“I see,” said Barnes. He turned back to Bill. “Now that your lawyer is here, I imagine you don’t mind answering a few questions.”
Bill looked bewilderedly at Arthur. Arthur didn’t say anything.
“There’s really only one question at the present time,” said Barnes. “You know Arthur Johnson, the Sheldons’ butler?”
That seemed to me a relatively un-ominous question, but to my surprise and alarm, Bill’s face went a dreadful grey. He threw me a glance as desperate as the glance of a drowning man. Quietly, his eyes fixed on my son’s, Barnes repeated the question and Bill managed:
“Yes, yes. Sure. I know Johnson.”
“Are you on good terms with him?”
“I guess so. I’ve known him for years. Never thought much. I …”
“He wouldn’t have any reason for bearing you a grudge?” Once again Bill threw that hopeless glance as if I and only I could save him from some unmentionable horror. I hadn’t the faintest idea what was coming, but my son’s evident terror infected me.
“No,” he said. “Johnson wouldn’t bear me a grudge.” Barnes turned back to Arthur Freedland. “I have already interviewed Arthur Johnson. At six o’clock Mr. Sheldon gave him the evening off. But at five o’clock, at the time of Bill Duluth’s first visit to the house, Johnson both let him in and showed him out. He tells me that Bill Duluth was in an extremely emotional state. He tells me that when Bill Duluth left the house, as he was going out of the front door, white and shaking with rage, he said quite distinctly, whether to himself or to Johnson—Johnson is not sure which … Bill Duluth said…”
Once again Barnes used his contrived, melodramatic pause. Bill had dropped his face into his hands.
“Bill Duluth said: I’ll kill him. If it’s the last thing I do. I’ll kill him!”’
So this was Barnes’s trump. Now it was played, it didn’t seem to me as deadly as I had feared. Slowly Bill raised his head. He seemed steadier now, almost as if it were a relief to have it out in the open.
I said: “Bill, did you say that?”
He shuffled his feet. Arthur Freedland looked up from the mg.
“If I were you, Bill, I wouldn’t answer that question.”
“No,” said Barnes. “Neither would I.”
“But he admits he was mad with Ronnie,” I cried. “He’s not trying to hide anything. He admits everything that’s the truth. He just didn’t kill him.”
After the fraction of a second’s polite attention, Barnes turned back to Arthur Freedland.
“So you see, Mr. Freedland—the opportunity, the motive, the possession of the murder weapon, the absence of supported alibi—the threat.” He paused. “That is the evidence at the present time. Unless his story has features which you haven’t mentioned, I think you’ll agree with me that I have only one course to take.”
My earlier, fatuous optimism that somehow Arthur would help was almost gone, but there was nothing left now except Arthur. I swung round to him.
“Do something, Arthur.”
Arthur Freedland ran a hand unnecessarily over his smooth, greying temple. “Well, old boy, one can’t expect miracles, you know.”
“I’m not expecting miracles. I’m expecting you to do something as a lawyer.”
“It’s as a lawyer I’m speaking. Not”—he paused—“not as an emotional father. And I’m telling you I don’t see there’s much of anything you can do at the moment.”
The ‘you’ was underlined delicately but distinctly. My anger, which Barnes’s presence always kept at boiling point, spilled over on Arthur.
“I asked what we could do. Not what I could do.”
Arthur flushed. Suddenly what was, I suppose, an obvious truth to everyone else, dawned on me.
“You are going to represent Bill, aren’t you?”
Arthur flushed more deeply. “Well, old boy, I’m not a criminal lawyer, you know. Hardly my field. Not our field at all. Now, of course, I could put you on to any of a number of perfectly reputable criminal lawyers who might…”
“So you don’t believe Bill’s telling the truth. That’s what you’re hedging about?”
Very quietly, Barnes said: “That’s hardly the sort of question I would advise you to ask of a lawyer in front of a policeman.”
Arthur Freedland looked at me. All the pretenses of legal impersonality had gone. His face was icy cold, shutting me out.
He said: “Ronnie Sheldon was my best friend.”
