I felt suddenly ill as I began to glimpse the proportions of this tragedy. Now I could understand that screeched,
'Nothing happened!' And the statue of David. And the whispered, 'Evil, evil, evil . . . '
'You loved him?' I asked gently.
'So much,' he said in a harrowed voice. 'So much . . . '
He lifted his head to drain his tumbler, then held it out to me in a quavery hand. I filled it without compunction.
'You never married, Reverend?' I asked.
'No. Never.' He was staring at the ceiling again, seeing things that weren't there.
'Did you tell Godfrey how you felt about him?'
'He knew.'
'And?'
'He used me. Used me! Laughing. The devil incarnate.
All I saw was the golden glow. And then the darkness beneath.'
'Knowing that, Pastor, why did you help him become a man of God?'
'Weakness. I did not have the strength of soul to withstand him. He threatened me.'
'Threatened you? How? You said that nothing happened.'
'Nothing did. But I had written him. Notes. Poems. They would have ruined me. The church . . . '
Notes again. I was engulfed in notes, false and t r u e . . .
I took a deep breath, trying to comprehend the extent of such perfidy. The pattern of Godfrey Knurr's life was becoming plainer. An ambition too large for his discipline to contain was the motive for trading on his charm. He moved grinning from treachery to treachery, leaving behind him a trail of scars, wounds, broken lives.
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And finally, I was convinced, two murders that meant no more to him than a rifled cash register or this betrayed wreck of a man.
'So you did whatever he demanded?' I said, nailing it down. 'Got him out of scrapes, got him into the seminary?
Gave him money?'
'All,' he said. 'All. I gave him everything. My soul. My poor little shrivelled soul.'
His words 'shrivelled soul' came out slurred and garbled, almost lost between his whisky-loosened tongue and those ill-fitting dentures. I did not think he was far from the temporary oblivion he sought.
'Sylvia Wiesenfeld,' I said. 'You knew her?'
He didn't answer.
'You did,' I told him. 'Her father owned the drugstore where Godfrey stole the money. A lovely girl. So vulnerable. So willing. I saw her picture. Did she love Godfrey, too?'
His eyes were closed again. But his lips were moving faintly, fluttering. I rose, bent over him, put my ear close to his mouth, as if trying to determine if a dying man still breathed.
'What?' I said sharply. 'I didn't hear that. Please repeat it.'
This time I heard.
'I married them,' he said.
I straightened up, took a deep breath. I looked down at the shrunken, defenceless hulk. All I could think of was: Godfrey Knurr did that.
I took the whisky glass from his strengthless fingers and set it on the floor alongside the couch. He seemed to be breathing slowly but regularly. The tears had dried on his face, but whitish matter had collected in the corners of his eyes and mouth. Occasionally his body twitched, little moans escaped his lips like gas released from something corrupt.
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I wandered about the lower floor of the house. I found a knitted afghan in the hall closet, brought it back to the parlour, and covered the Reverend Ludwig Stokes, a bright shroud for a grey man.
Then I went back into his study and poked about. I finally found a telephone directory in the lowest drawer of the old walnut desk. There was an S. Wiesenfeld on Sherman Street, not too far from the home of Goldie Knurr. It seemed strange that such tumultuous events had occurred in such a small neighbourhood.
The woman who answered my ring was certainly not Sylvia Wiesenfeld; she was a gargantuan black woman, not so tall but remarkable in girth. Her features, I thought, might be pleasant in repose, but when she opened the door, she was scowling and banging an iron frying pan against one redwood thigh. She looked down at me.
'We ain't buying,' she said.
'Oh, I'm not selling anything,' I hurriedly assured her.
'My name is Joshua Bigg. I represent a legal firm in New York City. I've been sent out to make inquiries into the background of Godfrey Knurr. I was hoping to have a few minutes' conversation with Miss Wiesenfeld.'
She looked at me suspiciously.
'You who? ' she said. 'You New York folks talk so fast.'
'Joshua Bigg.' I answered slowly. 'That's my name. I'm trying to obtain information about Godfrey Knurr. I'd like to talk to Sylvia Wiesenfeld for a few moments.'
'You the law?' she demanded.
