Click-click-click . . .
Aleck looked down at my upturned face, and as he helped me up from the floor he said, “I suppose he’ll send someone; we were disconnected. Whattcha got there?”
“An envelope, didn’t quite make the wastebasket.”
Mr. Benchley crossed the room to peer down at the envelope addressed to Father Michael with the return address, Father Timothy Morgan, Grosse Pointe, Michigan.
“It’s postmarked December 22, 1925.”
“Odd.”
“Nothing inside,” I said. “Have you searched the desk drawers, Mr. Benchley?”
We made a cursory search, but came up with no letter, just a large number of Christmas greetings from folks wishing Father Michael a Merry Christmas. The trashcan was empty, thanks to Mrs. Daniels, and looking on all surfaces around the big room, we found nothing that might have been contained in the envelope. That meant that the letter was opened after Mrs. Daniels had tidied up the room in the morning, after Mrs. Daniels had left to visit her sister in the hospital. Possibly just before Father Murphy’s telephone call to me at the Gonk. Was whatever was contained in the envelope the something he wanted to show us? Could it be that the something in the envelope was important enough for someone to kill for?
I stepped over Father Michael (who’d become so much a part of the landscape of the room that I no longer felt queasy) and with a poker pushed aside the blackened bits of wood and ash. Heat rose from the remains, indicating a fire had only recently burned itself out.
“So we have a couple of old letters from Father John dating back, the last postmarked September, and an empty envelope of a letter received this morning from Father John’s godson, Father Timothy. Odd.”
“Why odd?” asked Aleck.
“Because according to Mrs. Daniels, Father Tim’s been staying here all these weeks. He only went back home to Michigan at dawn this morning.”
“Maybe the letter was lost and was just delivered.”
“Perhaps . . .” I said, putting the envelope in my coat pocket. I clipped on Woodrow’s leash, and then Mr. Benchley and I left Aleck to wait for the police as we crossed the street in search of the Brazen Hussy.
We rang the bell of the second-floor-front apartment in the brownstone numbered 242. This was undoubtedly the residence of the Brazen Hussy, as when we descended from the front steps of the rectory we saw the curtain move and the glint of sunlight reflected on glass.
“Whaddayawant?” came the sweet musical strains of a voice not unlike the guttural blast of a muted trombone.
Speaking into the box: “I’m Mr. Benchley, Madame, and I’m with Mrs. Parker, here, and we’d like to speak with you, if that’s all right.”
“Don’t want any.”
“Doesn’t she sound pleasant?”
“We’re not selling anything, Mrs. Reynolds. We came from St. Agatha’s across the street.”
The only reply was the click of the door lock release, so we entered into the hallway. A flight of stairs led us up to the second-floor landing. We knocked on the door facing the front of the house, which stood ajar, the aroma of roasting beef wafting out into the hallway, and we were bidden to enter.
The woman described by Mrs. Daniels was a very pretty redhead, and no more than thirty years of age. She was sitting in a chair beside the window, and it took me a moment to see that the chair had wheels and was of the sort used by invalids. And then another woman who perfectly matched the gruff voice through the callbox entered from the kitchen.
The room was well appointed; the furniture stylish. The same could be said of the redhead. Once our introductions were made—her name was Hermione Reynolds, and the gruff-voiced hired woman was Miss Winny Winkle—we told of our mission. Miss Reynolds said that she often sat by the window to watch the street. She’d recognized us from before, entering and leaving the rectory several times. It was all she had to do until her broken leg, a compound fracture, healed and the cast could be removed three weeks from now. She knew Father Michael as she’d attended services at St. Agatha’s most Sundays before her accident. She’d seen the youngish priest, Father Timothy, whom Father Michael sent often to administer communion to her until she was on her feet again and could attend mass, leave early this morning carrying a suitcase, and saw Mrs. Daniels leave the house around eleven. She saw no one else, other than the mailman, approach the house. She asked why we were inquiring, and we told her of our grim discovery, at which point she turned to the window, clutched a fist to her chest, and bowed her head. She didn’t turn back to look at us as we made our goodbyes, making me wonder how deeply upset she must have been. Just as we opened the door, we heard her say, “Poor old soul,” as she continued her frozen gaze down on the street.
