by Gerald Elias
‘Sybil savors the poetic irony of the plan. But then she has an even more brilliant idea, the result of some shrewd thinking on her part. What if, by some impossible odds, it is determined that Aaron’s death is not from diabetes, not by accidental ingestion of the poison mushroom, but an intentional act? That someone did, indeed, put Gyromitra esculenta in his squirrel stew when no one was looking. Sybil would not want to take the blame, of course. Who would? But if not her, then who? Why, it would be that hussy: plain Audrey Rollins!
‘When Sybil had thought the fling between Audrey and Aaron was a thing of the past she’d been willing, if not happy, to let bygones be bygones. After all, boyfriend Lucien had punched Aaron, Aaron had promised to mend his ways, and Sybil thought she had scared the girl away for good. But then she hears from her former rival, Lisette Broder, that Aaron just can’t get enough of Audrey. Lisette reports the sounds of rutting she overheard while roaming the corridors of the Dolly Cooney Performance Building. While Sybil is expounding upon Baroque performance practice on stage at Feldstein Auditorium, hubby was pounding in a utility room backstage.
‘In truth, had Audrey been a raving beauty Sybil might not have minded as much, but the fact that Audrey is plain and hubby still has the hots for her rubs Sybil the wrong way entirely. She decides she’ll get back at Audrey Rollins for the humiliation the “affair” with her hubby has caused.
‘So sly Sybil hires Audrey and her rash boyfriend, Lucien, to butle at the fateful soiree. She engineers a liaison between Audrey and Aaron, which Mr Testosterone believes will be an amorous one. At the precise moment, Sybil, under the pretext of having him clean up, escorts Lucien into the room to bear witness. Audrey and Lucien flee, but they are already trapped. If the authorities ever determine foul play in the death of Aaron Schlossberg, it will be pinned on Audrey and Lucien. In an amazing coincidence, as a childish prank, Lucien mixes nasty jack-o’-lantern mushrooms with tasty chanterelles, making half of the guests uncomfortably ill. They all recover, but, much to Sybil’s delight, it puts an extra nail in Audrey and Lucien’s collective coffin.
‘To shed any doubt whatsoever about any potential involvement in his death, Sybil decides it will be more convenient for Aaron to die elsewhere. They always say the spouse is the prime suspect and Sybil wants none of that. As Aaron’s health precipitously deteriorates, she tells him she is going to be his Florence Nightingale and take him to the Dolly Cooney Medical Center. On the way, though, she makes a detour and deposits him at Stuyvesant Hall instead. As it’s late at night during spring break she’s confident no one will be there to see what she’s doing or discover poor Aaron until it’s too late. Unfortunately for her, Aaron is a big, burly man, and his dead weight – pardon the expression – is too much for her to handle alone.
‘So before she leaves the house, Sybil calls her new confidante, Lisette Broder. As much as the two of them had been at odds with each other, they both have significant axes to grind with Aaron. And so Lisette, a genetically submissive sort, reluctantly agrees to assist the dominating Sybil. They drag the incapacitated Aaron along Sam Consiglio’s slippery, newly waxed floor down into Room Nineteen, where Lisette had been diligently practicing, and leave him to die an ignominious and excruciating death. When the authorities find him, what other conclusion can they reach than that Aaron died while feverishly composing music until his last moments, like Mozart did with his Requiem? Even though Aaron fancied himself Beethoven.’
Jacobus took a sip of his Scotch. He savored its peaty richness and the fire that ran down into his belly.
‘Are you finished?’ Sybil asked.
‘Not by a long shot, my dear. I’m just getting started. Did I mention that Schlossberg’s murder was the perfect crime?’
‘No. You didn’t.’
‘Good. Because it wasn’t. You see, Sybil has already made several serious blunders. First, could Aaron have driven alone to Stuyvesant Hall in his condition? Impossible. But the fact was, his car wasn’t even there. So how did he get there? Someone had to have driven him. Second, there was no music on the piano. What composer doesn’t have music manuscript paper and a pencil while composing at the keyboard?
