Murder, She Reported

by Peg Cochran

  “A woman up in Yorkville was knocked down and had her purse snatched in broad daylight. The police are there now, taking her statement, so we’ve got to step on it.”

  “Coming.”

  Elizabeth was grateful to be on the move. She didn’t think she could stay awake if she had to spend the day at her desk pecking out another one of Estelle’s columns. She grabbed her camera and followed Kaminsky out the door.

  They took the Lexington Avenue IRT line from Grand Central Station. By this time of the morning, the worst of the crowds had dispersed and they were able to get seats. Elizabeth sank into hers gratefully, staring at the black square of the window opposite her as the train rattled along through the tunnel.

  Kaminsky stretched out his long legs, crossing them at the ankle. The hems of his trousers rode up, and Elizabeth was amused to note that his dark brown wool socks had clocks knitted into the design. He smelled of cigarettes, Ivory soap and hair tonic, and Elizabeth somehow found that comforting.

  “So why are you looking so hangdog this morning. Late night?”

  “Sort of.”

  Elizabeth braced herself as the subway rounded a corner, the wheels screeching against the iron rails, just before entering the Fifty-ninth Street station.

  “I have learned something interesting, though.”

  “Let’s have it, then.”

  “It’s as we suspected. DeWitt was lying and Gloria and Frances didn’t get along at all. Gloria has been a daddy’s girl since her mother died.”

  “And then along came the evil stepmother.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Now how did you find that out?”

  Elizabeth looked away. “I…I heard some women talking in the ladies’ room at the Stork Club.” That wasn’t exactly the truth, but it was close enough.

  The memory of how her friends had snubbed her came rushing back, and Elizabeth felt her stomach clench.

  Kaminsky whistled. “Swanky place. I wouldn’t have figured a working girl like you would be frequenting a joint like that.”

  Elizabeth bit her lip. She’d have to be more careful with what she talked about in the future.

  “It was a date.”

  “So the fella’s got money, I guess.”

  “No. Just trying to impress me, I think.”

  The train pulled out of the Fifty-ninth Street station and once again began to pick up speed.

  “Good work, Biz.” Kaminsky got to his feet. “Here’s our stop.”

  The clouds had blown over and the skies were clear and blue when they exited the subway station.

  “We’re looking for an address on Eighty-fifth Street near Second Avenue,” Kaminsky said, plopping his hat back on his head. “How about we walk down Eighty-sixth Street?”

  They waited at the light and then crossed to the south side of the street. Elizabeth peered in the shop windows as they walked.

  “Look!” she cried pointing to a display in the window of the Elk Candy Shop. “Aren’t those piglets darling?” She turned to Kaminsky. “Imagine! They’re made out of marzipan.”

  Kaminsky shuddered. “Never could stand the stuff myself. Our neighbor—a little old German lady—used to give us some every Christmas.”

  “What’s that delicious smell?” Elizabeth asked as they walked farther down the street.

  Kaminsky pointed to a shop front where a large sign, Deutsche Bockwurst, hung in the window. “It’s Schaller and Weber, right over there.”

  Elizabeth peered in the window where a man in a long white butcher’s apron was arranging a mouthwatering display of sausages and wursts of every imaginable kind.

  Elizabeth felt her stomach grumbling.

  They turned the corner onto Second Avenue and Kaminsky scanned the numbers on the buildings.

  “Here we are,” he said, pointing to a brownstone tucked in between two other buildings. Starched white curtains hung in the first-floor windows and the front steps had obviously been recently swept clean.

  Kaminsky pressed the doorbell, and they listened as a buzzer sounded inside.

  Moments later the door was opened by a uniformed policeman. Kaminsky whipped off his hat and pulled his press card from his pocket. The policeman nodded and stood aside for them to enter. He motioned them toward a door at the end of the corridor.

  The brownstone had obviously been divided into separate apartments. The stairs leading to the second floor were covered in worn gray carpeting and the linoleum leading to the first-floor apartment, though clean, was old and cracked.

