The Policewomen's Bureau

by Edward Conlon

  Marie wanted Sandy to see another side of her, a better side, one that showed her as a woman of pluck and flair, like Casey Jones, not someone who cried alone in the dark. Not that Casey had a life outside of work, that anyone knew—not a husband, or a boyfriend, or even a cat. Anyway, it had been quite a while since the last “surprise slumber party,” scooping up Sandy for an overnight respite with one of her sisters, but the baby wasn’t a baby anymore. The kid wasn’t deaf or dumb. Sid would never let Marie go for good. He’s said so, more than once. Divorce was something for movie stars, not cops or Catholics. And Marie didn’t want to leave him. She wanted her marriage to improve, and she had reason to believe that it could. Things weren’t always so terrible, mostly—Sid was loving to Sandy, when he was around, and he and Marie hadn’t had a serious disagreement in months.

  Not since the night before she’d run into Detective Marino. In her purse was the torn-out page from the Encyclopedia Britannica he had sent her. Until she read it, Marie hadn’t been sure that Gypsies existed outside of movies, but the article was circled, so that it was clear he wasn’t talking about gypsum:

  The mental age of an average adult gypsy is thought to be about that of a child of ten. Gypsies have never accomplished anything of significance in writing, painting, musical composition, science or social organization. . . . Society has always found the gypsies an ethnic puzzle and has tried ceaselessly to fit them, by force or fraud, piety or policy, coaxing or cruelty, into some framework of its own conception, but so far without success.

  Marino’s mother-in-law had outlived two husbands and had a sizable nest egg built up when she went looking for a third. Advice from a higher plane was sought, in the form of a certain Mrs. Abbie, who perceived dark forces surrounding them: “I see the letter ‘R,’ a man of power, something gold.” Who could that be but Detective Ralph? Marie understood why he wanted to put a stop to it, but the situation didn’t strike her as an emergency. Lots of ladies wasted time with palm-reader types with no harm done.

  Still, it had been months since Ralph had first asked for help, and she called him right away when the article arrived in the department mail. She was too breezy in her tone. “So, Ralph, how much did the old gal take your mother-in-law for?”

  “Eight grand that we know about.”

  Marie almost dropped the phone.

  “It’s not just the money, Marie,” he went on. “She’s like a loan shark, coming back for more. She’s got my mother-in-law scared half to death, convinced everybody’s against her. She hates her kids now. The witch put it in her head they might poison her food, and she doesn’t eat. She was ninety pounds last week when we put her in the hospital. Her skin’s hanging off her like old paint.”

  The next day, Marie and Sandy put on matching sky-blue sundresses with a white floral print and went to Silver Beach. They held hands. How could they possibly look more innocent? “Who wants ice cream?”

  With scoops of chocolate in waffle cones, they were a sentimental juggernaut that no one could have withstood, even if a troop of Soviets manned the checkpoint. Marie realized that she’d never worked a real two-hander before, with a partner who was equally in the game. A smile lit her face as she neared the gate, and then Sandy cried out in delighted discovery—“Look, Mommy, a rabbit!”—and pulled Marie forward, like a dog on a leash. Marie had planned to tell the guard that they were there to see the Murphys, or maybe the Russos, depending on his complexion, but he made no remark on their passage. Once he was no longer an impediment, his features faded from view, vanishing except for his smile, like the Cheshire cat. They had breached the perimeter.

  The streets of Silver Beach were pocked with potholes, the asphalt ending on either side in vague edges like a smear of butter on bread. There were no sidewalks. The notion of a private neighborhood had led Marie to expect manors and mansions, but the houses were cottages, often in need of a coat of paint. The house she and Sid had picked in Yonkers was bigger than the ones she saw here. Still, the place had its charms, and the hazy summer sunlight favored even the most ramshackle bungalow with a postcard glow: Greetings from Silver Beach, August 1958. Wish you were here.

  Lanes of old elms provided ample shade, gulls wheeled overhead, and she could smell the tang of salt in the air. Men in shirtsleeves pushed lawnmowers, the whirling blades filling the air with a locomotive drone. Throngs of children milled and ran, and Sandy nearly lit out for a foursome of little girls in a game of hopscotch, like she had for the rabbit, but Marie held fast her hand. “Sorry, honey.”

