“So you see, Woody, Paul Revere was not just a patriot. He may also have been America’s first dental detective!” Doc Sauer paused and watched the look of amazement on Woody’s face. He would have to invite the kid back for more history lessons. Maybe he even had an acolyte, he mused.
***
Woody left the library late one afternoon and, walking across the quad, saw a raucous crowd in front of Aitchison Hall. He heard the rhythmic chanting of “1-2-3-4, we don’t want your fucking war” build to a crescendo. He walked over and stood silently on the fringe and picked up the skunk-like smell of marijuana but couldn’t see anyone actually smoking.
Then, he heard a disembodied voice say “C’mon, Meacham. I saw that bullshit war-mongering letter you wrote to the Thorndyke Student Voice expressing support for the damn war. Where’d you get that nonsense – from your parents?” Woody recognized the voice and tried to push forward but the crowd was now in motion, moving ovine-like to another location. Suddenly, there was an opening and a straggle-haired, pimply-faced student turned and gave Woody the finger. It was Brad Drebek from his German history class. Woody was surprised to see Birdsie walking next to Drebek with his arm draped over his back. Without thinking, Woody shouted “You’re an asshole, Drebek”, causing a few of the protesters to turn and stare disdainfully at him.
Unfazed, Woody yelled to Birdsie while motioning for him to drop back and join him. Birdsie looked glassy-eyed and had a joint hanging from his mouth. He shrugged his shoulders and yelled back “Light up a spliff and take a deep drag, Woody. It will do you good.” He was grinning broadly as he walked backwards into the crowd.
***
During spring break, Woody stayed on at Thorndyke, helping one of his history professors with a tome on post-war Germany. He heard that Birdsie had taken off for San Francisco to join the beautiful people streaming into an area called Haight-Asbury. Who knows, Woody speculated, maybe he took Drebek with him and they’ll commune with kindred spirits and not come back.
Woody did some research and learned that Birdsie’s namesake – Ralph Waldo Emerson – had a number of thought-provoking things to say about war, pro and con. He doubted that any of the protesters, including his friend, had given the topic serious thought. Hell, if Emerson were at Thorndyke right now, they would probably shout him down.
***
Woody and Birdsie were in the gym together for the first time since his front teeth were turned to dust. Birdsie tried to break the ice by joking light-heartedly about the incident with Drebek. When Woody frowned, he laughed and said, loud enough for everyone to hear, “Hey, I’m not guarding you with those new choppers, pal. Can’t afford to buy you another pair of expensive caps.” Woody looked at Birdsie with a mixture of disgust and disappointment and just walked away.
***
Woody came back to Doc Sauer’s a few more Tuesday nights after that initial visit to eat apple pie a la mode and other sugar-laden desserts. He found it curious that Mrs. Sauer was always gone to her bridge club before he arrived.
Final exams were under way and visiting Doc Sauer was a nice reprieve from Woody’s study grind. After he graduated, Woody would go up to Parlor Harbor for the summer to contemplate his future. His childhood friend, Jerry Kosinsky, would be spending the summer with him and Birdsie had promised to visit – but that was before their latest confrontations.
After the uplifting story of Paul Revere, Doc Sauer went to the dark side and told the story of John Wilkes Booth. Doc Sauer was a natural storyteller and Woody sat mute in rapt attention.
“To dispel rumors that Lincoln’s assassin had escaped to South America, Booth’s body was brought up the Potomac River from the Port Royal, VA farmhouse where he had been shot in the neck. Only a complete autopsy would remove all doubts that the body was actually Booth’s. Upon its arrival in Washington, DC, the corpse was placed on the USS Montauk moored on the Potomac River where Booth was examined by several medical experts, one of whom was Dr. William Merrill, a local dentist. Merrill had filled two teeth for the acclaimed actor shortly before the assassination. He pried open the rigid mouth of Booth to confirm that the two gold fillings were his handiwork. Mystery solved, right? Not by a long shot.
