Friday the Rabbi Slept Late

by Harry Kemelman

  Macomber laughed. “That’s a curious way of putting it. I don’t suppose Monsignor O’Brien who did it a couple of years ago, or Dr. Skinner who took a turn at it one year, think of themselves as being in the blessing business either. But they did it.”

  “It’s at least more appropriate to their respective professions than it is to mine.”

  “Aren’t you all in the same profession?”

  “Oh no, we stem from different traditions, all three of us. Monsignor O’Brien is a priest in the tradition of the priests of the Bible, the sons of Aaron. He has certain powers, magical powers, that he exercises in the celebration of the Mass, for example, where the bread and wine are magically changed to the body and blood of Christ. Dr. Skinner as a Protestant minister is in the tradition of the prophets. He has received a call to preach the word of God. I, a rabbi, am essentially a secular figure, having neither the mana of the priest nor the ‘call’ of the minister. If anything, I suppose we come closest to the judges of the Bible.”

  “Well,” said Macomber slowly, “I think I see what you mean, but nobody really—What I mean to say is that we’re primarily interested in the ceremony.”

  “Were you about to say nobody listens to the prayer anyway?”

  Macomber laughed shortly. “I’m afraid, rabbi, that I was going to say just that. And now I’ve offended you.”

  “Not at all. As a rabbi I am just as aware that people do not listen to my prayers as you are that they don’t listen to your most serious arguments. I am not concerned with whether those standing on the dock will be in a mood of proper devotion so much as whether the purpose of the prayer might not be frivolous.”

  Macomber seemed disappointed.

  “Why are you so anxious to have my husband give the prayer?” asked Miriam.

  Macomber glanced from one to the other and saw in her even look and in the determined set of her chin that it was futile to temporize. He decided to gamble on the truth.

  “It’s the bad reaction to this unfortunate business at the temple. Especially the last few days, there’s been talk—not nice talk. We’ve never had anything of this sort and we don’t like it. We had the idea it might help matters if we could announce that the Board of Selectmen had invited you to bless the fleet. I agree with you, it’s pretty silly—a brainstorm the Chamber of Commerce dreamed up a few years back. Oh, it’s done in some Catholic countries in the small fishing villages, but there ships are serious business and their success affects the whole economy. And there’s considerable danger, too. It’s even reasonable in Gloucester, where the big fleets sail from. Here it’s just meaningless ceremony, but as far as you’re concerned, rabbi, it will serve to underscore the fact that the Selectmen—and therefore the responsible people in town—will have no part of these shameful acts.”

  “That’s very kind of you, Mr. Macomber,” the rabbi said, “but aren’t you perhaps exaggerating the situation?”

  “No, believe me. You personally may not have suffered any annoyance or embarrassment, or if you have you may have shrugged it off as the work of a crackpot or two that will stop when the real culprit is caught. But this kind of case is the hardest to solve and frequently doesn’t get solved at all. In the meantime, some very decent people can be hurt. I don’t say that this scheme will solve the situation, but I’m sure it’ll help a little.”

  “I appreciate what you are trying to do and the spirit that prompts it—”

  “Then you agree?”

  The rabbi shook his head slowly.

  “Why not? Is it against your religion?”

  “As a matter of fact, it is. It’s specifically mentioned: Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.”

  Macomber rose. “I guess there’s nothing more to be said but I wish you’d think about it. It’s not just you, you understand, it’s the whole Jewish community.”

  When he left, Miriam exclaimed, “Oh David, these are good people.”

  He nodded but said nothing.

  The telephone rang and he picked up the receiver. “Rabbi Small,” he said, and then listened. She watched him, alarmed as she saw the color rise in his face. He put the instrument back on its rest and turned to his wife. “Is that the kind of wrong number you’ve been getting?” he said quietly.

  She nodded.

  “The same person each time?”

  “Sometimes it’s a man’s voice and sometimes a woman’s. It has never seemed like the same voice twice. Several times it has been just a string of obscenities, but most of the time they say terrible things.”

  “This person, quite a nice voice by the way, wanted to know if human sacrifice was required for our approaching festival—I suppose he was referring to Pesach.”

  “Oh no!”

  “Oh yes.”

  “It’s terrible. This lovely town has such nice people like Hugh Lanigan and Mr. Macomber, and then those people on the phone …”

  “Crackpots,” he said in contemptuous dismiss. “Just a few nasty crackpots.”

  “It’s not only the phone calls, David.”

  “No? What else?”

  “When I go into the stores, the clerks used to be so warm. Now they’re polite. And the other customers, those I know, they try to avoid me.”

  “You’re sure you’re not imagining it?” But he sounded less certain of himself.

  “Quite sure, David, isn’t there something you can do?”

  “Such as what?”

  “I don’t know. You’re the rabbi; you’re supposed to know. Maybe you ought to tell Hugh Lanigan what’s been happening. Maybe you ought to consult a lawyer. Maybe you ought to consider Macomber’s offer.”

  He made no answer but returned to the living room. She looked in to find him sitting in his armchair, his eyes staring fixedly at the wall opposite. When she offered to make him some tea, he shook his head with annoyance. Later she ventured to look in again, and he was still in his chair, his eyes staring straight ahead.