  “But, Mommy, I want to play!”

  Sandy was eager for a little brother or sister; that she would remain an only child was, for Marie, a matter of high probability and devout hope. Sandy’s eyes grew avid at the sight of playmates, and Marie grieved to see it. “Maybe later, baby. There’s somebody I want to visit.”

  “Who?”

  “A lady.”

  “What lady?”

  Marie knew she couldn’t end the conversation with such a meager disclosure. She’d considered divulging that they were on a case, but it would overexcite Sandy; saying they were out to catch a wicked witch would terrify the child. Did Sandy know the Italian word for witch, strega? Marie spoke to her in English, her nonna in Italian, but God forbid if Sandy ever told Mama about it. “A lady who plays cards.”

  Sandy paused, quizzical. “What kind of cards?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Go Fish?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Can I play?”

  “We’ll see.”

  “How long will it take?”

  “An hour.”

  “Huh.”

  The response seems to have struck an acceptable midpoint, neither interesting enough to tempt interference, nor tedious enough to provoke protest. Marie restrained herself from cleaning the chocolate smears from Sandy’s face. At her destination, a modest blue-shingled colonial, an older gent was trimming the bushes. His back was to the street.

  “I’m sorry,” said Marie. “Is this the Abbie residence? Is Mrs. Abbie here?”

  The old man’s eyes tightened, but there was only so much suspicion he could maintain in front of a chocolate-covered child. “Do you have an appointment?”

  “Do I need one? God, I’m so sorry—I should have known! I’ve heard so much about her, she must be so busy. Is she home?”

  The effect Marie was striving for was one of harebrained adorability, and it worked like a tonic on Grandpa. He set his clippers down and went inside. “Let me see if she’s in.”

  As Marie led Sandy across the lawn, she felt some resistance. She didn’t have to drag her, but there was a counterpull, as if Sandy had suddenly gained ten extra pounds on her forty-pound frame. Marie saw the flaw in her plan—this was hardly the “better side” she hoped to show; it was another pathetic aspect, from a different angle. She was at a loss how to explain that this particular false face was an invention, a costume for a party. Marie might not have succeeded in concealing all her flaws, but Sandy knew that her mother wasn’t a ditzy blabbermouth. Marie leaned down and said, in the secret-keeping voice, “It’s a special kind of card game, honey. We have to pretend, but they can’t know we’re pretending.”

  Sandy squeezed her hand, relieved. A female figure appeared on the other side of the screen door, portly and diminutive, largely in shadow. Her accent was neither local nor obviously foreign. “May I help you?”

  “Yes, I hope so—Miss Abbie? Mrs. Abbie?”

  “Who are you?”

  “My name is Marie—”

  “Mommy is a housewife, she stays at home with me, all day.”

  Marie hadn’t anticipated the contribution from her daughter. It wasn’t a bad ad lib, but the encore might not be as helpful. She covered Sandy’s mouth, as if to wipe away the chocolate. “Yes, Mrs. Abbie, it’s true, and this is my daughter, Sandy, who needs her pretty face cleaned. I hoped I could talk to you, for advice. About things. I hear there’s nobody like you. I couldn
’t—Well, I just had to come.”

  “Who sent you here? Who told you about me?”

  “Do you know Sheila McGonnigle?”

  “Never heard of her.”

  “No, of course not! What am I thinking? It’s her sister-in-law, Mary.”

  “Mary who?”

  “Mary, Mary, Mary—what is her name? I met her at the McGonnigle christening, months back. Brunette, very sweet, fifty or so, give or take?”

  Mrs. Abbie shrugged, but Marie could see her shoulders slacken, as wariness left her body. Each had read the other, drawing the same conclusion: What harm could this foolish woman do? She went on, “Married to Phil? No, it’s Sheila, married to Phil. My head, it isn’t on straight today. Anyway, we’re moving out of the Bronx soon, and I said to myself, I just have to talk to Mrs. Abbie, I just need some advice. It’s been such a time—”

  “It’s twenty dollars for the consultation. Not a fee, a donation. You have it?”

  “Yes,” Marie replied. She’d be reimbursed, but she hadn’t thought the advice would be quite so dear. Twenty dollars paid for eighty gallons of gas.