“Four years later, in 1869, amid continuing conspiracy theories that the person in Booth’s grave was someone else, the body was exhumed and his family sent a representative to confirm Merrill’s dental work. It was authenticated a second time but no one bothered to ask the dental expert to identify himself. Was it Merrill? Was it a quack? No one knew for sure and so the suspicion that Booth was still alive continued for years before eventually dying away.” Doc Sauer sat back in his chair with a self-satisfied grin and took a few deep breaths, having delivered his story with the expertise of a professional announcer reading for an old-time newsreel.
Woody wondered what would come next from the dental oracle. “Well, that’s it for tonight, kid. Got patients arriving at 8:00 tomorrow morning and I need to get my beauty rest. Next Tuesday, Woody?” asked Doc Sauer.
***
After polishing off a large slice of lemon meringue pie, Woody sat back in his chair, anxious for his next lesson in dental history.
“So, kid, when was the first recorded event of forensic dentistry?” Doc Sauer asked rhetorically as a bewildered expression formed on Woody’s face. “Paul Revere?” he offered hesitantly.
“Well, you’re only a few thousand years off but that’s okay. This case involves the emperor Nero in ancient Rome. You’ve studied him, right kid?” Doc Sauer asked with a quizzical expression on his face. Woody bit his lip but said nothing.
“What are they teaching you over there at Thorndyke? The best way to teach and enjoy history is to tell stories and make it come alive. It makes students eager for more – or at least it should.
“Nero fiddled while Rome burned, every schoolboy should know it. Anyway, few seem to remember that he was also a Momma’s Boy. Agrippina was Nero’s domineering mother and the wife of the Emperor Claudius. She had a rival for her husband’s affection, one Lollia Paulina, and would not tolerate it. Paulina had left Rome voluntarily or perhaps had been exiled, no one knows for sure. Even though she now lived a considerable distance away, Agrippina was intensely jealous so she sent a Roman guard to supervise Paulina’s ‘suicide’. Demanding proof that her rival was dead, she had the head of Paulina brought to her. By the time it reached Rome, the head was so distorted and badly decayed that the face was unrecognizable. Agrippina was frustrated but then she remembered what were considered the unique teeth of her rival. Were they long, bucked, haggled - no one knows for certain – but history tells us that Agrippina forced open the jaw and confirmed that the teeth belonged to Lollia Paulina. For completing that basic examination, Agrippina is considered by many to be the first person in recorded history to apply the techniques of forensic dentistry. So, whatta you think, kid?”
“I think they need you in the History Department at Thorndyke, Doc” Woody said animatedly. Doc Sauer stood up, smiled, and patted Woody on the back. He could have listened to Doc’s stories all night but knew each evening had its limitations.
As he was leaving, Woody turned to Doc Sauer and said, “Please thank Mrs. Sauer for the pie. I hope to meet her one of these nights and thank her personally.” Doc Sauer nodded but said nothing as he closed the door.
***
Without revealing the source, Woody mentioned a few of Doc Sauer’s stories to a teaching assistant in the History Department one day and got a puzzling look in return. With final exams underway, Woody didn’t make it back to the dentist’s house. He was starting to wonder if Doc Sauer was truly a reliable amateur historian or just a spinner of fantastic yarns.
***
On the day before graduation, Billy and Gwen came to town. They had contacted the Birdsongs and invited them to dinner at a local chop house. At one point, Gwen thanked the Birdsongs for their generosity in footing Woody’s dental bills and Birdsie chimed in with a comment about Doc Saue
r. “Hey, Woody, tell your parents about your Tuesday night visits to Doc’s house. He cleaned my teeth the other day and it sounds like he’s got you mesmerized with tales about famous people and their teeth” Birdsie said with a sarcastic grin on his face.
Everyone was staring at Woody as if he had been keeping a dark secret and now had to explain himself. He grimaced and said “It’s nothing bizarre, really. He tells what might be considered dental detective stories but, the thing is, they sound pretty darn convincing. Yeah, he’s a bit eccentric but I like him.”