  “Will you unzip me, please?” she asked.

  Without rising and quite automatically, he pulled at the zipper on the back of her dress. He seemed to come to, for he asked, “Why are you taking off your dress?”

  “Because I’m exhausted and I want to go to bed.”

  He laughed. “Why, of course. How stupid of me. You can’t very well go to bed with your dress on. If you don’t mind, I’ll stay up a little while longer.”

  Just then they heard a car drive up and stop at the door. “Someone is coming,” he said. “Who could it be at this hour?”

  They waited, and after a while the doorbell rang. Miriam, who had quickly zipped herself up, went to answer, but even as she approached there was the sound of a roaring motor and wheels spinning against gravel. She opened the door and looked out. She saw the tail-light of a car speeding down the street in the darkness.

  Behind her, she heard her husband exclaim, “Oh my God!” She turned and then saw it too: a swastika on the door, the red paint still fresh and dripping like blood.

  He put out a tentative forefinger and stared dumbly at the red spot on his finger. All at once Miriam burst into tears.

  “I’m sorry, David,” she sobbed.

  He held her close until he felt she had regained her composure. Then, his voice harsh, he said: “Get me some of that household cleaning stuff and a rag.”

  She pressed her face against his shoulder. “I’m afraid, David, I’m afraid.”

  26

  ALTHOUGH THE RABBI’S PICTURE HAD BEEN IN THE PAPERS as one of those connected with the case, Mrs. Serafino did not recognize him when he rang her bell.

  I am Rabbi Small,” he said. “I should like to talk to you for a few minutes.”

  She was not sure she ought to, and would have liked to ask her husband, but he was still asleep.

  “Is it about the case? Because if it is, I don’t think I should.”

  “I came to see her room.” There was something so positive and assured in his tone that to refuse seemed almo
st impertinent.

  She hesitated and then said, “I guess it will be all right. It’s back here beyond the kitchen,” and she led the way.

  The telephone rang on their way into the kitchen and she raced over to pick it up at the first ring. She talked for a moment and then hung up. “Excuse me,” she said to the rabbi. “We have an extension beside our bed, and I didn’t want to wake Joe.”

  “I understand.”

  She opened a door from the kitchen and stood aside so he could enter. He looked around the room—at the bed, at the night table beside it, at the bureau, at the small armchair. He went to the night table and read the titles of the few books on its shelf; he glanced at the small plastic radio on top of the table. He studied it for a moment and then turned the knob and waited until he heard a voice announce, “This is Station WSAM, Salem’s own station, bringing you music—”

  “I don’t think you’re supposed to touch anything,” she said.

  He turned it off and smiled apologetically. “She play it much?”

  “All the time—this crazy rock and roll music.”

  The door of the closet stood open. He asked her permission and then looked inside. Mrs. Serafino herself opened the door to the bathroom.

  “Thank you,” he said. “I’ve seen enough.”

  She led the way back to the living room. “Did you find anything special?”

  “I didn’t expect to. I just wanted to get some idea about the girl. Tell me, was she pretty?”

  “She was no beauty, for all the newspapers kept calling her ‘an attractive blonde.’ I guess they call any girl that. She was sort of attractive in a corn-fed farm-girl sort of way, you know, thick waist, thick legs and ankles—oh, I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right, Mrs. Serafino,” he reassured her, “I know about ankles and legs. Tell me, did she seem happy?”

  “I guess so.”

  “And yet I understood she had no friends.”

  “Well, she and this Celia who works for the Hoskins a couple of houses down sometimes went to a movie together.”

  “Any men friends, or wouldn’t you have known?”

  “I think she would have told me if she had a date. You know how it is, two women in a house together, they talk. But I’m sure there were no men friends. When she went to a movie Thursday nights, she’d either go alone or with Celia. Yet in the papers it said she was pregnant, so I guess she must have known at least one man.”

  “That Thursday, was there anything unusual about her behavior?”

  “No, it was about like any other Thursday. I was busy, so she took care of the children’s lunch, but she left right after. Usually she would go out before.”

  “But it was not unusual for her to leave when she did?”

  “I wouldn’t say so.”

  “Well thank you, Mrs. Serafino, you have been very kind.”

  She went to the door with him and watched him walk down the path. Then she called after him, “Rabbi Small—there’s Celia now if you want to talk to her, the girl with the two children.” She watched him hasten down the street and accost the girl.

  Rabbi Small spoke to Celia for a few minutes and then walked to the corner of the street and glanced at the mailbox. He got into his car and drove to Salem, where he spent some time before driving back home.

  Mr. Serafino got up shortly after noon. He washed, rubbed his hand against his blue-black beard stubble and decided not to shave until evening, and went down to the kitchen. Outside in the backyard he saw his wife playing with the children and he waved. She came in to serve him his breakfast and he sat at the kitchen table reading the comics in the morning newspaper while she puttered at the stove.

  Not until he finished breakfast did a word pass between them. Then she said, “I’ll bet you’ll never guess who was here this morning.”

  He made no reply.

