20

by John Edgar Wideman

  “And Mrs. Klein?”

  “And Mrs. Klein facing him, watching him, this man, her husband, her …her accomplice, this man she knows better than he knows himself, this man balanced far an instant between the solid ground and the distant ocean, between life and death. And perhaps, just perhaps, she sees in his eyes a plea; not the plea we take for granted, but its opposite, a plea to be left alone, a plea to let this accident happen, a sign that he wishes it to happen, has always wished but never had the courage on his own. She sees this conjectured plea, Mrs. Klein does, and because she knows him better than he knows himself, knows that he wants, has always wanted, this accident to happen, because she is his accomplice in all things in spite of herself, she lets him drop—like the ernes in reverse, she lets him drop, helplessly, inevitably away from her and into the ocean. And what is that? Not legally but really, not in court but in life—an accident? a suicide? a murder?”

  Her voice died away as if it, too, were falling into the cove, and turning toward the ocean as it disappeared into silence, she stared into the distance, arms folded, the fisherman's wife keeping her anxious vigil again.

  “Perhaps,” the Detective said, “just perhaps in this moment we're talking about, Mrs. Klein sees a different plea in her husband's eyes; perhaps she does see the plea we take for granted: the plea for life. And perhaps as she sees this plea, she realizes suddenly that she wants, that she has always wanted this accident to take place, and realizing this, she lets him fall. A possibility, is it not?”

  “Yes,” she said softly, still staring toward the cove. “Yes, a possibility.”

  “And perhaps she not only lets him fall. Perhaps in that moment of realization that she wants, has always wanted, this accident to take place, perhaps she decides to help it take place. Perhaps she disturbs the balance, tips the fulcrum, helps the accident along…”

  Mrs. Klein turned toward him, her eyes, though, directed above and beyond him, preternaturally still. “Perhaps,” she said in a whisper.

  The Detective studied her, oblivious to everything but her face, to everything but the case which had distilled itself into this face in this moment—his detective's instinct which carried him now, which controlled him, which became him in this moment, sensing the pressure point, her need to confess.

  “Did she, Mrs. Klein?” the Detective asked gently. “Did Mrs. Klein push her husband off the cliff?”

  He waited, watching her silently as she dropped her gaze gradually, lowering her line of vision to the chair where he sat: a slow focusing, a curious stare, as though she had just noticed his presence there. Her skin was ghost-white, her hands at her sides; her fingers pinched the nap of her skirt.

  “Do you know about Descartes?” she said. “Shall I tell you about Descartes? Shall I give you the lecture, a lesson in history from the medieval scholar?”

  “Descartes?”

  “Did you know that a historian is a detective too, that a historian seeks something definite too, that just like you I'm in the business of reconstructing crime, the crime of our past? I do that. I collect evidence; sift through the clues, the artifacts; examine motives, relationships, culpability—yes, culpability, too. And there's where we differ, you and I, Andy and I, because I assign blame. It's a historian's most sacred duty, even if only a feedback mechanism for the generations to come, even if it's just a corrective adjustment for the social gyroscope. I assign blame, declare it aloud. Descartes, I say, Descartes: guilty as charged.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “How could it happen, I ask myself? How could such shortsightedness exist, such self-delusion? The man was a Catholic, a religious man, schooled by Jesuits. His Catholicism mattered to him; they say that as an adult he always asked himself how the Jesuits at La Flèche would receive his work. He refused to see it, though; he refused to admit to it; became indignant at the mention of it. It's just hypothetical, he would say, my work is hypothetical; it isn't necessarily applicable. My work is theoretical, so it can't be a threat. And because he could say that to himself, because he could fool himself with that rationalization, he kept on with his work. This Catholic, this religious man, kept right on destroying the very world he relied on, the very beliefs which gave him comfort and purpose. He turned heaven into a clockwork; he turned God into an idea; he robbed them of meaning; he robbed them of mystery. Descartes killed for all those who came after him what he himself valued most. He was the true end of the Middle Ages; he was the real father of the Modern Age: the first man who could destroy his own world and call it theoretical.

