Evil Friendship

by Packer, Vin

  “Immediately.” And she began to walk slowly back down the path they’d come.

  Mary Drew bent and picked up the knife and the cloth, then ran to catch up with her.

  She said, “Moly, please tell me.”

  “Don’t call me that name. I won’t call you Druid either.”

  “What?”

  “It’s silly, don’t you see? That’s all.” And She stuffed her hands into the pockets of her long black coat, her head lowered, the long black hair blowing about her face in the new wind.

  “I can’t imagine what’s happened to you. Has Roddy upset you, or your mother?”

  “I haven’t even been home.”

  “Won’t you tell me?”

  There was silence save for the crunch of the twigs and leaves underfoot as they walked along slowly. Lights beyond them on the horizon were beginning to show evening, and a tower bell at Chillam off in the east sounded the half-hour.

  Mary Drew Edlin felt on the verge of tears, but said nothing, could think of nothing to say. Then Martha spoke. “What would you say, Mary Drew, if I told you I’d been with a man?”

  “Martha! When? Oh, don’t hold off, when?” Mary Drew’s voice changed back to the light tone of excitement that always preceded their secret-telling.

  But Martha’s was still very somber. “Recently. Very recently.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? Heavens, why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I wondered what you’d say.”

  “I think it’s absolutely remarkable! Martha, tell me about it? Who is he? Not Roddy — oh, heavens, your mother would die!”

  “I can’t tell you who it was.”

  “Is it someone I know?” Mary Drew was bubbling with the news; sure, too, that Martha would tell her. That was like Martha — to make it very dramatic and serious; that was what she adored about her. There was always something new, some huge news or idea.

  “I’m really not going to tell you, Mary Drew.”

  “And you’re never going to call me Druid?” Mary Drew teased. “Never again?”

  Martha stopped walking and looked at Mary Drew. “You’ve never been with a man, have you?”

  “Heavens no!”

  “Nor ever wanted to be?”

  “No! No! Now, tell me!”

  “Don’t you think it’s peculiar that you don’t like men?”

  “Why?” Mary Drew couldn’t keep from smiling, anticipating some great joke.

  “I mean it,” Martha said angrily. “Don’t you think it’s peculiar that you’d rather be with me than a man?”

  “Martha — what is the matter?”

  “I like men. I don’t think they’re boring or silly, or any of it! I’m going to get married one day, and have children!”

  “You are?” Mary Drew stared at her uncomprehendingly.

  “Don’t you know what it means if you don’t like them? Don’t you know what it means if you’ve never wanted to be with one? Well, don’t you?”

  “Moly — ”

  “And don’t call me Moly! I don’t want to have anything to do with Chillam!” Her voice caught, and tears came to her eyes. “Or you!”

  “Moly, Moly — ”

  “Stop it! Stop it!” Martha Kent shouted. “I — hate you!” and in a sudden, impulsive gesture she flung the candle’s butt at Mary Drew, and it hit her across the cheek before it fell to the ground. Mary Drew stood dead still, dumb-struck, her legs and arms trembling.

  “And when I marry,” Martha Kent said, “I’m going to take my marriage seriously. I’m going to be in love with the man I marry!”

  Then she turned and ran from the woods, leaving Mary Drew behind her.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Statement made by Michael Lewis Stoke in the Edlin-Kent case

  JUNE 8, 1956

  I work for the Weerdale City Council as a laborer. I live at Jenning Road, Weerdale. I am an assistant of Douglas Tullett at Southwark Park. About four-thirty on 8 June last I was working near the tool and supply shack, just south of the tearoom. I was going toward the shack when I saw Douglas Tullett running toward the tearoom, yelling at me to come there. I went and waited outside, as I did always. A man holding an ice cream cone in his hand said there was a murder.

  Then Douglas Tullett came out of the tearoom and ran down the path toward the valley. I ran after him. We found the body of a woman on the path there. She was on her stomach. She looked to be dead. (Exhibit A photos 1 and 2 handed to witness.) These pictures show where the body was when I arrived. I noticed the round stone on the path by the body. The red knee-sock was on the bank. I adjusted the woman’s skirt, pulled it down. I did not touch the body in any other way.

