Saturday the Rabbi Went Hungry

by Harry Kemelman

  “Take me, for example. I’m considered a pretty decent, lawabiding citizen. I’m considered a good husband and a good father, and even the people I deal with profession­ally—criminals and lawbreakers—speak of me as fair and honest. But every now and then thoughts go through my head—”

  “This is common to all men.”

  “Of course. It isn’t what you think but what you do that matters. But what if the opportunity came to do one of these things just when it happened to occur to me, and it involved no great risk on my part, no real action—just a turning away—failing to do something rather than doing it. Do you see what I mean, Rabbi?”

  “All right, I see the point you’re trying to make. You mean that in this kind of killing, almost accidental and so easy, no great animus is required.”

  “That’s it.”

  “So where does that leave you?”

  The chief shrugged. “With damn little to go on.”

  “Suppose you ran the story in the newspapers. That might turn up something.”

  Lanigan shook his head. “It will have to wait for a few days, I’m afraid. The D.A. thinks we may be able to come up with an answer if the story is kept secret.”

  “Then you do have a lead.”

  “Not really,” the chief said. “Beam’s idea, but the D.A. thinks it’s worth checking. And, mind you, from a straight, logical basis, it’s possible. He’s got it in his head that the widow did it. Why? Because then his company won’t have to pay off. His argument is that as far as we know she’s the only one who profits. She becomes richer by fifty thousand dollars for one thing, and for another she gets rid of a husband who was not only old enough to be her father but was no bargain in a lot of other re­spects, too.”

  “She married him when he was an alcoholic. Does Beam think that now that he at least partially reformed, he was a less desirable husband?”

  “I’m just giving you his idea, Rabbi. There’s a little more to it. He feels that business about having him buried in a Jewish cemetery with the Jewish rites was just a big act to show how devoted she was, like another woman might pretend to faint or weep whenever she thought someone was watching. That if all this had been on the up and up, she wouldn’t have bothered to bury him in the Jewish cemetery since he had no feelings about it when he was alive.”

  “Such involved psychological analysis,” said the rabbi. “I wouldn’t have thought our friend Beam capable of it.”

  “Well, of course, he’s seen a lot of this kind of thing,” said Lanigan apologetically. “I can understand where he might be suspicious of any unusual manifestation of grief on the part of the widow. And when you add the fact that she didn’t answer the phone when the Marcuses rang—”

  “But that happened after ten o’clock, and according to the autopsy Hirsh was already dead sometime before nine.”

  “According to Beam, the fact that she didn’t answer shows she left the house. If she left then, she could have left earlier. Suppose she sees him drive into the garage but doesn’t see him get out. So she goes across the street. Maybe she tries to rouse him. Maybe she gets a kind of revulsion and says, all right, stay there. It crosses her mind that it might be easier without him. Then later after ten, just before the Marcuses called, she runs out to see what the situation is. Is the motor still running? Is he still alive? She finds him dead and runs back in time to get the second call. Then she plans what she’s got to do after that. She goes home, makes believe she hasn’t noticed the garage door is down, and calls the police so that they can discover the body for her.”

  “You keep referring to Beam. How do you like it?”

  “Mrs. Hirsh doesn’t seem that kind of person to me, but I’ve had enough experience to know my feelings about people don’t mean a darn thing. On the other hand, what else have I got? It’s a logical starting point—she’s the only one we know who profits from his death.”

  “I see.”

  “So we’re keeping it quiet for a few days—at least un­til we can check Mrs. Hirsh out.”

  “And if it’s not Mrs. Hirsh, do you have any other leads?”

  “We’re checking into anyone who might have had any contact with Hirsh. It’s all we can do. I went over to the Goddard Laboratories yesterday to see the big boss himself.”

  “Goddard?”