  “Are you with me so far? Has my fellow detective kept up with me? Because I'm going to leave you behind now; I'm going to make the leap of faith. I'm going to take up the historian's prerogative and say: guilty, Descartes, guilty as charged.”

  “Guilty of what?”

  “Murder, fellow detective. Descartes killed God.”

  Mrs. Klein paced in front of the Detective, an absent-minded, irregular path across the thick orange rug; he focused on her face, tried to concentrate and force the connections, but nothing made sense. The feeling, though, was still there, the instinct of the detective, the belief that this was all part of the confession, a need to reduce tension, a gradual, perhaps allegorical revelation of her involvement—if only he could decipher it.

  “What are we talking about, Mrs. Klein?”

  “The motive, of course. We're talking about the motive for the murder…” She paused, a wan and bitter smile flickering across her features. “I mean, of course, the hypothetical murder of Andrew Klein.”

  “And what would that motive be?”

  “Revenge. Revenge for the death of God.”

  “You mean to say that Mrs. Klein killed Mr. Klein because Mr. Klein killed God?”

  “Let's say that he was an accomplice in the death of God. It's a possibility, isn't it?”

  The Detective shook his head.

  “You don't believe it?”

  “I believe that Mrs. Klein believes it, but…”

  “But it's subjective, is that it? It's not the objective truth? It's not what the detective sees when he sees what he sees? Of course not. How stupid of me even to suggest it. The detective, a son of Descartes in a manner of speaking, doesn't believe in God alive or dead, does he?”

  “Not as a motive for murder, he doesn't.”

  “No, no—of course not. We'll have to try something different then, won't we?” She paced silently for a moment, her face a caricature of concentration, mimed sarcasm; then, as if inspired suddenly, she turned to him. “Has the detective ever been in love? Has he ever been married?”

  The Detective hesitated, shades of his earlier suspicion reappearing, his distrust of her, his reluctance to be exposed personally. But it was much too late to worry about involvement; he had already lost his professional distance, and, too, he still believed they were nearing an answer, that just beyond one of these bends in their meandering conversation, the solution awaited him.

  “Yes,” he said, “I've been married.”

  “Good. Well start from there then; well start from the top. It's always a good idea to start from what you believe in, and since the detective believes in marriage, marriage it is—the motive for the murder, the hypothetical murder of Andrew Klein.”

  “Marriage is the motive?”

  “No, revenge is still the motive, but revenge for the death of a marriage instead of revenge for the death of God. You do believe in the death of a marriage, don't you? The detective can see that, can't he? It is a possibility, is it not?”

  The Detective said nothing, felt the conversation turning again—on him, out of his control, like his leg, like his heart, like the last two years of his life, a man adrift in a current he no longer had the strength to resist, a man afraid. And Mrs. Klein seemed to feed on his weakness as she probed him with her bulging eyes.

  “Yes, I can see that he does; he believes in its possibility. But let's analyze it, shall we? Let's take the possibility
and analyze it for its likelihood, stretching our minds to meet its implications. We need to flesh it out a bit, this motive; we need something a little more specific. An etiology of a murder, a history of causes, if you will. How about…” She nodded to herself. “Yes, how about infidelity—infidelity on the part of the victim's wife?”

  “Infidelity?” the Detective said; his voice was no longer his, behind the glass again, far away from him.

  “Yes, infidelity; adultery; cheating on one's mate. You do believe in it? It is a possibility?”

  The white, feminine-fancy stationery, the rubber band, the slanting curls of Sadie's script…it is late, night, and spotlit, stage center, the woman sits. I'm keeping a diary, she says. The man nods, accepts, but now and forever the Detective wanders, peering into, peering from, the blurred and darkened corners, the edges of vision, superimposing new transparencies, analyzing possibilities—but who can tell now, who can tell…?

