The Iron Gates

by Margaret Millar

  “Now and then.”

  “I’d like to talk to her. How would you like to dig her up for me?”

  “Aw, now, Mr. Sands,” Bill said. “What the hell. I got a wife and family. I don’t whore, you know that. If my wife’d hear about it . . .”

  “Use a phone.”

  “Sure. I never thought of that. Why, sure, Mr. Sands.” He got up. “It’ll probably cost you some money. I figure I’ll say it’s a business appointment.”

  “Good idea.”

  “You got five bucks to waste?”

  “Yes.”

  Bill went into the office. After assuring the manager of the house that he meant business, five bucks’ worth, he was allowed to speak to Susie.

  “Susie? This is Bill, up at the Allen.”

  “Well, what do you want? Or is that too personal?”

  “There’s a guy here. Five bucks.”

  “I don’t want to come out on a stinking night like this for five bucks.”

  “You see in the papers about Greeley? He got his wings. And I don’t mean the kind that lets you fly a plane.”

  “Well, well,” Susie said thoughtfully and hung up. Fifteen minutes later she was at the Allen. She had dressed in a hurry and hadn’t combed her hair and her lipstick was blurred around her mouth.

  Bill took her to the back booth and introduced her to Sands. She looked Sands up and down very slowly. “Who are you kidding?” she said.

  “Jesus, you can’t talk to Mr. Sands like that,” Bill said. “Why, Mr. Sands . . .”

  “Sit down, Susie,” Sands said. “You’re right, I’m harmless.”

  “I didn’t mean that,” Susie said. “Holy God, I wouldn’t say a thing like that to any guy. I meant, you’re not the type.”

  “How do you know?” Bill said, scowling. “Mr. Sands has a hell of a lot of muscle under those clothes, ain’t you, Mr. Sands?”

  “Blow,” Sands said, without looking at him.

  “Sure,” Bill said. “Sure. I’m on my way.”

  When he had gone Susie sat down. “What’s the gag?”

  “Questions. About Greeley.”

  “I get it. Policeman?”

  “Yes.”

  Surprisingly, she leaned back and smiled. “That’s a relief. I’m kind of tired tonight. And I got nothing on my conscience you don’t know about.”

  “Known Greeley long?”

  “Not so long. Two months maybe, just in the line of business. He was a cheapskate. You could have knocked me over with a feather when he came in Tuesday night and paid ten bucks for the whole night and didn’t even stay. We came here and stayed for a couple of hours and guess what we drank.”

  “Champagne,” Sands said.

  “Yeah, can you beat it? Poor Eddy, it must have been too much for his system. Bill told me he died.”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you know him?”

  “Not personally.”

  “He was a hophead. He gave himself a dose after we left the pier.”

  “What time?”

  “Twelve, or so.”

  “And then?”

  “Then he sent me home in a taxi,” Susie said dryly. “Believe it or not. He said he had to meet someone. He’d been talking big stuff all night. It made me laugh. The only thing Eddy was good for was rolling drunks, like he must have done to get that fifty.”

  Sands gave her five dollars. She took it with a wry smile.

  “Easy money. Wish to hell I could always get paid for talking. You couldn’t see me for mink.”

  Sands got up and put on his hat. “Good night, and thanks.”

  “Too bad you got to go.”

  “Yes. I have an appointment.”

  He didn’t mention that the appointment was at the morgue, with the mortal remains of Mr. Greeley. Nobody had claimed Greeley and he was due for a long cold wait before someone did.

  The morgue attendant slid out the slab like a drawer out of a filing cabinet.

  “You want me to stick around Inspector?”

  “No,” Sands said. His face looked gray and when he reached out to take the sheet off Greeley his hands were shaking.

  The morgue was intensely quiet. None of the street sounds penetrated the walls and the harsh white ceiling lights emphasized the silence. Light should have motion and sound to go with it, but there was no motion except the fall of the sheet and no sound but Sands’ own breathing.