  I stayed with the body when Tullett ran back to the tearoom and was still there when the ambulance man came. I stayed with the ambulance man until Sgt. Cudahy arrived with the constable.

  I did not speak to either of the accused at any time.

  (Signed)

  MICHAEL LEWIS STOKE

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Q. Has this girl, Mary Drew Edlin, had heterosexual relationships?

  A. As far as I can ascertain, she has not.

  Q. Yet a physician testified this morning that he had examined her at her father’s request, and considered her not a virgin.

  A. It is my opinion that such an examination, after such time has passed as did in this instance, is not reliable.

  Q. Did the Edlin girl ever say she had relations with a member of the opposite sex?

  A. Yes.

  Q. And you doubt this?

  A. She spoke only in vague terms about the matter. She mentioned no names. There is every indication that she knew no members of the opposite sex with whom such a relationship could be brought about. Her only friend was the Kent girl.

  — Crown Prosecutor cross-examining Dr. Rose Mannerheim at the Edlin-Kent trial

  CHRISTMAS DAY, 1955

  Henry Edlin set the wig on his head and made his face into an expression of mock concern. “Tak soom o’ mah niff — ” he said, then burst into laughter. Louisa laughed too, setting her spoon by her cup of tea in the saucer. “Ah, you were excellent, Henry. And I’d always thought that I was the stage-struck one in our family. I wish Tony could have seen you!”

  They were still talking about it, though it had happened two nights ago. Henry Edlin had played the part of the doctor in the annual Christmas mystery play. Mary Drew thought the plays were bores, never mind the tradition. They had silly plots, all about a victim being slain as Winter and brought back to life again as Spring, with the language so old and odd that it was hard to make anything of the whole matter. Her mother and father had chattered on and on about it all day yesterday, shutting up only long enough to go to church in the evening and to listen to carolers outside sing, “God bless the master of this house.”

  Mary Drew drank her tea and brooded on the same thing she had been brooding on for three days: Martha. Martha’s change. She felt not so much desolated by it as desperate because of it. She could not believe it, and so she felt that the solution to the problem was like finding the solution to the Chinese puzzle — a certain thing to do that would solve it … the right move to make. In everything between Martha and herself, there had been a way to play the game, a right way. And so now too, there was still the game, she believed, but she must find a way to behave that would win Martha back.

  “Oh, I’ll say my lines for Tony,” her father was saying.

  Then for the thousandth time, he repeated the jibberish he had said in the play: “Tak soom o’ mah niff naff dahn thy tiff taff!”

  Louisa Edlin giggled again and exclaimed, “Hurrah!”

  “And why are you so quiet, m’luv?” Henry Edlin said to his daughter in a twinkly tone, the wig lop-sided on his head. “Tell me, m’luv, wot ails ye?”

  Mary Drew said, “Oh, nuts! I wish we could have Christmas!”

  “And thot we will, when Anthony come, m’luv!” her father said.

  Mary Drew sighed and
stirred her tea. “Everyone’s had theirs by now. We’ll have ours on the day after, I suppose.”

  Louisa Edlin looked across the table at her daughter. “Tell me,” she said, “have you and Martha had a spat, Mary Drew?”

  “Of course not.”

  “She hasn’t called up in days, and I don’t believe you’ve called her up either.”

  “We don’t have to call each other up all the time!”

  “Oh?” Louisa Edlin answered. “I thought you did.”

  “Can’t I have one friend without your making so much of it?”

  Henry Edlin said, “We’ve made nothing of it, m’luv. It’s been Martha this and Martha that, and Martha and I this and Martha and I that, and then Martha and me and me and Martha!” He chuckled. “Niff naff dahn thy tiff taff, if you ask me!”

  “Oh, don’t be so silly!” Mary Drew snapped, “with that damn wig on your head!”

  “Mary Drew!” Louisa Edlin said. Henry Edlin looked terribly hurt.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “We don’t talk that way — ever!” her mother said.

  “I said I’m sorry.”

  Henry Edlin was off in the corner of the room, silently removing his wig, rubbing his eyes tiredly with his thumb. “I suppose I have carried on absurdly,” he said.

  “Not at all, Henry I Mary Drew’s just terribly irritable this morning.”

