Mysteries of Winterthurn

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Yet, once begun, such follies cannot, it seems, be halted: nor did a portly berobed gentleman of the cloth, a member in good standing of the Brethren, balk at his task, as he read, in a trembling voice, certain vehement passages from the Old Testament, pertaining to God’s wrath, and God’s justice, and the fate in store for those who resist His love. Following this, the hooded minister inquired of Rosenwald, if he repented of his hideous crimes, before God, and man: and, even as the dread noose was being lowered, somewhat clumsily, over his head, he took care to hold himself erect, his knees not buckling, and to say in a voice that was heard clearly across the Green: “I, Isaac Rosenwald, repent of nothing, for I have nothing to repent: and only ask of my God that He forgive yours—”

  Whereupon, with a sudden brusque movement, the incensed hangman cut him off in midsentence: and he fell: and suffered some five or six minutes’ agony at the end of the rope: and died.

  Postscript

  The reader will share the outrage of any person of sensibility, to learn that, following this ignominious episode, not a single arrest was made by the police: and this despite the fact that, at the actual time of the hanging, some five hundred persons must have been crowded into the square; or watching from rooftops and trees nearby. (There exist daguerreotypes, and pen-and-ink sketches, of the lifeless body, which was not cut down from the gallows until well past dawn: and, ah! how diminutive and childlike the frame, and how placid the countenance, of that ill-treated man! Yet no representations exist of the Jericho Brethren who had killed him: nary a hint of their ghostly, yet stolid, presence at the gallows, and crowded about on all sides: so that, to the superficial glance, it might seem that Isaac Rosenwald had contrived to die by his own hand, at the end of a rope; or had been thus struck down by his Maker, with no human agency involved.)

  Yet, as the beleaguered Chief of Police Hiram Munck had occasion to say when questioned, over a period of months, by divers outraged parties,—amongst them the State Solicitor-General, and the American Jewish Committee, and one or another Winterthurn citizen of uncommon integrity—it is well-nigh impossible to make identifications of masked men; nor was it any more possible, in these confused circumstances, to persuade men to inform upon one another,—for anyone might accuse anyone else; and mere whispers and innuendos would assuredly not stand up in court. Then too, how might individual arrests be made?—for the police should end up, as Mr. Munck frowningly said, “arresting nine-tenths of Winterthurn City, which cannot be done.”

  The Traitor

  Through the long months during which Isaac Rosenwald had been held in custody, there had always been, amongst informed and thoughtful citizens, a modicum of uncertainty (whether voiced aloud, or no) as to his actual guilt,—still more, as to the likelihood of his having murdered all five girls. Yet, following the hanging, there descended upon Winterthurn City, virtually overnight, a remarkable species of doze, or amnesia: as if, with the erasure of the prime suspect, the dread mystery of the “Cruel Suitor” had itself been erased!—and there no longer remained the need, still less the wish for a need, to pursue it.

  “And now, let us pray that he restrains himself!”—thus more than one person was overheard to murmur, with naught a moment’s pause to consider the singular import of his words: or how very curious it was, they were so readily understood.

  In so complaisant, or, it may have been, so numbed, an atmosphere, one can well imagine the wildly commingled emotions,—amazement, and incredulousness, and simple shock, and derision—provoked by the disclosure, in mid-September, that yet another “suspect” had been arrested by police, as the “Cruel Suitor”: and this, so extraordinary a personage, and blessed, as it were, with a name that exuded a local sanctity,—no one but Valentine Westergaard himself.

  Yet it would have been an egregious error to suppose that Mr. Munck had dictated a warrant for Valentine Westergaard’s arrest, without the single-handed effort of Xavier Kilgarvan to assemble an airtight case against the villain: without, indeed, the ceaseless pressure put upon him by the impetuous young Kilgarvan,—who claimed he would expose, and humiliate, and deprive of their authority, such high-ranking officers as Munck, if they did not bow to his will: and acknowledge Westergaard’s guilt. Yet more remarkably, he had somehow persuaded the District Solicitor, Mr. Hollingshead, that the State might proceed with confidence in bringing Westergaard to trial, no matter the prowess of his legal defense,—a coup much discussed by gentlemen of the bar, in commensal fraternization at the Corinthian Club, or the Winterthurn Athletic Club, very near the vicinity of Courthouse Green: for was not the canny Hollingshead, with an election year imminent, obliged to be most cautious?—and how dared he brave the wrath of Old Winterthurn (which is to say, the reigning families of the Valley, a number of whom,—the Westergaards not excepted—were millionaires many times over), whose donations to his campaign fund, over the years, had been most welcome? “In short, it must be the case that Valentine is guilty,” these gentlemen concluded, at last, “else Xavier Kilgarvan would have been banished long before this, and sent away in disgrace.”