We were on our way back across the street to meet Aleck at the rectory just as two police cars, sirens blasting, pulled up to the curb, and blue uniforms emerged from each. Unfortunately, a couple of carloads of reporters had tagged along, the men having been hanging around the police station waiting for a call to come in to alert them to a juicy lead for the late editions. We’d have to enter the rectory through the church entrance to ward off their attention.
“Here we go again,” I said to Mr. Benchley, and later, to the detective interviewing us: “Detective, we’ve got to stop meeting like this!”
There was something bigger going on for a second murder to have been committed. If Father John could have led the Feds or the police to the capture and conviction of the missing Healy brothers from Tennessee, because he had known for certain of the brothers’ involvement in the darktown fire, why the circuitous journey to New York via Michigan? Why not just tell the authorities in Tennessee? Certainly Father John had to be stopped from going to the police. The question, posed by the insightful Heywood Broun, kept nagging at me: Was Father John in pursuit of the culprits or had they been chasing him? I don’t know why the positioning mattered, but it might have something to do with his death.
And now there was another killer out there. What did Father Michael discover, or have innocent knowledge of, that could have made somebody want to kill him, too? If only Mr. Benchley had been at the Royalton to receive his urgent calls, or if we could have arrived at the rectory sooner, perhaps we might have prevented his death! I knew that there was nothing we could have done any differently; we left our luncheon only minutes after I spoke with the priest on the telephone. And yet, I knew it would haunt me, and I’m sure Mr. Benchley as well, that we were not able to get to him in time.
Aleck, Mr. Benchley, and I decided that if we were still in any danger our best line of defense was to go about our business as usual, keeping away from the police station and our faces out of the newspapers, so that our involvement—our connection to both murders—would appear to be nothing more than incidental to the killer. The murderer might not quite understand that murdering one of us would bring the entire city down on him. Our fame here in New York and across the nation had made us celebrated figures, and if one of us was killed by his hand, a dragnet would move at full steam to track him down. Huge rewards would be posted—Swope alone would put up a hundred thousand dollars, especially if he could secure an exclusive story for his paper. Killing any one of us was suicide.
Once the alarm was out reporters converged like rats emerging from the sewers on trash day. These men, the young ones and the old, wore the uniform of the hardboiled newsman—ties askew, suits rumpled, shoes scuffed and in need of repair or the trash bin, oil-stained hats affixed to shaggy heads—and all looked equally haggard. They had gathered in a tight bunch at the rectory’s front door. After having chased cars from police stations around the city, where they’d spend long hours waiting by telephones for something to happen (hopefully, a big heist or a big bust, but above all a lead story that they could call in to their newspapers’ city desks), they were thirsty for details.
The detective on the case saw the value of a plan we’d concocted to divert attention from ourselves and downplay our discovery of the
dead priest. Especially when we suggested that the press might spin a story that would send the citizens of the city into a panic. Certainly, every man of the cloth would be a potential victim. And then there were the “crazies,” the crackpots who’d take a shot at us just for the chance to be in the limelight!
So after the police made a statement to the effect that there had been a tragic “accident,” Mr. Benchley went outside to address the eager newsmen with a hastily written statement:
“Woollcott, Benchley, and Parker stumbled onto the body of Father Michael Murphy when they arrived at the rectory of St. Agatha’s earlier this afternoon. The celebrities had gone to the rectory to discuss with Father Michael the final details of a musical show they had been planning for the benefit of the homeless orphans of the city, to be performed next spring. Mr. Benchley is quoted by this reporter as saying, ‘We enjoyed working with Father Murphy. It is sad that he fell and hit his head on a candlestick. But, we will prevail; the show will go on for the children of the city!’”
