by Rick Homan
By the time I had read several pages about false accusations of ritual murder, and had looked at other examples of this image, my knees were weak. I am not sure which was more shocking: the hideous nature of the slander or my own ignorance of this history. I had read dozens of books and heard hours of lectures about European art, and I had learned enough European history to understand that art in its original context, but never before had I seen any hint of this.
As I absorbed the shock of this discovery, I began to think about what it meant. I now knew that the muralist who was part of the Eden Commune had included in his “tree of life” an anti-Jewish image that had deep roots in the European tradition from which Fuchs and his followers came.
Since I also thought that the recurring figures in the mural were evidence of eugenics, I was on the verge of proving that members of the commune were in some ways forerunners of the Nazis. This was like finding out that someone’s family had been slave owners, or had participated in the genocide of Native Americans.
No one at Fuchs College would thank me for publishing this information. It was hard to imagine they would even tolerate my presence. Forget about tenure, they might find a way to fire me by the end of this academic year.
But I knew I could not bury my discovery, partly because I had enough of a conscience to know we all have to take a stand when we see something that’s wrong, but also because the purpose of my profession is to create and share knowledge. It would be fun to tell a friend that the painting she found in her grandmother’s basement is a lost masterpiece by Edward Hopper, but the obligation is the same when the discovery brings no joy.
I did however rethink my strategy. The implications of this image were too profound to be mixed into a classroom lecture on folk art or announced to the campus in the student newspaper. I had no wish to shame the founders of the Eden Commune and by implication Fuchs College. And, though he had acted selfishly, Jacob deserved better than to have this thrown in his face. Rather than beating him at his own game, I decided to invite him once again to collaborate.
I sent him an email asking if I could drop by his house Friday afternoon.
When I walked into my art history class on Friday morning, the room fell silent. Usually they continued chatting with one another while I plugged my laptop into the room’s projection system and opened my textbook and notebook on the lectern, but on this day it was so quiet by the time I got to the front of the room that I paused and looked around to see what the reason might be. No one looked up at me. Byron Hawley was bouncing one knee as he stared at the ceiling. Ursula Wilmot appeared to be reviewing notes from previous classes and checking things off in the margins. All the others rested their eyes on their desktops or on the floor. These lulls often happen around midterm, but it was early for that.
“Good morning!” I said, with a bit of extra energy, hoping to wake everyone up. “Today, we’re going to find out what a flying buttress is and see how it revolutionized art in gothic churches.”
Not even a flicker of interest. I had learned from one of my professors in grad school how to break through a wall of student apathy: use their own silence against them. “Who can tell me what a buttress is?” I left that question hanging in the air while I plugged in my laptop, put a slide of Notre Dame Cathedral on the screen, and found the appropriate pages in my textbook and notebook.
When all was ready, the classroom was still about as lively as a tomb. I’m sure they thought that if they just kept their heads down long enough, I would start babbling about the glories of stained glass. Instead I folded my arms, stood my ground, and swept the room with my eyes.
After about thirty seconds, cracks began to appear in their defenses. Two women who always arrived together and sat together in the back, began glancing sideways at each other.
I knew that if I called on someone by name I would lose the battle of wills. So, I waited.
Ursula Wilmot remained fascinated by her own class notes. Byron Hawley seemed absorbed in whatever he saw on the ceiling, no doubt projections of whatever painting he was working on. Others fidgeted.
Still I waited.
One of the two in the back slipped her phone out of her purse and held it beneath the writing arm of her chair, apparently thinking that made it invisible to me. After half a minute of furious thumbing, she looked up and said, “a reinforcement of a wall or other part of a building?”
“Thank you. That’s right. So why would some buttresses be described as ‘flying?’” When no one replied after a moment, I added, “you can see why if you look at what is on the sides of Notre Dame Cathedral in this picture.”
Most of them glanced up at the screen and then looked down at their notebooks. Once again I folded my arms, ready to wait them out. This time it took only about ten seconds to get an answer.
Most professors resent having to practice dentistry. Often they can be heard saying, as they leave the classroom, “that was like pulling teeth.” I’ll admit I grew tired and ended class five minutes early, but not before telling Byron Hawley I wanted to speak to him.
As the others left, he shuffled to the front of the room and waited, stone-faced, to hear what I had to tell him.
I pulled from my purse a check payable to him for the amount a shop in Chillicothe quoted me for removing spray-painted graffiti from a car. He stared at the check for a moment, and, without looking up at me, grabbed it from my hand and walked out.
Ursula Wilmot came forward, handed me a copy of the student newspaper, and said, “You should read this.” I took it from her, and she left the room. I saw nothing noteworthy on the front page until I got to the lower left corner and found the headline that read, “Slain Student Had Lesbian Affair.”
Chapter 32
My stomach felt like I was riding down in a very fast elevator. I hid the paper in my notebook, gathered all my things, and hurried to my office. Even there, I was afraid someone would drop by and see the look on my face while I was reading the article, so I called the department’s secretary and told her I wasn’t feeling well and needed to cancel my office hour and one o’clock class. She assured me she would post the appropriate notices, and I hurried out of the building.