'No,' I said, 'not exactly. I represent attorneys who, in turn, represent a client who is bringing suit against the Reverend Godfrey Knurr. I'm just making a preliminary investigation, that's all.'
'You going to hang him?' she demanded. 'I hope.'
I tried to smile.
' W e l l . . . a h . . . ' I said, 'I'm sure our client would like to.
May I speak to Miss Wiesenfeld for a few moments?'
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She glared at me, making up her mind. That heavy cast-iron frying pan kept banging against her bulging thigh. I was very conscious of it.
' W e l l . . . ' she said finally, 'all right.' Then she added fiercely, 'You get my honey upset, I break yo' ass!'
'No, no,' I said hastily, 'I won't upset her, I promise.'
She stared down at me again.
'You and me,' she said menacingly, 'we come to it, I figure I come out on top.'
'Absolutely,' I assured her. 'No doubt about it. I'll behave; I really will.'
Suddenly she grinned: a marvellous human grin of warmth and understanding.
'I do believe,' she said. 'Come on in, lawyer-man.'
She led me into a neat entrance hall, hung my coat and hat on an oak hall rack exactly like the one in Miss Goldie Knurr's home.
'May I know your name, please, ma'am?' I asked her.
'Mrs Harriet Lee Livingston,' she said in a rich contralto voice. 'I makes do for Miz Sylvia.'
'How long have you been with her?'
'Longer than you been breathin',' she said.
The enormous bulk of the woman was awesome. That had to be the largest behind I had ever seen on a human being, and the other parts of her were in proportion: arms and legs like waists, and a neck that seemed as big around as her head.
But her features were surprisingly clear and delicate, with slanty eyes, a nice mouth, and a firm chin that had a deep cleft precisely in the centre. You could have inserted a dime in that cleft. Her hands and feet were unexpectedly dainty, and she moved lightly, with grace.
Her colour was a briar brown. She wore a voluminous shift, a shapeless tent with pockets. It was a kaleidoscope of hues: splashes of red, yellow, purple, blue, green — all in a jangling pattern that dazzled the eye.
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'You stand right here,' she said sternly. 'Right on this spot. I'll tell Miz Sylvia she's got a visitor. I takes you in without warning, she's liable to get upset.'
'I won't move,' I promised.
She opened sliding wooden doors, squeezed through, closed the two doors behind her. I hadn't seen doors like that since I left my uncle's home in Iowa. They were panelled, waxed to a high gloss, fitted with brass hardware: amenities of a bygone era.
The doors slid open again and Mrs Livingston beckoned me forward.
'Speak nice,' she whispered.
'I will,' I vowed.
'I be right here to make sure you do,' she said grimly.
The woman facing me from across the living room was small, slight, with long silvered blonde hair giving her a girlish appearance, although I knew she had to be at least forty. I could not see a leg brace; she wore a collarless gown of bottle-green velvet, a lounging or hostess gown, that fell to her ankles.
She was a thin little thing, still with that look of tremulous vulnerability that had caught my eye in the photos in the Knurr family album and Je
sse Karp's yearbook. She seemed physically frail, or at least fragile, with narrow wrists, a white stalk of a neck, a head that appeared to be pulled backward, chin uptilted, by the weight of her hair.
She had a luminous quality: pale complexion, big eyes of bluish-green (they looked like agates), and lips sweetly bowed. I saw no wrinkles, no crow's feet, no furrows — nothing in her face to mark the passage of years. If she had been wounded, it did not show. The smooth brow was serene, the dim smile placed.
But there was a dissonance about her that disturbed. She seemed removed. The lovely eyes were vacant, or focused on something no one else could see. That half-smile was, I soon realized, her normal expression; it meant nothing.
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I recognized Ophelia, looking for her stream.
'Mr Bigg?' she said. Her voice was young, utterly without timbre. A child's voice.
'Miss Wiesenfeld,' I said, bowing, 'I know this is an intrusion, and I appreciate your willingness to grant me a few moments of your time.'
'Oh la!' she said with a giggling laugh. 'How pretty you do talk. Doesn't he talk pretty, Harriet?'
'Yeah,' Mrs Livingston said heavily. 'Pretty. Mr Bigg, you sit in that armchair there. I sits on the couch here.
