When No One Was Looking

by Rosemary Wells

  “That’s what counts, isn’t it?” Mr. Hammer continued. “You think you cheated on the exam, Kathy, because you’re so worked up about the other thing. You’ve got a good little conscience there. I admire it. But you’re all upset. You cracked under too much heat, Kathy, and when people are upset, they do things and say things they don’t mean and that they’re sorry for afterward. Now trust me, and trust your mom and dad. We’re grown-up people, Kathy, with a lot of years behind us. You’ve only been a kid so far.”

  Kathy’s feet were folded neatly beneath her on her favorite rose-covered chair. Mr. Hammer’s logic and his expression were like a thick flawless blanket. Warm and inviting. Impenetrable.

  “Now only you know whether you fudged a little bit on the test, but what we all know, Kathy, your mom and dad and I, is that you had an unbelievable amount of pressure on you in Florida. You stood up to it incredibly. You had a lot of pressure today in a subject you hate. You’ve got a lot of pressure coming in two days with the Newport tournament. Now you add to that a lot of unfounded gossip and a big imagination, you’re going to come up with a little breakdown.”

  “I haven’t had a breakdown,” said Kathy.

  “Nobody takes a tranquilizer unless they’ve had a breakdown,” interrupted her mother.

  “Will you please tell me, Mr. Hammer”—Kathy felt her voice rising—“how come you knew all that stuff about Oliver, right down to the kind of tacks he used?”

  “Routine, honey. He comes from another town. Moves here for the summer. Police do a routine check. Happens a hundred times a week. I happen to know about it because the police chief, Dom D’Amico, is my wife’s brother-in-law. I knew you played ball with the fellow, and I wondered who he was. That’s all.”

  “First you’re after Marty. Now it’s Oliver, isn’t it?”

  “Nobody’s after anybody, Kathy,” he said sadly. “Nobody did anything to anybody. What you’ve heard is a lot of rumors.”

  “I will not play,” said Kathy. “I won’t eat or sleep before Saturday unless everybody stops hiding stuff and comes out with it straight. I’ll hear it from you,” she added, “or I’ll find out for myself.”

  “She’ll hear it from some other dingbat source, Ken,” said Kathy’s father.

  Mr. Hammer leaned back on the sofa. He snapped his fingers softly. “Stubborn as a little mule,” he said, whistling between his big white teeth. “Well, that’s why she wins the big ones. Okay.”

  “Please tell me what’s happening,” Kathy repeated.

  “Kathy,” her mother broke in, “Ruth Gumm’s parents are trying to stir up a hornet’s nest.”

  Mr. Hammer took over again, seeming to have decided what approach he would use. It was the friendly one. “Hornet’s nest isn’t the word for it,” he said, catching Kathy’s eyes with his own. “Kathy, I want you to listen hard now, okay? Just relax that active little brain of yours and listen. Please?”

  “Okay.”

  “First of all, these people—Don’t get me wrong. They lost their kid. They’re very, very upset about it. I understand just how they feel. But they didn’t go to the police, Kathy.”

  “They didn’t?”

  “No. They went straight to the head of the New England Lawn Tennis Association. Caroline Collins. She went to the police. Now again, maybe they weren’t thinking straight. Their daughter had a terrible accident. But it was an accident, Kathy. A terrible tragedy. But that doesn’t give them the right to pin it on someone else. To lay blame and try to find a scapegoat, does it?”

  “Well ... no.”

  “Do you think it gives them the right to upset many other people’s lives just because they’re upset?”

  “Well ... Kathy began.

  “You know, honey, sometimes grown-ups can act just like children. When a kid can’t accept a disappointment, what does he do? He lays on the floor and has a tantrum. He says, ‘My brother did it!’ He says anything to get around it! Well, in the face of personal loss and tragedy some people, adult people, do the same. Rather than living through a bad situation and facing up to it, letting time heal their wounds, they use up all their energy flying around like a chicken with its head cut off. Blaming, accusing, heedless of the feelings of others, they try and change what they can’t change. You know, my wife has a little what-d’ye-call-it, needlepoint thing on the wall of our kitchen. It says ‘God grant me the serenity to accept what I can’t change, the courage to change what I can change, and the wisdom to know the difference.’ That make any sense to you, Kathy?”