  Mercilessly the lights stared down at Greeley like cold impartial eyes, examining the protruding bones, the misshapen feet, the broken grimy toenails, the legs skinny and hairy and slightly bowed. Whoever had washed Greeley had done a poor job, and whoever had stuffed his chest with sawdust and sewed him up after the autopsy had been equally careless.

  Greeley, a nuisance from first to last, and even yet a nuisance for nobody wanted to pay for his burial.

  “Greeley,” Sands said.

  It was the only epitaph Greeley got and he wouldn’t have liked it if he’d known it came from a policeman.

  Sands bent over, forcing himself to touch the cold flesh.

  Later he telephoned Dr. Sutton, one of the coroner’s assistants.

  “I just had a look at Edwin Greeley,” he said. “Greeley? Oh yes. Accident case.”

  “Did you notice a puncture on his left upper arm?”

  “Can’t recall it. He was so full of punctures it’s a wonder he could walk.”

  “This one’s on his arm, barely noticeable.”

  “What of it? The inquest is over. The evidence was perfectly, clear. It was either accident or suicide and I can’t see that it makes much difference at this stage of the game. Are you thinking of murder?”

  Sutton sounded incredulous and quite irritated. “You know me, Sands. I’m always on the lookout for homicide. There’s not a chance of it in this case. I knew Greeley, had to testify that he was an addict a couple of years ago. He was a damned suspicious man. If you think he’d stand around while somebody shot a lethal doze of morphine into him . . .”

  “How would he know it was lethal?” Sands asked softly. “Here’s something else for you. I just found out that Greeley took a shot of morphine around twelve Tuesday night. He was found the next morning around six, and had been dead about three hours or so, is that right?”

  “Right.”

  “Well, think about it a minute. There’s no hurry, Greeley won’t run away.”

  There was a long silence.

  “Yeah,” Sutton said at last. “I catch it. The times are wrong. If the shot that killed him was the one he took at twelve, he didn’t die soon enough. So it wasn’t the twelve o’clock one.”

  “And carrying the time element further,” Sands said, “why would Greeley take another dose some two hours later? Addicts don’t throw the stuff around. Greeley had an appointment some time after twelve. It looks as though he hopped himself up for it, and then someone gave him a little extra.”.

  The case of Mr. Greeley was unofficially re-opened on Friday morning.

  On Friday morning, too, Dr. Goodrich made his second report to Andrew by phone.

  “It’s difficult for me to give you any definite statement at this stage,” Goodrich said. “As a gynecologist you’ve had plenty of experience with the mental disturbances of women during the menopause period. Usually the disturbances are fairly light—insomnia, bad dreams with a latent sexual content, periods of hysteria or depression . . .”

  “You think that’s what’s the matter with her?” Andrew said.

  “Frankly, I don’t. It’s intensified the situation, of course. But she seems to be suffering the after-effects of a very severe shock. She is dazed and badly frightened, so frightened that I get the impression that she wants to stay here because it is safe. That’s not uncommon we have quite a few patients here who refuse to leave, but they’re ones who’ve been here for a long time and who can’t bring themselves to give up their changeless routine and face a changing world again. But your wife is a newcomer; they usually fight to ge
t out. . . . Are you sure you’ve been entirely frank with me about the preceding events?”

  “I’ve told you everything I know,” Andrew said, listlessly. “She was alone in the house with the two maids and a man delivered a parcel. No one knows what was in it. She took it with her when she left.”

  “There was no difficulty between the two of you? At Mrs. Morrow’s age, sometimes . . .”

  “No difficulty at all. We’ve been married fifteen years and Lucille has been the best possible wife. And I—I don’t know what kind of husband I’ve been, but she seemed happy.” He paused and added quietly, “Very happy, I think.”

  “This fear of hers,” Goodrich said. “It’s not the wild irrational type we find here so often. I was wondering if it might do any good to have you and the rest of your family come here this afternoon. Some frank talking might clear the air somewhat. On the other hand, you understand it might do some harm?”

  “I understand. Will she—will she want to see us?”

  “We might have a little trouble there, but so far she’s been co-operative about doing things and she can probably be persuaded.”

  “Of course we’ll come. We want to do everything possible to help her.”