  “Come in.” Mrs. Abbie led them inside, down a hall lined with Persian carpet, to a curtain of multicolored glass beads. The old girl really had the Gypsy bit down, Marie thought. She kept a grip on Sandy, lest the dazzle prove too much for her. As Mrs. Abbie drew back the curtain for them, she seemed slyly prideful, delighted by their impending delight. Marie was awed by what she saw—it could have been a chapel in the Vatican. Candles flickered, making shadows dance on the wall; at the far end of the chamber, on a high table covered with gold cloth, there was a parade of porcelain saints, a foot tall or more, and a crucifix in the center. Marie noted the Madonna, the Infanta of Prague, and her old friend St. Anthony of Padua, with his lilies. The crucifix was brutal and baroque, with rivulets of blood streaming from nails and the crown of thorns. A green velvet couch faced the altar; beyond it were a black-lacquered coffee table and a throne-like velvet chair. Marie and Sandy were directed to the couch, the better to contemplate Mrs. Abbie against a tableau of the sacred and terrible.

  Sandy believed they really were in a church, genuflecting before the altar and crossing herself. Marie wanted to yank her to her feet until she realized that the saints remained themselves, despite being suborned into conspiracy. She wondered if Mrs. Abbie had a Jewish room, too, full of menorahs and holy scrolls, or if this chapel could switch like a speakeasy when the constable knocked, the bar shelves reversing into bookshelves, the roulette wheels flipping into tea tables, cups and kettle glued in place. They took their assigned seats. Sandy seemed uncomfortable, and Marie held her hand firmly.

  Mrs. Abbie must have been nearly seventy, with steel-gray hair in a tight bun and a face round as an apple. She wore a black housedress and a white satin shawl with intricately sewn beadwork. She had the somber mien of a woman devoted to seeking out hard truths for those in need. Marie had already supplied her with an abundance of information, and two mainstays of soothsaying were foreclosed upon from the outset: the rings she wore meant that Prince Charming had already arrived; Sandy was eloquent testimony to a functioning uterus. She’d even mentioned that they would be moving. It would be interesting to see how long it took her to repackage the real estate deal as a revelation. Time check: 1315 hours. Mrs. Abbie might have been working this hustle since the days of President McKinley. She withdrew a pack of cards from her shawl and set them on the table. They were larger than ordinary playing cards. “Cut the deck.”

  Marie complied, and Mrs. Abbie shuffled them. “Cut again.”

  The cards were fanned out in a line. Mrs. Abbie’s touch was so deft she could have dealt blackjack in Monte Carlo. “Clear your mind, and breathe deep. Breathe.”

  Again, Marie obeyed, and she felt strangely lively and peaceful at once. There was no reason she shouldn’t enjoy herself, even to allow herself to be slightly beguiled by the old shyster.

  “All right now. Pick a card. Just touch the one you want. You will feel the right one. Don’t hesitate, don’t second-guess. When you know, show me.”

  Marie passed her hand from one side to the other, alert to any intuition. There were intervals of dullness and flashes of excitement, a kind of pull of warmth, in three places—no, two really—and she could almost hear Geiger-counter clicks from the one that emitted the greater radiation. She pointed to a card. Mrs. Abbie seemed pleased, though Marie had not done as she was told, hesitating and second-guessing both. When Mrs. Abbie turned the card over, Marie was confused. It wasn’t any old playing card, but a picture of someone who looked like he was having a fit. Was it the joker?

  Sandy leaned over, drawn in by the gravity and the ceremony. This was not like when her aunts played pinochle for pennies. “It’s an upside-down man,” she said, reaching to touch it before Marie caught her hand.

  “Yes,” said Mrs. Abbie. “The card is for the Hanged Man.”

  Marie felt light-headed. These must be tarot cards. She’d never seen one before. A few girls in high school had gone through a tarot fad for a couple of weeks. Marie kept her distance from them. Black magic had all the appeal of head lice. Hadn’t the girls gone on to the Ouija board after that? And then what had happened? Alice Cantor got pregnant at sixteen; Frannie Angelini lost a leg in a car crash; and Jeannie Torrance must have gained fifty pounds overnight and grew little whiskers. Marie felt sick. She had brought her daughter here. What would Mama say now? Strega! Strega! Strega!

