Deadline for a Critic

by William Kienzle

  It was clear Valerie was stunned. “Groendal and you! I can’t believe it! The father of my half-brother . . . God!

  “But what’s this got to do with me? It all happened long before I was born. Why would he sabotage my career? I never had anything to do with him. I don’t even know him. So, again: What’s this got to do with me?”

  “It’s hard to say, baby. It’s a feeling. A feeling I’ve had all along. That he was out to get me. It’s like a scale that was left unbalanced.”

  “But why? God knows you’ve had a tough enough life.”

  “I know. I know. But he hasn’t done anything to me personally. I feel as if he thinks I made him leave home and that he deserves some sort of revenge for that. But he’s never gotten it. He couldn’t, I guess. For most of the time, I was so low he couldn’t kick me. But he still ‘owes’ me. That I feel. And if he can’t reach me directly, I feel he’ll try to get at me through someone I love—you.”

  “Mom!”

  “This is all hindsight, baby. It never entered my head for a moment that he would take it out on you. That’s one reason I never told you. But now . . . well, it seems that’s the only explanation for what he’s done.”

  Val clenched her jaw. “Mom, I’m going to get the bastard for you. I swear it.”

  Jane shook her head. “Val, don’t lower yourself to his level. Just take special care of yourself. I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you.”

  “Don’t worry about me, Mom. Thanks for telling me all this. It couldn’t have been easy for you. But . . . does he know about all this—about Billy?”

  “I don’t know. I only saw him once after . . . that night. He didn’t seem to believe the baby I was carrying was his. Maybe he never knew about Billy. Or, if he did, he still probably wouldn’t have admitted his responsibility.”

  “Then that’s my ace in the hole. I may never have to play it. I hope I don’t. But one thing: Whatever it takes, I’ll get the bastard for you. I really will.”

  Again, Valerie seemed to be lost in a private fantasy.

  It was as if someone had added color to a black-and-white photo, clarifying it. Koesler had lived through the original events of Valerie’s story with the principals. He’d been there when Jane and Ridley met. Later, he had felt constrained to listen to Ridley recount the details of his sexual encounter with Jane. Subsequently, Koesler had witnessed the aftermath of Ridley’s breakdown after learning of Jane’s pregnancy. Finally, Koesler had attempted to aid Jane in her struggle to raise a handicapped child.

  But Koesler had been unaware of Ridley’s attempt to revenge himself against Jane through Valerie.

  The priest thought of all this for a few moments before nudging Valerie on. “And then . . .?”

  “And then I returned to New York, did some more modeling. Even the modeling began to suffer. It may surprise you, Father, but you can’t have a blank mind while you’re modeling. It takes a lot of concentration.”

  “I never thought about that.”

  “Well, it does,” she said pointedly. “And I was preoccupied with Ridley Groendal. I had a lot of trouble concentrating on my modeling. I also had a lot of trouble sleeping. It was one thing to say I was going to avenge my mother and myself, and another thing to actually do it.

  “A guy like Ridley Groendal leads a pretty insulated life. Physically, it’s hard to get near him. The New York Herald is like an armed camp. You can’t get beyond the lobby without an appointment. And even then, there’s no entry until the person you’re going to see comes and gets you.

  “It’s very much the same with Groendal’s apartment building. The security is excellent. And anyway what are you going to do even if you do get next to him?

  “The whole thing was very frustrating. And then something else happened.”

  “Huh?”

  “Red Walsh graduated. He was drafted number one by the Detroit Pistons. It wasn’t the team he wanted. He wanted to go to the Knicks because he thought I was going to stay in New York and he wanted to be close to me.”

  She did not state this at all self-consciously, which gave Koesler pause. He concluded she must be a most self-assured young woman.

  “And that’s where he came, right after the draft. Then he came after me. Boy, did he ever! He gave the full-court press a new definition. We were together almost all the time. He got to like the theater. And I promised I would get interested in basketball.