‘And why, indeed, would Aaron be at a piano in the basement of Stuyvesant Hall? First of all, if he needed a piano, why use a second-rate student instrument when he could have had his pick of the faculty Steinways? Second, he did all his composing at home and not on a piano keyboard at all, but on his very sophisticated computer. In fact, the score to his unfinished opera, Anwar and Yitzhak, never left his studio. Things are suddenly not looking right.
‘And they’re not smelling right, either. Let’s say – for argument’s sake – that Aaron, on his last legs, managed to haul himself to Room Nineteen to compose. Why would he do it with the lights turned off? Only a blind man wouldn’t turn on the lights. And the piano fallboard closed? That’s even more of a head scratcher. And the ventilation turned off, too? Makes no sense. Maybe, just maybe, in the middle of winter that would’ve been overlooked, but it was an unseasonably warm spring break. That would have been very uncomfortable for Aaron, and when Sam the janitor discovered Aaron’s body, it was even more unpleasant for him.
‘What nails Sybil’s coffin is the missing harpsichord part to Vivaldi’s “Spring.” Lisette had lost her Ricordi Edition part. An eagle-eyed violin teacher – let’s call her Yumi – notices that the harpsichord part to “Spring” is also missing from Sybil’s enviable library of Baroque manuscripts. Put two and two together, and you figure Lisette borrowed it for the chamber orchestra rehearsals. There’s nothing at all sinister in that, except for the fact that Sybil had publicly disavowed having anything to do with Lisette. Why would she do that if she has nothing to hide?
‘Sybil’s missteps begin to conspire against her. One night, she receives a visit from a blind man – let’s call him Persistent – who questions her about some inconsistencies in the story. An hour later she receives a call from Lisette, who frantically relates to Sybil that Persistent wouldn’t take no for an answer. He is going to meet her the next morning and has uncomfortable questions.
‘What to do? Things aren’t looking good. The only one who knows what Sybil did to Aaron is Lisette. Sybil plans hastily. A little too hastily, it turns out.
‘“Stay right there,” Sybil tells Lisette. “We need to talk.” She hurries to Stuyvesant Hall and finds Lisette in Room Seven. Sybil sees the Vivaldi harpsichord part in a pile of Lisette’s music and realizes her error of having lied about not having anything to do with her. She takes the music back. That problem solved, at least. Now no one can connect the two of them. But in the end, it will do just the opposite.
‘Sybil assures Lisette everything will be all right. Sybil will take care of everything. Lisette returns to practicing, her back to the door. Sybil removes a chair and once outside wedges it under the door handle. She then disconnects the power from the wall outlet, cutting off the ventilation. At first Lisette thinks the light has simply gone out, but when she realizes the room is getting stuffy, she quickly understands the jeopardy she is in. Lisette is trapped. She tries the ventilation switch, but for some reason it’s not working. She panics. But the more she panics the more toxic the air becomes with her own carbon dioxide. Lisette desperately tries to pry and pound open the soundproof door, but to no avail. She can’t dislodge the chair that was wedged under the outside door handle and no one can hear her cries for help.
‘When Persistent discovers Lisette’s body the next morning, he also discovers that the Vivaldi harpsichord part is missing. For someone as conscientious as Lisette, it’s highly unlikely she would lose something like that twice, especially a one-of-a-kind manuscript that belongs to someone else. Persistent recalled that Lisette told him she was going to practice it the night of her death, meaning it disappeared about the same time she died. So the most likely scenario is that Sybil, who had already made so many mistakes, took it back to try to erase any trace of their misbegotten connection.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Jacobus’s mouth was dry. He took another sip of Scotch and smacked his lips. The whisky was almost gone. He let the flavor linger nostalgically.
‘That’s the story,’ he said.