  Yet, as an elder felt obliged to point out, with a fond faint smile, and a puckish arching of his eyebrows, “there is actual guilt, and there is proven guilt: and how commonly is it the case, that the two are espoused?” Whereupon the abashèd gentlemen deferred to him as having, most succinctly, summed up all that might be said.

  WHAT HAS HAPPENED to young Kilgarvan, to rouse him so strangely?—to cause him to bear arms, as it were, against Valentine Westergaard?

  Thus the question was asked in Winterthurn drawing rooms, and in one or another of the private clubs, or wherever, by happenstance, persons acquainted with both young gentlemen met: the ladies whispering of the amazing development no less than the men, with many a fluttering of a brocaded or silken fan, and a frisson of anticipation: for, quite apart from the possibility of Valentine Westergaard, of all people, being an actual murderer (a prospect, I might as well point out here, no one could take seriously, as the very concept of murderer was to them indistinct), there arose the likelihood of a court trial of unparalleled drama and intrigue, to liven the upcoming season,—one in which, moreover, two young, attractive, and wondrously eligible bachelors would be “locking horns.”

  Yet the general sentiment was one of shocked disbelief, that the Colonel’s grandson, despite his peculiar,—and even, upon occasion, notorious—ways, should be suspected of any crime whatsoever; let alone a capital offense; let alone this capital offense. For while much had been whispered of Valentine and his circle, in recent years, and the Molly O’Reilly embarrassment had not been forgotten, it was quite another matter to imagine the elegant young gentleman, with his curled hair, and velvet jackets, and fur-trimmed coats, and lavender gloves, as the suitor,—let alone the murderer—of mere shop-girls, of South Winterthurn stock! But somehow it had happened that Xavier Kilgarvan, acting out of his own volition, and financing an investigation of sorts out of his own pocket, had arranged to pay the fees of an expert pathologist, on the staff of the Massachusetts General Hospital, that the bodies of all five of the murdered girls might be exhumed, and re-examined: with findings rumored to be somewhat different from those of Mr. Deck. (It was even rumored, doubtless irresponsibly, that Xavier had stooped to outright bribery in getting permission for certain of these exhumations,—as the next of kin of the murdered girls, when they could be located, were most reluctant to disturb the slumberous peace of the dead; and were justifiably apprehensive of what an expert autopsy might yield.) Beyond this, Xavier was said to have assembled a thousand-page portfolio, the fruit of many arduous nights and days, when, oft-times in disguise, he had mingled with the inhabitants of South Winterthurn, seeking firsthand accounts from persons who had glimpsed Valentine Westergaard in the company of Eva Teal, or any of the slain girls; or had been privy to disclosures made by the girls, regarding their friendships with Westergaard. (Ancillary to this was the disquieting rumor that the young detective, in piecing together h
is case against Westergaard, had several times spoken with frightened persons, both male and female, who claimed that, many months previous, they had offered their testimony freely to the police, and had wished to swear affidavits naming Westergaard, and not Rosenwald, as the object of their suspicion,—being, for their pains, summarily dismissed from police headquarters; and sent away with the admonition that bearing false witness, and interfering with the progress of a police investigation, were criminal offenses. Also, it had come to light that several sworn affidavits, including that of Rosenwald’s garrulous landlady, Mrs. Buzard, had subsequently been retracted; and that this information had been suppressed by Hiram Munck.)