  “Well, we got engaged. By now I was so happy I had darn near forgotten about Groendal. Then it happened.”

  Valerie got up and began to pace. She stopped and hunted through her purse until she found some cigarettes. She lit one. “Excuse me, Father. I rarely smoke, but I’m kind of nervous.” She looked around for an ashtray; finding none she wondered if this might be a “no-smoking” section of the rectory.

  Koesler calmed her fear by finding an ashtray in one of the drawers and placing it on the desk. From her manner, he assumed she was nearing the heart of her story—the reason she had come to see him in the first place. “What happened?”

  He brought her back to the point.

  “Okay.” She inhaled deeply, then let the smoke drift from her nostrils. As she continued speaking, she exhaled smoke from her mouth, punctuating her words. “We were walking down Fifth Avenue near St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Red and I. We had just picked out our wedding rings at Cartier’s.

  “You know how when you’re in New York and you see somebody who looks like some celebrity, it usually turns out to be not a lookalike but the real celebrity?”

  Koesler nodded. He’d had the experience.

  “Well, we were walking, very happy together, when who should be coming toward us but Ridley Groendal. That other guy—his home companion—Harison—was with him. But I didn’t even notice him till later. All I could see was that face—that cocky, self-satisfied face.

  “I’d never done anything like this before, but something inside me snapped. I just rushed over, blocked his path, and started yelling at him.

  “At first, he looked startled. But then, when he recognized me, he got this smirk. It just made me more furious. I was shouting, shrieking, demanding to know how he could rate my performance when he wasn’t even at the theater.

  “I called him every name I could think of, most of them words I’d never used before. The street was crowded and people started to gather ’round.

  “But it was obvious that I wasn’t getting anywhere. His smirk never wavered. He was really reaching me. So, I started hitting him.”

  “You what?” Koesler could not imagine a diminutive person like Valerie causing much damage to one as big as Rid. On the other hand, intense emotion can confer incredible strength.

  “Yes, I started hitting him. At first, Harison tried to stop me. So I hit him. He would have come back at me but Groendal pushed him aside.

  “That was what was so odd, looking back at it: Groendal just stood there taking it, with a little smile on his face, like he was enjoying it. And I was getting in some pretty good licks.”

  Koesler was momentarily distracted. He recalled the beating Charlie Hogan had given Rid in the shower room at the seminary. Then too, Rid had just stood and taken it. Did he never in any way try to defend himself? Was there a masochistic streak in him?

  “Anyway, it didn’t last long. It takes longer to tell it than it did to do it. Once I got physical, Red moved in, grabbed me around the waist from behind, lifted me clear off my feet and carried me away. I think he acted just before a cop arrived on the scene to put me away.”

  “And then?”

  “And then I started swinging at Red. At that point I would have hit anybody or anything. But, of course, he didn’t take it like Groendal did. Thank God he didn’t hit me back. He just pinned my arms and talked to me quietly till I calmed down.” She ground out the cigarette and resumed her chair.

  “That was it?”

  “Pretty much, Father. But one thing still bothers me.”

  Ah, th
ought Koesler, here it comes. Valerie waited a moment. But when Koesler did not ask, she went on. “About the time Red pulled me away from Groendal, I was shouting that I would kill him. I shouted it over and over.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “Well, isn’t that a sin? Murder certainly is a sin. And we were taught that a thought about committing something like murder could be a sin too . . . Father?”

  “Maybe. It depends. Thoughts are kind of tricky.”

  “Tricky?”

  “We’re capable of thinking anything. A thought all by itself probably doesn’t have any morality to it at all. Nor do words, if they have no real intent. Remember the story Jesus told about a father who sent his two sons into the fields to work? Son number one says, ‘Sure I’ll go, Pop’—or words to that effect. Son number two says, ‘Not on your life.’

  “But son one ends up going fishing while son two rethinks the whole thing and gets down to work.