After I crossed College Avenue into the residential section of campus where fewer people were coming and going, I stopped and texted Abbie: “My Hutch NOW.”
Once inside my front door, I stood by the window and read the article:
On the night, she was killed, Fuchs College senior Kate Conrad allegedly met a woman from Blanton for a sexual encounter behind Buddy's Bar, according to the Edwards County Sheriff’s department. The name of the woman is currently being withheld.
The Sheriff’s department spokesman refused to speculate on whether this encounter, which was discovered by patrons of the bar, led to Conrad’s death later that night. The Sheriff’s department considers her death suspicious and is investigating it as a possible murder.
Conrad was known to be a favorite of art history professor Nicole Noonan, who joined the faculty this fall. Dr. Noonan has degrees from San Francisco State University and the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is a native of San Francisco, CA.
I was trying to decide whether I needed to breathe into a paper bag to stop myself from hyperventilating when I heard a rap at my door. I opened it, and Abbie stepped in.
I held up the newspaper. “Have you seen this?”
“Is that today’s?”
I handed her the paper, pointed to the headline, and turned away. Leaning on the kitchen sink and looking out the window, I got my breathing under control. When I turned back, it seemed her face, paler than usual, had turned to stone.
“Did you know?” she asked.
I shook my head.
She closed her eyes and stood there holding the paper. “Where was she from?”
“Lancaster.”
“Pennsylvania?”
“Ohio.”
She nodded. “At least that’s a decent-sized town, and it’s c
lose to Columbus.”
“What do you mean?”
“More chance there was a bookstore or a church with an outreach ministry, maybe a community hotline for teenagers to call. I guess it doesn’t matter now. I was just hoping she had some way of understanding herself and of talking to people who understood her. Was she out to her parents?”
“I don’t know.”
Abbie held up the paper. “This would be a terrible way to find out.”
I poured myself a glass of milk. “Do you want anything?”
She shook her head.
We sat at the cafe table, and I took a deep breath before speaking. “This is going to sound incredibly petty, but how dare they say she was ‘a favorite’ of mine? I don’t have favorites, and that belittles the work Kate was doing on her own.”
“That doesn’t sound petty. I’d say it sounds about right.”
“By the way, I had a disturbing conversation about this with Sheriff Adams this morning. He came by to tell me Huey Littleton caught Kate and this local girl in the act, and that he’s investigating whether Huey or someone from the girl’s family may have come after Kate. The disturbing part was when he said Kate was ‘not entirely innocent.’ He implied that she was partly responsible for what happened to her.”
Abbie made a sound in her throat as if she were gagging. Her pale cheeks were flushed with color.
“This makes me want to go crazy and throw things,” I said.
“That’s not a bad idea, but don’t throw anything expensive,” she replied.
After we sat for a minute without talking, I said, “I’m going to give the campus another way to remember her. She made a significant discovery by studying the mural in the chapel. Jacob has been trying to keep it under wraps, but I’m seeing him this afternoon, and I’m going to convince him we should find a way to publish it under her name. I want her to be remembered as a scholar.”
“Good for you, Noonan,” said Abbie as she stood up. “I have to go. I have a one o’clock. Are you around this weekend?”
“Yeah, although Lionel and I might drive up to Columbus on Saturday. How about you?”
“I’m not sure. I have to call Sharon tonight. We’ve been talking. I might go to Pittsburgh.”
“That is definitely the best news I’ve heard all day. I hope you work things out.”
“Thanks. I’ll check you later.”
Abbie left. I pulled the shade in my bedroom and stretched out on the futon. I needed to play some mental chess before my meeting with Jacob at three o’clock. In case my meditation turned into a nap, I set an alarm for two thirty.
I felt surprisingly good as I walked over to Jacob’s house that Friday afternoon. So much had gone wrong, but I was finally in a position to do something about it. I knew what Kate had discovered, and I knew Jacob had her notebook, so I could call his bluff if he continued to pretend he knew nothing about the coffins in the mural, the stabbed child, and its significance. I hoped he would admit he had gone behind my back, agree that there was no point in suppressing Kate’s discovery, and join me in preparing an article that would acknowledge her contribution to interpreting the mural.
As I turned up the walk to his front door, I could hardly believe that less than four weeks had passed since I had first visited this house. Our consultation on research in the archives seemed like something that happened in a previous lifetime, one that did not include the murder of a brilliant young woman. I wished I could turn the clock back.
Chapter 33
“Good afternoon, Nicole.” Jacob welcomed me with a smile and waved me through his front door and toward the living room.
“Good afternoon, Jacob.” I smiled back and walked through the archway into that lovely room with its built-in bookcases, tall windows and fireplace. I sat as I had before on the loveseat and admired once again the collection of precious Meissen porcelain in the tall glass cabinet in the corner. On the coffee table in front of me were two recent issues of a history journal and a fine old leather-bound book. It might have been a bible or a volume of Goethe. I couldn’t see the spine.