  “I’ve seen them. The needlepoint samplers. I know what it means.”

  “Okay, Kathy, now I’m going to ask you a tough question, and I want you to give me a truthful answer.”

  “Yes, Mr. Hammer?”

  “You think you’re ever, ever in your whole life going to be able to add two and two and two?”

  “You mean math?” said Kathy, looking down at her hands.

  “I mean math. Do you ever think you’ll play the violin in a concert?”

  “No,” Kathy answered questioningly.

  “You ever think you’re going to be a great ballerina?”

  “No.”

  “Do you think you’ll ever be any good, even good enough to pass first-year algebra, at math?”

  “If I studied, maybe.”

  “Did you spend all last year and all summer studying?”

  “Yes, Mr. Hammer.”

  “Did it do any good? Can you change it, Kathy? Can you change it? Can you learn the violin or ballet or math?”

  “No.”

  “Then accept it.”

  Kathy was silent.

  “Okay?” he asked.

  “Okay,” she said unsurely.

  “Now I’m going to explain something else nobody can change. When Police Chief D’Amico gets charges, when someone charges somebody with wrongdoing, the police have no choice, Kathy, but to pursue it. To investigate the charges. It’s the law. Now it’s my personal opinion that what happened is a terrible misunderstanding, but this is what has come down the pike so far. The cops have a specimen of red clay that the club manager wiped up off the pool-house floor. The pool water, at the time of the accident, was overchlorinated. After the autopsy Ruth Gumm’s parents went to Mrs. Collins at the NELTA. They thought you or somebody close to you had tried to harm their daughter because she had beaten you many times and was to play you the next day. Mrs. Collins went to the cops, and the cops came to Molina. He was very defensive. Thought they were accusing him of carelessness with his pool. He showed them the sponge with the clay on it and said the tennis pro over there had been messing around in the pool house and it must be her fault. Now it looks to me like your club manager wanted to get your tennis coach fired. He didn’t really think there was any funny business. He just wanted to clear his name from a negligence charge. There’s a feud going on between the two of them. Doesn’t look like the coach is too popular.”

  “Marty?”

  “You like her?”

  “Without Marty I’d be nowhere.”

  “Oh, come now, honey. Marty didn’t give you your talent. The good Lord did that.”

  “I will not leave Marty.”

  “Okay, okay. But just supposing this Marty person had decided to tip the match in your favor that day. Just supposing.”

  “Marty would never do that,” said Kathy.

  “We don’t know where she was the evening before. As a matter of fact anybody who spent the day at the Newton Country Club and got their feet full of that red clay could have gone into the pool house. To tell you the truth, D’Amico’s been too busy to do much about this yet. We do know where you were, Kathy, thank God.”

  “She was at algebra and down at the public courts practicing,” said Kathy’s mother. “Just ask Mrs. Diggins. Ask Joe Potter.”

  “I was at Fenway Park,” said Kathy.

  “What?” asked her father in horror. The atmosphere in the room changed so suddenly Kathy became alarmed. “It’s ok
ay,” she said. “I came home after the fifth inning. I didn’t want to be late, and the Yankees were winning anyway.”

  “Oh, boyoboyoboyoboy,” said Mr. Hammer.

  “You could have been raped! Mugged!” said her mother.

  Mr. Hammer held up his hand for silence as if he were in a disorderly kindergarten. “Can you remember a bus driver, Kathy? Do you have a ticket stub?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Remember someone who sat next to you? Anything at all? Anybody see you? A guard? Did you talk to anybody?”

  “No, sir.”

  Again Mr. Hammer snapped his fingers softly and distractedly rubbed at his jaw. “Listen, listen, listen,” he said. “Kathy, we’ve got a completely wrong slant on this. There’s no homicide charge here. It was an accident no matter how you slice it. Nobody wanted to kill the poor girl. Even if what her parents say is true, that somebody did dump some chlorine in the pool, it was at worst a practical joke. Do you understand that?”

  “She died,” said Kathy.

