“And of course this number two drug was not prescribed for Mrs. Gold?” Mrs. K asked.
“Of course. So as I’ve already told you, the medical examiner found evidence of both drugs one and two in Mrs. Gold’s system and concluded that, especially given her weakened condition at the time, that is what caused her death.”
“I see,” Mrs. K said. “But as you say, you already told us this, although not in such detail. So how does it relate to Daniel?”
“Yes, I’m getting to that. One of the characteristics of drug number two, I’m told, is that it does not stay active in the system very long. In other words, if one were to take drug number two, say, in the morning, and drug number one in the evening, although there might be some slight effect, it would not be very dangerous, because number two would already pretty much be out of one’s bloodstream.”
We again nodded.
“Now, drug number one, the drug that Mrs. Gold was supposed to take, was always given her with or just after her dinner—it is supposed to be taken with food, I believe—by her son, Daniel. We assume—and in fact, I don’t believe he denies—that Mr. Gold gave his mother drug number one that evening, as scheduled.”
I wished Inspector Corcoran would call him Daniel. It was hard to remember who this “Mr. Gold” was, since we almost never called him that.
“If you consider those facts for a moment,” Corcoran went on, “you’ll see where I’m heading. If Mr. Gold gave his mother drug number one, and if, in order for it to be fatal, drug number two had to be given her at or at least near the same time, he is the only one who was in a position to give her both that evening.”
He let this sink in for a minute. Even I could follow this reasoning. It let off the hook, so to speak, all those people who entered Vera’s room, for whatever reason, earlier in the day.
Corcoran began again. “Now, I know, Mrs. Kaplan, you are a big fan of Sherlock Holmes, and we’ve talked about the need to look for both a motive and an opportunity in these cases. Daniel Gold is the only person, or at least the only person of whom we are presently aware, who had the opportunity to administer both of the fatal drugs to his mother.”
“Yes, I see,” said Mrs. K. “I am not sure you are correct about that, but let us go on to talk about motive. I assume you will tell us that Daniel’s motive was that he was going to receive a large inheritance in his mother’s will?”
Inspector Corcoran looked surprised. “Well, yes, in part. But how did you…?”
“Daniel already told us this. And I do not see that it is very important. Of course he would receive an inheritance as her son, especially because he has been so good to her.” Mrs. K went on to mention the point we had already discussed, that you cannot suspect everyone who receives a legacy in a will of wanting to murder that person, especially if the person is already getting toward the end of her life.
“Yes, I agree,” Corcoran said after Mrs. K had finished. “And if that were the only motive Mr. Gold might have had, we would at least be less certain of our position. But there is more to consider.”
“Such as?”
“Well, first of all, there is the obvious fact that he is a pharmacist. He would not only be familiar with the interactions of drugs such as these, but he would have access to them, perhaps even to those no longer on the market.”
“Yes, I suppose so,” Mrs. K conceded, if somewhat reluctantly.
“As you know, he was very reluctant to allow an autopsy, and as I understand it he only agreed after you, uh, put pressure on him, correct?”
“Yes, but I assume you understand that he was objecting for religious reasons. That should not be held against him.”
“Perhaps. It’s just something to take into account. But there’s also his financial circumstances. I cannot go into detail, but suffice it to say he was, and is, in need of a considerable amount of money, and very soon.”
We both were silent as we took in this bad news. We certainly could not contradict it, as we had no knowledge of Daniel’s finances. Inspector Corcoran waited patiently.
Finally Mrs. K said, “So this is your case for murder? Is it not all what would be called circumstantial evidence? You are just drawing conclusions from these circumstances.”
“Well, no, but before I go on, I want to point out that sometimes circumstantial evidence is all we have to go on. There’s not always an eyewitness, or a smoking gun. And I believe it was Thoreau who said ‘Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk.’ ”
This seemed like a strange thing for Mr. Thoreau to say, and I did not quite understand what a fish would be doing in the milk, but Mrs. K seemed to, as she said, “Yes, I suppose so. Still, I think you are making a big mistake. I know Daniel very well, and it is simply impossible that he would do such a horrible thing, even for all the money in the world.” She was getting quite emotional.
Corcoran smiled and held his hand out as if to stop her becoming too upset.
“Mrs. Kaplan,” he said, “I can well understand your feelings, and I realize you are much closer to Mr. Gold and know him better than any of us here. And I also realize that, no matter how strong circumstantial evidence is, even if that trout is definitely in the milk, it is not as conclusive as an eyewitness might be. And even eyewitnesses can be mistaken, as has been shown many times. But there is also one other piece of evidence that I must mention that may change your thinking somewhat.”
“And that is?”
“Given all of these circumstances that I’ve already mentioned, we obtained a search warrant for Mr. Gold’s home.”
“A search warrant?” Mrs. K said, surprised. As was I. “For what could you be searching? The murder weapon?” Although this was a sarcastic question by Mrs. K, it turned out to have a serious answer.
“In a way, yes,” Corcoran said. “Believe it or not, it’s not uncommon for a criminal to fail to dispose of all evidence of his crime, either because he’s so confident he won’t be apprehended he doesn’t need to, or just because he’s careless. We were hoping to find some trace of sibutramine somewhere in his home. It was a long shot, you might say. But it paid off, because we actually found an unmarked bottle in his medicine cabinet that, when analyzed, contained a few sibutramine pills. That was when we decided to make the arrest.”
