The Good Friday Murder

by Lee Harris

  The dinner was hamburgers and french fries, a can of Coke, and vanilla ice cream, an all-American meal to celebrate our country’s birthday.

  “Do you like hamburgers?” I asked.

  “I like mine with ketchup,” James said.

  “Here’s some ketchup.” I picked up the sealed packet that was on his tray and tore it open. “You can squeeze it on,” I explained, showing him.

  “Where’s the bottle?”

  “The bottle’s in the kitchen. It’s easier to use these on a tray.”

  “I like that,” Robert said. He had managed to open his ketchup packet himself with only slight damage. He wiped up the spilled red sauce with his napkin.

  “This is a good Fourth of July dinner,” I said. “You know that today is the Fourth of July, don’t you?” I addressed the question to both of them.

  “No, it’s not,” Robert answered. He didn’t seem upset at my error. He was smiling.

  “Sure it is. It’s Wednesday, July fourth.”

  “Today is April ninth,” James said. “It’s Easter Sunday.”

  23

  My thought at that moment was, I wish Joseph were here. It would have been wonderful for her to see firsthand how right she was. Forty years of their lives had been lost, and the only saving grace was that the twins had forgotten—or never comprehended—how bad those years had been.

  I explained simply that they had been apart for a long time. I promised to bring a calendar the next day and we would talk about it. I stayed until the second bed was put in the room. Then I left them in the care of Greenwillow.

  —

  Thursday morning I drove to Greenwillow as early as I felt was decent, carrying a church calendar Aunt Meg kept in the kitchen. The twins were sitting jacketless in the backyard. I pulled a chair over and said good morning.

  “Good morning, Chris.” James.

  “Good morning, Chris.” Robert.

  “It’s a nice day, isn’t it?”

  “Warm,” James said.

  “When were you born, James?”

  “February nineteenth, 1921.”

  “I was born first,” Robert added. “He’s the baby.”

  “What day of the week was that?”

  “Saturday,” they chorused.

  I took a sheet of paper from my bag on which I had jotted down some dates and days, using Aunt Meg’s old almanac. “Do you remember May sixteenth, 1949?”

  “I remember,” Robert said. “It was a Monday.”

  “It was sunny,” James said. “Magda came and we went out for a walk.”

  “Did she come in the morning or the afternoon?”

  “In the afternoon. In May she always came in the afternoon.”

  That would fit with what I knew. Magda was still in high school then. It wasn’t until the following fall that she started coming in the morning.

  “What day would July fifth, 1990, be?” I asked.

  They looked thoughtful.

  “Thursday,” James said.

  “Yes,” I agreed. “It would be Thursday. Robert, James.” I looked at each of them. “One day in 1950, someone put you in one place and you in another place. Yesterday you came back together. This is 1990.” I opened Aunt Meg’s calendar and turned the pages until I got to July. I put my finger on the fifth.

  “Where is 1950?” Robert asked.

  “It’s gone,” I said. Ridiculously, I wanted to apologize, to say how sorry I was that I couldn’t get it back for them.

  They had become contemplative, if that was the word. Perhaps they were trying to assimilate what I had said. I sat quietly, not wanting to complicate their thoughts with something else new.

  Finally James said, “Nineteen fifty-one.”

  After a moment, Robert said, “Nineteen fifty-two.”

  They alternated the years until Robert reached 1990. Then they stopped. They had brought themselves up-to-date.

  —

  I hung around Greenwillow most of the day, but I spent only a little time now and then with the twins. I visited with Gene, went out to lunch, chatted with Virginia. Each time I returned to the twins, they greeted me like a long-lost friend.

  I played the calendar game with them again, asking what day of the week dates before and after their lifetime occurred on. They seemed to alternate in giving answers without ever overtly agreeing to do so, and they were always correct.

  In the afternoon I walked with them in the small area behind the residence. “Do you remember Dr. Weintraub?” I asked.