  “Her difficulty seems to have started with that parcel. I’d like to know what was in it. I haven’t asked her, naturally, since she has refused to answer even my ordinary questions. But my own idea is that it was some token from the past, and that, coming when it did, it’s caused some exaggerated guilt complex.”

  “We’ll do everything we can,” Andrew said. “We—feel it very keenly. My daughter was to have been married this afternoon.”

  “What a pity,” Goodrich said. “Three o’clock would be the best time. I’ll see you then.”

  The taxi came up the driveway and Giles leaned over and picked up his suitcase.

  “Well, good-bye, Giles,” Polly said. “Nice to have known you.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake.” He let the suitcase fall again. It sent up a little cloud of snow as it landed. “Are we going into it right from the beginning again?”

  “I don’t like people who run out on things.”

  “I’m not running very far. To the Ford Hotel, in strict fact. I can’t stay here any longer, I’m in the way and you know it.”

  “You’ve changed quite a bit in the last few days.” She scuffed the snow with the toe of her shoe, scowling at it. “You didn’t used to be rude all of the time.”

  “I can’t stay here,” he repeated. “I feel like the worst kind of fool. The expectant bridegroom out on a limb and the fire department out to lunch.” He looked down at her, helplessly. “Damn it, you shouldn’t stand out here without a coat.”

  The taxi driver honked the horn.

  “You’d better hurry,” Polly said flatly.

  “Polly, I’ll phone you when I get there.”

  She looked at him coldly. “What for?”

  He leaned down to kiss her but she turned her head away. He put his hands on her shoulders and swung her around again.

  “Look,” he said. “You’ve made a mistake about me. I’m not a man like your father.”

  “Leave my father out of this. He’s a better man than you’ll ever be.”

  “That’s what I’m saying,” he told her quietly. “He’s big enough not to resent being bossed around by the women in his family. But I can’t take it like that. If I could I’d make my peace and agree to stay here and take whatever comes. You can’t have it all your own way, Polly.”

  “Can’t I?”

  He picked up his suitcase again. “You know where I am if you want me.”

  “Certainly.”

  She turned and walked toward the house without looking back. With a savage bewildered, “Damn,” he strode to the taxi and opened the door.

  Slowly Polly went into the living room and stared for a minute, her eyes hot with rage, at the small photograph of Lucille on the mantle. “She did it,” she said through clenched teeth. “She did it, it’s her fault. She’s always spoiled everything for me.”

  The occupational-therapy department consisted of two large cheerful rooms with wide windows through which the sun was pouring. There were two nurses in the room as well as the teacher, but they wore bright-colored smocks over their uniforms and the place had the atmosphere of a friendly informal workshop.

  In one corner fibers of willow-wood were soaking in a tub of water and standing beside the tub was Mrs. Hammond weaving the wood on an upright frame. She paid little attention to detail but seemed to enjoy flipping the strands violently around.

  “Come, come, Mrs. Hammond,” the teacher said. “Let’s take it a little more slowly.” She turned to Lucille. “Mrs. Hammond is making a lampstand. Isn’t she doing well?”

  “Yes,” Lucille said.

  Mrs. Hammond went on flipping.

  “If you see anything you’d especially care to work at, Mrs. Morrow . . .”

  “No. No—anything—anything at all.”

  “Come, Cora,” the teacher called across the room. “Let’s get to work now. Show Mrs. Morrow your lovely picture. Perhaps she’d like to do one like it.”

  “I’m sure she would,” Cora said primly.

  Cora had a small niche of her own occupied by a wooden frame with a piece of burlap stretched across it. On a table Reside it lay little bowls of macaroni, barley, rice and similar foods.

  “We glue these to the burlap,” the teacher said to Lucille. “And when the whole thing is done, it is painted. Some of the work is really amazing, though Cora, I’m afraid, is not very diligent.”

  “It isn’t diligence that counts,” Cora said with a wink. “It’s the artistic impulse, and scope.”

  “It certainly has a great deal of scope,” the teacher said and glanced at the odd pieces of rice and barley scattered haphazard over the frame. “I’m still not quite sure what it’s going to be.”