Honey, you want to rest yourself?'
'No,' the lady said, 'I prefer to remain standing.'
I seated myself nervously. My armchair was close to the corner of the big davenport where Mrs Livingston perched, not leaning back but balancing her bulk on the edge. She was ready, I was certain, to lunge for my throat if I dared upset her honey.
'Miss Wiesenfeld,' I started, 'I have no desire to rake up old memories that may cause you pain. If I pose a question you don't wish to answer, please tell me so, and I will not persist. But this is a matter of some importance. It concerns the Reverend Godfrey Knurr. I represent a legal firm in New York City. One of our clients, a young woman, wishes to bring serious charges against Reverend Knurr. I am making a preliminary investigation in an attempt to discover if Knurr has a past history of the type of, ah, activities of which he is accused.'
'Pretty,' she murmured. 'So pretty. It's nice to meet someone who speaks in complete sentences. Subject, verb, object. Do all your sentences parse, Mr Bigg?'
She said that quite seriously. I laughed.
'I would like to think so,' I said. 'But I'm afraid I can't make that claim.'
She began moving across the room in front of me. I saw then that she limped badly, dragging her left leg.
Below the hostess gown I could see the foot bound in the 406
stirrup of a metal brace.
She went close to a bird cage suspended from a brass stand. Within the cage, a yellow canary hopped from perch to perch as she approached.
'Chickie,' she said softly. 'Dear, sweet Chickie. How are you today, Chickie? Will you chirp for our guest? Will you sing a lovely song? How did you find me, Mr Bigg?'
The abrupt question startled me.
'I saw your photograph in the Knurr family album, ma'am. With Godfrey. Mr Jesse Karp supplied your name.
The Reverend Ludwig Stokes provided more information.'
'You have been busy, Mr Bigg.'
'Yes, ma'am,' I said humbly.
'The busy Mr Bigg,' she said with her giggling laugh.
'Busy Bigg.' She poked a pale finger through the bars of the cage. 'Sing for Busy Bigg, Chickie. What is Godfrey accused of?'
I had determined to use Percy Stilton's scam. The one that had worked with Bishop Oxman.
'He is accused of allegedly defrauding a young woman of her life's savings by promising to double her money.'
'And promising to marry her?' Sylvia Wiesenfeld asked.
'Yes,' I said.
'He is guilty,' she said calmly. 'He did exactly that.'
A low growl came from Mrs Livingston.
'I'd like to have him right here,' she said in her furred contralto. 'In my hands.'
'Miss Wiesenfeld,' I said, 'may I ask you this: were you married to Godfrey Knurr?'
'Chickie,' she said to the bird, 'why aren't you chirping?
Aren't you feeling well, Chickie?'
She left the cage, came back to the long davenport. The housekeeper heaved her bulk and assisted Sylvia to sit in the corner, the left leg extended, covered with the skirt of her long gown. Mrs Livingston reached out, tenderly smoothed back strands of blonde hair that had fallen 407
about her mistress' pale face.
'Oh la!' Miss Wiesenfeld said. 'A long time ago. Where are the snows of yesteryear? Reverend Stokes told you that?'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'It happened in another world,' she said. 'In another time.'
Her beautiful eyes looked at me, but she was detached, off somewhere.
'But you were married?' I persisted. 'Legally?'
'Legally,' she said. 'A piece of paper. I have it.'
'How long were you married, Miss Wiesenfeld?'
She turned those vacant eyes on the enormous black woman.
'Harriet?' she said.
'Fourteen months,' Mrs Livingston said. 'Give or take.'
'And then?' I asked.
'And then?' she repeated my question, perplexed.
'Did you separate? Divorce?'
'Harriet?' she asked again.
'He cleared out,' Mrs Livingston told me furiously.
'Just took off. With everything of my honey's he could get his hands on. But her daddy was too smart for him. He left my honey some kind of fund that cur couldn't touch.'
I tried to remember when I had last heard a man called a
'cur.' I could not recall ever hearing it.
'So you are still married to Godfrey Knurr?' I asked softly.
'Oh no,' Sylvia Wiesenfeld said with her disturbingly childish laugh. 'No, no, no. I have a paper. Don't I, Harriet? So much paper. Paper, paper, paper.'