Jacob paused just inside the archway and asked, “Can I get you anything? Tea? Coffee? A glass of wine?”
“No, thank you.”
He sat in the armchair with its back to the door and clasped his hands over his belly. “So how is the work coming along?”
He asked this with such warm expectation that for a moment I wanted to tell him everything I knew, but I remembered Kate and proceeded to set my trap. “I’m afraid I’ve hit a dead end. Maybe you can help me. In the records of the Eden Commune, have you ever seen any reference to a child being murdered?”
His brow furrowed, and he said, “No. What a horrible thought! Why do you ask?”
“Hidden among the details of the mural is an image of a child who has died from multiple stab wounds.”
He gasped and raised his eyebrows. “The mural in the chapel?”
I had to purse my lips to stop myself from smiling at his attempt to seem surprised. “Yes, Jacob. I’m wondering if the muralist was documenting an actual crime committed at that time.”
“I’ve never seen a record of any such crime, I’m happy to say. I’m surprised to hear that there is such an image in the chapel.”
He had fully committed to his lie, so it was time to spring the trap. “I don’t think you are surprised, Jacob. For one thing, you’ve read about it in Kate Conrad’s notebook.”
He shook his head as if clearing cobwebs. “Excuse me, what notebook are you talking about?”
“I called Kate’s parents last week to ask if I could see the notebook she kept for my class. Her mother told me that you had already spoken to them, and that they had mailed it to you.”
“They mailed it?” He shook his head. “I haven’t received it.”
Apparently, he thought that if he ignored the obvious, I wouldn’t ask. “But you did call Kate’s parents? Why did you want to see her notebook?”
He stared into the distance and nodded slowly. “I saw her in the library. I think that was the day after you introduced me to her in the chapel. I inquired about her work on the mural and offered to help. She said something about such an image. I must have made a note of it somewhere and then, after she was killed, I suppose I wanted to find out what she was thinking. Yes, now that I think of it, I did call her parents and ask for the notebook, but it never arrived, and I must have forgotten about it.” He smiled. “There’s probably a note about it on my desk, buried under a stack of other notes. You know how it is. Thank you for reminding me.”
I had to give him credit for thinking fast. He took the few facts I put before him and bent them into a story that made him look innocent. “Do you recall what she said about the image when you spoke to her in the library?” I asked.
He made a good show of thinking about it before saying, “I’m afraid not.”
“What suggestions did you make?”
He held out both hands, palms up, and gave a slight shrug. “I’m afraid I don’t remember things like I used to.”
I did not for one moment believe his memory was failing. “Did she think the image was a record of an actual crime or did she have some other theory?”
“I wish I could remember. I suppose that’s why I wanted to see her notebook. I must check with the mailroom.” He glanced at his watch. “Well, it’s too late now. They close early on Fridays. I’ll check with them first thing on Monday. They may have forgotten to put a package slip in my box. It could be sitting there right now.”
I looked him in the eye. “I think you know what she was researching from your conversation with her. I think you recognized the stabbed child for what it is, an anti-Jewish image, and did your best to throw her off the scent. I think you got that notebook from her parents to keep me from getting hold of it. Maybe you didn’t want it to come out that some members of the Eden Commune carried on a tradition of bigotry that goes back to the Middle Ages. I’ve discovered that history on my own,
and I’m going to write about it. I hope we can cooperate on this, and I hope you will work with me to make sure Kate gets credit for this discovery.”
Jacob’s eyelids drooped slightly, as if he were thinking more than seeing. “I don’t care for the accusations you’re making, but for a moment let’s take a look at this idea you have. Felix Fuchs was a religious leader, but he broke with the institutional church in Germany. So, it’s hard to believe he or his followers would have continued this anti-Semitic tradition that was a product of that church. Also, he was influenced by the philosophical movement called the Enlightenment. Like most of the leaders of communes in the 1800s he believed in things like the brotherhood of man and equality, so I don’t think he subscribed to the belief that some people are inferior.”
I sat forward on the loveseat so I could get both heels on the floor and sit tall. “Charles Fourier was also a post-Enlightenment thinker. Nonetheless, his vision of a new society said Jews were only good for manual labor on farms. European anti-Semitism did not disappear with the Enlightenment, as the history of the twentieth century tells us.”
Jacob sneered and clapped his hands three times. “Well done, Dr. Noonan. You win the debate.” He sat forward and braced his elbows on the arms of the chair. “You’re right, of course. Your student somehow worked out the meaning of this image.”
“If by ‘somehow’ you mean imagination, critical thinking, and research, then I agree with you.”
“When I spoke to her in the library I recognized the image as typical of the blood libel against Jews, a loathsome tradition and, as you’ve said, a very old one. I tried to steer her in a different direction.”
“Why?” I asked. “She had made a significant discovery. We could have encouraged her to write it up for publication. She might have won an award or a scholarship.”