Ceremony of the Innocent

by Taylor Caldwell

  Jochan, the affable and smiling, said, “So am I. Jumpy. By the way, I’m selling a lot of my stocks. I hope you are, too, Charlie.”

  “Yes. Little by little. I don’t like all the optimism in the country. I think it is being deliberately stimulated.”

  “Oh, come now. By whom?”

  Charles frowned. “I wish Jeremy were alive. He’d know. He told me a lot about—this—before he was killed. Long ago.”

  “Crashes always follow booms,” said Jochan. “That’s why I am steadily selling.”

  “If everyone felt that way we really would have a bust,” said Charles. “I just read that Professor Irving Fisher said, the other day, that the prices of stocks had reached ‘what looks like a permanently high plateau.’ That’s what is worrying me. When economists are elated it’s time for prudent investors to give the matter some thought. And when politicians are also elated it’s time to head for the cyclone cellar.”

  His friend the Senator had died the year before, but earlier than that he had also warned Charles. “Get out of the Market as fast as possible, Charlie, or as much as you can. I am getting hints, though the picture is murkier than ever and more hidden. I think Mussolini and Hitler should be taken more seriously than they are, and Stalin also. Something’s going on; I used to know considerable but I can’t find out anything now. Those men are not the crackpots the newspapers declare they are. And some somebodies are supporting and financing all of them.”

  “What have they got to do with the Stock Market, Senator?”

  “I don’t know, exactly. But I think they are a part of the whole picture. I know it sounds fantastic, but fantasies are usually based on some secret reality.”

  At three o’clock, this hot August day, Francis and Christian and Gabrielle arrived, accompanied, to Charles’ surprise, by three strangers. Francis, whose hands were tremulous, introduced them. Suddenly Charles recognized one of them: A Mr. William Wainwright, of one of New York’s most prestigious law firms. Charles knew him slightly, and his vague alarm increased. The other two gentlemen, according to Francis, were a Dr. Emil Lubish and a Dr. Enright. Now Charles was deeply disturbed. “Medical doctors?” he asked when shaking hands. He studied Dr. Lubish, the heavy man, and the younger and fleshy Dr. Enright.

  “Psychiatrists, sir,” Dr. Lubish said, and looked properly solemn.

  What the hell? thought Charles. He glanced at Gabrielle, in her blue linen dress and small blue cloche, and at Christian, and when he saw the sobriety of their faces he felt a hard tightening in himself, and a wariness.

  “We can make this brief, I believe, Mr. Godfrey,” said Mr. Wainwright. “It’s really a very simple matter. I represent Mr. Porter, Miss Porter, and Mr. Christian Porter. I have here a number of affidavits, by these physicians, and by Mr. Francis and Mr. Christian Porter, three domestics employed by Mrs. Francis Porter, and myself. I have consulted the others and have been present, in the background, when Mrs. Porter was being treated, psychiatrically, by Drs. Lubish and Enright—”

  “Treated?” exclaimed Charles, and now he was sweating very visibly. He sat on the edge of his chair. “For what?”

  Dr. Lubish said, “For a psychosis. Schizophrenia. Catatonic and paranoid types. She is definitely catatonic now.”

  Charles was so appalled and aghast that he could only sit in his chair, widely staring and dumfounded. Mr. Wainwright, whose reputation was not to be questioned even by Charles, ceremoniously laid a sheaf of papers before the other man. Jochan sat forward, silent, listening, his fair brows drawn together.

  “There is here, also, an affidavit, very important, from Mrs. Jochan Wilder, Mrs. Porter’s most devoted friend,” said Mr. Wainwright.

  “Ah,” said Jochan, very softly, but only Charles heard him.

  “Please read these affidavits,” said Mr. Wainwright, a gentleman of about fifty and conservatively dressed in dark-blue serge even on this hot day. He had a narrow and studious face with very bright blue and intelligent eyes. “It will explain everything. We lawyers know the value of time.”

  Still dumfounded, Charles began to read. His florid face became set and pallid. Silently, as he finished an affidavit, he passed it on to Jochan, who had begun to smile faintly, but not with amusement.