  Elizabeth followed Kaminsky down the hall and through the door the policeman had indicated.

  The small parlor was crowded with furniture, and knickknacks sat on lace doilies on every available surface. An ornate cuckoo clock had pride of place on the fireplace mantel. The room was cold, and the small, older woman with graying hair in waves to her chin sat in a chintz-covered armchair with a heavy sweater wrapped around her. She was wearing thick black stockings on her stout legs and had an apron tied around her waist.

  A man sat in a wooden rush-seated chair turned so that his back was to them. He glanced over his shoulder and Elizabeth recognized him as the detective who had been at the scene of Frances’s murder—Sal Marino. She felt in her pocket where she still had the card he’d given her. Although he was sitting, he gave off the same waves of suppressed energy Elizabeth remembered from the first time she’d met him. And she found him just as attractive as she had then.

  “We’re done here,” Marino said, getting up from the chair and placing it back in the corner where he must have taken it from. He turned to the older woman. “Mrs. Kauffman, I’ll be in touch when I have some news for you.”

  He paused when he saw Elizabeth and gave a slow smile. She found herself wishing he wasn’t leaving so soon.

  He nodded at Kaminsky, clapped his hat on his head and made his way to the door. Elizabeth felt as if some of the light had been taken from the room with his departure.

  Kaminsky introduced himself to Mrs. Kauffman and pulled up the wooden chair Marino had just vacated. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”

  Mrs. Kauffman reached for the cup of tea on the table beside her with trembling hands.

  Elizabeth got out her camera. Taking the woman’s picture felt intrusive, and she knew that was something she would have to get over if she hoped to succeed in this job. She busied herself with finding the right angle for her pictures to take her mind off the uncomfortable feeling.

  Mrs. Kauffman flinched when the flashbulb went off. Elizabeth removed the spent bulb and hastily inserted another one before she lost her nerve.

  “Mrs. Kauffman, do you want to tell me what happened?” Kaminsky repeated, his pencil poised above the notepad he had pulled from his back pocket.

  “A young man grabbed my purse. Right in broad daylight. He knocked me over.” The flowered porcelain teacup clattered in the saucer as she put it back on the table. “What’s the world coming to when a decent, God-fearing woman like myself can’t walk down the street without being molested?”

  “What did the thief look like?”

  Mrs. Kauffman licked her lips and her eyes darted to and fro. “He was a young man. Dark-haired. He was wearing black pants and a white shirt.”

  “It’s cold out. Did he have on a jacket?”

  “Yes.” Mrs. Kauffman nodded. “It was a dark color—navy blue, I think—and it zipped up the front. And he wore a black hat.”

  “Do you remember anything else?”

  Mrs. Kauffman’s lips tightened and she shook her head.

  Kaminsky scratched behind his ear. “The clothing you describe sounds like a uniform—the unofficial uniform of the German American Bund.”

  “Ach, yes.” Mrs. Kauffman rubbed a pale, blue-veined hand across her forehead. “The Amerikadeutscher Volksbund
.”

  “Did the man say anything to you?”

  Mrs. Kauffman’s lips trembled. She hesitated. “He said, ‘Geh nach Hause, Jude.’ ” She looked down at her clasped hands. “Go home, Jew.”

  * * *

  —

  Elizabeth realized she was still shaking when she and Kaminsky got back to the Daily Trumpet offices. She felt a combination of a strange sort of feverish excitement that seeing Marino again had stirred up along with horror over what had happened to Mrs. Kauffman.

  “I can’t believe that happened to poor Mrs. Kauffman,” Elizabeth said as they hung up their hats and coats. “Who would do something like that?”

  “Nazis, that’s who. A nasty bunch,” Kaminsky said as he paused to light a cigarette. “That Hitler fellow is stirring up a lot of trouble for the Jews. Funny-looking guy, too.” Kaminsky took a deep drag on his cigarette and blew the smoke out in a stream.

  “I think it’s terrible,” Elizabeth said, horrified to hear the quaver in her voice and feel the tears springing to her eyes.