We had to hope that at least some people would buy that story. And of course, now, because Mr. Benchley cannot tell a lie, we’d have to do a show for the benefit of the city’s orphans. At least one good thing will come from this tragedy.
Within a few hours presses were printing variations of the story that the priest died accidentally, and we three were set free and sitting in my apartment, reading and rereading Father John’s letters.
Aside from a few paragraphs in which Father O’Hara described his impressions of the Scopes Trial, the life of a parish priest in a small Tennessee town was far less than exciting, concerned with services, sacraments, births and deaths, and helping the sick and the poor. These day-to-day references could not have been of much interest to anyone who wasn’t in the “God Business”: that Mrs. Woodward’s appendectomy went terribly wrong, killing her and leaving six children under the age of eleven motherless, and the death of an infant from scarlet fever, were the most dramatic and compelling events to be noted. Many reports of monies earned through various events, such as bake sales and white elephant sales, and the theft of a year’s supply of votive candles were tedious and led us no closer to finding the reason leading to the priest’s murder. Sometimes I think such letter-writers fill pages with such mundane stuff in an effort to validate their correspondence when there is really nothing worth reporting. But as I read on I realized that there was nothing mundane at all about his life. Rather, here was a man conflicted, a conflicted soul in a world of conflict; a preacher of love and charity in a region rife with ignorance, bigotry, greed, and contempt. I heard a tone that reflected not only the tedium of his daily ministrations, but the frustration at his helplessness in effecting improved living conditions in the poverty-plagued pockets of the rural districts. Although feeling ineffectual and realizing the thanklessness of his dedicated efforts, he soldiered on. I sensed that a profound loneliness had burdened him as he tried to shoulder the grief of others, while finding none on which to lay down his own troubles. Was he depressed? Or was it simple weariness and a need for a change of scene that sent him off on a trip around the country in search of the human connection offered through the company of his godson and old friend?
Me and a distraught Mrs. Murphy
Bury the lead!
Chapter Eight
I’d often found this time of year heart-wrenchingly depressing—the forced, almost excessive cheerfulness. There were lights everywhere, trees everywhere, bells, bows, tinsel, and holly everywhere, plenty of booze everywhere, handsome men everywhere, and music everywhere. You’d think that would make a girl happy. But I was traveling alone through the strings of parties, lights, and glitter. I’d no man, no husband to come home to. No children. And that’s what Christmas was all about. The celebration of the birth of a Child, and deep within me there was a yearning for a child of my own.
Every day I’d see skinny little Lincoln Douglas buffing away at gleaming shoes, his little hands bare in the cold damp, his back arched against the wintry wind.
When I’d stop to get a shine, his hooded eyes stayed downcast; and once, when I arose from the folding chair and handed him two-bits, he forgot himself and I caught his eye. His shyness was palpable as he quickly nodded his thanks and bowed his head to stare down at the sidewalk.
I wanted to cry.
I wanted to shake him, to make him look at me and see that he should not be frightened. I only wished to be of help in any way I could. He needed a decent coat, but I knew he would not accept my charity. Lincoln Douglas had been well taught to be afraid of well-meaning white people.
An idea popped into my head. Lincoln would get a warm coat.
I don’t know what made this season bearable, except for the fact that Aleck and Mr. Benchley were unusually attentive. Even Edna did not grate on my nerves when she’d appear at luncheon several times a week, now that her Showboat was finished. I sought distractions, if only to quell the underlying sense of menace haunting me since Father Michael’s murder.
Jane and I lunched and Tallulah, who also was alone, was always game for an afternoon cocktail or a steak at our favorite speakeasy, Tony Soma’s. I suppose they remembered the events of last season when Eddie and I parted ways and a failed affair with a newspaper reporter sent me on the skids to land in the hospital by way of my foolish attempt at ending my life. I’d forgotten that an affair is just that, a single event with a start and end time. Silly me. I didn’t think anybody’d really care if I popped off. I thought they just wanted me around to provide the entertainment, as I’m always good for a fast and clever retort to brighten any conversation. My wit has made me famous; my wit has brought me into the sphere of the geniuses of my generation, but I don’t know that I belong in such a world. I have to work so hard to be witty. Yet, it’s all I know.