  “Tony will be home soon. Then you won’t have to listen to me,” Mary Drew said.

  “Now, now,” her father walked back to the table and put his arm on her shoulder, “We don’t see much of Tony any more. Won’t it be rather good to see him again?”

  “I wouldn’t know. He’s not here yet.”

  “Mary Drew, you’re behaving very poorly for Christmas!” Mrs. Edlin said.

  “I don’t have any Christmas spirit. That’s all.”

  “Well, try to summon some up,” Mrs. Edlin stood and took up the teacups and saucers. “After all, dear, it only comes once a year.”

  “That’s true,” Mr. Edlin said, “and when it comes it brings good cheer, dear,” and he pinched his daughter’s chin.

  Mary Drew forced a smile. “All right. I’ll behave!” making her voice brave cheerfulness. “Maybe I’ll have a walk.”

  “There’s my girl,” Henry Edlin said. He picked up a piece of peppermint and held it down to his daughter’s lips. “Tak soom o’ mah niff naff dahn thy tiff taff!” He roared with laughter.

  • • •

  Southwark Park was a little over a mile from the Edlins’. Mary Drew walked there in an aimless fashion, pausing now and then — once at a milk bar, once at the druggist’s — wondering if she should call up Martha Kent … perhaps just to say, “Merry Christmas, Moly.”

  But that wasn’t the answer; there was nothing new in that.

  She had never had a friend before — never once, and as she reviewed her friendship with Martha, it seemed that all this trouble since that day in the woods had something to do with a man … or men in general. They had not discussed men at all. It was a new, and still unfathomable, direction that Martha had taken.

  Wasn’t it that Martha wanted her to be with a man? But why? Because Martha had…. Almost no one they knew had, of this Mary Drew was sure. No one at Chillam, certainly — the way they locked them in like prisoners at night. She and Martha were different from all of them — they were all a lot of damned fools; still, what made them different? What marked them different …? Was that it?

  “Is that what you want, Moly?” Mary Drew murmured almost aloud.

  It was strange, and yet, it was like a sacrifice; a rite, or a ceremony. The blood of the lamb.

  But what was all of that about marriage and children! Mary Drew became confused when she tried to remember Martha’s exact words. She felt somehow that she was very close to the solution; still, too much puzzled her. And where would she find a man even so?

  It was a clear day, and she had thought of taking the boardwalk by the beach, of picking up some shingles, and looking out at the wonderful chalk bluffs of Trumpet Head. But they had been there together, Martha and she, that afternoon they had sat on the shingles and talked for the longest time about going to America one day together. They would have their own apartment, and both would write plays that Broadway would produce. Then Hollywood would buy them, and they would be very rich and go all around the world. They would buy a home in France. Mary Drew could remember how Martha had said, “Oh, say, listen — listen, Druid,” and both had sat on the shingles hushed, listening then to the little portable radio that rested beside them. There was a Frenchman speaking, an announcer, who said that the Gaité Parisienne melodies that they had been idly half-listening to, as they sat there, had been played by the Boston “Poops” Orchestra.

  Both of them had howled with laughter; then in the next minute, sat in silence, with only the sea’s sounds as Martha snapped off the radio.

  “It was like an omen, Druid,” Martha had said, “Oh, we will have that chateau in France one day!”

  Mary Drew could not go back to Trumpet Head alone, not now, on Christmas without Martha. Instead, after an hour’s walk, she found herself turning into Southwark Park, passing by the firs and oaks, with the sun bright, but the air very cold this Christmas noon.

  When she saw him, she was afraid. It was his eyes that made the fear. They looked dazed, like the eyes of someone gone soft in the head, and they were large eyes, watching her from inside the shrubbery. The face was red and puffy, and the lips, very narrow ones, were puckered in a tight-lipped odd sort of smile. She began to walk very fast, thinking of the tearoom up ahead.

  But he came behind her, and then he said something:

  “Tearoom’s closed, puppy.”

  “What?”

  She stopped, and he stopped, and they stood regarding one another, a good distance between them. She saw his breath in the cold air, and the red face, and those eyes, but not with fear now. He was short and chunky, wearing the striped wool jacket, his bare hands half-crammed into the pockets; he stood straddle-legged. She didn’t like him, but she was suddenly not afraid of him.