‘What a splendid fairy tale!’ Sybil Baker-Hulme said. ‘I applaud you.’ And she did. ‘No wonder you are such a great musician. You have the most creative imagination I’ve ever encountered. But tell me, how does this fable end?’
‘It ends however Sybil wants it to end.’
‘Such as?’ she asked.
‘Turning herself in is one possibility.’
‘Mr Jacobus, your naïveté is almost endearing. I don’t think that’s going to happen, because there are so many flaws in the story itself.’
‘Such as?’ he asked.
‘Such as with regard to poor Lisette’s death. You make the outlandish claim that after trapping her in a practice module I disconnected the ventilation system. But you’re wrong, Mr Jacobus.’
‘Am I?’
‘You certainly are. There is no evidence whatsoever the plug was pulled.’
‘And how would you know that, Sybil?’ Jacobus asked quietly.
‘Because …’
‘Cat got your tongue? I’ll tell you. Because after you unplugged it you plugged it back in. After you watched as Lisette Broder begged to be let out of her gas chamber. After you waited for three or four hours and were sure she was dead. You plugged it back in and removed the wedged chair from underneath the door handle. But with so much to remember, it’s no surprise you neglected to put the chair back in the module. It’s the only explanation of how Lisette could have suffocated with the switch still on. And, face it, it’s your pattern. The more you attempt to cover up, Sybil, the more you expose yourself.’
‘Your theories are as empty as your musicianship,’ she said.
I’m really getting under her skin now, Jacobus thought. He smiled to himself and waited.
‘If, as you conjecture,’ Sybil resumed, ‘Aaron’s dalliances were such common knowledge, why would he suddenly be susceptible to Bronislaw’s blackmail? What Aaron was or wasn’t doing with young ladies was hearsay. “He said, she said” kind of thing. If it did occur I would dare say it was consensual. Nothing could actually have been proved against him.
‘Also, conservatory faculties, you know, are much like families. Warts and all. Yes, there’s some truth in the notion that everyone might be ready to stab each other in the back, but they don’t wash dirty linen in public because all of them, all of them, have more than their share of stained nighties.’
‘Perhaps,’ Jacobus said. ‘But the dirt Bronislaw had was different than the run-of-the-mill gossip. It was hard evidence. It was documented proof stored in official files. If it had gone public it would have put an end to your marriage. In its own perverse way, I suppose it did. But it would also have ended Aaron’s career and legacy, and put him in jail for a long time. The public humiliation of a trial alone would have killed him. It would also have opened a legal can of worms for the conservatory for covering up his crimes. And though I don’t shed a tear for hacks like Hedge and Tawroszewicz, I’ve met a few good people here, and of course, there are the students.’
‘Ah, yes. The sacred students!’ Sybil said. ‘The cavorting, sacred students. What makes you think one of them – let us call her plain Audrey Rollins – didn’t kill Aaron? She, and many others according to your story, would have had ample motive. And Audrey had the means and opportunity as well, and disappeared at a most convenient time.’
‘Audrey certainly made the story interesting,’ Jacobus replied. ‘But there were a few things that made her an unlikely suspect. First was Aaron’s disposal at Stuyvesant Hall. Why? If they had poisoned him, why not just let him rot at home? But even if there were a reason she and her boyfriend had been planning on kidnapping him, they would had to have kept an eye on your house continuously from the time the party ended, just to make sure he was there to kidnap and you weren’t there to witness it. Then they would have needed to track the deterioration of his health to make sure he was in such a weakened condition he wouldn’t be able to resist, or once in the practice room, to escape. Second, according to Sam Consiglio and Connie Jean Hawkins, students were not permitted access to the building over spring break without special permission. Third, even if there was a connection between Audrey and Aaron’s death, there was nothing to connect her to Lisette Broder’s, especially since Audrey was still doing her best to remain invisible. Finally, I had a gut feeling that she was being honest and you were not.’
‘So much supposition, Mr Jacobus! But if I hated her as much as you say, why would I have hired Audrey for that party?’
