doesn’t it?” Before he could start to lecture her, she went on, “I think it would be best to be open to all possibilities, since the police don’t have any likely suspect yet. We don’t want to get the public in an uproar for no good reason. The courts don’t like it when someone is wrongly convicted of a crime in the press.”
“No,” said Lowenthal. “That they don’t.” He coughed gently. “I like the way you rolled in the Knott murder, making it another part of the pattern, not necessarily connected to Moncrief, but an unhappy coincidence through Hadley and Grimes. And you’re right: high society has been rocked by the violent deaths happening in a matter of days. I know I’ve told you to keep your eye out for a scandal, but make sure you have solid proof of one, if it crops up. For now, we’ll keep you on Knott as well as Moncrief, but how long will be up to you and what you can uncover to show a link. High society isn’t like the gangsters — they kill each other all the time — but the upper crust doesn’t go in for slaughter. Having your by-line on the pieces gives us a degree of protection from suits, and you know it’s possible that we could get sued if we don’t back up everything we print.”
“I remember the trial. The Clarion did step over the line then, and Richman was right to resign over it,” Poppy said in as mild a voice as she could; she did not add that Lowenthal’s promotion to his present position was one of the results of Vincent Richman’s miscalculation.
“That was during the Great War. Things were different then.” He shifted on the loveseat. �
��But Richman went too far. Saying a man is an enemy spy without rock-solid evidence is irresponsible, and having German relatives isn’t good enough. It muddies the water too much.”
Poppy shook her head, then took a chance. “It’s still not that different. And, boss, you really did dodge a bullet with the Boorsten incident.”
Since Lowenthal had been at the center of that crisis some three years ago, he pulled at his lower lip as he thought. “You got a point there, Thornton. The Board wouldn’t tolerate another blunder like that one. So check all your sources and make sure of the details. It’s safer to print when there are details; and don’t rely on relatives — no matter what they promise you, in the end they’ll circle the wagons and throw you to the wolves.”
“That’s why I’ll be doubly careful,” Poppy vowed.
“And you understand the ground rules. That’s good. Get to work on it this evening.” Then he raised his voice. “Eunice! Coffee and a couple of your fresh doughnuts.”
A swinging door opened at the end of the parlor’s L-shape, and Eunice Lowenthal came in with a laden tray; she was in a neat, flowered house-dress with an old-fashioned full skirt that fell to four inches above her ankle. She gave Poppy a wide smile as she set down the tray directly in front of her husband. “It’s good to see you, Miss Thornton.”
“Thank you, Missus Lowenthal,” Poppy said, realizing for the first time that Eunice Lowenthal must have been a very pretty, soft-faced young woman, but the softness had sagged and left her with an uncomfortable facial resemblance to a Basset hound; to add to the decline, she now had a stout-bodied figure, a testament to her skills as a cake-and-pastry baker, all developments that she took on with patient dignity, meticulous attention to dressmaking, and careful haircuts to minimize the loss of her beauty. “Would you like me to pour?”
“You go right ahead,” said Lowenthal for Poppy. “She takes one sugar and a little cream.”
“Is that what you would like?” Eunice asked Poppy.
“That would be fine,” said Poppy, grateful to Eunice for this courtesy.
Eunice took her good china coffee pot and poured out a steaming stream of it into a Limoges cup, then took up the creamer and added about half a teaspoon of the cream to Poppy’s coffee, after which she held out the sugar-bowl and sugar-tongs to Poppy. “Have as much as you like.”
Poppy used the tongs to take one cube. “Thank you; this will be fine.” She used the very small spoon in her saucer to stir the coffee, thinking that Aunt Jo would approve of Eunice Lowenthal’s hostessing skills.
The nearest light flickered.
“Electricity!” Lowenthal exclaimed. “Well, it’s great when it works. Eunice, I’ll have a little imported sugar in mine; the sugar that was delivered last Tuesday, from Ireland. And then break out the kerosene lamps, just in case.”
“Yes, I will,” said Eunice tonelessly, filling another Limoges cup, but leaving a more space. “I’ll be right back — with your sugar.”
It was at moments like this that Poppy wished she were more like her Aunt Esther, who would lambaste Lowenthal for treating his wife in such a way; but since Poppy had a job to protect, she offered Eunice an understanding smile.
“Would you like any … sugar, Miss Thornton?” Eunice asked.
Knowing that the sugar in this case was whiskey, Poppy shook her head. “What I have is fine, thank you.”
“You should have some,” Lowenthal encouraged her. “To celebrate. It’s excellent sugar.”
“I’ll celebrate at home, later. After I get some more work done.” She closed her briefcase and picked up her cup-and-saucer. “So I’ll leave as soon as I’ve finished my coffee, and one of these doughnuts.”
Lowenthal signaled with his hand. “Chop-chop, Eunice.”
Poppy bit back a sharp remark, sinking her teeth into the powdered-sugar-and-pastry of Eunice Lowenthal’s justly famous doughnut; the powdered sugar held to her lipstick, and Poppy reached for a napkin to wipe it away. “Boss,” she began hesitantly. “You have a housekeeper and a cook, don’t you? Why does Missus Lowenthal always serve your guests?”