  The fans whirred in the thick hot silence. A dusky perfume wafted from Gabrielle. Christian smoked a cigarette. Francis sat tensely, his fingers laced together. The psychiatrists were relaxed and serene. Dr. Lubish smoked one of his large black cigars. The uproar of Fifth Avenue was unusually loud in the silence of the office, where only the crackle of turning papers could be heard. A fine golden dust danced in a stream of burning sunlight. Gabrielle kept dabbing her eyes with a scented handkerchief. Once she sobbed aloud and Jochan smiled sweetly at her, and she hated him.

  When both Charles and Jochan had completed their swift reading Charles sat solidly back in his chair and regarded each of his visitors with cold and terrible eyes. But his face showed nothing.

  “I see,” he said. “It’s Ellen’s money, isn’t it?” Now there was a violent hatred in his eyes. He fixed them on Francis. “So,” he said.

  Francis stammered, “I know you never liked me, Charles, and never understood my real solicitude for Ellen. I love her. You never believed it. I just want her restored to health.”

  Charles’ mouth opened on an obscene expletive, and then he closed it. Amazed now, he believed Francis, and he felt a thrust of pity for him combined with his rage. “So, in a way, you are a victim too, aren’t you, Frank?”

  Francis looked bewildered and glanced mutely at Gabrielle and Christian. Charles stared at them. “Vampires,” he said. But then he was never very original. “You’d institutionalize your poor mother and seize her money. Very simple.”

  He looked at the doctors. “You own a sanitarium, don’t you? Mrs. Porter is scheduled there—until her death.”

  “Are you impugning our reputations as psychiatrists?” asked Dr. Enright, speaking for the first time in his hoarse voice. “I suggest you look up our medical credentials, and I warn you against slander and libel.”

  “I have my own opinion,” said Charles, and his voice was ominous. “Yes, I see it all. I have the picture very complete in my mind. You are ready to take this case to court, have Mr. Porter assigned as Mrs. Porter’s legal guardian, and lock her away for the rest of her life.”

  “Only until she is cured,” said Francis in a piteous voice.

  Charles regarded him. “Frank, she will never be cured It was planned that way. Don’t you understand, you damned innocent?”

  “Slander!” exclaimed Dr. Lubish.

  “I don’t think so,” said Mr. Wainwright. “This is a natural reaction from an old friend of Mrs. Porter’s. Mr. Godfrey is also the administrator of the late Jeremy Porter’s will.”

  “Oh, I understand,” Charles interrupted. “I understand only too well.” Again he looked at the children of Ellen. “I knew all about you both from the time you were born. And your father had his doubts about children, too. They are now justified.”

  “I object,” said Mr. Wainwright, and his face flushed.

  Charles smiled, and it was a ferocious smile. He quoted, “‘Incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial.’ You haven’t sworn me, sir. I know you are a very reputable lawyer. I am only sorry that you’ve been—hoodwinked.”

  “Hoodwinked?”

  “Yes. Mrs. Porter is as sane as you are, sir.”

  “I’ve seen her, Mr. Godfrey. In my layman’s opinion, which isn’t admissible, I know, she is insane.”

  “I wonder if it couldn’t have been induced,” said Charles in a musing voice.

  “By whom?” demanded Dr. Lubish, waving aside a cloud of smoke.

  “Oh, you won’t get me there! I am just—wondering.”

  Mr. Wainwright was beginning to look uncomfortable. He had a Reputation. “Have you seen Mrs. Porter recently?”

  “No, I haven’t,” said Charles with reluctance. “She’s become a recluse.”


  “She never recovered from her husband’s murder,” said Dr. Lubish. “I have it there, in my own affidavit A sad case.”

  “I believe,” said Mr. Wainwright, “that Dr. Lubish has a recent photograph of Mrs. Porter, taken in his office.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Dr. Lubish, moving heavily in his chair and fumbling at a pocket. “Here it is.” He presented the cardboard to Charles. “I still have the negative,” he added.

  Charles studied the snapshot. He was shocked. He could not recognize Ellen in this old, haggard, and devastated woman, with the graying hair, the vacant face, the staring eyes, the dropped and open mouth, and the disorder of her whole person. But he knew the aspects of a drugged person, and his rage mounted.