  “It’s a pictorial representation of James Joyce’s Ulysses. I believe I told you that before. The medium is perfect for the work.”

  The teacher hesitated. “Well, in that case . . . Would you care to do something along this line, Mrs. Morrow?”

  “She could work on this with me,” Cora said.

  “Let Mrs. Morrow answer for herself, Cora. We must be polite.”

  “All right,” Lucille said. “I don’t care.”

  Mrs. Hammond had stopped work and was staring at the bowls of food with somber eyes. Unobtrusively, one of the nurses moved across the room and stood beside her.

  “Give me more food and more clotherings,” Mrs. Hammond intoned. “Give me . . .”

  “Now, Mrs. Hammond, you’ve just had your breakfast. We’ll give you a little lunch later on. What a really good job you’re . . .”

  “. . . more food and more clotherings.”

  The nurse picked up a strand of willow and handed it to her. Mrs. Hammond flung it down again. It whistled through the air and struck the nurse’s leg.

  “Give me more food and more clotherings.”

  “All right. Come along.”

  The two went out, the nurse’s arm tucked inside Mrs. Hammond’s in a firm friendly way.

  “She’s always worse on visitors’ day,” Cora explained. “Her husband comes to see her. Here, pretend you’re working and the teacher won’t interrupt us talking.”

  Lucille selected a piece of macaroni from the bowl. She held it up between her fingers and gazed at it dully. It seemed to expand before her eyes, to become the symbol of her future life.

  All of my life, she thought, all of my life, while Cora’s voice tinkled on: “Mrs. Hammond came from a very wealthy Jewish family. Then she married this man, a clerk of some kind, and her family cut her off because he wasn’t Jewish. They were very poor, and then she lost her baby at birth. Since they told her she’s never said a word but that one sentence. On visitors’ day her husband comes and talks to her, but I don’t think she hears anything. She’s been here for a long time.”

&nbs
p; A long time? Lucille thought. So will I.

  “You aren’t listening,” Cora said.

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Well, then, Mrs. Hammond must feel that her husband starved her and killed the baby. And at the same time she must blame herself too, for renouncing her religion.”

  The Filsinger twins came in with Miss Scott. Mary identified herself immediately.

  “I have told the superintendent a thousand times that when Betty doesn’t feel well she shouldn’t have to come down here.” She threw back her head and shouted, “Superintendent. Super—in—ten—dent!”

  “Hush, Mary,” Miss Scott said, and turned to Betty. “How do you feel, Betty?”

  “I feel fine,” Betty said vacantly.

  “She’s putting on a brave front!” Mary cried. “She doesn’t look well—oh, any simpleton could see how pale she is.”

  She stroked her sister’s rosy cheek.

  The teacher appeared from the other room.

  “Mary, Miss Sims is going to have her washrag finished before you if you don’t hurry. She’s tatting the edge right this minute.”

  Mary snorted. “Come on, Betty, come on, Betty. Watch you don’t fall. Oh, you shouldn’t be allowed to come down here in your condition. Don’t fall, Betty.”

  “I feel fine,” Betty said.

  “Oh, you’re so brave, dear. If it wasn’t for Miss Sims beating me, I’d go right to the superintendent this minute. Oh, dear. Oh, Miss Scott, am I doing right?”

  “Perfectly right,” Miss Scott said.

  The morning went on. Except for Mary Filsinger’s occasional cries for the superintendent, there were no disturbances. Lucille and Cora were skillfully separated by the teacher and Lucille found herself becoming genuinely interested in Mrs. Hammond’s abandoned lampstand. She liked the feel of the willow fibers, smooth and pliant, and for the first time in years she felt the satisfaction of actually constructing something with her hands. When the luncheon bell sounded she had almost forgotten where she was and that she was to stay there the rest of her life.

  “I won’t go down.” Lucille stood by the window in her room, her hands clenched against her sides. “I don’t want to see anyone.”

  “Oh, come now,” Miss Scott said. “We all have visitors today, even the twins. You’ll be all alone up here. And after your family sent you those lovely roses . . .”