  “No, Lemuel Goddard has been dead for several years. He was local—a Crosser in fact. He started the lab when he retired from G.E. They retire them at sixty-five there, whether they’re ready or not. Lem Goddard wasn’t ready, so he started a lab of his own. He had a place—an old warehouse in Lynn. Then he went public and sold stock. They expanded and built this place on Route 128. When he died, the Board of Directors decided that the man they wanted to head up the organization was not a scientist but an administrative expert, so they got this army gen­eral, Amos Quint. One of these desk generals from the Quartermaster Corps. Iron-arse Quint, I understand he used to be called in Washington.” He glanced at Miriam. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Small, that just came out.”

  She smiled faintly. “I’ve heard the word.”

  “There’s nothing so army as one of those desk gener­als,” the chief went on. “His secretary who brought me into his office didn’t actually salute but she kind of stood at attention.” He laughed. “When I asked him how well he knew Hirsh, the general says, ‘I make it a point not to know my men well.’ How do you like that?”

  “Wasn’t it Caesar, or Napoleon, who knew every man in his army by his first name?”

  “I guess that’s old-fashioned. Quint explained to me that if you’re going to run an efficient organization and not get bogged down in a mass of trivia—that’s the word he used and with a flick of the hand as though brushing something away—you’ve got to operate strictly through channels. ‘I see them when I hire them and when I fire them and that’s all.’ From then on, everything goes through channels. He tells them that when he hires them, and when he fires them, he tells them why. So as far as Hirsh was concerned, anything he wanted to bring to the notice of old Iron—of Quint—had to go through his supe­rior, Dr. Sykes.”

  “I see. The Lowells talk only to Cabots and the Cabots talk only to God.”

  “That’s about it, Rabbi. But, of course, Quint had a dossier on Hirsh and knew quite a bit about him. I gather that Hirsh was not too hot lately. Maybe he was at one time, but certainly not while he was at Goddard. In fact, I gathered he made a number of rather bad mistakes—the last one, just a few days before his death.”

  “Why didn’t they fire him?”

  “I asked the same question. I gather Quint was going to this last time because this time it was real serious, or perhaps the general had come to the end of his patience. You know, Rabbi, that could have been another argu­ment in favor of suicide, if I had known about it at the time.”

  “I wonder why Quint didn’t fire him earlier. From what you say, he doesn’t sound like the type to stand for more than one error on the part of an employee, especially one so far down the ladder as I gather Hirsh was.”

  “That was Sykes. I asked the same question, and Quint said Dr. Sykes went to bat for him each time and so he played along. Even the time Hirsh got drunk Sykes managed to get him off. It started right there in the lab as a matter of fact. They were working on a special method for aging whiskey quickly by shooting an electric current through it somehow. The chemist who was working on the project mixed up a batch and brought it around for the boys to sample and give their opinions. Hirsh was one of those offered a taste and it set him off. The chemist, by the way, was fired.”

  “Why?”

  Lanigan laughed. “That’s another thing about this lab. You’d think they’d all be working together, sketching di­agrams and circuits and formulae and whatnot on the tablecloths at lunch. Nothing like it. You see, most of their work is done for industry, and if news leaks out their clients’ stocks can be affected. I gather that in the past some of the scientists weren’t above taking a little flyer on this inside info
rmation. So the rule was laid down that everyone is to keep his nose firmly set against his own little grindstone. The men in any given section will confer with each other but they don’t contact the other sections except when absolutely necessary—and then it’s done through the department heads.”

  “Interesting. So you didn’t get much from Quint. Did you question any of the other employees?”

  “I did, but I got nothing that helped. As I said, everyone there tends to keep to himself. And Hirsh was a quiet sort, even withdrawn.”

  “It doesn’t leave you with much.”

  “No, it doesn’t.” He looked eagerly at the rabbi. “Any ideas, Rabbi? Anything strike you?”

  The rabbi shook his head slowly.

  “Well, it helps just to talk it over, I suppose.” But it was obvious that he was disappointed. He looked directly at the rabbi. “By the way, did you know that Ben Goralsky knew Hirsh?”

  “No, I didn’t, although I saw him at the funeral.”

