“Your father can take you. Helen can walk. Maybe I walk to meet her.” Elise tilted her head to one side, studying her daughter. “You look pale. And it’s cold today.”
“Mother, I’ll be fine.” Julia leaned her cane against the wall and buttoned her coat.
“Maybe you shouldn’t go in at all.”
“Really, Ma, I’m not sick.”
“You came home early yesterday.” She spoke quietly as if she didn’t want Howie to hear.
“I was shaken up, that’s all. It’s understandable.” Julia tied the scarf on her head and began to pull on her gloves.
“But, Julia, the murder. You shouldn’t work where there was a murder!” Her mother crossed her arms over her chest.
Julia opened her mouth to protest but stopped herself as she stared at her mother’s vulnerable eyes. Only as tall as her daughters, Elise Dell always gave the impression of towering over them. In a quiet, persistent way, she dominated their lives, never out of thought. She had a frail build, pale complexion, and blue eyes that compelled affection. She enjoyed dressing up for special occasions and prided herself in looking ten years younger than her age. She followed the lives of movie stars with childlike pleasure, listened to radio soap operas in the afternoon while having a cup of strong coffee and would become teary-eyed over a gift of perfume or inexpensive paste jewelry. What she lacked in household skills over the years she’d made up for in—in what, wondered Julia as she slowly smiled at her mother. In something irresistibly likable, a natural charm that made them all want to revolve around her and take care of her despite her faults. Julia could think of no one in the world like her mother. Now she looked afraid, an emotion Julia was seeing more and more in her mother’s eyes as time wore on, and the inevitable but ordinary tragedies of life chipped at her cushioned heart.
“It might not have been a murder,” Julia said, taking her mother’s hands in hers. “It might have been an accident and everyone is going crazy over it.”
Her mother shook her head. “It was in the paper this morning. Didn’t you see it? They said murder.”
Julia had seen it, but still she reassured her mother. “If it was…someone who killed Dr. Lowenstein…it was probably something personal. A feud of some kind.” Balancing her weight on her good leg, she leaned forward and hugged her mother. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll call you from the office today.”
She turned, grabbed her cane and left, closing the heavy oaken door with a quick whoosh. The Dell house, an old pre-war Victorian, sat in a quiet tree-shaded neighborhood in the Shrine of the Little Flower parish, a church just built. Sometimes Julia dreamed of owning her own home—a sleek new “rancher” style like the ones she’d seen in Helen’s magazines. No stairs.
The brisk air and bright sunshine felt good on her cheeks as she walked to the bus stop three blocks away. She liked being on her own, she liked breathing deep and feeling as if each step were a new beginning.
As she walked, Julia remembered something she could have told her mother to comfort her. The detective hadn’t called her yesterday afternoon. He’d wanted her number in case he had more questions. He would have called with more questions—maybe they’d solved the case already, or maybe they’d determined it was an accident, after all.
***
Sal Sabataso pulled his Chevy up to the curb in the well-to-do neighborhood of Homeland in the city’s northern section. When he’d arrived here yesterday, he’d thought at first he’d written the address down wrong, and had pushed his new gray fedora back to scratch his head as he’d reread the slip of paper. Nine-oh-six Willow Lane. It wasn’t the kind of place a Lowenstein would fit in.
Big brick houses with well-tended yards lined the street of the swank and exclusive neighborhood. Now Sal walked casually down the road, studying the homes, noting the new and expensive cars along the curb, in contrast to the old but well-kept colonials with freshly-painted shutters and gleaming doors. Everything felt clean and polished here. And the quiet—in his neighborhood, quiet always felt like a prelude to something happening, something noisy and alive. Here the lack of sound felt disapproving, as if unseen eyes were waiting for him to speak too loudly or say the wrong thing.
Sean would have shrugged it off and done his job, talking comfortably with friends of the deceased, getting what he needed and moving on. It was one of the things Sal was trying to learn from his partner—how to get people to open up to you and how to pretend, at least, that you fit in anywhere. Sal had a knack for sticking his foot in it. On more than one occasion, he’d managed to rile up a witness to the point of clamming up entirely. Or he’d go to the opposite extreme—as he had with Mrs. Wellstone yesterday—and be so damned chummy he got their life story complete with footnotes.