  Sandy leaned in again. “What did he do? Was he bad?”

  Mrs. Abbie smiled, cocking her head to the side. “It isn’t what he did. He isn’t anyone. He’s a picture, a sign. And he isn’t being punished. The Hanged Man means transformation, change. Don’t be upset. It isn’t bad at all. Let me finish. All of us, we need to know what the cards say.”

  Mrs. Abbie laid them out in a kind of hopscotch formation, one card at a time and then doubles, crossed over. Marie winced at the reminder of how she’d pulled Sandy away from the children playing, minutes before. The girl should have stayed outside, where it was safe. And yet Marie knew that she was being ridiculous. She would have had to stifle a yawn had the fortune-teller worked with an ordinary deck, where hearts meant love, diamonds money, and sevens and threes were lucky for this reason or that. Mrs. Abbie made a nasal noise, like cattle lowing. “Very, very interesting.”

  Marie didn’t want to look at the cards. “What do they say?”

  “Pentacles mean property, the nine here often means a house, as does the seven of cups. A house. You will move into a new home, very soon.”

  Sandy cried out, “We bought a new house!”

  Mrs. Abbie stroked her chin. “Yes—but perhaps you haven’t moved in yet. That is what the cards tell me.”

  Marie surreptitiously checked her watch: 1321 hours. Six minutes only? She had to give the strega her due. Marie had arrived as a disbeliever and would leave in the same condition, but, at the moment, she was tied up in knots. Knots, an old standby from the hag-bag of tricks: Bring me a piece of string, so I can untangle your problems. Eggs, too, to show the spirits in their true form. You’d bring an egg to the strega, and she’d cover it in special cloths. She’d say magic words, and then crack it open. The blood-red yolk meant that your money was cursed, and you had to empty your bank account so that she could cleanse and bless the cash. She’d wrap it up and do her abracadabras, with strict instructions not to open the package until the next day, when you’d find your money had turned to newspaper and the witch was in the wind. This was not Mrs. Abbie’s way, Marie was sure. There was no need to run when the saps were begging to hand over their life savings.

  “I see the letter ‘M,’ the number four,” said Mrs. Abbie, her voice tentative, exploring. “The color blue. An older woman, who was a strong influence on you.”

  Sandy interjected, “I’m four!”

  Mrs. Abbie nodded sagely. “Yes, that explains that. What else?”

  Marie was unimpressed. Yes, she wa
s one of four children, she wore a blue uniform and worked for Inspector Melchionne, but a woman eager to agree would have seen her mother, the sky, and the number of wheels on her car. It’s like you’ve known me my whole life!

  “When you were younger, you met a man at a large gathering. A wedding? There was dancing,” Mrs. Abbie continued, her tone growing surer. “Maybe just a dance. The men there were in costumes. Uniforms? You were shy, you are still shy sometimes, even if people don’t know? You are not always happy. And yet . . . tell me about the young man at the dance. Was he a soldier? Yes, I think he was.”

  “Let me think.”

  Marie didn’t want to think. A soldier? A dance? Her estimation of Mrs. Abbie had improved considerably.

  “This was not a good experience. And yet good did come of it.”

  “Let me think.”

  Marie, Ann, and Dee used to volunteer at the USO dances at the YMCA on 34th Street on Saturday nights. Mama would bellow at them as they left, “Gard’ i vestiti!”—Watch your skirts!—and they always did. Still, it was patriotic to help, and it was fun to mix with the young men, mostly, though some got fresh, thinking city girls were easy. There were punchbowls of juice, cookies, a few donated trays of bagels that led to bitter remonstrations by country boys about how they didn’t know how to make donuts here. A small band played their favorites: Is you is, or is you ain’t my baby. Marie remembered when Dee punched a boy during that song, after he tried to touch her behind.

  And then she felt Sandy pulling at her hand, as if she’d fallen asleep. Mrs. Abbie was speaking. Maybe she had been, for some time. “I was asking you about the dance, with the soldier.”

  “You know, there were several dances that were quite memorable.”

  Mrs. Abbie grunted and smiled. “This particular evening, it must have been of great consequence in your life. A difficult experience, but it made you stronger.”