Holy Terrors

by Mary Daheim

  “Having your own business is a big responsibility,” Judith asserted, now on the defensive. “If things keep going well, I can hire an assistant. But not yet. I’m still paying off the loan on this place and Dan’s mound of debts.”

  This time the pause was lengthy. Judith was about to ask Joe if he was still on the line when she heard his voice pour into her ear like warm honey: “The Manhattan Grill…a small lamp glowing on white linen…scotch aged in an untamed Highland glen…a steak so thick you have to slice it on the horizontal…happy voices all around you, but the only one you hear is mine…what do you say, Jude-girl? We could ride the last ferry across the bay and come home with the sunrise.”

  Judith’s knees crumpled. She gripped the phone with one hand and clutched at the sink counter with the other. “Joe…oh, dear, I don’t know…I suppose I could get Mother fed and then…”

  The clump of Gertrude’s walker brought Judith back to reality. Her mother was coming into the kitchen, having descended the back stairway. “Almost five-fifteen and no supper? What’s going on around here?” Gertrude growled.

  Judith pulled the phone close and tried to sound business like. “We’ll do it the first week of May. I’ll put it on the calendar. ’Bye.” Sheepishly, she looked at her mother. “Phyliss is just finishing up. Dinner will be ready in twenty minutes.”

  “Twenty minutes!” Gertrude gave the walker an extra thump. “Look at me, I’m weak from hunger!” She stopped, fixing her daughter with a penetrating eye. “Look at you, you’re white as a sheet. Or as sheets used to be before they started putting tiger lilies and prancing pigs all over ’em. What’s the matter? Another stiff?”

  “No. Just a…reservation.” It was actually true, Judith thought, since she was the one with reservations about resuming an intimate relationship with Joe. She turned her back on Gertrude and hauled Sweetums out of the sink. Roused from his nap, he hissed and spat at Judith before marching indignantly to the back door. Phyliss came into the kitchen just then, immediately engaging Gertrude in their ongoing feud. Judith tried to ignore them, busying herself with potatoes and brussels sprouts while the chicken baked in the oven. She was a fool to let her mother intimidate her. Joe was right, it was ridiculous to make such a to-do over a few days. It had probably been absurd to keep away from each other all these months in the first place. And yet, when Judith looked deep into her own heart, she had to admit the truth: She was afraid. But she didn’t know why.

  As Gertrude and Phyliss got into a heated harangue over To Starch or Not To Starch, Judith realized that Joe had not relayed the information about the rabbit suit from the lab report. Maybe he hadn’t gotten the data yet. Maybe he didn’t intend to tell her. Maybe she should call him back.

  But Sweetums was clawing at the back door and making ugly noises low in his throat. Judith turned down the potatoes, edged around the arguing women, and went to let the cat out. With her hand on the knob, she was startled to see a man coming up the back steps. It was Kurt Kramer, and he looked more disagreeable than usual.

  “Carl Rankers said to use the back door,” Kurt told Judith in his abrupt manner. “The front is reserved for paying guests, I take it.”

  “Well, sort of,” replied Judith, booting Sweetums out and ushering Kurt in. The truth was that the back door was more convenient for neighbors such as the Rankers, the Dooleys, and the Ericsons. “Let’s go into the front room,” suggested Judith, stopping just long enough in the kitchen to introduce Kurt to Phyliss Rackley and to remind Gertrude that she’d met the Kramers at a parish picnic five years earlier.

  “You the one who complained about my potato salad?” Gertrude inquired, with a bulldog thrust of her face at Kurt.

  Kurt’s rigid form twitched a bit. “What?”

  “Never mind,” said Judith, pushing open the swinging door that led into the dining room. “Have a seat,” she called to Kurt over her shoulder as she led him into the big living room. “Would you like a drink, or a cup of tea?”

  “Nothing.” Kurt didn’t take Judith up on her offer of sitting down, either, but assumed an intransigent position between the matching sofas and glared through his glasses. “You’ve been meddling in my life,” he declared without preamble. “Eve and I want you to stop. Now.”

  “Huh?” Judith was flabbergasted. “What are you talking about? Have you been listening to Arlene Rankers?” It occurred to Judith that his accusation could stem only from some wild piece of gossip inadvertently set loose by Arlene.