But Sean had been late this morning, so Sal had popped into their boss’s office—Mark O’Brien was the fellow’s name—and told him they’d be out on the Lowenstein case that day, being careful to say “we’ll be out” so O’Brien would think Sean was meeting him somewhere. The poor fellow needed a break after what he’d been through with his wife.
Up ahead, a woman hugged her coat to herself as she walked two scampering Boston terriers. Sal picked up his pace as if he belonged here but muffed it by stumbling over a tree root and cursing under his breath. He recovered his sensibility and approached her, touching his hat and smiling as he came nearer.
“Morning, ma’am,” he said, trying to imitate the gentle and confident voice of his partner. The woman merely nodded her head as she strode toward him.
“I was wondering,” he said, stopping in front of her, “if you know of Dr. Lowenstein.”
The woman’s smile left her. “No one I know by that name lives around here.” She stood in front of him now, and her coat was open just enough for him to see the gray uniform of a domestic servant.
Just yesterday, old Mrs. Wellstone had been quite talkative about her neighbor. Maybe this maid had embraced the snobbishness of her employers and didn’t want to admit that a Jew resided in the neighborhood.
“Who lives here?” he asked, pointing to Lowenstein’s house.
She looked at the white shingled home with an arched trellis by the front door and fat boxwoods below the windows.
“That would be Dr. Mike’s house,” she said. “Poor Dr. Michael Lowe.” She pronounced the name loudly and carefully so that he understood this man was entitled to be here.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Don’t know why I got the name wrong.” He tried to remember yesterday’s talk with Wellstone. The woman had been a bit hard of hearing. And how many times had he said “Lowenstein” anyway? Just once, at the outset of their conversation. The rest of the time, it was “the doctor,” or “your neighbor.” Jeez, how’d he miss that? And what about the papers Sean had scooped up—any of them have the name Lowe on them?
“Were you a friend of his?” she asked archly. The dogs pulled at the leashes, and she strained to hold them back.
“Yeah…uh, I worked with him,” he said, not wanting to give away his police identification. It could scare her off. She must not have seen the papers, the stories about “Lowenstein’s” murder. She sounded like she only knew “Dr. Mike” was dead. Maybe Wellstone had blabbed to her maid, and word had gotten around.
She looked at him, as if she had better things to do. He wished he had a biscuit or cracker to feed the dogs, but his pockets were empty. He wondered if Sean carried such things for circumstances like this. “I was supposed to stop by this morning.”
“You’re a friend and you didn’t know he’d passed away?” She shook her head as the dogs tugged at the leash. “I really don’t feel comfortable talking about it.” She let the dogs lead her away.
“Damn,” he muttered. As soon as she was out of sight, he walked up to Lowenstein’s door. It was locked, of course, and he didn’t have the key. Sean had pocketed it yesterday from among the deceased’s belongings at the lab.
He opened the mail bin on the door and peered at some unreachable env
elopes and a flyer on the floor. He could make out a gas bill and a church notice about the Lent and Holy Week schedule that year. Both addressed to Dr. Michael Lowe. Yesterday’s mail, delivered after they’d left the house.
He heard a car rumble to life down the street, so he pulled away from the door and walked to another neighbor’s house. There he was able to talk to another maid at the door, this time a plump Negro woman with a white lace cap to match her apron. The mistress of the house, a new bride, was already out for the day. Yes, the maid knew of Dr. Lowe, but she was miserly with information until Sal told her he was with the police, investigating Dr. Lowe’s unexpected death. After a shocked silence and a murmured “Lord have mercy,” the maid was more forthcoming.
“Did he have many friends?” Sal swept the neighborhood with his arm.
“He was a quiet man. Didn’t join in much. Except at church,” the maid said. She didn’t move an inch from the front door. “Mrs. Wellstone’s a member, the house on the other side of him, and sometimes he’d give her a ride on Sunday.”