Best friend! Ronnie hadn’t even liked him. The jerk, I thought, the pompous, double-crossing jerk.
I said: “Ronnie was my best friend too.”
“I know it.”
“And I’m telling you that Bill didn’t…”
“I’m sorry, Jake. If you want me to recommend a man…” I turned to my son. Standing next to Sylvia Rymer, he looked small, almost wizened—the way Jean had looked at Water Island when he had taunted her.
“No,” I said. “For God’s sake, no. We’ll get a lawyer we can trust.”
Arthur Freedland gave a stiff “washing-of-hands” shrug. “Very well. In that case … if you’ll excuse me… It’s late. My wife will be worrying.”
“Yes,” I said. “So will Miss Boo.”
Arthur said: “Really, Jake.” He glanced sheepishly at Barnes. “Well, if that’s all?”
“That’s all at the present time, Mr. Freedland.”
“Then I’ll be going.”
“Yes.”
Arthur started for the door. He picked up his coat. He turned uncomfortably as if he felt obliged to say something to me and then, just as uncomfortably, gave up. He left the room. I thought of him hurrying home in a taxi, waking up Mrs. Freedland and his mother-in-law. “Really! Would you ever have believed it?”
I never wanted to see him again.
13
After Arthur Freedland had left, Barnes continued to sit, quite still, on the studio couch. At length he got up. His silence completely dominated the room. Then he said:
“All right. Let’s go.”
Bill blinked. “You—you’re going to arrest me?”
“I’m afraid so.”
Bill looked down vaguely at his shirt-sleeves. “But … then I guess I’d better put on some clothes?”
“Yes.”
Bill started for the bedroom. At the door he turned to Sylvia Rymer. He made a hopeless little gesture.
“Sylvia, maybe you’d help … I mean, getting my things together and everything.”
Sylvia Rymer hurried to him. They went into the bedroom together.
Barnes and I were left facing each other. Unexpectedly he smiled at me. His face was charming when he smiled. Dimly I wondered whether if I had met him under some other circumstances I should have liked him. It didn’t seem possible, not with the futile, churning anger in me.
He said: “I’m sorry, Mr. Duluth.”
“That’s big of you.”
“I know how you’re feeling.”
“You do?”
“Yes, I do—and I’m sorry. You haven’t had much of a break.”
From his eyes, from the slight change in his voice, I knew he wasn’t referring only to Bill; he was referring to Felicia too. My anger turned to hatred. Wasn’t it enough for him to be the all-seeing, all-knowing policeman? Did he have to go around playing the Angel of Sympathy too?
I said: “Do you imagine I give a damn whether you’re sorry or not, when you’re arresting my son and he’s innocent?” Very softly, he said: “If I thought he was innocent, I shouldn’t be arresting him, Mr. Duluth.”
“And you, of course, couldn’t possibly make a mistake?”
“I could very easily make a mistake, Mr. Duluth. In this case I don’t think I have. But I don’t expect you to see it my way.”
“Oh, no,” I said. “It’s a free country. We live in a wonderful land. Everyone can believe what they want to believe. A father can even believe that his son is innocent. A …”
“Mr. Duluth, I know the be
st defense lawyer in Manhattan. Do you want me to call him?”
He had said that so quietly that for a moment I could hardly believe he’d said it.
“I can call him now,” he continued. “I’ve already spoken to your brother about it. He thinks it’s a good idea.”
He was looking at me as if what he was asking was a favor for himself. Explosively, I said: “If there’s one thing I hate, it’s an understanding cop. Stick to your own job. You picked it. Presumably you enjoy it.”
“Enjoy it! ” he said. “You think I enjoy it?”
His voice was as bleak as a wind on a mountain. He looked quite different, tired and spent.
“I wish you’d let me call the lawyer, Mr. Duluth.”
And I realized then that he meant it. Heaven alone knew why, but he wanted to dissociate himself from the Arthur Freedlands, he wanted to go as far as he could on my side. It was incredible, but the night had travelled so deep into the realms of the bizarre that it hardly seemed odd. My hatred and fear of him were still there, but they were, in some way, suspended. He had managed to turn everything upside down, making us fleetingly and preposterously allies.