  “She died of drowning, Kathy. Not of chlorine. Chlorine can’t kill anybody. She could have died in the ocean swallowing too much salt water if the salt water made her gag and closed up her throat and she couldn’t breathe. That happened to me once, snorkling off Jamaica. If I hadn’t been close to the boat and two fellows hadn’t dragged me out of the water, I would have drowned just because I swallowed too much salt water and it came up and I couldn’t control the spasm.”

  “People don’t die of practical jokes,” said Kathy.

  “Honey, a four-year-old wouldn’t try to kill somebody by putting chlorine in the water. No, no, no. If it was intentional, honey, somebody only meant to incapacitate the girl’s vision, or maybe her sinuses, very slightly, and our only concern here is the New England Lawn Tennis Association and whether they suspend you from the Newport tournament. Not the police, Kathy, the NELTA!”

  “Well, what are we going to do about the NELTA?” Kathy’s mother asked suddenly. “What are we going to do if they suspend Kathy from the tournament Saturday.”

  “I’m not playing anyway,” said Kathy. “I’m giving up tennis.”

  “Don’t be a fool!” snapped her mother. “Don’t be a—”

  “Ladies! Ladies!” said Mr. Hammer, and this time he held up both arms like a prize-fight referee.

  “Nobody’s going to get suspended from anything. I’ll talk to Caroline Collins myself. Nobody’s going to get suspended from anything.”

  “Marty’s been suspended from the club,” said Kathy.

  “Honey,” said Mr. Hammer, “your Marty is a crazy lady. She’s got a very, very nasty little reputation. She didn’t get that for nothing.”

  “Well, Marty’s a little direct sometimes, but ... Kathy faltered.

  “Honey, this Marty is talking to an Italian police chief about the Mafia. She’s going on with a mouth like a longshoreman. She’s a crazy, crazy lady.”

  “She didn’t do it.”

  “Honey. Are you aware ... well, at a certain time of life certain women pass through a stage, particularly when they’re not married and don’t have kids. They get like all twisted up inside. Everything’s out of proportion to them. She was a fine, fine player at one time, but she’s washed up, and now, Kathy, she’s gone and put all her eggs in one basket, and that basket is you.”

  “Listen to Mr. Hammer,” said Kathy’s mother.

  “Honey, look. Even on the off chance she did do something of this kind, there’s no way to prove it. All the cops have is a little itty bit of red clay that could have come off anybody’s shoe, and that includes your mom, your sister, Oliver English, you, and even your little brother, Bobby. Ruth herself could have gone in there for some reason. No judge would look at a case like this. Nobody is going to be arrested, Kathy. Not Marty, not anybody. The personal feud between Molina and your coach was bound to erupt over something. All we want to do is get you clear and the NELTA off our necks. Understand?”

  “You’re trying to pin it on Marty,” said Kathy.

  “Put her to bed,” said Mr. Hammer without his smile.

  Jody’s voice suddenly rang clearly from the partially opened living-room door. “Can I come in now?” Jody asked.

  “Jody, please go to bed,” said her mother. “It’s after ten.”

  “I have something to say, Mom.”

  “Well, say it.”

  “I remember when I was home alone that night. The night you’re talking about. I was doing the dishes, and I put on one of my records.”

  “Jody, what is this about? Can it wait?” asked her father. “Mr. Hammer doesn’t have much time.”

  “It would be helpful to Kathy.”

  “Come in, honey,” said Mr. Hammer. “Come on in. I hear you’ve got a pretty strong right arm too!” He chuckled.

  Jody did not smile. She sat cross-legged and composed on a hassock. “I remember exactly how I was feeling that evening,” she said. “Listening to my record. I was happy to be listening to my record instead of having to listen to a baseball game on TV. I hate baseball,” she added firmly to Mr. Hammer. “Anyway, I remember thinking that it was a waste because I’d looked it up in the paper that afternoon and the ball game wasn’t on TV anyway.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Mr. Hammer.

  “Well, it was a waste, you see, because even if I hadn’t been alone in the house, I could have played my record anyway.”

  “Jody, you’re talking in circles,” said her mother. “This has nothing to do with Kathy.”