“That would be the Cathedral of the Incarnation?” he asked, remembering the envelope.
“Yes, sir. The Episcopal cathedral.”
“He ever talk about where he came from—like the west side?” Sal asked. The west side of town was a Jewish section.
She shook her head vigorously. “Far as I know he’s always been here.” She nodded her head toward Lowenstein’s home. She lowered her voice. “Mrs. Wellstone has a key to his house. Every year he went away and she’d have her maid pick up his mail and such.”
Sal knew about that.
“He have someone like you to help out?”
She smiled. “Angie Hamilton. Comes by every Friday.”
He spoke with her for a few more minutes, during which time she told him how “Dr. Mike” had seen to a bad bee sting of hers last year that had “swelled up her arm” so bad she could barely move her fingers. “He was real nice to me, too,” she confided, “tended to me in his living room, not the kitchen, even though I was afraid of him spilling medicine on his things.”
“He was nice to Angie too?”
“Mm-hm. A real gentleman. Always gave her a gift at Christmas and time off at Easter.”
He handed her his card. “I’ll stop by later but if you think of anything, give me a call.”
She went back to her chores, and he went back to his car, slipping behind the big wheel quickly, unsure whether to be proud of his detective work or disappointed with its meager results. As his fingers touched the keys to start the ignition, movement in his rear view mirror caught his gaze. An old Ford lumbered into view, its driver peering at street addresses. The car looked out of place here. It was dusty and noisy, its right front fender dented in. Sal slumped down in the seat and watched.
The driver pulled up to the curb by Dr. Lowenstein’s house, digging the front passenger side tire into the curb. Guess I know who dented that fender, Sal thought, peering out from under the brim of his hat.
A woman in a gray suit got out of the car, looking up and down the street before approaching Dr. Lowenstein’s door. She raised her gloved hand to knock but stopped before fist hit wood. Her hand then flew to her mouth, as if realizing the occupant was no longer among the living. She pulled a handkerchief from her purse and blew her nose, shaking her head in sorrow. She then tried the knob of the door. When it didn’t give, she tried lifting the sash of a nearby window, but it wouldn’t give either. She looked over her shoulder after this effort as if afraid someone had seen her. She raised her hand to her brow, as if distraught, and looked up at the house, assessing other avenues of entry. After a few seconds, she hung her head in defeat, obviously giving up. She turned and walked back toward her car, still looking down.
By this time, Sal had exited his vehicle and met her at her own. She looked up, startled, brown eyes watery from crying. Her features were small but her cheeks well rounded, giving the impression that she was a bit overweight when in fact she was slender as a reed, her thin suit hanging on her frame. Her lipstick was too red, and her dark hair unfashionably long, curls crushed at her neck by a metallic clip. She wore rhinestone earrings and a matching necklace that looked like children’s jewelry.
“Could I have a word with you, ma’am?” Sal asked.
“No!” She rushed to the driver’s side, but Sal followed her there and placed his hand on the door so she couldn’t open it.
“What’s your name? What you doing here?”
She visibly cringed at his sharp words and looked about to cry.
“None of your business.”
“I’m with the police,” he pressed. “How’d you know Dr. Lowenstein?”
“Oh God. I…” She looked back at the doctor’s house as if he could help her. “I worked for him. I’m—I was—his secretary. Susan Schlager.” She gathered her wits, sniffling back her fears. “I just wanted to see if I could get in and get some of his research papers—before they were lost forever. In the investigation.”
Sal didn’t believe her, but a quarter hour more of questioning got him no other explanations, and she broke down sobbing so hard about her boss that Sal gave up, once again thinking how he’d done something wrong, something Sean would have handled better. After taking down her phone number and address, he let her go, following her all the way into town where she parked and went into her office.
Chapter Five
“MAIL’S HERE.”
Linda stood in front of Julia’s desk, sorting envelopes. “Is he in?” Linda nodded toward the hallway with the labs and doctors offices.