  Most shocking of all,—and most damning for Westergaard—while he, Wolf Kilgarvan, and one or two others had been attending the races in Saratoga, the cunning Xavier had taken the opportunity of misrepresenting himself to Valentine’s servants, and, under pretext of taking measurements for new draperies, had searched the handsome Hazelwit townhouse “from top to bottom,” as he boasted: making the discovery therein that, in two of the rooms, the carpets had been very recently cleaned; and the hardwood floors fastidiously sanded; and dappled across the wainscoting, a modest number of bloodstains were to be found,—or, in any case, stains that gave the appearance of being blood. So enterprising had young Kilgarvan been, and so shameless in his intrusion upon a gentleman’s privacy, he had forced the lock to Valentine’s boudoir, which no servant was permitted to enter: and found therein, hidden away in a massive chest of drawers, the murder weapon itself!—this being an antique dagger, gilt-handled, and studded with ornamental gems, which had come down through the family from the time of the Earl of Westergaard, who had formed so fortuitous an alliance with Richard III and had long remained fiercely loyal to his monarch. The dagger, or small sword, had been, it was said, carelessly wrapped in a silken dressing gown of Valentine’s, and secreted away at the rear of a drawer, as a child might have hidden it: in guilty haste, and with no forethought: evidencing so little calculation, the blade of the dagger yet betrayed some very suspicious dark stains, as did the turquoise dressing gown.

  (Herewith, I shall include, for the reader’s information, two groundless,—nay, utterly fantastical—rumors that evolved from the above, and made the rounds, sotto voce, of the very best drawing rooms in the Valley: the first, that the ghostly imprint of Eva Teal’s face had been retained on the dressing gown, and would be shown as evidence at the trial; the second, that, upon exhumation, it was discovered that the ghostly image of Valentine Westergaard’s face was yet retained on the irises of the murdered girls’ eyes!—the which grisly evidence, when demonstrated to the jurors, could not fail to convict poor Valentine. Hearing these things, the accused man was said to have flushed with annoyance, that his “second-best dressing gown had been despoiled in such a wise”: and that none of the sluts had had the common decency to shut her eyes, at a crucial moment.)

  Of the numerous newspapers that had dealt so severely with Isaac Rosenwald, naught but the Vanderpoel Sun, and the Nautauga Falls Bulletin, and, from time to time, the New York Tribune, chose to make an issue of the newest development in the case: and, even in these, until the start of the trial in January, very little space, indeed, was granted it. The Winterthurn Gazette, owned by the Goshawks, and overseen by Osmyn, could scarcely ignore such extraordinary local news: yet, as the Goshawks had been compatriots of the Westergaards for at least six generations, and had several times intermarried (albeit not invariably happily), Osmyn could scarcely wish to highlight Valentine’s arrest, nor dwell upon its evident necessity. Indeed, it was whispered of Osmyn that he grew increasingly frightened of the news that tumbled, near-daily, into his lap: for, after the lynching of Rosenwald, he had at once closed down the newspaper for a full week,—with the explanation that the presses required cleaning, re-oiling, and the like; and, when the Gazette resumed publication, the editorial page had exercised admirable discretion in including but a single carefully phrased piece on the constitutional rights of all American citizens to trial by jury, and due process of law: regardless of their “probable, or self-evident guilt.” No mention was made of the curious behavior of the law enforcement officers on the fatal night, save a brief and respectful notice, well hidden on an inside page, to the effect that Sheriff Frank Shearwater, having suffered a heart attack of moderate severity on the morning of August 10, had, from his very hospital bed, resigned his position,—the which he had held, as the article would have it, “with honor and distinction, and oft-demonstrated courage, capability, and integrity,” for nearly two decades.

  WITH THE OUTBREAK of the new scandal, it was not to be remarked upon that all of the Westergaards went into seclusion: nor even that Xavier Kilgarvan’s family was so reticent in wishing to discuss his role in the matter. Mr. Kilgarvan toiled away in his workshop for longer hours than before, with only his faithful Tobias in attendance: for, as wholesale orders for his toys had gradually declined, a felicitous reversal in custom-made orders seemed to be in effect, from the more wealthy amongst his clientele,—to whom $800 rocking horses, meticulously crafted, and fitted out with genuine horsehair, mother-of-pearl teeth, a “real” children’s saddle, and the like, were naught but charming trifles; and $1,000 dolls, named variously Rosabelle, and Annemarie, and Little Eve, and Salome, were beginning to make their appeal. Never one to readily creep forth into society, as he phrased it, Xavier’s father now resolutely declined all invitations; and the reigning worry of the household was that, at the very last minute, he should suffer one of his “neuralgias,” and fail to attend Bradford’s wedding.