“Okay,” I said, “call the lawyer.”
He smiled. “Thank you, Mr. Duluth.”
He went to the telephone and talked. He came back to me. “He’ll meet us at the police station.”
I looked at him, not understanding anything about him.
I said: “Whatever made you become a policeman?”
He shrugged: “Sometimes I wonder,” he said.
Bill and Sylvia came out of the bedroom. Bill had put on a necktie and jacket. It was the same grey and white sports jacket that he had worn that first disastrous evening at Ronnie’s. The middle button and the tweed around it had been torn away. In the humiliating fight with Ronnie? He was carrying a little zip bag. He said :
“Can Sylvie come?”
“If she wants to.”
Sylvia found a coat. We all went downstairs. There was a police car at the curb with a cop at the wheel. Peter was sitting in the back seat. He must have come down with Barnes and been waiting there all that time. He didn’t say much of anything, for which I was grateful.
We drove to the police station. We went upstairs past the night desk to the detectives’ room. The whole drab building brought back cruel memories of Felicia. I tried not to think of them. I tried to make myself into a walking body with no thoughts and no feelings.
Barnes’s lawyer was there. He was called Elton McGuire. I’d heard the name. He had red hair. But I didn’t react to him at all. He was just someone else who was part of it all. Barnes asked me to make my statement first. Peter had already made one. He took me into a box-like office. A detective came in with a shorthand machine. I made my statement. Dimly I remember just listening to questions and answering them as truthfully as I could.
Then Bill went in. Peter and Sylvia and I sat on wooden chairs. One of the detectives brought us paper cups of coffee. Peter drank his. I didn’t. Neither did Sylvia Rymer. A newspaper reporter came over and pestered us. Peter coped with him. Eventually Barnes called us back into the office. We all trooped in, taking almost all the space.
Barnes was sitting behind the desk. Bill and his lawyer were sitting opposite him. Barnes handed me some typewritten sheets.
“Here’s your statement, Mr. Duluth. Perhaps you’d sign it now and save yourself another trip?”
I read through the statement. I made myself read carefully because I knew it was important. It all seemed to be there just the way it had happened. I signed it.
Barnes took the papers. “Thank you, Mr. Duluth. And now —I’m afraid there’s not much point in any of you staying any longer.”
Sylvia Rymer started to cry. Bill said: “Sylvie …”
I said: “But we can see him again?”
“Sure,” said the lawyer. “Sure, Mr. Duluth. Don’t worry. I’ll fix everything. I’ll see you in the morning.”
I looked at Bill. He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at Sylvia Rymer.
“ ’Bye, Sylvie.”
“Good-bye, Bill.”
“Good-bye, Peter.”
“Good-night Bill.”
My son turned to me then. The blond hair had fallen over his forehead. He didn’t flop it back.
He said: “Tell Jean I’m okay, Pop.”
“All right.”
“And tell her—tell her I’m sorry about Ronnie.”
“Yes.”
“And, Pop, I’m sorry I’ve loused things up for you. I didn’t mean to. It wasn’t what I wanted …”
I looked at him and at Barnes and at the quiet, dreadful little office that symbolized the abyss between our past and our future. I thought: I’ll never forget this moment. I’ll never be happy again.
Barnes said: “You’d better go.”
I put my hand on Sylvia Rymer’s shoulder. She twisted away from me. We all three went out of the office, through the squad room where a radio was playing a bebop record, and down into the street.
Sylvia Rymer hadn’t said a word to me since we left her apartment. She didn’t say a word now. She just hurried forlornly away down the street, the unbuttoned coat flapping round her.
Peter said: “Okay, Jake, let’s get home. Iris is waiting up for us.”
“No,” I said.
“Jake, don’t be a fool. You shouldn’t be alone.”
I turned to him. I knew he was trying to help. He was my brother and I loved him. But I’d had enough of people—even of Peter.
I said: “I want to go to my place. Please, Peter, I know what I’m doing.”
“If you really mean it…”
“I mean it.”
“Okay, Jake, then. We’ll call you in the morning.”