“Yes, but his door is closed,” Julia said, picking up envelopes Linda tossed on her desk. Dr. Jansen hadn’t said much before disappearing into his office an hour ago. A quick comment on “how awful” the news was about Dr. Lowenstein, a question about the course of the investigation. When Julia had little information to offer him, he’d seemed annoyed. Then again, he often seemed irritated to her. She was used to it. She had notes to type, several meetings to arrange, supplies to order and now the mail to sort. She’d left his paper on his desk, finished and free of errors.
Although Dr. Jansen’s role in the polio research was only peripheral, mail had increased dramatically as word had leaked out about the possibility of a vaccine. Heartbreaking, pitiful letters had begun arriving by the dozens—mothers pleading for cures, wives and husbands offering money for a chance to try the “new medicine.” What must the mail have been like in Pittsburgh, at Dr. Salk’s lab, if they were inundated here?
The first time she’d read one of the letters, Julia had been overcome with both pity and embarrassment as she’d recognized her own family in each plea. Her mother had urged her, when she’d begun work at Hopkins, to “talk with the doctors” about her case. Even now, Mutti thought a cure was possible. It made Julia feel as if she’d let her mother down.
If it were left to Dr. Jansen, the letters would have all been thrown away. But Julia typed responses to each one, a simple message she’d had Mrs. Wilcox approve, thanking the correspondent for the letter but making no promises. Now, as Linda dropped letter after letter onto her desk, Julia couldn’t help heaving a long sigh. Since she’d lost half a day yesterday, she had no time to spare to respond to all these.
Behind her, Susan Schlager spoke up. “I can answer some of those for you if you need help, Julia.” Linda shot Julia a knowing glance. Susan was afraid of losing her job now that her boss was dead. Julia looked at Susan with sympathy. The poor gal had been so shaken when she’d arrived late for work that she’d hardly been able to talk. She’d sat, gloved hands in her lap, for a good ten minutes gathering her wits just from walking past the lab where her boss had worked. When Julia had offered her condolences, though, Susan had tried to brush them aside. “I’m all right. He was just my boss, that’s all. I’m worried about my job. Steve bought a new car so’s I could drive the old one, you see, and we can’t afford for me to be out of work.”
Julia turned and smile
d at her now, trying to ease her mind. “Thanks, Sue. That would be helpful. I’ll open the letters and show you what to send them. I have a file.”
“Do you think you’ll keep working once you’re married?” Susan asked as Julia turned back to her desk. At first Julia thought the question was directed at Linda, whose wedding plans were far advanced. But then she realized Susan was talking to her, fishing for possible openings on a new job for herself now that Dr. Lowenstein had passed away.
“I guess so. I hope so,” Julia said, suddenly imagining a life with nothing to occupy her time except tidying a little home. As much as she wanted a place of her own, that vision filled her with the same sense of claustrophobia she’d experienced working in the law firm on Belair Road. She’d miss working, she decided, and would have to let Will know she intended to keep her job. Maybe he wouldn’t like that.
“I think that’s it,” Linda said, dropping the last envelope onto Julia’s blotter and taking a similar collection to her desk. She also handed a few items to Susan, addressed to Dr. Lowenstein.
“If you’re worried about a job, Sue, you could always clean the cages,” Linda teased. The scientists used chimpanzees for the polio research, and the girls disliked the animals intensely. They were smelly and noisy and, Julia thought, pitiful in a way that elicited anger, not mercy, in her heart. The secretaries had jointly agreed that they’d stick together in rebuffing any attempts to have secretarial staff do anything related to the chimps’ care. Julia was particularly vulnerable in this regard because she’d had polio and therefore wouldn’t be at risk of catching anything from infected animals. Last year when the lab was short-staffed, she’d been afraid—maybe unreasonably so—of being asked. When she’d confessed her fear to Linda, the girl had marched into Mrs. Wilcox’s office, informing her that none of them would tolerate such a request. Mrs. Wilcox had found a new animal tender that very week, Earl Dagley.
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