  “But, Mom, don’t you see? If Kathy went to Fenway and saw a game that was not televised, all she has to do is give a pretty good description of it, and then she can prove she was there.”

  Mr. Hammer clapped his hands together. “One smart cookie you’ve got there!” he said. “Okay. All right. Now, come on, Kathy. We’re getting somewhere. I’ll have Dom D’Amico order the videotape of the game from channel six. All the games are videotaped even if they’re not broadcast on TV. Any little thing you can remember, Kathy, that wouldn’t be in the papers or on radio will do the trick.”

  It was then that Kathy realized, for the first time, that she actually might be in real trouble herself—that people might not believe her story. Suddenly she wanted to sit in her father’s lap.

  “Anybody go out on the field?” Mr. Hammer asked. “Any streakers, kids? Anything like that? Any fan make a spectacular catch? Anybody lean over the fence to get a foul ball? Fall on the tarp, say?”

  Kathy shook her head. “Guidry was pitching,” she said after a pause. “The Yanks were winning six to nothing. Jackson hit a home run into the right-field seats.”

  “Something that wouldn’t be in the papers, Kathy,” said Mr. Hammer patiently.

  “It was just ... an old ball game. A boring one. The trouble is I was so upset about having to play Ruth the next day I could hardly concentrate. I just remember sitting there in my seat thinking I was going to be sick. Maybe default the match. Maybe I would get a migraine. I know it’s awful, but I was crossing my fingers that maybe Ruth would get sick or—”

  “That’s a no-no, Kathy,” said Mr. Hammer. “Try to remember the ball game.”

  “I just really remember one thing. Coming through the gate, you know? After you go up all those stairs inside the dark stadium? I remember when I saw the field for the first time. It was so green, so green ... like an emerald with the lights on it and the sky still light. I remember how white all those little baseballs looked during the warm-up. And the Boston uniforms. So white against that green.”

  Mr. Hammer advised Kathy to sleep on it. He then congratulated Kathy’s parents on having one daughter so talented and the other so smart. Kathy did not hear this as more than a distant buzz as she fell asleep in her chair.

  8

  “WHERE IS YOUR MIND, my dear?”

  Kathy did not flinch at this question. She scooped a backhand low off the court and with it hit one of the ball can targets that Marty had set up ne
ar her base line. She watched the can fall over and banged her racket head on the hard court. “I hate these courts,” she said.

  “It’s nothing to do with the courts,” said Marty. “You have played on these courts many times.” She popped the ball across the net. The wind whipped unsteadily off the marina. Marty’s hair flew around her head in all directions. The boats banged against one another at the dock, and Kathy realized she’d been listening more to the sounds of the boats and the crying of the gulls than to Marty. “Concentrate!” Marty ordered. Kathy knew Marty did not like the public courts either. First because she despised anything public and also because in her playing days hard courts did not exist for anyone above the hack amateur level. Kathy became aware of a particularly large brown gull which landed on the pro-shop roof, and she netted an easy forehand.

  “Are you aware, my dear, that tomorrow morning at ten o’clock you will be starting your first round in the New England Championships?”

  “I know, Marty.”

  “Then why, please, are you looking at the quaint New England scenery that you’ve seen every day of your life?”

  “I’ve hit the can twenty times, Marty. What’s wrong with that?” Kathy asked. She was bent low, shifting her weight from foot to foot, holding her racket ready.

  “There’s nothing wrong with that. I am watching your face. There’s something wrong with that, I’ll tell you.”

  Kathy sighed loudly. “What? What’s wrong with my face?”

  Marty stood at the net with her hands on her hips; the gusty wind at her back still blew her hair around wildly. “A year and a half ago,” she said in a bright and snappish voice, “when I first saw you play in that free clinic, I watched your expression as you hit every shot. You didn’t get many balls in the court the first few times, but you hit every single one like a winner. You looked hungry and mad as a cornered cat. Also you enjoyed it. Now you look like some kind of modern dancer with her head in the clouds.”

  “I’m sorry, Marty. I’ll concentrate. I’m cold. That’s all.”

  “Do you think you’re going to get beyond your first round tomorrow playing like a sick parakeet? You can completely destroy all the good you did yourself in Florida.”