  “I stopped to go over the lector list with Carl,” said Kurt through tight lips. “I didn’t even see Arlene. Eve found out you had an appointment with Wilbur Paine this afternoon. You were there an hour before she was. My wife gathered you made defamatory remarks about her. She’s furious, and I don’t blame her. Eve is a very sensitive woman.”

  Eve Kramer struck Judith as about as sensitive as a nuclear warhead, but she held her tongue. Still aghast, Judith tried to piece this little puzzle together. “Wilbur told Eve I was there?” Somehow, that didn’t seem quite right, given Wilbur’s natural discretion.

  Kurt’s square chin shot up. “Eve can read. She saw your name in Wilbur’s appointment book. A last-minute scheduling, the secretary told her. Wilbur wasn’t pleased.”

  The scenario unfolded in Judith’s brain: Eve, sharp-eyed and nervy, forcing her way into the offices of Hoover, Klontz, and Paine as she had threatened to do, perhaps even barging in on Bob Boring, and provoking Wilbur to breaches of confidentiality. Judith wanted to sit down, but refused to give Kurt the advantage of direct eye contact.

  “See here, Kurt,” she said, trying to be firm but civil, “I went to see Wilbur on a personal matter. Eve’s name—not yours in any way—happened to pop up in the conversation. All I said,” Judith went on, taking a deep breath and a big chance, “was that I didn’t see how she could possibly break Emily Tresvant’s will.”

  Kurt Kramer’s Adam’s apple bobbed, and his pallid skin turned ashen. “What do you know about it?” His voice was an echo of its usually incisive tone.

  Torn between a natural wish for candor and a practical need for deception, Judith opted for the former, mainly because she couldn’t think of a plausible fib to carry out the latter. “My cousin Serena and I came by the Paines’ house Saturday night. Before we could get out of the car, Eve showed up. She made a scene. We overheard some of it.” Judith lifted one wide shoulder in a self-deprecating gesture. “It puzzled me, that’s all. I didn’t understand your wife’s connection with the Paines—or the Tresvants.”

  Kurt’s color came back, and he started to pace the length of the living room, from the French doors to the telephone stand. His hands were clenched behind him, head bent, eyes riveted on the Turkish carpet. He seemed lost in thought, and Judith wondered how long it would take before Gertrude demanded her supper.

  “You knew I worked for Tresvant Timber?” Kurt asked abruptly, stopping in front of the bay window with its sweeping view of downtown and the bay.

  “Comptroller, as I recall,” replied Judith. “You retired a while back, right?”

  “Last year.” Kurt’s stern face clouded over. “It wasn’t my choice. I was forced out by the Japanese owners. They wanted their own people.” He avoided looking at Judith, his unseeing gaze on the eclectic collection of pillows that rimmed the window seat. “Understandable, I suppose. The only thing left of Tresvant Timber in this state are the trees.”

  And, Judith recalled, Emily’s profits from the sale to the Japanese. Leaning on the back of the sofa, Judith studied Kurt Kramer’s spare, tired figure. It occurred to her that his bark might be worse than his bite. She wasn’t sure she could say the same for his wife.

  “You’re young enough to work somewhere else,” she said kindly. “There must be half a dozen companies in this town that would be glad to get someone as competent and experienced as you are.”

  Kurt actually brightened, giving Judith the impression that he was unused to compliments. “I thought about it,” he
said. “But the settlement was generous, as was the pension. I’d been there twenty-six years. It seemed to me that it was time to give my talents—such as they are—to the Church.”

  “That was very charitable of you,” Judith said, and meant it. “Did Eve agree?”

  “Yes.” He had stopped pacing altogether, and was now seemingly tempted to sit down in Grandma Grover’s rocking chair. “Eve’s a very understanding woman. In her way. She has always believed in me.” He spoke with a trace of pride. Mark Duffy’s image sprang to Judith’s mind, with his comments on Kate. He, too, had been proud of his spouse, yet Judith had sensed something else under that thick veneer of mutual devotion. With Kurt, all emotions seemed honest, if raw. Judith didn’t begin to like Mark less, but she definitely began to like Kurt more.

  “So Eve thought Emily should have remembered you in her will?” It was a longshot, but the only logical guess.

  Kurt’s shrewd blue eyes zeroed in on Judith. “No. Well,” he equivocated, “not as things stood. It was all very impersonal, you see.”