‘That it was you and not your better half who hired her is certain, because he told me, himself, at the party. He did the cooking and you took care of all the other details. But you ask a good question. I asked myself the same one. Why? Why hire someone you hated and risk tawdry history repeating itself yet again? And the answer was: you wanted history to repeat itself!
‘You had it all figured out. And you had to have planned it all in advance because false morels don’t grow like dandelions. There’s no guarantee you can find such a rare trophy on the spur of the moment.’
‘Mr Jacobus. I say! What an ornate fabric you have weaved. A thing of speculative shreds and postulated patches. And you’ve fashioned it to fit so cozily!
‘Not that I believe a word of what you say, but I am going to ask you for a favor. Not for me but for the conservatory. All right, for me, too. It might seem to you as if I were trying to get away with murder. But even if I were to go to trial I would have an excellent defense: the scorned wife, a husband who abused his position and preyed upon his own students. I could easily come out smelling like the proverbial rose. A heroine who saw a horrific wrong being committed over and over again and put an end to it, even at the peril of her own future. And believe me when I say I’ve got lawyers whose way with words could put Shakespeare to shame.
‘Mr Jacobus, what’s done is done. There’s no going back. Let us move forward. Let us make reforms here at Kinderhoek to protect our young ladies. Let us make conservatory policies transparent and fair. But don’t you agree that involving the police would bring everything down like a house of cards? What good could it possibly do? Consider the best interests of the students. And of music.’
‘You know,’ Jacobus said, ‘I might have bought that if you had walloped Schlossberg over the head with a sledgehammer. I probably would’ve helped you do it. And it wouldn’t have even bothered me that you tried to get away with it, either. After all, no one wants to rot in prison, especially when their mission is to proclaim to the world how mezzo piano liberated Europe.
‘But I’m not going to let you off the hook, dear Sybil. Why? Because the reasons you killed him had little to do with righting a wrong. You stood idly by even after learning your husband had been raping young women and only decided to kill him when you discovered that Bronislaw Tawroszewicz was blackmailing him. By killing him, you prevented Tawroszewicz from getting tenure. That was one motive.
‘But, mainly, you killed him to get revenge upon a young woman. If all else failed, you were all too ready to pin the crime on Audrey Rollins, an innocent human being who had already been victimized by your husband. You even planted the idea in my head that she had killed Schlossberg when yo
u so subtly and innocently asked me about her well-being.
‘You would have been content to see Audrey Rollins and Lucien Knotts behind bars forever for the crime you committed. More than content. Delighted. And then you murdered Lisette Broder for no other reason than to keep her from talking. To think that you were trying to entice me with your new book at the same time you knew you were about to murder your husband. You talk about Shakespeare, Lady Macbeth.’
‘You sound so bitter, Mr Jacobus. So very bitter. I begin to believe your setbacks in life have clouded your rationality. Your desperate need for validation, both personally and professionally, is so very, very great. I’m saddened by it. I really am. The brilliance that once was, gone so far astray. I must ask you, why have you come here this evening? What are your intentions? To make me grovel? To plead for mercy?’
‘By no means.’
‘Then what?’
‘To give you an opportunity to make amends. I’ve sent a tape recording to the New York Times reporter Martin Lilburn. It is essentially word-for-word what I’ve just laid out. If you surrender to the authorities, I’ve told him not to print it. If you continue to deny it, you’ll have hell to pay and you won’t get back any change. Lilburn will be waiting to hear from me.’
Sybil laughed.
‘How melodramatic! If only Aaron had been here to write an opera about it. The authorities, whom I presume you to mean my dear friend Police Chief Albert Pine, suspect me of murder as much as they understand Pythagorean tuning. The only possible result of Mr Lilburn’s exposé would be a lawsuit, which he would lose. Mr Jacobus, I’ve done my best to discourage you from rash and futile action. I must now remind you to consider the fact that you do not have a shred of proof I had anything to do with either murder.’