  “What have you been giving her?” he demanded.

  “Mild sedatives, to allay her anxieties and apprehensions. By the way, do you know she is an alcoholic also?”

  “No, I didn’t. And I don’t believe it,” said Charles. There was something about that poor bloated face which sickened him.

  “I have but one concern—my unfortunate patient,” said Dr. Lubish. “She desperately needs institutionalization—if she is to survive at all. If this is not accomplished very soon, I fear for her very life. I am responsible—”

  “I am sure you are,” Charles interposed. Dr. Lubish’s face darkened.

  He looked at Gabrielle, and remembered what his daughter had told him. “You are quite a hussy, aren’t you?” he asked. “You can’t wait for your mother to die, can you?”

  “Slander,” said Christian. Charles turned to him. He almost lost control of himself.

  “Do you know you have perjured yourself?” he demanded.

  “Now,” said Mr. Wainwright. “That is a very bad accusation.”

  “So is perjury,” said Charles. He pushed back his chair.

  “Who has been paying her psychiatric bills?”

  There was a little silence. Then Dr. Lubish said, “Her children. They are so distressed. They wanted to keep the matter confidential. Laymen, alas, still think there is something shameful about mental illness. I understand.”

  “So,” said Charles, “that is why no bill has come to this office.” He wanted to kill, preferably Gabrielle and Christian. But Francis’ aspect, miserable and confused, and very open, assured Charles again that Francis was sincere. The only scoundrels were Ellen’s children—and her psychiatrists. He knew all about psychiatrists and their dissident opinions in court. He knew one honest one, whom he frequently consulted in legal matters.

  He said, in a very tight and threatening voice, “I am going to fight this, you know. Things are not going to be settled amiably. I demand that Mrs. Porter submit to an examination by a very reputable psychiatrist, whose word is respected in court. Dr. George Cosgrove.”

  For an instant dismay appeared on the faces of the two psychiatrists. Dr. Cosgrove had the most eminent credentials. Then Christian said, “I object.”

  Charles grinned at him. “You object? To another opinion? How do you think that would sound in court, laddie?”

  “Mr. Godfrey is quite right,” said Mr. Wainwright. “In fact, I suggested this myself, if you will remember, Mr. Porter.”

  Francis nodded. “I want that, too. I want Ellen to be well.”

  Charles almost liked him. “Then, it is settled. Before I agree to any court procedures we will consult Dr. Cosgrove. I will abide by his opinion.” He looked at the two doctors. “Do you object?”

  Dr. Lubish said, “Dr. Cosgrove has not treated Mrs. Porter for all these months. Over a year. I am sure our opinion, then, is better than his will be.”

  “We’ll see,” said Charles. He turned to Francis again. “Ellen must be examined by Dr. Cosgrove. If her children object—” He spread out his hands. “The case will be thrown out of court. I will take care of that.”

  He added, as if talking to himself, “I have just seen a play. Kind Lady. Perhaps Ellen is in the same situation. We’ll see.”

  He touched the papers on his desk. “As for these affidavits, somebody—somebodies—are going to smoke very hotly over these. I will take care of that, after Dr. Cosgrove has been consulted.” He smiled. “I believe judges don’t care much for perjurers and liars.”

  The exit of the company was almost a rout. Only Mr. Wainwright remained for a moment. He said to Charles, “See here, Charles. I am very upset about all this. Do you actually believe there is some chicanery about the case?”

  “Without doubt. And I intend to prove it in court—if it ever gets there. I want to spare poor Ellen that. Her personality is very fragile, and she is a loving and trusting woman. A court appearance, and the duplicity of her children—would probably kill her. She believes her children love her. It is all she has now. They anticipated that her personal appearance in court would not be expected, ‘due to her condition.’ I am beginning to believe that most children are a curse-that is, if money is involved. Jeremy was right. I give advice to parents whose children I suspect: Leave your money to schools and colleges and charities, and let your children know what you have done. You will be spared a lot of anguish and misery—and you may actually save your own life.”

  Mr. Wainwright thought, then he nodded and smiled sourly. “I’ve seen a lot of that myself. Do you suggest I withdraw from this case?”