  Puzzled, Judith said nothing, but tipped her head to one side in an encouraging gesture. Kurt, flushing slightly, looked like a hunter who had walked into his own snare. “It’s old news,” he said, trying to extricate himself. “Originally, Emily had left everything to her sister, Lucille Frizzell. But when Lucille died, Emily remade her will. She left the bulk of her estate to all Tresvant Timber officer-level employees with twenty-five or more years of service. Naturally, at that time I was fairly new with the company and it meant nothing to me. But of course,” he added, growing even redder, “by the time she died, I would have qualified, along with about a dozen others. Then John Frizzell came on the scene, and Emily changed the will again.” The bear trap of a jaw clamped shut as Kurt Kramer made a vain attempt to hide his bitter disappointment.

  The front door banged, signaling that Phyliss Rackley was en route to the bus stop and her home across the ship canal in the Rutherford District. Judith half heard her cleaning woman’s departure, but her brain was calculating the Tresvant millions divided by twelve. Whatever the amount, Kurt’s share would have been hefty. She was surprised that he had told her about the previous will. But of course Wilbur knew, and so, probably, did Norma.

  “Why,” queried Judith, “did Emily wait so long to make John her heir?”

  Kurt made an impatient gesture with his hand. “Don’t you think John started writing and calling a lot? Emily might not have been sick then, but she was getting old.”

  Kurt’s explanation made sense to Judith. Having sold her timber empire, Emily’s interest in her ex-employees would have dwindled. In old age, she would have felt more kinship with whatever real family she had left, no matter how tenuous the connection. “Opportunism knocks,” Judith said with a wry expression.

  Kurt’s thin smile was cynical. “You can’t blame John, I suppose. Eve figures he’ll buy up half of Europe and the Orient. He’s a genuine collector. I’m afraid my wife has let John’s good fortune upset her.”

  “Huge fortune,” remarked Judith. “If he can keep it.”

  A muscle twitched along Kurt’s steel jaw. “The court will have to define ‘family man.’ These days there may be a lot of latitude.” He gave a sharp shake of his head. “I’d better go. Eve will have dinner on the table at six.” For a brief moment, Judith thought Kurt was going to take her hand. Instead, he jammed his fists in the pockets of his brown leather jacket and allowed his facial muscles to relax a bit. “I was a bit boorish when I arrived,” he said, sounding faintly gruff. “But Eve was having a temper tantrum. Maybe she exaggerated what was said in Wilbur’s office.”

  “Maybe.” Judith smiled. “It’s been a rough weekend for all of us.”

  “So it has.” Kurt frowned. “Especially for Sandy.”

  Judith’s eye traveled unbidden to Gertrude’s picture of the dancing Jesus. Somehow, it didn’t seem so comical. “Yes,” she agreed, “especially for Sandy.”

  TEN

  IN A VIOLENT world, the murder of a Heraldsgate Hill housewife would have merited no more than one thirty-second story on the evening news. But because the housewife had turned out to be a househusband, Sandy’s demise was once again worthy of TV attention.

  Judith, attired in her favorite blue bathrobe and drinking a diet soda, watched the eleven o’clock news in her bedroom. Sandy, according to the toothsome anchorman, was in fact George Philip Sanderson, forty-four years old, and born in Paterson, New Jersey. Police had verified the weapon as a pair of embroidery scissors. Sanderson’s roommate, John Frizzell, had no comment other than to confirm the victim’s real identity. A shadowy John was shown in the doorway of the Frizzell bungalow. There was no mention of Wilbur’s rabbit suit.

  Judith stayed tuned for the weather, which was fifty percent chance of rain, fifty percent chance of sun, and possible thunderstorms. In other words, she thought, punching at the pillow with her fist, a typical Pacific Northwest April forecast. Except for the possibility of an earthquake. Judith went to sleep.

  Her dreams flashed by in neon, a testimonial to her mental unrest. Joe was parachuting out of a hot-air balloon over Paterson, New Jersey, while Gertrude chased a dancing pig that turned into Mark Duffy. A ten-foot rabbit menaced Judith, but revealed itself to be Cousin Renie, stuffing her face with brussels sprouts. Kurt Kramer announced his intention of marrying Phyliss Rackley, who announced her decision to have a lesbian affair with Norma Paine, who announced that she was really the Pope. Judith awoke at seven a.m. feeling very tired.