  “The point Jesus was making is that some of our thoughts and words are effective and some are empty and meaningless. Part of the proof, at least sometimes, is what a person will actually do about what she thinks or says.

  “Make any sense?”

  “Well, I haven’t killed him—yet. But I don’t know if that’s only because of what’s happened since.

  “Very shortly after my encounter with Groendal, Red and I got married. Of course we moved back to Detroit. Red’s been with the Pistons ever since he broke into the league and, as a result, his best business connections, endorsements, commercials are here. And there wasn’t any point to my remaining in New York. Groendal had effectively shot down my stage career—and he was still on guard in case I continued to try. Red makes good money . . . real good money.”

  Koesler nodded. “I know.”

  “So, I’ve been able to do a little community and semipro theater here in Michigan. We enjoy our kids. And thank God there are no more cattle calls or hanging myself out on a line like a piece of meat.

  “So, what I mean is, I haven’t killed him. But to be honest, I don’t know why I haven’t. I guess maybe because I’ve got ‘the good life.’ I certainly wouldn’t want to go to jail . . . not with a good and loving husband and a fulfilled life.

  “But . . . what if I could get away with it? Just between you and me. Father, I honestly don’t know whether I’d do it. After what he’s done to me and my poor mother . . . I just don’t know. I’ve got a lot of getting even to do before we’re quits.”

  “‘Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.’” Koesler threw the Biblical quote out reflexively. It fit. But he had never known it to be effective in the face of a genuine, deep desire for revenge.

  “Well, if it’s His, He’d better get cracking. No. I’m sorry, Father. I’m sorry, God. That’s flip.”

  “Would you feel better about it if you went to confession? If you confessed it—sin or not—as it is in the sight of God?”

  “I don’t think I can do that, Father.”

  “Why not?”

  “’Cause I’m not sorry. I don’t know whether it’s a sin or not. But I know I’m not sorry. And you gotta be sorry to go to confession . . . don’t you?”

  “That’s true.”

  “It helped. It really helped. Father. Just saying it out loud. I feel better just having told you about it. Honest, it helped. But I’ve still got to wrestle with this. Do I really want to kill him? Do I have to get revenge?” She sighed, then smiled tiredly. “I guess I’ll see you again. But thanks for taking all this time with me, Father.”

  Koesler showed her out of the rectory. He poured a light Scotch and water, turned on the classical music station, and thought.

  The “talking cure”—it never failed to amaze him. There comes a time in most people’s lives that some secret and/or shameful thought or deed demands verbalization. And if it doesn’t get aired, it may drive the person mad. But saying it, speaking it, telling it to someone, acts as a release valve. That’s where Catholics have traditionally had an advantage—in confession. Not only do they have the opportunity of telling the secret either in the anonymity that the confessional provides—or, lately, face to face—but they can walk away feeling that they have been forgiven.

  And this pretty well wrapped up the strange case of Ridley C. Groendal. During his relatively brief life he had managed to make many enemies and very few friends. Of the enemies, four were literally mortal enemies in that each had stated in Koesler’s presence the intention of killing Rid.

  And now he was dead. Nature and Rid’s abuse of nature had contributed. Diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart problems were exacerbated by high living, thoughtless consumption of food and alcohol, and—finally—AIDS. Rid’s was a condition programmed to explode. It had been detonated by four letters—one from each antagonist. After an evening of particularly heedless gastric abandon, Ridley had read the letters. All was in readiness for the explosion, and the letters had done it. Groendal read them and became apoplectic. His blood pressure shot up to the ceiling. He went into a convulsion and died.

  Each of the letter writers had threatened to kill him. Which of them had succeeded—or was it a collaborative effort?

  Shortly after leading the recitation of the rosary for Groendal, Father Koesler thought he knew the answer to that question. Of all the people in this drama, his position was unique in that he knew each of the dramatis personae and their interrelationships.

  He needed to ask only one question and, depending on the answer, his solution would prove to be either right or wrong.