Woody looked intently at Birdsie, wondering what had prompted his snide remark. They had been virtual strangers since the latest confrontation at the gym and Woody heard that Birdsie was smoking marijuana almost every night, hanging out with Drebek and some townies that had no connection to Thorndyke. Someone had mentioned that Birdsie was a reliable source of weed and that Drebek, now his constant companion, might be his supplier. And then there were the increasingly confrontational war protests. Birdsie was seemingly always at the front of the pack, chanting the latest anti-war slogans.
“Listen, he puts a twist on history that is refreshing. His stories of Paul Revere and John Wilkes Booth are amazing. So, on a few Tuesday nights when his wife makes dessert and goes to her bridge club, I go over and listen to him talk. I don’t believe he’s making this stuff up. Why would he?” Woody had started off feeling a bit defensive but was now clearly annoyed as he looked around the table inquisitively before glaring at Birdsie.
“Have you actually met Mrs. Sauer, Woody?” Mrs. Birdsong asked gently. Woody shook his head and then she continued, almost sotto voce. “Doctor Sauer’s wife died over five years ago, young man. By all accounts, he took it pretty hard. I don’t know who is making those desserts but it is certainly not Mrs. Sauer.”
Woody was stunned and speechless. He looked over at Birdsie who, stifling a laugh, said “Well, at least we can agree that he certainly does first class dental work.”
***
Woody’s parents left right after graduation and promised to come up to the cottage within the next few weeks. Meacham had intended to tell Woody that Rudy and possibly the Clintocks were now in Parlor Harbor but somehow it slipped his mind.
Jerry Kosinsky showed up at Thorndyke the next morning. They packed up his car with Woody’s gear for the ride to Parlor Harbor. As they were leaving campus, they ran into Birdsie walking with Drebek. There was an awkward exchange of good-byes but nothing more was said.
Woody made excuses to himself but was ashamed that he never went by to say good-bye to Doc Sauer.
CHAPTER SIX
Woody and Jerry Get Reacquainted
After graduating from Parlor City High School, Woody and Jerry went their separate ways to college, one to Thorndyke and the other to Pythian. They never drifted apart but lost that valuable and often unspoken intimacy that comes from being near a dear friend on an almost daily basis. During summer breaks, Woody came home and worked a variety of jobs that he quickly forgot while Jerry went off on excursions out West, traipsing through national and state parks looking for buried treasure, or so he said.
Together at Pritchard Cottage, there was some initial awkwardness as they tried to reconnect. Both of them knew instinctively the need to re-establish the bond that was so strong when they were kids. The war hung over them like it did most young people, creating uncertain futures that could conceivably separate them for years to come, if not forever. It was a sobering reality after living in a protective academic cocoon for four years.
The easier dialogue, which broke the ice, was the recollection of events that dominated their childhood memories. Jerry brought up Woody’s paper route and the Saturday morning rituals with their fathers at Lattimore’s Bakery. Woody recalled Jerry’s fascination with some ancient religion and the “Z” stenciled on one of his tee shirts. “That was for Zoroaster, Woody, and if I recall correctly you thought it was the sign for Zorro,” Jerry laughed. “Yeah, I was a little too serious about things for a 12-year old” he added with a shrug.
“It annoyed and frustrated me at the time, Jer. All those hours you spent in the library when I was trying to lure you outside. But the truth is, I admired you all along – still do” Woody said wistfully.
“I’ll tell you what I admire about you and will never forget, Woody. Your grandfather is strangling someone on your front lawn and you whack him with a baseball bat, saving that person’s life who, it so happens, is in love with your mother and ends up becoming your stepfather. You were 10-years old, man, but somehow had the presence, hell, the courage, too, to do the right thing at a crucial moment. Now, that’s heroic.” Jerry stopped talking but couldn’t stop shaking his head in utter amazement, as if the scene he depicted had just happened yesterday and he had been an eyewitness.