  “Yes,” Mrs. Klein said, “yes, I can see that he does. The detective believes it's a possibility. However, let's assume a further motive, a motive for the infidelity, a motive for the motive. All causes are external, says Descartes, every cause has a cause. Hypothetical murder is caused by hypothetical infidelity which, in turn, is caused by the hypothetical death of a marriage. Now what is it, I ask myself as a historian, as a detective in a manner of speaking, what is it that caused this hypothetical death of a marriage? What's the cause of the cause of the cause, I ask myself as a believer in the scientific method? Are you with me, Descartes?”

  The Detective felt himself nod.

  “All right. So how could it happen, how could this marriage, which started out so wonderfully, die? The man was not unkind. The man was loving and considerate in his own way. His marriage mattered to him; it was the bedrock of his life, in fact. His work, however, was changing him, was beginning to obsess him. He refused to see it, though, refused to admit to it; he became indignant at the mention of it. And because he refused to admit to it, he got worse, became more and more obsessed with his work (which was hypothetical to a degree, which was theoretical), and it was killing his marriage, killing what mattered to him most. Can you see that? Are you with me so far? Is that a possibility for the detective—that someone, without knowing it, could kill what mattered to him most?”

  “The absent husband,” the Detective said softly. He wet his lips. “The empty vessel.”

  “Yes,” Mrs. Klein said. “Absent. Empty.”

  “Perhaps, perhaps she didn't let him know. Perhaps if he had only been told…”

  “Perhaps he couldn't be told. Perhaps no matter how hard she tried, he wouldn't admit to it.”

  They were silent for a moment. Mrs. Klein retreated to her chair, stepping backward, never taking her eyes from the Detective's.

  “Yes,” she said, “he couldn't be told. He became obsessed with his work and wouldn't admit to it. And there we have the cause, the hypothetical cause of the death of a marriage. But what's the cause of the cause, I ask myself? I do that. I keep asking myself why he became so obsessed with his work—gruesome, cold work, with awful implications. How could he fool himself with those rationalizations? How could he let his work kill what mattered to him most? Can you tell me that, can my fellow detective please come up with the solution to that?…Because I can't.”

  “Perhaps,” the Detective said; he shook his head. She waited, pinioned him with her protuberant stare, with its sincerity. “Perhaps,” he began again, “she never understood. Perhaps if she had become involved herself, if she had had the gift herself…those moments when he was completely engaged, those moments when in the middle of a problem, he felt at peace with himself, carried by something bigger than himself, perhaps if she had felt them too?” He faltered. “Perhaps she never understood.”

  “No,” Mrs. Klein said softly, eyes averted, “no, she never understood.”

  “So she…?” The Detective hesitated, hoping Mrs. Klein would complete the question; but instead, she only prompted him.

  “So she?”

  “She was…unfaithful?”

  “Perhaps—it is a possibility, is it not? But you see, that's what he never understood. He never admitted to himself that it was a possibility. Oh, he believed in possibilities, all right, but his possibilities were always hypothetical, theoretical. He never in his heart believed that it could actually take place.”

  There was a pause, a natural lull, this part of the interrogation brought to a close. Helpless, the Detective stared at Mrs. Klein—she knew, she did know something, about the case, about infidelity—and his glance was a plea for her to stop her teasing, to end the ambiguities and tell him something…something definite. For a moment, she seemed to relent, her face gone sad, hidden in her hands, rubbing her eyes with her fingertips; but then, recharged, she surfaced quickly, an actress again, exuding energy—merciless.

  “And there we have it; Descartes himself couldn't have done better. Our etiology, our history of causes: his obsession with his work led to the death of their marriage which, in turn, led to her infidelity which, in turn, served as the motive for his murder. All hypothetical, of course. All theoretical.”