  “Oh yes,” James responded. “He plays games with us.”

  “What kind of games?”

  “Number games,” Robert said, and I recalled the twins’ talent for coming up with prime numbers of increasingly larger denomination.

  “When was the last time you saw him?”

  “Friday,” James said, and my heart skipped a beat. “March thirty-first. He came after lunch. We played the radio game with him.”

  “What’s the radio game?”

  “President Truman broke away from reporters during his morning constitutional to talk to a young lady in a wheelchair. The lady, Miss Sue Ann Rogers from Iowa City, said afterward that she just wanted to tell the president how proud she was of him and how happy she was to have shaken his hand. Reporters who stopped to speak to Miss Rogers were unable to catch up with the president and returned instead to the White House.” Robert spoke these words with the tone and cadence of a seasoned, old-time radio announcer, and I realized he was repeating something he had heard on the radio.

  “That’s a good game,” I said. “What did Dr. Weintraub say when you told him that?”

  “Good for you, Robert,” James said. “You’re a man of many talents.”

  “You both are,” I told them, wondering later if they had any idea what the sentence meant. But it didn’t seem to matter to the twins; they were happy.

  —

  When I got home I found a large, thick envelope on the doormat. The return address was New Hope, James’s erstwhile home. I opened the envelope and found a number of stapled scientific papers, all printed on one side, and a brief note from Dr. Sanderson apologizing for the lateness of the package.

  It seemed to me there was very little I could learn from the material that would help me to find Mrs. Talley’s murderer, but I thought it would be interesting to see the kinds of experiments that had been done with the twins. And I was particularly interested in Dr. Weintraub’s letter setting forth his reasons for believing in the twins’ innocence.

  The letter turned out to be at the top of the pile, and I pulled it out of the rubber-banded pack and took it to the dining room. It was a beautifully written document in which the doctor described the twins, whom he had known over a period of nearly two years, in terms that would have deflated the toughest prosecutor. He had visited each of the twins in jail (separately, I noted), and had been shocked at the degree of regression each exhibited.

  Finally there was an impassioned plea for a reexamination of the facts of the case, the immediate release on bond of the twins to the custody of an institution he named, and a new effort to find the killer of Mrs. Talley.

  Jack called as I finished reading the letter. This time his enthusiasm was as great as his amazement. “You really did it,” he said after I’d run through yesterday and today. “Did you ask them any thing about Good Friday?”

  “Not yet. I’m waiting for you to be there. I really don’t know what to do if they name someone as the killer.”

  “I’ll bring a tape recorder. Can I pick you up about ten?”

  “Ten’s fine.”

  After we hung up, I called Magda and told her the news.

  “My boys are together,” she said, sounding tearful.

  “I’d like you to see them. Are you free tomorrow?”

  “Yes. I can be free.”

  “I’ll pick you up and we’ll drive to Greenwillow together.”

  She agreed to be ready at nine-thirty. I was starting to worry
about my car. It was seeing more activity in two weeks than in all the years I’d owned it.

  24

  The twins didn’t really recognize her until she spoke.

  “My boys,” she said, looking from one to the other. “It’s me, Magda. Look at you, how wonderful you look.”

  They broke into smiles, and I sat on a chair a little away from them to keep out of the conversation. I had told Magda not to talk to them about Good Friday. Instead, she reviewed days she had spent with them, remembering with delight skirts, sweaters, and dresses she had worn in the 1950s when Robert and James described them.

  At one point Magda tried to ask them about a date during their forty-year hiatus. The reaction was striking. They looked at each other but said nothing. There was no little smile, no brightening eyes, just the silence of life without memory.

  I joined them after a while and asked them if they remembered going to church. Working backward from April 1950, they gave me dates three or four weeks apart, details—“Mama wore her fur coat”—and occasionally some special thing that happened—“A baby cried.” At one point I asked them if they remembered the mass, and to my amazement, they began to recite in Latin.