I looked beseechingly at Mrs Livingston.
'We got us a letter from a lawyer-man in Mexico,' she said disgustedly. 'It said Godfrey Knurr had been granted a divorce from his wife Sylvia.'
I turned to Miss Wiesenfeld in outrage.
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'Surely you went to an attorney, ma'am?' I said. 'I don't know divorce law all that well, but the letter may have been fraudulent. Or Mexican divorces without the consent of both parties might not have been recognized in the state in which you were married. I hope you sought legal advice?'
She looked at me, eyes rounding.
'Whatever for?' she asked in astonishment. 'I wanted him gone. I wanted him dead. He hurt me.'
I swallowed.
'Physically, ma'am?' I said gently.
'Once,' Mrs Livingston said in a deadly voice. 'I told him he puts hands to her again, I kill him. I told him that.
But that's not what she means when she says he hurt her.
He broke my honey's heart.'
She was speaking of her mistress as if she was not present. But Miss Wiesenfeld did not object. She just kept smiling emptily, face untroubled, eyes staring into the middle distance.
'Oh la!' she said. 'Broke poor Sylvia's heart.'
I was not certain of the depth of her dementia. She seemed to flick in and out, sometimes in the same sentence.
She was lucid in speech and controlled in manner, and then suddenly she was gone, flying.
'Ma'am,' I said, hating myself, 'what did Godfrey Knurr do with your money? When you were married?'
'Ohh,' she said, 'bought things. Pretty things.'
Mrs Livingston leaned towards me.
'Women,' she said throatily. 'High living. He just pissed it away.'
That 'pissed' shocked me. It was hissed with such venom that I thought Godfrey Knurr fortunate to have escaped the vengeance of Mrs Harriet Lee Livingston. She would have massacred him.
'Harriet,' Sylvia said in a petulant, spoiled child's voice,
'I want to get up again.'
'Sure, honey,' the housekeeper said equably, lurching to 409
her feet. She
helped her mistress stand. Miss Wiesenfeld dragged her leg back to the bird cage.
'Chickie?' she said. 'Chirp for me?'
There were other questions I wanted to ask. I wanted to probe deeper, explore the relationship between Sylvia and Knurr, discover how the marriage had come about, when, and why it had dissolved. But I simply didn't have the stomach for it.
It seemed to me that all day I had been poking through the human detritus Godfrey Knurr had left in his wake. I was certain Roscoe Dollworth would have persevered in this investigation, but I lacked the ruthlessness. He had told me never to let my personal feelings interfere with the job, but I couldn't help it. I liked all these victims, shared their misery, their sad memories, and I had heard just about all I could endure. Probing old wounds was not, really, a noble calling.
When I departed from the living room, Sylvia Wiesenfeld was still at the bird cage. Her forefinger was reaching through the bars. 'Chickie?' she was saying.
'Dear, sweet Chickie, sing me a song.'
I didn't even thank her or say goodbye.
Out in the hallway, Mrs Livingston helped me on with my coat.
'You going to mash him?' she demanded.
I stared at her a moment.
'Will you help?' I asked.
'Any way I can.'
'I need that marriage licence,' I said. 'And the letter from the Mexican lawyer, if you can find it. But the marriage licence is most important. I'll try to get copies made this afternoon and bring the originals back to you. If I can't get copies made, I want to take the originals to New York with me. I'll return them; I swear it.'
'How do I know?' she said mistrustfully.
'I'll give you money,' I said. 'I'll leave fifty dollars with 410
you. When I return the licence, you return the money.'
'Money don't mean nothing,' she said. 'You got a pawn that means something to you?'
I looked down at myself.
'My wristwatch!' I said. 'My aunt and uncle gave it to me when I was graduated from school. It means a lot to me. But it's a cheap watch. Not worth even fifty dollars.'
'I'll take it,' she said. 'You bring the marriage licence back, or mail it back, and you gets your watch back.'
I agreed eagerly and slipped the expansion band off my wrist. She dropped the watch into one of her capacious pockets.
'You wait right here,' she commanded. 'Don't move a step.'
Tenth Commandment Page 38