  “There’ll be a war, mark my words.”

  “But just the other day President Roosevelt said that our country would remain at peace.”

  Kaminsky gave a harsh laugh. “And I’ve got a bridge to sell you. I don’t believe it for a minute.”

  Elizabeth felt a chill that had nothing to do with the draft coming in the old rattling windows of their office building.

  She glanced at Estelle’s closed door, and this time she could discern the outline of Estelle sitting behind her desk. Elizabeth hoped she’d have time to eat her lunch before Estelle came out with another column to be typed. Mrs. Murphy had packed a sandwich for her—homemade chicken salad on white bread—and had insisted on cutting off the crusts so it would be a sandwich proper enough for a young lady like Elizabeth. She’d been scandalized at the thought of Elizabeth not having a hot lunch, let alone eating it at her desk.

  Elizabeth retrieved the sandwich from her purse and was unwrapping the waxed paper when her telephone rang.

  She picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

  “Elizabeth, this is Gloria DeWitt.”

  Elizabeth pushed her sandwich away—she’d suddenly lost her appetite.

  “I’d like you to have tea with me this afternoon. There’s something I want to discuss with you. Meet me at the Palm Court at the Plaza at five o’clock.”

  Before Elizabeth could say another word, Gloria had hung up.

  Elizabeth groaned.

  “What’s the matter?” Kaminsky asked from his desk, where he was enjoying his egg salad and onion sandwich.

  “Gloria DeWitt wants me to have tea with her. This afternoon. She must be furious with me.”

  “That’s great,” Kaminsky sputtered, his mouth full of egg salad. “Get whatever information you can out of her. We’ll see if we can make tomorrow’s paper.” Elizabeth spent the rest of the afternoon developing the pictures she’d taken that morning. She couldn’t shake the feeling of dread that hung over her like a heavy cloak. What did Gloria want to talk to her about if not to berate her for allowing that picture to be used?

  Kaminsky knocked on the door of the darkroom just as she was finishing up.

  “Let’s see what you’ve got.” He examined the photographs drying on the carousel, pausing before each one and rubbing his chin.

  “Good job, Biz. I talked to the boss, and we’re going to tie this story in with one on the rise of the German American Bund in New York City.”

  * * *

  —

  It was later than Elizabeth would have liked by the time she was able to leave the office. She buttoned her coat and pulled on her gloves as she ran toward Madison Avenue. The bus was already at the stop and a line of people were waiting to get on. The last person had mounted the steps and the bus driver had his hand on the lever to close the door when Elizabeth arrived, frantically waving at the driver to wait.

  The bus was crowded, but she made her way toward the rear where she was able to find a strap to hang on to. The man standing next to her was well over six feet tall, and his arm, as he clung to the pole overhead, blocked her view out the window. It was warm with all the bodies pressed together and Elizabeth loosened the scarf around her neck.

  Elizabeth fretted at each stop, silently urging the passengers to hurry on and off. Gloria was no doubt already furious with her—she didn’t want to make it worse by being late.

  The bus finally reached her stop, and Elizabeth pushed her way to the exit. The bus had been close and stuffy, and she breathed a sigh of relief when she felt the fresh air on her face.

  She hurried across Fifty-ninth Street and was breathless by the time she reached the Plaza. The venerable building towered over Central Park South, floodlights illuminating the twenty-story façade in the growing dusk. Carriages were lined up along Central Park South, the horses stamping their hooves impatiently and snorting great clouds of vapor into the cold night. The air was tinged with the faintest scent of manure.

  Elizabeth stopped for a moment to catch her breath, nodded to the doorman then plunged through the door and into the majestic marble lobby of the Plaza Hotel.

  Elizabeth unbuttoned her coat and yanked off her gloves as she made her way across the lobby to the Palm Court. She put a hand up to her hat but didn’t have time to check to be sure that it was on straight.