“So what’s next, Jerry? Have you decided?” Woody asked, unwilling or unable to react to the story his friend had just told. Jerry sat pensively for what seemed like a long time and Woody wished he had thanked his friend for his heartfelt comments. Jerry had his thumb resting on the tip of his mouth and was gnawing at the nail, deep in thought. Woody remembered that pose well.
By the time he had reached high school, Jerry was derided by some of his classmates as a bookbuster. He had quickly moved beyond the stage of clever and precocious kid who some adults found annoying as well as intimidating. In truth, he was already a budding but still raw intellectual. When Miss Smith, the librarian, told him about a Professor Eyesmore at Pythian who had written extensively about man’s place in what he termed the “caravan of life”, Jerry read voraciously about this iconoclastic teacher whose specialty was paleoanthropology. Soon, he knew he had to study under him and chose Pythian despite offers from more prestigious institutions.
At college, Jerry was a free thinker and a serious one – no pseudo-intellectual in a sea of poseurs. Eyesmore had seen his potential almost immediately and warned him about the ideologues and what he called “the doctrinairists” not just at Pythian but elsewhere, pushing their particular point of view when they should have been encouraging students to stray off the conventional path and view everything with a critical eye. Jerry had absorbed it all and was diligently trying to apply Eyesmore’s tenets in every aspect of his life.
“We were forced into the trees to survive and if we hadn’t, we would not be recognizable today. Except for the vicissitudes of centuries, we might be out there now barking in the plains like prairie dogs. What I’d like to do is rent a house and roam the prairies, live as a stoic and ascetic but with the Vietnam War …….. “Jerry stopped short when he saw the puzzled look on Woody’s face but then pressed on, unable to contain himself.
“Did the snout adapt, grow a tiny brain that prompted him to eventually start ambling along on dry land? Why do some fish climb trees in Africa – it’s true, Woody, don’t give me that look! – I’m not talking black magic nonsense. I think they’re called mudskippers. Anyway, the point is that evolution is not complete and we don’t live in a man-centered universe. We just think we do. The truth, even if unpopular, is that we emerged from the ooze thousands of years ago and here we sit, drinking beer and talking to each other. Now, don’t get me wrong, that’s a good thing but there shouldn’t be any certainty about what comes next – after humans, that is. I just don’t accept that we are necessarily evolution’s highest achievement.”
“We’re going to get drafted, Jer. We’re both One-A. That’s reality for me – not the snout or whatever you call it. You’re not thinking of crossing the border, are you” Woody asked, realizing that Jerry had spoken eloquently but had ignored his question. He was closely watching his friend for any troubling signs. What he was hearing was making Woody nervous.
Not waiting for a reply, Woody said, “Hey, maybe I’ll hold up the bank in broad daylight and end up at Strathmore Prison like Rudy and the Clintock boys. I can hang out with the friends they certainly made there and wait out the war. They’re out, you know, and back home.”
***
Later that evening, the boys were getting a little sloppy and their heads were buzzing. It was inevitable that the conversation got back to Rudy Gantz and the Clintocks.
“What do you think those lug heads are doing today?” Woody wondered out loud, referring to the twins. “Hey, they never figured out that they can bend steel with their bare hands and could have waltzed out of prison months earlier. My guess is that they are hanging around the Projects waiting for Rudy’s instructions.”
Jerry stood up on wobbly legs and started waving his arms affectedly. Woody sensed he was about to deliver another soliloquy and was eager to hear what would come next from the oracle. “The Clintocks inhabit a world of primordial memories where language serves no useful purpose. Oh, they have a grunting, monosyllabic vocabulary to get by but language doesn’t interest them as a means of communication. I imagine that prison only drove them deeper into a silent world where they feel most comfortable. Is it any wonder that they let a half-wit like Rudy Gantz do their thinking and talking for them? To them, he’s a virtual Einstein.”
A Murder In Parlor Harbor Page 5