  “S’truth. In fact, it was Goralsky who got Hirsh the job at Goddard.”

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-SIX

  The door was opened by a maid in uniform. She es­corted him into the library and said she would tell Mr. Goralsky he was here.

  Ben Goralsky appeared almost immediately, and showed him to a chair. “I’m glad you could come, Rabbi. My father was pleased when I told him you said you’d be over to see how he was.”

  “I would have made it earlier, but I was laid up myself for a few days.”

  “Yes, I know.” He hesitated. “I heard some rumors—I may have made a little trouble for you about this business with Hirsh.”

  “There has been a little trouble,” the rabbi admitted.

  “Well, I just want you to know I’m sorry.”

  The rabbi was curious. “Your father feels strongly about the matter?”

  “I haven’t talked about it with him—except that once. When this fellow Beam told me it was probably suicide, I mentioned it to my father and he was awfully upset. It was a day when he wasn’t feeling so good. I guess he thought it was near the end. He said it wasn’t according to the regulations, and he started to worry maybe you folks weren’t going to keep the cemetery on a strict Or­thodox basis. You know, this being a Conservative tem­ple, instead of Orthodox like we’re used to, you’re apt to take a lot of shortcuts and make a lot of changes. So he was worried about being buried there.”

  “I see.”

  “According to him, Hirsh should have been buried on the side somewhere with no ceremony or anything. He told me about one that he had seen in the old country when he was a young man. There was this girl who took her own life. She was going to have a baby, and she was still a girl—I mean, she was unmarried. They just put her in the ground, and the next day her father went to work as though nothing happened. I mean, they didn’t even mourn her for the seven days. It must have made a terrible impression on him, because he was terribly upset about Hirsh getting a regular funeral. He said if she was buried that way then Hirsh should be, too. Of course, he was confused because there’s no connection.”

  The rabbi made to rise, now that the amenities were over, but Ben Goralsky waved him back. “My father’s dozing right now. I told the nurse to let me know when he wakes up. Are you in a hurry?”

  “No. As a matter of fact, I wanted an opportunity to talk to you. I understand you knew Isaac Hirsh.”

  “Yeah, I knew him. I knew his whole family. They lived next door to us in Chelsea, years ago. I knew his father and mother, and I knew him.”

  “And that’s why you recommended him for that job at Goddard’s?”

  His thick lips parted and his heavy face relaxed in a grin. He shook his head slowly. “I recommended him for that job, and I put enough muscle behind it to make sure he got it. We’re good customers of Goddard Lab, and I can talk turkey to Quint who runs the place. I got Hirsh that job because I hated his guts.” He laughed aloud at the look of surprise on the rabbi’s face.

  “Like I said, they lived next door to us, the Hirshes. Both our families were mighty poor. We had this chicken business, his father had a little tailor shop. Mrs. Hirsh was all right. She was a good woman, and when she died I went to the funeral. We all did. My father closed the store so we could all go. Mr. Hirsh, he was something else again. A lazy good-for-nothing, always bragging about his precious son. We were four kids. I got two brothers and a sister, and every one of us worked in the store, af­ter school, Sundays, nights. You had to in those days to make a living. I didn’t even finish high school. I quit at the end of my first year and went to work in the store full time. But Ike Hirsh, he finished high and then went on to college and then went on after that to become a doctor—not a regular doctor, a doctor of philosophy. He didn’t play with the other kids in the street. He was a little fat, roly-poly kid, the kind the other kids make fun of. So most of the time, he stayed inside reading books. And his father would come over to our house and brag about him. You know how Jews feel about education, so you can imagine how my father felt about us, especially in com­parison with him. And old man Hirsh never let him forget it. But let me tell you something, Rabbi, my father never threw it up to us.

  “Then Mrs. Hirsh died, and Mr. Hirsh waited just one year, practically to the day, to remarry. Now you know, you don’t meet a woman and ask her to marry you and get married in a day or two. Not at that age, you don’t. That means he was making arrangements during the year of mourning, while his wife was hardly cold in her grave. Ike had got himself a government job—big deal, after all that build-up—and didn’t even come to the wedding. And he didn’t go to his father’s funeral a year later. My father went. He wanted me to go, but I wouldn’t.