Lowenthal lifted his caterpillar eyebrows as if he had never noticed this. “I don’t know. She always has, from the time we got married, and I was a reporter, just like you.”
Not just like me; you were never female, Poppy thought, but said, “But she doesn’t have to now, does she?” She heard a car start outside and realized that her cab was leaving. Returning her attention to Lowenthal, she wondered if she should change her mind about the whiskey.
“See if you can convince her of that.” He sighed. “I keep telling her, let Missus Waters serve, or hire Waters’ niece to do it when we entertain, but she won’t hear of it. She takes her own doughnuts and cakes to the Veterans’ Home every two weeks, and plays pinochle with the men there. She’s a dynamite pinochle player. Beats me six times out of seven. And she’s a Quaker; you wouldn’t think she’d go in for playing cards.” His obvious pride in his wife’s talents startled Poppy, who found her disapprobation in her boss’ conduct fading. “You know, the Great War was a real eye-opener. As all the Doughboys went off to war, a lot of their sisters and wives took over their places in industry — well, you must know that: your Aunt Esther organized whole companies of them, just as she trained many nurses during the ‘Flu. During the Great War, your aunt had women driving the dairy trucks, and delivering the mail, and manning the telephones for the police, and distributing public support to the poor, and setting the type for the newspapers. Between the Great War and the ‘Flu, we lost a lot of those women, along with the men who died in the epidemic and in battle. My mother pitched in, did her part.” He paused thoughtfully. “She was fifty when she started her work, a grandmother, and with a crippled husband at home, but she took on dispatching ambulances for Pittsburgh — that’s my hometown — from 1916 to 1921.”
This was news to Poppy, and as she listened to Cornelius Lowenthal go on, her opinion of him continued to change. “Do you have any brothers or sisters?” She realized that she had never heard him speak of brothers or sisters.
“Used to have five, but the ‘Flu got the oldest of us — Augustus — and my sister Lorelei died in childbirth in ‘15. I’m the fifth of six. Lorelei was the second. My brother Thaddeus, the third, is in Washington, one of those behind-the-scenes men in the Justice Department. My sister Celeste, the fourth, is married and lives in Montpellier with her four kids; her husband is a civil engineer. My brother Everest, the youngest, is in a veterans’ home in Florida; he’s not right in his head. He had Trench Fever, and it damaged his brain. ”
“Oh.” Poppy tried to think of something appropriate to say, and came up with “I’m sorry about your brother.”
Eunice came back through the swinging door, a small pitcher in her hands. “Your sugar, Mister Lowenthal.” She extended the pitcher to him, and gave him a satisfied smile.
Lowenthal took the pitcher and poured in a quarter of a cup of his Irish sugar. “Thanks, sweetheart,” he said.
“I’ll leave you alone for now,” Eunice said. “Call me if you need anything. Nice to see you again, Miss Thornton.”
“Thank you, Missus Lowenthal,” said Poppy to the retreating Eunice.
“She’s a gem; I’m a lucky man.” Lowenthal said with a brief grin that was so lopsided that Poppy wondered if this was the first time he had had recourse to his imported sugar this afternoon, or was it that he had a hidden streak of sentimentality. “So, Thornton, how soon can you turn in your Monday story tomorrow? You’ll bring it to me, like today, unless I tell you otherwise. I don’t want you getting into trouble. That doesn’t look good for anybody.”
The lamp flickered again.
“Damn!” Lowenthal took up his cup of coffee now laced with whiskey. “I hope we have enough kerosene for the night.”
“It may just be something on the line; our lights flicker regularly.” Poppy took another bite of her doughnut, and again wiped her mouth.
“You l
ive farther out. I’m not surprised you have trouble. But young Ben Franklin walked by this house from time to time. You’d think our service would be more reliable. There’s an electrical station two blocks away, right next to the fire station.” He had more coffee and took his doughnut from the plate. “As soon as I’m done, I’ll call the messenger, and then a cab to send you home.” He chewed vigorously, then had a gulp of his coffee. “I know it’s an inconvenience to have you come all this way, but you must see that it’s necessary. Don’t worry, the paper will pay for it.”
This gesture of generosity outside the office made Poppy wonder why Lowenthal was being so helpful. “I can take the streetcar.”
“Yes, you can, but Eunice would never let me hear the end of it.” He continued to devour his doughnut, making his observations around his chewing. “I don’t want it said … that I would allow a woman alone … to ride the streetcar after sunset … Especially not one … of my own reporters.”
“Then, thank you, boss,” she said, and finished her doughnut before drinking the last of her coffee, noticing how the shadows were encroaching on the parlor.
Lowenthal set down his cup and lumbered out of the loveseat, and made his way into the entry-hall where the telephone stand was situated. He spoke curtly to the operator, giving the woman the number of the Clarion. As soon as he finished ordering a messenger to come to his house, he rang off and then placed a second call to the Liberty Taxi Company, requesting a taxi at his address in ten minutes. Then he hung up and trundled back into the parlor, closing the draperies before returning to the loveseat. “The taxi will come shortly. You might as well add a little more coffee to your cup and have another doughnut.”
“Thank you, but I’ll pass,” Poppy said, and noticed the lamp fluctuating rapidly, and concluded that Holte was doing the ghostly equivalent of laughing.
Haunting Investigation Page 21