  By eight o’clock, Gertrude was replete with scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. Judith drank orange juice and coffee, but abstained from food, conscious of the two pounds she’d gained over the Easter weekend. She was also aware that her wardrobe needed replenishing, especially if she was going to dinner in less than two weeks at the Manhattan Grill. She vowed to call Kathy, her favorite sales-woman at Donner & Blitzen Department Store, at the crack of ten.

  But just before eight-thirty, Arlene Rankers was banging at the back door. “Carl’s saying Mass,” she said, whipping in through the passageway with a blazing red azalea in her arms. “Here, this is a special thank-you for hosting the relatives. Weren’t they great? I wish they’d been hijacked.”

  “Hold it,” exclaimed Judith, set awhirl as usual by Arlene’s blatant contradictions, but backing up to her first announcement. “Carl can’t say Mass, he’s not a priest. What are you talking about?”

  Arlene had paused to hug Gertrude, who was still at the dinette table, drinking coffee and smoking like a steam engine. “You sweetie,” Arlene cooed, “you look like a princess in that zebra-striped housecoat this morning! Carl could just eat you up!”

  “How about replacing Carl with some lions and tigers and bears, oh my!” muttered Judith, setting the lavish azalea on the counter. “Arlene, explain yourself. About Carl and Mass, I mean.”

  “What?” Arlene’s blue eyes danced from Gertrude to Judith and back again. “Isn’t your daughter a regular pest? I already told her—Carl is doing a liturgy. We have no priest at SOTS this week. Father Hoyle went on vacation, and Father Tim is sick.”

  Like most Catholics in the archdiocese, Judith was well aware of the shortage of ordained clergy. Not only were priests sharing parish duties, but in some cases, the laity had been pressed into service. Men and women alike, they were not able to offer up the Mass, but they could—and often did—conduct a prayer service that was at least a meaningful substitute.

  “What’s wrong with Tim?” asked Judith. “Flu?”

  Arlene gave the smug Gertrude a last pat and sat down in one of the four matching dinette captain’s chairs. “No. I’m not really sure what it is, but he hasn’t been well since Easter. In fact, he was barely able to concelebrate the services over the weekend. He won’t come out of his room at the rectory.”

  Judith poured coffee for Arlene and refilled Gertrude’s mug. “Why not? Is he too weak?”

  Arlene poured milk from a pitcher i
nto her coffee. “I don’t know. Carl talked to Mrs. Katzenheimer, the housekeeper, and she said he’s been in there since Sunday afternoon.”

  Alarmed, Judith stared at Arlene. “Is he…alive?”

  “Of course he’s alive,” Arlene replied with a touch of impatience, as if the mere suggestion of death at SOTS was absurd. “He told Mrs. Katzenheimer he didn’t feel well and he wanted to meditate.” Arlene took a drink of coffee and gave an offhand shrug. “All that meditating is well and good, as long as you don’t do it alone. It just gets too quiet.”

  Judith didn’t bother to dissect Arlene’s last statement. Instead, she told herself that Tim Mills was probably responding to the violence in—and violation of—the church. He was, after all, a sensitive young man on his first parish assignment. Judith said as much.

  “Tim?” Arlene scoffed at the suggestion. “Our Mugs dated him, remember? He’s a pretty tough customer. Mugs could only deck him once in the six months they went together.”

  “I don’t mean tough physically,” Judith countered. “Emotionally. It wouldn’t be easy for any priest to have a murder take place in the parish precincts. Tim’s only been here about a month.”

  “No spunk,” asserted Gertrude. “Not like the priests in my day. I remember old Father Houlihan at St. Mary’s-in-the-Pines, he used to wear fur underwear.”

  Judith raised an eyebrow. “Do you mean a hair shirt?”

  Gertrude shrugged under her baggy cardigan. “Whatever. Made him itch like crazy. We all thought he had fleas. Smelled bad, too. But he was tough.” She gave a little shudder to underscore the point.

  Arlene took another swallow of coffee and announced her departure. “I’m taking a chicken casserole over to John Frizzell’s for his dinner tonight. Kate fixed her beef noodle bake for him, but he wouldn’t accept it. I guess he’s still upset about Mark trying to recover his wheelbarrow. People can be very strange.”

  Being upset over an alleged attempt at reclaiming a wheelbarrow was the very least of the oddities that circled around John Frizzell. Or so it seemed to Judith. “I’ll come with you, Arlene,” she said. “I can pick up something for his dessert at Begelman’s.”