  “Well, things had been getting better for us right along. The war helped. We had gone on living in the same little old house in Chelsea, in the same old neigh­borhood even though at that time we could have afforded a lot better. By the time the war was over, we were pretty comfortable. My father had done a little speculating in real estate. He had bought some good stocks. And still he went to work every morning in the store. We had ex­panded there too, doing a big wholesale business, but my father was down there every morning in his apron and straw hat. That’s the kind of man my father is.”

  “And in all this time, I take it you hadn’t heard from Hirsh?”

  “That’s right. Then one day he comes to visit us. He’s got an idea for manufacturing transistors. Nothing revolutionary, you understand, but it can cut costs anywhere from ten to twenty percent. I hardly knew what a transistor was, let alone my father, but he was convincing and my father had great faith in him. I guess without realizing it, my father had been sort of sold on the idea that he was a genius. Hirsh had it all worked out, and it looked good. He had contacts with all kinds of govern­ment agencies and we’d be sure to get government contracts. Well, to make a long story short, my father agreed to invest ten thousand dollars. Hirsh didn’t have to put up a dime and he was a full fifty percent partner.

  “We got a warehouse and we set up our plant and started to operate. He was the big idea man, and I was the dumb slob that knew just enough to check in supplies, check shipments, see that the employees worked. And in a year we had lost ten thousand dollars on top of our original investment. Then we got a contract. It wouldn’t show us much of a profit, but it would carry us for a while. I went out and bought a bottle to celebrate. We had a couple of drinks, drank each other’s health and success to the business. In the middle I got called away and had to be gone the whole afternoon. When I got back, I found Hirsh still in the office—dead drunk.”

  His face portrayed his shock of the memory. “Imagine, Rabbi, an educated Jewish boy—a drunkard. I didn’t tell my father. I was afraid to. I was afraid to admit it to myself. I kept telling myself it was an accident, that he had got a little high and didn’t realize how much he was tak­ing. The next day he didn’t come in. But the day after, he was there right on time as if nothing happened. And th
e next day, he was drunk again. I stood it for a couple of weeks, and then I told my father. ‘Get rid of him’—that’s what my father said. ‘Get rid of him before he ruins us.’ ”

  “I take it you did.”

  Goralsky nodded his head in grim satisfaction. “I put it up to him to buy us out or let us buy him out. Of course he couldn’t raise the money, and it wouldn’t have done him any good if he could. Could a man like that run a business? We paid him fifteen thousand in cold cash, and said goodby. And you know, Rabbi, it was like pulling up an anchor. A couple of months later we got a really good government contract and we were on our way.”

  “Did you know about the contract when you made him the proposition?”

  “As God’s my witness, Rabbi. We had filed our bid months before, but we hadn’t heard a word about it.”

  “All right. Then when did you see him next?”

  “I never saw him again. We went public and sold stock and we got to be a big operation. We moved to this house. And then one day I got a letter from Hirsh telling me he’s applied for a job at Goddard Lab and figures that perhaps I can help him because they must know me. So I called Quint and put it to him as strong as I could, and made sure that in his letter to Hirsh he’d say they were giving him the job largely on my say-so.”

  “But I don’t understand. You say you did it because you hated him.”

  “That’s right. There he was with his Ph.D. from Tech and I hadn’t gone beyond the first year high. I wanted him to know that with all his education, he had to come to me for a job, and that I could deliver.”

  “But didn’t you see him after he came?”

  Goralsky shook his head. “He called a couple of times, and each time I told the girl to say I was out. I’m like superstitious, Rabbi. You had trouble with some hard-luck guy, I’m afraid it can rub off. And you want to know something: I was right. Twenty years ago, this Hirsh almost ruined us. He comes back to town and, sure enough, the son of a bitch almost ruins me again.”