  Part Seven

  In Paradisum

  21

  The Gregorian Chant was so reassuring and beautiful. Ridley would have wanted the choir to offer this final commendation of his soul to heaven. Father Koesler wanted to think that he would have suggested it even if Peter Harison had not requested it. But why quibble over credit for so inspired a thought?

  Koesler stood at the foot of the casket to conduct the final church rites before leaving for the cemetery. He let his mind wander through the familiar Latin. “In paradisum deducant te Angeli . . .”

  May the angels lead you into paradise; may the martyrs come to welcome you and take you to the holy city, the new and eternal Jerusalem. May the choir of angels welcome you. Where Lazarus is poor no longer, may you have eternal rest.

  The police had been most cooperative last night. Of course, things might not have gone so smoothly had it not been for Inspector Walter Koznicki.

  Koznicki and Koesler had been friends for many years. The Inspector was head of Detroit’s busy homicide department. It happened that Father Koesler had been of some help, by contributing his religious expertise, in solving some police investigations that had Catholic overtones. While their relationship had begun on a completely professional basis, over the years it had grown into a close and abiding friendship.

  It was Koznicki who, after being contacted at home by Father Koesler, had gotten the ball rolling. David Palmer, Carroll Mitchell, Charles Hogan, Valerie Walsh, and Peter Harison were summoned to police headquarters at 1300 Beaubien.

  While they waited for the principals to arrive, Koznicki showed Koesler the letters that Ridley Groendal had read just prior to expiring.

  Koesler was quite sure he knew essentially what each letter would contain, but he read them nonetheless. There was nothing better to do while awaiting the others.

  The letters had been smoothed out and flattened in clear plastic binders. But Koesler could tell by the creases in the papers that Ridley had crushed them rather forcefully before casting them in the wastebasket or on the floor. His final fury was almost palpable.

  Later, Koesler would remember only salient segments of the four letters.

  David Palmer:

  . . . Groendal I find it hard to believe that any adult could hang onto and nurture a childhood grudge the way you have. You played a trick on me. I played one on you. We were kids, for God’s sake! All these years, you’ve imagined that I took something away from you
—Interlochen.

  Nothing could be further from the truth. You had no talent You were a fourth-rate musician. You turned into a fifth-rate human being. But because of our childish pranks you have shit on my career over these many years. And I’ve taken it. All I’ve done is gripe and grouse over your unfair treatment. It occurs to me that you’ve done all you can to me. The time has come to return the favor. You’ve been sitting in the critic’s chair untouched and untouchable for too long.

  I wonder how artistic America would react to the fact that its premier critic is an unpunished and, to date, undetected arsonist. You were not alone when you set that fire in the auditorium. I was there with my camera. I’ve got the photograph. You and the fire.

  It happened a long, long time ago. But not long enough for your ego to be free of the shame of it. I know you, Groendal. You’ve built the irreproachable image of the impeccable commentator who feels free to tear everyone else apart, confident that your seamless garment will never be rent or soiled.

  I promise you this, Groendal: Beginning with arson, I will find out all your evil from peccadillos to capital sins, and make sure the artistic world, especially your many victims, knows what a prick you are. Groendal, the world lost one of its great assholes when God decided to put teeth in your mouth. . . .

  It continued in the same vein. Koesler shook his head. He wondered how Dave would feel if the media got hold of his letter. Undoubtedly he had never thought of that when he sent it. Koesler went on.

  Carroll Mitchell:

  . . . It seems to me that your function is to be the constant judge of competition. Actors competing with each other, competing with actors of the past. Playwrights in competition with each other. Which is the best play on Broadway; which is the worst? Constant competition. And you are the judge, the acknowledged chief judge. The judge of all this competition.

  You have judged my work over all these years and always found me sadly wanting. You have been a harsh and cruel judge of many other adequate to fine playwrights. You have been the supreme Judge for all these years. Yet, the only time you were in actual competition with me, you were so frightened by that competition that you committed the most heinous crime possible to any writer: You stole. You plagiarized!