  “Closed, puppy,” he repeated. “Holiday, puppy.” “I wasn’t going there anyway,” she said. “Oh? Where was you going then?” “For a walk.”

  “By yourself on Christmas day, puppy?” He made an odd sound that might have been a laugh, then stepped up to her, slowly, as though he were measuring his chances of getting that close. They were very good. Mary Drew stayed still, regarding him coolly.

  “I got a tearoom, puppy.”

  “You!” Mary Drew snickered.

  “Back there, I have,” gesturing over his shoulder with his thumb.

  “What’s back there! A shack!”

  “It’s mine, puppy.” He reached a chubby knuckle out and nudged her scarf, and at his touch, Mary Drew Edlin knew the solution to her problem. She looked at him.

  “Don’t be afraid, puppy. I’ve met lots of little puppies here in Southwark,” he said.

  “I’m not afraid,” she said.

  “You speak right up, don’t you, puppy?” He knew too, and he gave a burst of laughter, his breath frosty in the noon air. Then he put his hand on her. “Naw, naw,” he said, “you’re not the first puppy,” and he slipped his hand inside her coat, let his fingers up under her sweater.

  Mary Drew Edlin said, “Not here, you damned fool!”

  He pulled away, bent double with laughter now; after a bit he straightened and passed the back of his hand across his unshaven chin. “Ah now, you’re a smart puppy, and you’ll follow like a good puppy, you will.”

  He went ahead of her. “The shack is warm,” he said over his shoulder. “We’ll have some Christmas there, puppy!”

  He walked fast. It was hard for her to keep up with him.

  On Christmas night at the Kents’, Roddy Sawyer raised his drink for a toast. “To this house,” he said, “and to the best friends a man could ask for — Doctor, Helen, and Martha!”

&
nbsp; Everyone held their glass in the air a moment, then sipped.

  “I really mean it,” Roddy said. “It’s been the best Christmas I can remember. Oh, darn it — how I wish I’d not left the roses behind at the pub. Helen, you should have roses for Christmas night!”

  “They’ll cheer some poor lonely person there who has no warm home,” Helen smiled. “Never mind, Roddy.”

  William Kent settled back in the leather chair, closing his eyes and holding his drink aloft.

  He said,

  “At Christmas I no more desire a rose

  Then wish a snow in May’s new-fangled mirth

  But like of each thing that in season grows …”

  “Love’s Labour’s Lost!” Roddy said. “Am I right?”

  “Yes, but who said it, and what act was it?”

  “Berowne, in the first,” said Roddy.

  William Kent nodded. “Fine, fine, Rodney…. Yes, yes.”

  Martha sat in the corner on the leather footstool, by the fireplace. For the occasion, she was allowed one drink and she had gulped it. She felt slightly fuzzy and quite sad. She wanted to think of some way to excuse herself and go phone Mary Drew. For days she had wanted to talk to Mary Drew, but there was no way to do that without explaining everything — all that had happened that afternoon, what Rush had said to her, all of that. And the lie she had told, about the man … Mary Drew would hate her for that. It seemed to Martha that she had lost Mary Drew, that things between them could never go on as they had. How she hated Chillam. How she hated Rush for telling her all the things she had, and herself for her own thoughts immediately after. The world seemed so dirty — Roddy with his sneaky ways, and her mother, her own mother. Last night, on Christmas Eve, she had heard her mother’s footsteps on the way to the Crow’s Nest, after her father was asleep. And an hour later, a good hour later, the same steps sneaking back down the stairs.

  She had written about it in her diary:

  “December 24, 1955. I write this as my own mother makes her way to Roddy’s room, for more of their ugly romance. My father is asleep — poor father, trusting in her! How can she be so vile! Vile is the only word for it, and for everything I wrote about these past days. The only clean tying was what Mary Drew and I had, and I ruined that by listening to Rush’s foul talk. Oh, diary, please help me find a way out of this and back to Mary Drew. We could let the world go to hell then, and not care. God bless Mary Drew, and help me keep from her my filthy thoughts that bothered me about us!”