We stood looking at each other wintrily. I said: “He didn’t kill Ronnie.”
My brother glanced down at his sleeve. “McGuire’s a fine lawyer. He’ll do everything that’s possible.”
“But he didn’t do it. You haven’t heard him. If you’d heard him, if you’d seen the look on his face…”
I looked away from him. I was afraid if I looked at him I might see from his expression that he thought Bill was guilty too, and I didn’t have the strength to have to absorb that.
My mind was filled with huge, confused planning. “I’m going to get him out of this. I’m going to find out who did kill Ronnie. I’m going to …”
The sentence got out of control. I started to shake.
“When I think of him there in that place with that goddam policeman … and he’s innocent. He didn’t do it. He …”
Peter’s hand was on my arm. “You’d better come with me.”
I twisted out of his grip and started away down the pavement.
“Jake,” he called.
But I didn’t look back. I walked to the comer and crossed Third Avenue. The streets were as desolate as the interior of an old, abandoned house. It seemed impossible that a New York morning could be coming clanking awake in an hour or two. Everything was dead, wiped-out—like Felicia, like Ronnie.
And suddenly, almost in a vision, I saw that what I’d said to Peter had to be true. Ronnie was gone. There was nothing that could save him. But I had to save Bill. It wasn’t just for Bill’s sake; it was for my own. This was my ordeal, as much as Bill’s. My life, so far, had been a succession of abject failures. I had failed as a husband. I had failed as a father. I had, in a way, failed as Ronnie Sheldon’s friend. This time I couldn’t afford to fail. I was sure of Bill’s innocence. He was irresponsible, confused, hopelessly entangled in a love that was too strong for him. He had behaved with folly. But he was just another frail human being. There was none of the stuff of a murderer in him. He was as incapable of killing as I. He was innocent. I knew it.
That knowledge was in me like the seed of something new, something that would bring me health. If I betrayed that knowledge, through apathy, I should be lost.
I let myself into the apartment
. It was four o’clock. I decided to call Jean. Bill had said she was in the living-room when he had gone there with the gun. She had been lying in her claim that Ronnie had locked her upstairs immediately after I left. She might know something. That, at least, was something I could settle. I went to the phone in the bedroom. I sat down on the bed and put a hand out towards the receiver.
Before I reached it, I had fallen asleep.
14
I woke up. Sunlight was coming through the window. It was just after seven. Sleep had made no gap. I remembered everything instantly and thought: I’ve got to see Jean. I felt terrible. I stripped and took a shower and dressed in clean clothes. I thought of making coffee, but I didn’t dare. I felt that, if I lingered in the apartment even for that little extra time Lieutenant Barnes or the lawyer or some other of the new ominous elements of life would turn up to hinder me. I had to get to Jean while the fight was still in me, before the despair, which lurked on the threshold of my mind like a wolf, finally pounced.
I walked to 58th Street. It wasn’t far. The streets had a gentle morning serenity. Didn’t New York know the end of the world had come? A truck swung round a comer, tossing a bundle of newspapers on to the pavement. As I passed, I saw the name DULUTH in huge capitals on the headlines. In a few minutes, everyone would know, and we should never really be ourselves again. We should be stylized figures in a public show, the heartbroken father, the adulterous young wife, the victim, the murderer. Bill—the murderer. We were now in the public domain—like Felicia.
I had thought the street outside Ronnie’s house would be crawling with sightseers or at least with policemen. But no one was there. I rang the buzzer. Johnson opened the door, almost immediately. He was in his shirtsleeves. I’d never seen him that way before, without the armor of his uniform. He’d always been such a butlerish butler. Felicia used to say he’d been born in a frock-coat with a silver tray under his arm. Now, in the exposure of blue braces and a piece of undershirt showing behind the open shirt collar, he was just an old man, bewildered and bereft. Suddenly, through the sight of him, realization of my other almost as unendurable loss came flooding back. Apart from Angie, whom he worshipped, Johnson’s whole life had been Ronnie. The fact of Ronnie’s death was as plain from the old man’s face as if the body was still lying in front of me.
My Son, the Murderer Page 11