  “Dominus vobiscum.” James.

  “Et cum spiritu tuo.” Robert.

  “Sursum corda.” James.

  “Habemus ad Dominum.” Robert.

  “Gratias agamus Domino Deo nostro.” James.

  “Dignum et justum est.” Robert.

  It gave me a rather wonderful feeling of having entered a time warp. I have no memory of Latin masses, which ended with John XXIII.

  I took Magda home early enough that I would avoid the commuter rush when I returned to Oakwood. In and out of New York twice in one day is a little more than I find tolerable.

  I ate dinner with Dr. Sanderson’s pile of papers next to me. Besides developing a great respect for Dr. Weintraub, I felt he must have been a very warm and caring man. His affection for the twins crept into his writing. I found it refreshing.

  The phone rang while I was getting ready for bed.

  “Christine Bennett?” a man asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “This is Harry Forrest. I live on Sunset Drive, over on the other side of town. How’re you doing with those twins?”

  “Just fine. I’m working hard at it.”

  “Got anything yet or are you still digging?”

  For some reason, he irritated me. “I’m still trying, Mr. Forrest.”

  “Well, good luck. Just wanted to know how things were going.”

  That night, for the first time since I had left St. Stephen’s, I had trouble falling asleep. Tomorrow we would ask the twins the crucial questions of that long-ago Good Friday. It would surely be an emotional day.

  And for me, too, it would be special. It was a week since I had seen Jack, and I found myself wanting him in a very physical way. I wanted to be near him. I wanted to touch him. I dearly wanted to be kissed.

  So I tossed and turned for a while, anticipating the coming day.

  —

  Jack arrived a little before ten, armed with a small tape recorder, several tapes, and fresh batteries. We drove in his car and arrived at Greenwillow at ten-thirty.

  Virginia didn’t ordinarily work on weekends, and as she didn’t know of my plans for today, she was absent. The twins were sitting at a round, umbrellaed table behind the building, where we’d been doing our talking since the Fourth. I stopped and said hello to Gene, introducing him to Jack. I told Gene we’d have lunch with him later, and he went to join a friend. Gene happens to love Greenwillow. Sometimes on my visits I’ve had the feeling he’d rather be with another resident than with me.

  We joined the twins at their table, and I introduced Jack. He showed them the tape recorder and let each of them say something which he played back. They were fascinated by the sound of their voices, and they agreed on tape to let Jack record our conversation. We began by demonstrating their calendar talents and then I asked them if they remembered April seventh, 1950.

  There was no hesitation. They recalled the doorbell ringing and Magda coming in. They recounted their departure to the park, Magda’s questions about the day she was born, their answers. As I listened, I realized Magda had been my second-best witness; everything she had said was corroborated by the twins.

  We relived their return to the apartment, Mama’s return with two bags of groceries—“Mama bought Corn Flakes today,” from James—and Magda’s departure.

  “Did you eat lunch?” I asked.

  “Cheese sandwiches,” Robert said. “There’s no ham today. It’s Good Friday.” (I could almost hear his mother explaining it to him.)

  After lunch, Mama turned on the radio and sat down with a book. “You boys go to your bedroom and be good boys.” James said the words as though he were his own mother.

  They went to their bedroom and looked at pictures in a magazine. (It sounded like Life, but I couldn’t be sure).

  There was silence. I could imagine their minds turning the pages of the forty-year-old magazine.

  Jack signaled that he wanted to change the tape, and I waited till he had the new one going.

  “Did someone come to visit?” I asked.

  “The doorbell,” Robert said.

  “Did Mama answer the door?”

  “Mama.” James.

  “Who was there?”

  “Jerry,” Robert said.

  “Jerry,” I echoed. “Who’s Jerry?”

  Silence. One of the questions they can’t answer. Over and over I realized they were little more than recording machines. Substantive questions left them nonplussed.