  Mrs. Klein rose from her stainless steel chair and stepped toward the wide glass wall to her left. Behind her hung a canvas, the room's largest, riotous with color; beyond her the sky, still uniformly overcast, had darkened gradually into a premature nightfall, the evening smothered by fuliginous shadows that clung like lichens to the mist-topped, brine-soaked rocks. No gulls or terns crossed the sky now and the Coast Guard cutter had disappeared from view. The dull green of the ocean was gone too; all of the cove, the scene of the crime, framed by the shrieking orange of the drapes, had been bled of its color, merging into shades of the approaching night, toward one black frame, impenetrably opaque. The Detective watched Mrs. Klein as she stared at the cove. She seemed trapped to him then, out of place in the room, a creature indigenous to the outside world, this violent seascape he was forced to call home, but which frightened him, overwhelmed him now with its blunt indifference to human forms; a world he had ignored all his life until Sadie had died, leaving him the letters to open his eyes; a world beyond rooms, beyond measure, baroque with complexity, whose secrets defied his powers of detection, and which, alien and immense, had begun to cloud his mind with alien thoughts. He had tried to hide from those thoughts, their suspicions, their ever expanding, spiraling implications, afraid that he would lose himself in their cold immensity, a mote of matter in infinite space. But then Mrs. Klein had appeared, those thoughts, that world given an advocate, a face and voice for their mysteriousness; and, too, with her sarcastic probing, her relentless intrusion into his private self, an instrument of that world's steel-stark justice: its detective.

  A world, a woman, he feared; a crime he could not comprehend; a life he could no longer with confidence justify, although an end, the end, was drawing near. Fact, he told himself, fact: you're dying. It was Mrs. Klein who reminded him.

  “It's about five,” Mrs. Klein finally said, “wouldn't you say?”

  “Yes—about five.”

  “It's about time, then, wouldn't you say?” She turned to him, her face passionless; a scale-bearer, implacable Justice. “Time to test the hypothesis.”

  The Detective swallowed, turned away; Sally would be in the kitchen now, his study—down the hall and around the corner—warm and safe. Looking up again, he shrugged his shoulders, shook his head.

  “Oh yes you do,” Mrs. Klein said. “You know what I mean—you may not want to, but you do. It's time, Descartes, time for the real detective to take over; time to reenact the crime, test the hypothesis. You do understand that the time has come?”

  Adrift in the current, unable to turn away, he watched her. Freeze-frame the crime, he has said, says, hears himself say over and over, the words in amber, the climax of detection. Freeze-frame the crime; enter its world; reenact, relive the moment of its occurrence—but if the crime's your life, when the crime's you
r life…? The Detective turned toward the cove, an alien world darkening: the scene of the crime, the death of Mr. Klein, or just another seaside postcard setting?

  “It's a little before five,” she said again. “It's time,” he heard her say to him.

  He didn't move, the mobile spinning above him, the sun—hidden somewhere behind the house, the clouds—dropping faster now, light fading, sight fading. He had thought himself a good husband, a good father…The Detective felt a hand tugging gently on his sleeve. Mrs. Klein bent over him; seemed, he thought to whisper to him, a voice from beyond the glass: “I'll help you, Descartes. I'll be your accomplice.”

  The Detective stood, felt himself stand, silently led to the corner of the room; a slow procession, priestess and penitent, seeress and initiate, seekers after truth in a ritual reenactment—detectives, too, in a manner of speaking. There, at the brink, the oblique angle where glass and plaster met, Mrs. Klein deserted him, slipping behind a strand of drapery, the Detective alone again and staring out…at the scene of the crime, the wormwood wilderness of his enforced retirement, this dimmed Maine coast. He reached out, touched the glass, tested its illusions, the cool hard sheen of its sentinel surface, his own image, a wraithlike visage, cast back at him—“pass no further!” Always stopped; always between the see-er and the seen, this cruel exclusion, a glass partition; this permanent exile, the limits of knowledge: Moses, the old man, brought to the top of the mountain and shown where he can never go; Moses, forever dying in the land of Moab, on the other side of what he wished to know. But then, against his skin, the breath of the wilderness, a cold wind penetrating; the pulse of the surf, like the hushed promise of the burning bush, drawing him forward; the drapes thrown open; and there, in the corner, the Red Sea miraculously parting: a door.