  Charles shook hands with him. “After we hear from Dr. Cosgrove. He will convince you. And then you must tell Ellen’s children yourself why you have withdrawn.”

  After Mr. Wainwright had left, Charles turned to Jochan. “Well?” he said.

  Jochan shook his head, smiling his sweet and amused smile. “Dear Kitty,” he said. “Dear, dear Kitty. She always hated Ellen. I heard she was after Francis Porter. This may be her revenge. But we’ll manage that, won’t we?”

  “We will, indeed,” said Charles. “By the way, have you any hold on Kitty, the love?”

  “Well, I am paying her alimony, in addition to the divorce settlement. Of course, if she were convicted of perjury, or libel, or conspiracy—”

  “I think,” said Charles, “that you should have a talk with dear Kitty. After Dr. Cosgrove has examined Ellen. I don’t think Kitty would enjoy the Tombs.”

  “And neither would poor Ellen’s domestics. I think, Charlie, we should get very busy very soon.”

  That night Charles told Maude all about the interview, and she was tremendously agitated. “Now, calm yourself, sweetheart,” said Charles. “It is quite a usual case—where money is involved. What did you say?”

  “I think,” said Maude, “that I will consult your Father Reynolds. Ellen needs comforting, at the very least. You are not going to tell her about her children, are you?”

  Charles reflected. “No. It would kill her.”

  He called his daughter to him, and told her in confidence. “Do you know anything, Genny?”

  His daughter was disconcerted. Then she said, “Daddy, Christian has told me, several times, that his mother is crazy. I didn’t think anything of it, at first. But now I do. What a monster he is. And you thought I was in love with him! How could you have been so silly?”

  He kissed her. He said, “All parents are silly—about their children.” She did not see his dark expression. He added to himself: Where money is concerned no man is innocent. Especially children. He had left his daughter only a lifetime small income. He did not believe in inherited wealth.

  C H A P T E R 39

  FRANCIS SAID TO GABRIELLE and Christian, “I don’t think we need worry. Dr. Lubish will consult with Dr. Cosgrove—”

  “Can he be reached?” asked Christian, who was much less wise than his sister. Gabrielle kicked him smartly in the ankle.

  “Reached?” asked Francis.

  “He means,” said Gabrielle, “will Dr. Cosgrove be willing to examine our mother, and testify in court.”

  “Of course,” said Francis with fervor.

  They narrowed their eyes at him with cunning malice.

  “We have no alternative
,” said Francis. “Charles Godfrey has given us the ultimatum: He will fight the case in court and bring in formidable psychiatrists—and psychiatrists often differ before the bar—or we have your mother privately examined by Dr. Cosgrove and abide by his opinion. He is a very eminent man. I have heard him in court myself.”

  Gabrielle’s tongue daintily touched the side of her mouth.

  “So we have to convince dear Mama to be examined by still another doctor,” she said. She reflected. Drs. Lubish and Enright had assured her that “there would be no trouble at all” with Charles, or little, at the worst. Their reputations were manifestly good, and they were respected. Now this contretemps had arisen through that damned Charles Godfrey.

  “What if Dr. Cosgrove disagrees with the other doctors, Francis?”

  Francis was very earnest. “I doubt he will. Your poor mother is obviously mentally ill. Even a layman can see that; even her servants know it. Kitty Wilder, who has known her since she was almost a child, sees the terrible change in her.”

  “Dear Aunt Kitty,” said Christian with gloom. “I watched old Jochan when her name was mentioned. He almost chuckled aloud. I can see him as a witness against her, in spite of the fact that she divorced him. Everybody knows that our dear auntie frolics in bed with almost everyone.”

  Francis was shocked. “How can you say that of your mother’s best friend?” But he was shaken.

  “What if Cosgrove disagrees with our psychiatrists?” Gabrielle repeated. “It’s a possibility, you know. We must be prepared for it.”

  “Then we must get still another.”

  They regarded him cynically. They knew what they knew, which Francis did not, that infernal innocent. “Well, we can only try,” said Christian. He was very despondent, and full of anger and hatred and, above all, frustration. Even Gabrielle, the sprightly, was lugubrious.