My acid tongue has cost me friends, too, because sometimes I don’t know when to keep my mouth shut. I almost believe it when I say I don’t care what people think. I don’t know that I’m so very droll, so very sophisticated. It’s hard to be amusing, to keep up the pretense of being anything very special.
Most of the Round Tablers are alone in this city. It’s a tough place to make a success. Most have no family close by. And the understanding we all possess is that you’re only as good as your last show, or book, or joke. Too soon you can become yesterday’s news, and we all want to forget yesterday in hopes of a better tomorrow. So we live for the moment: fast and furious.
But I do have friends, I learned, and this season they made sure I was not lonely. And as Christmas approached I joined into the spirit of the holidays.
Mr. Benchley arrived at my rooms on Christmas Eve morning carrying a large box covered in red foil and brandishing a huge green satin bow. Woodrow Wilson barked furiously at the foreign object blocking Mr. Benchley’s face, and stopped only when he had placed it down on the edge of my desk.
He bade me turn away and cover my eyes.
“The ones in back of my head?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Mrs. Parker,” he said as he pulled off the ribbon and lifted the lid. I admit that I began whining a bit, from impatient excitement, and Woodrow responded to my angst with several whimpers of his own, as we heard Mr. Benchley scuffling around.
“You and the President ought to start a singing act. Vaudeville is dying, and you two can quickly put it out of its misery.”
I’d no time for a comeback for the sound of strange and intermittent screeches that alternated with bars of music and voices. As I turned, Mr. Benchley stood back with a look of satisfaction as the Coon-Sanders Nighthawks Orchestra piped out “Yes, Sir, That’s My Baby.”
A radio!
“It’s grand!” was all I could say, admiring the cathedral-shaped box. I gave Fred a hug and Woodrow pulled at his cuff.
Mr. Benchley leaned over to pat my pup and then reached into his pocket from where he withdrew a steak bone wrapped in white paper. “You don’t think I’d arrive without your treat?” Woodrow made a fast
exit to the bedroom with his treasure.
As it was Christmas Eve, Mr. Benchley would take the train home in an hour to spend the holidays with Gertrude and the children. He was concerned about me and Aleck alone in the city, inviting us to his home for the holiday. But Aleck and I preferred to remain in town. Truth is, Gertrude and I have never really warmed to each other. Aleck has a standing invitation for Christmas Eve dinner with Edna. I’ll spend the eve with Jane and Ross, and on Christmas Day I’ll join Aleck for what always proves to be a sumptuous dinner at George and Bea Kaufman’s. It was decided that we would begin our inquiries once again into the deaths of the priests immediately following Christmas Day.
It had been a smallish group at luncheon these past weeks. George S., Irving, and Harpo and his Brothers were busy with their show, The Cocoanuts; George Gershwin had an opening on the thirtieth for Song of the Flame, and Ira was busy with lyric writing, too, for next season’s show. Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne were out of town for tryouts, and Ross had a deadline for his failing magazine, The New Yorker.
I suspect the tourists were disappointed when popping their heads into the Rose Room hoping to see a Marx Brother or two, or a glamorous Lunt or two. What they got was Aleck, Mr. Benchley, and me along with a scattering of newspapermen they might recognize by their bylines, if not their pictures.
One day at lunch, I voiced my concern about little Lincoln Douglas.
It was just Aleck, Mr. Benchley, Heywood Broun, Mark Connelly, Robert Sherwood, Bunny Wilson, and Edna at the table.
“It seems his father, Washington, was beaten up by some thugs,” said Heywood. “They put out his lights for a couple of days, broke his arm and a couple of ribs, too.”
[Dorothy Parker 02] - Chasing the Devil Page 14