  “What is Jerry’s last name?”

  Silence.

  “Did Jerry visit you before April seventh?”

  They did their staring bit. “March twenty-third,” James said. “It was raining.”

  “Did you talk to Jerry on March twenty-third?”

  “We played games,” Robert said. “Jerry brought chocolate.”

  “Is Jerry your friend?”

  “Jerry is my friend.” James.

  “Do you like him?”

  “I like him.” Robert. “Jerry is my friend.”

  “Is Jerry a little boy or a big man?”

  “Jerry is a big man.” James.

  “Does Jerry live in your building?”

  Silence.

  “Did you play number games with Jerry?”

  “No.” Robert.

  “Did you play the radio game?”

  They thought for a moment. “We played the radio game on January seventeenth,” James said. “Jerry’s shoes had snow. Mama said, ‘Wipe your feet before you come in.’ ”

  I gave it one more try. “What games did you play with Jerry?”

  “The match game.” Robert.

  “Did you make fires?” I asked.

  Silence.

  “Hold on,” Jack said. “I’ll be right back.”

  He went into the building, and I turned off the tape recorder. It was getting very hot and I wondered whether we should adjourn to the twins’ room, but I hated to break the continuity.

  Jack came back with a box of toothpicks. “Can you play the match game with these?”

  Robert took the box and dumped it on the table. Toothpicks rolled around and came to a stop. The twins looked at the scattered toothpicks, then at each other.

  “Seventy-nine,” James said.

  “I don’t believe what I’m seeing,” Jack said. He put the toothpicks back in the box by twos. At the end, one was left. “Seventy-nine,” he said. “Goddamn.”

  “That’s the match game,” I said to the twins.

  They nodded.

  I switched the tape recorder on. “You played the match game with Jerry, and once you played the radio game. And you played…” I left it open.

  “The hiding game,” Robert completed my sentence,

  “Hide-and-seek,” I interpreted. “No wonder there was so much noise in tha
t apartment.” I paused. “Jerry came to visit you on April seventh. Mama opened the door. What did Jerry say?”

  “Some day, isn’t it?” James.

  “Just beautiful. I was out this morning.” Robert.

  “You look nice. I like your hair.” James.

  “Oh, thank you. I had it done. For the holidays. Would you like some tea, Jerry?” Robert.

  “Sure.” James.

  “I got some nice Danish at the bakery.” Robert.

  Something started working at my brain. A boyfriend? Did Alberta Talley have a boyfriend?

  “Where are the boys?” James.

  “In their room looking at magazines.” Robert.

  “I want to talk to you about them.” James.

  “I know you do, but I gave you my answer. There’s just the three of us now, and it’s best for us to stay together.” Robert.

  “It wouldn’t be for long, a week, maybe two.” James.

  “I told you no, Jerry. I wish you’d listen to me, I’m not about to change my mind.” Robert.

  “It’s important. It’s really important. They’ll be well taken care of. I give you my word.” James.

  “And I gave you my last word. Now, do you want to be nice and have a cup of tea or do you want to leave?” Robert.

  “I just can’t take no for an answer.” James.

  “Well, you’ll have to.” Robert.

  “This is my life we’re talking about,” James said in a loud voice.

  “Get out of here, Jerry.” Robert.

  “Not until you say I can have them.” James.

  “What are you doing with that?” Robert.

  “Come on, Mrs. T. Give a little, will you?” James.

  “Get out of here, Jerry.” Robert’s voice rose with fear and panic. “Get away from me!”

  James let out a sound of pain.

  Then Robert said, “There’s the witch.”

  “What witch?” I asked, feeling confused.

  “The witch with the broom. The witch down there.” He pointed toward the ground.

  “Selma Franklin,” I breathed. “She must have been pounding on the ceiling. She was home, Jack.”

  “They probably turned over some chairs in the scuffle,” Jack said.

  “Were you boys still in your room?” I asked.