  Mrs. Kilgarvan, it was rumored, was aggrieved at her youngest son’s behavior, and, perchance, somewhat angered as well, for she could not believe of Valentine what Xavier said,—nay, insisted:—and relations between them had grown strained. Bradford comported himself with his usual dignity when forced to discuss the case, as often happened, with one or another of his business associates, or friends: saying that he knew nothing: that he scarcely felt he knew Xavier, grown so fiery of late: and had no opinion on the subject. As for Wolf and Colin,—Wolf could offer but a nervous, or flippant, remark, when questioned; and Colin so brusquely rebuked all inquiries, with a menacing frown, and a perceptible tightening of his fists, it cannot be wondered at, he was rarely approached.

  Xavier did appear mysteriously altered: as if he had somehow aged several years, in a brief span of time: his features discernibly less boyish now, and assuredly less gentle: the facial skin tighter than formerly, across the brow in particular: and a disquieting silver-gray glint, as of mica chips, to his gaze,—which, for so many years, had warmly impressed the ladies as limpid and dreamy, and wondrously appealing. To the casual eye he was perchance no less attractive than he had been; yet his social manner, even when resolutely courteous, and constrained, exuded an air of secret repugnance; and his smile was but measured and ironic. If some incalculable childlike exuberance had faded from his countenance, an air of gravity had well replaced it: and if he now seemed continuously on the very edge of impatience, or even brusqueness, his intrinsic good manners held him in check. It was known that, shortly after the death of Isaac Rosenwald, Xavier had appeared in certain places about town, both public and private, greatly distraught, and “not himself”: saying such rash, despairing, and ill-considered things, not only about the Brethren of Jericho, but about the police, and, withal, the entire community, that his mother had at last pleaded with him to desist: for outspoken censure of the Brethren might well be considered, at this date, a species of dangerous self-indulgence, indeed; and, surely,—as more than one troubled person pointed out to Xavier—Winterthurn City was no more criminal, no more sinful, no more human, than anywhere else, in this fallen world.

  All scornfully the young man absorbed this doubtful wisdom; and said in a voice of chill composure: “The world being fallen, as you say, I had always supposed our task was to raise it.”

  To some persons of his own age, or younger, Xa
vier could not fail to strike a prepossessing figure; for it is hardly to be wondered at that a female heart might helplessly accelerate in his presence. (Even so composed a young woman as Perdita, whom masculine attention, in recent years, seems to have badly spoiled,—or, it may have been, wearied—found in her cousin’s newly emboldened step, and peremptory manner, a quality very much to her liking: though the troubled young woman did not truly know whether she liked what her heart so vigorously bade her to like!—there being an incontestably greater comfort in gentlemen of another species altogether, in whom the manly sensibility, as it might decorously be termed, had somewhat atrophied. Thus it was, Perdita quietly observed to Thérèse that their cousin Xavier had changed, she knew not entirely how, and could not guess why: and Thérèse, in a similarly quiet tone, averred that he had changed, at least in manner: and quite oddly. “I do not like the change,” Perdita said. “I do not feel comfortable with it.” Whereupon Thérèse glanced at her, with an expression of scarcely disguised censure, and said: “But why do you imagine, sister, that it is an obligation of yours to like, or not to like, Cousin Xavier’s manner: or, indeed, to feel comfortable with it?—for I am not aware that he has ever meant a great deal to you.” Biting her lip, Perdita turned away; and with a childish agitation of her brow, murmured, so that her sister could scarcely hear: “He has not. He has never. Not a one of them!—ever. And so, and so,—why, he has not; and he will not; and pray do not trouble me again on this subject, Thérèse—!”)

  To others, however, of the older generations, Xavier’s aggressive behavior was disquieting indeed: and provoked many a reminiscence of the time when his father, the young half-brother of Erasmus and Simon Esdras, had dared go to court against them: as if any judge, or higher court of appeals in the State, would have found against the redoubtable Erasmus Kilgarvan—! (Though it was now generally believed that poor Lucas had been cruelly deprived of his inheritance,—not illegally, but merely cruelly: and it had been most heartless of his older brothers to have done so.)