  The Palm Court was a magnificent room—an outdoor garden brought inside with lavish palm trees and massive bouquets of fresh flowers under a domed stained-glass ceiling. A quartet played softly in the background, the music as soothing as the tinkling of a brook.

  Elizabeth scanned the tables quickly, looking to see if Gloria had arrived. She found her toward the back of the room and hastened over to where she was sitting. Gloria was wearing a red silk suit with a diamond brooch on the lapel and had a fox fur stole draped loosely over her shoulders. She held a sterling silver cigarette holder studded with garnets in one hand and a nearly empty martini glass in the other.

  “I’m so sorry I’m late,” Elizabeth said as she slid into the chair opposite Gloria.

  A waiter glided up to their table. “May I take your coat for you, miss?”

  “Thank you,” Elizabeth handed over her coat and scarf gratefully.

  The waiter reappeared moments later.

  “Won’t you have a drink?” Gloria said, holding her glass up to the waiter. “I’ll have another martini, please.”

  “Just some tea, thank you. Earl Grey, please.”

  The waiter bowed and moved away.

  “I suppose you know what I want to talk to you about,” Gloria said, peering at Elizabeth over the rim of her glass.

  Elizabeth had decided that she would explain…but she wouldn’t grovel. It wasn’t her fault the newspaper printed that photograph, and what was done was done. She couldn’t change it now.

  “I imagine it’s about the photograph,” Elizabeth said more coolly than she felt.

  Gloria tapped the end of her cigarette against the ashtray. “I think you owe me an explanation.” She leaned back in her chair and pulled the fox stole more closely around herself.

  Elizabeth noticed that Gloria’s eyes were slightly out of focus, and she wondered how many martinis she’d had before Elizabeth had got there.

  “The reporter took the photograph out of the trash can. I never meant for it to be published.”

  Gloria raised a glossy, dark brow.

  “Honest. I threw it away and Kaminsky—he’s the reporter—found it after I’d gone home.”

  Gloria leaned forward, putting both her arms on the table.

  “I need you to do something for me. I think you’ll agree it’s only fair.”

  “Yes. Of course. Whatever I can do…”

  “That photograph has given people the idea that I killed Frances. And
I didn’t. You believe me, don’t you?” She grabbed Elizabeth’s hands and held them.

  Her hands were colder than Elizabeth expected.

  “I believe you.”

  “Then you’ll help me?”

  “I don’t see what I can do….”

  Gloria pulled her hands away and inserted a fresh cigarette into her cigarette holder.

  “It’s your fault everyone thinks I murdered Frances in the first place. If it hadn’t been for that dreadful photograph and that headline positively screaming that I was guilty…”

  Elizabeth bowed her head. “I know. And I can’t tell you how sorry I am.” She stirred a spoon of sugar into her tea. “Why were you crying in the ladies’ room that night? It was your night. You should have been happy.”

  Gloria twisted the sapphire ring on her finger around and around. “I’d had a row with Frances earlier. She was threatening to tell Father to write me out of his will because of…things I’d done that she didn’t approve of.”

  Gloria grabbed Elizabeth’s hand again. “You’ve got to promise you won’t let them write anything else about me in that horrid newspaper you work for. You’ve done enough damage already.”

  “But I don’t have any say over what the paper prints.”

  “I’m sure you’ll find a way.” Gloria’s tone became even more hard-edged. “I could ruin you socially, you know. Or I could help smooth this whole thing over. Your choice.” She flicked the ash from her cigarette into the ashtray. “I’ve already told plenty of people you took that dreadful picture of me. Don’t think you fooled them by using a different name.”

  Elizabeth thought of her experience in the ladies’ room at the Stork Club and suppressed a shiver.

  “I can either tell them that I gave you permission to use the photograph or…”

  Gloria let the threat dangle in the silence. Elizabeth felt the blood pounding in her ears.

  “Or.” Gloria paused and took a sip of her martini, leaving a half moon of red lipstick on the rim. “I can tell them that the photograph was all a joke, and I was in on it. It was just too bad that the newspaper got hold of it and decided it would create a sensation.”