  “It was that Rabbi Small from the Jewish temple,” she went on. “You know, the one whose car they found the bag in.”

  “What’d he want?”

  “He wanted to ask me about the girl.”

  “He’s got a nerve. You didn’t say anything?”

  “I talked to him. Why not?”

  He looked at her in astonishment. “Because he’s a party to the case and what you know is evidence, that’s why not.”

  “But he seemed like such a nice sort of young man, not like what you’d expect a rabbi to be. I mean, he didn’t have a beard or anything.”

  “None of them do these days. Don’t you remember the Golds’ wedding we went to last year. That rabbi didn’t have a beard either.”

  “He wasn’t even like that, you know, dignified. He was just an ordinary young fellow, like he might be an insurance salesman or a car salesman, but not a fast-talker, just nice and polite. He wanted to see the girl’s room.”

  “And you showed it to him?”

  “Sure I did.”

  “The police told you to keep the door shut. How do you know he wasn’t planning to take something or rub out a fingerprint or even leave something behind?”

  “Because I was with him all the time. He only stayed a couple of seconds altogether.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to call the police and report it.” He rose.

  “But why?”

  “Because this is a murder case, and what’s in that room is evidence, and he’s a party to the case, and he might have been tampering with the evidence. And hereafter, don’t you go talking about this case to anybody, you understand?”

  “All right.”

  “Anybody, get it?”

  “All right.”

  “I don’t want you should say one single, solitary word, you understand.”

  “All right, all right. What are you so excited for? You’re all red in the face.”

  “A guy has a right to have some peace and quiet in his own house,” he raged.

  She smiled at him. “You’re just edgy, Joe. C’mon, sit down, baby, and let me get you another cup of coffee.”

  He sat down and ducked behind his newspaper. She got a fresh cup and saucer and poured his coffee. She was puzzled and uncertain and worried.

  27

  THE RABBI WAS NOT ALTOGETHER SURPRISED WHEN HUGH Lanigan dropped in that evening.

  “I understand you went calling on the Serafinos this morning,” he said.

  The young man reddened and nodded.

  “You were sleuthing, weren’t you, rabbi?” Lanigan’s lips twitched in an effort to be stern, although he obviously thought the situation amusing. “Don’t do it, rabbi. You could muddy the trail, and Lord knows it’s obscure enough as it is. I might also mention that it could excite suspicion. Mr. Serafino, who called to tell us about it, thought you might have come there to remove something, presumably something incriminating, from the girl’s room.”

  “I had no idea,” he said contritely. “I’m sorry.” He hesitated, and then went on timidly, “I had an idea I wanted to check.”

  Lanigan shot him a quick glance. “Yes?”

  The rabbi nodded and went on hurriedly, “In any sequence of events there’s a beginning and a middle and an end. The last time we discussed this case, I’m afraid we started at the end, with the handbag. I suggest you would get further if you started at the beginning.”

  “And what do you call the beginning? The girl’s getting pregnant?”

  “That could be the beginning, but we have no real certainty that was connected with the girl’s death.”

  “Then where would you start?”

  “If I were conducting the investigation,” said the rabbi, “I would first want to know why she left the house after Bronstein brought her home.”

  Lanigan considered the suggestion and then shrugged his shoulders. “She could have left for any number of reasons, to mail a letter perhaps.”

  “Then why take off her dress?”

  “It was raining at the time,” Lanigan observed. “Maybe she didn’t want to get the dress wet.�
�

  “Then she would simply have slipped on a coat or raincoat—as she did. Besides, mail is not collected until nine-thirty the next morning. I looked at the box.”

  “All right, then she didn’t go out to mail a letter. Maybe she just wanted to take a short walk, to get some air.”

  “In the rain? After she had been out all afternoon and evening? Besides, the same objection holds—why would she take off her dress? That’s really the basic question: why did she take off her dress?”

  “All right, why did she?”

  “Why, to go to bed,” announced the rabbi.

  Lanigan stared at the triumphant look on his face. Finally he said, “I don’t get it. What are you driving at?”

  The rabbi could not help showing some impatience. “The girl comes home from a night out. It’s late and she has to get up early the next morning. So she starts to prepare for bed. She takes off her dress and hangs it up carefully in the closet. Normally she would have gone on to take off the rest of the things, but something interrupted her in the process. I suggest it could only have been a message of some sort.”

  “You mean she got a telephone call?”

  Rabbi Small shook his head. “She couldn’t have because there is an extension upstairs and Mrs. Serafino would have heard the phone ring.”

  “Then how?”

  “The radio. According to Mrs. Serafino she had it on all the time. With girls of that age, turning on the radio is a conditioned reflex. As automatic as breathing. I suggest she turned it on as soon as she came in.”

  “All right, so she turned on the radio. What sort of message could she have received?”

  “There’s a news round-up from WSAM, the Salem station, at 12:35. The last few minutes are devoted to local news.”

  “And you think she heard a bit of local news that sent her scurrying out into the rain? Why?”

  “Because she had to meet someone.”

  “At that hour? How could she know where to meet this someone. I know that program—it doesn’t run personals. And if she was meeting someone, why didn’t she put on a dress first? Really, rabbi—”