At hearing this, both Mrs. K and I were, you could say, totally tsemisht. Confused. Even flabbergasted. Had a “smoking gun” really been found in Daniel’s hand? For Mrs. K especially this was a difficult thing to accept. Could Daniel really have done such a terrible thing?
Inspector Corcoran could see how this last thing he said had affected Mrs. K and me, and he hurriedly tried to reassure us.
“I know this is very difficult for you both,” he said, “and I’m sure you will continue to believe in Mr. Gold’s innocence, as is quite natural. But I assure you we are quite comfortable with our judgment that Mr. Gold is indeed the guilty party here. In other words, while I am very grateful for the help you’ve given us—and me in particular—to this point, now that, with your help, we’ve discovered the perpetrator of this crime, I’m asking you to accept our judgment and to let the process of justice run its proper course.” Jenkins nodded enthusiastically at this.
Mrs. K did not look at all ready to accept Corcoran’s judgment. “You are asking us to, what do they say, to butt out?” she asked. “To assume you are right in arresting Daniel?”
“Well, yes, although I wouldn’t put it quite that way.”
“Put, shmut, it’s all the same.” She stood up and turned to me.
“Come, Ida. It seems the police think this case is now closed. We have no further business here.”
“Now, Mrs. Kaplan,” Corcoran said, also standing, “please don’t take what I said the wrong way. I really am grateful for your help, for both of your assistance. But there comes a point when no further assistance is…is required, that’s all.”
Mrs. K’s tone softened a little. She said, “I know, Inspect
or Corcoran. You have to do your job the way you think best, not how I think you should do it.
“And we have to do the same.”
We started to leave the office, but then Mrs. K seemed to think of something and turned back to the policemen.
“Isn’t it too bad that the cousin is in jail?” she said. “He would make such a better suspect than Daniel.”
Corcoran looked puzzled. “The cousin? Whose cousin are you referring to?”
“Vera’s cousin, Erik. The one who is in prison.”
He still looked puzzled. “Yes, in our general background investigation we discovered the cousin, but why do you consider him important? I admit we didn’t follow up with him, because he wouldn’t figure in the will, or in any other way we could see.”
“Well, no, he would not, because he is in prison.” And Mrs. K told Corcoran what Mrs. Bissela had told us about Vera’s telling on Erik.
“Hmm. As I said, we didn’t really check up on him, but now that you tell me this, I think we’d better. Just to tie up loose ends, you understand. You say he’s in Sing Sing prison? I’ll have our records department check on that, just to make sure.”
“Oh, and one other thing,” Mrs. K said. “Daniel told us that a large part of his mother’s estate was to go to a man named Fred Herring. No, Herrington, I think. Is he still in the will, or does everything go to Daniel?”
Corcoran hesitated before answering, but then said, “Again, I’m sure Mr. Gold will tell you anyway, and a deceased’s will is a public document, so yes, Fred Herrington is still in the will. And yes,” he added, holding up a hand, “we realize that gives him a motive, and we wanted to speak with him—still do—but so far we’ve been unable to locate him. We’ll keep trying, as will the estate. But a motive without an opportunity, as you know, is very weak evidence, and at this point I can’t see him having that opportunity. Or this Cousin Erik either, for that matter. So to be honest, we won’t be spending a whole lot of time and effort on either man. As I said, we’re quite comfortable with our present conclusions.” He smiled as he said this, and Mrs. K accepted the point. Nu, she should argue with the policeman?
Again we turned to leave, and as we did Corcoran said, “I should remind you again that our little discussion here was in strict confidence, and I’d appreciate if you didn’t discuss any of the details of this case with others.”
“But it is already well known at the Home that Vera Gold was…did not die of natural causes,” I said. “We cannot pretend otherwise.”
“No, I don’t mean that. I mean the details, like what the medications were, the timing, that sort of thing. Our investigation is continuing even though we believe we have the right person, and the less those details are spread around, the better, if you understand what I mean.”
We understood, and we promised to be careful what we said. He again thanked us for coming—and no doubt was thankful also we were leaving—and we left his office.
—
On our way to the elevator, Mrs. K sat down on an upholstered bench, and I sat next to her. She looked quite pale and just sat quietly without saying anything, and I did not disturb her. Finally she turned to me and said, with the conviction of a person who knows she is right and is prepared to fight to prove it, “Ida, we have a lot of work to do.”
“But the policemen made it clear they did not want any more help from us. It is just like in some of the cases of Sherlock Holmes, and of course you know that even better than I, where the policemen tell Mr. Holmes to, how did you put it, to butt out. To be honest, I always wondered why the policemen would not be glad to have someone of Mr. Holmes’s great ability on their side. Jealousy, I suppose.”
“Yes, I suppose,” Mrs. K said. “But whatever the reason, I do not intend to do any such thing, any more than Mr. Holmes would. Especially as we are responsible for Daniel being in such trouble in the first place.”
“You mean because we convinced Daniel to allow the autopsy?”
“Yes, because otherwise, despite Fannie’s suspicions, I doubt Vera’s death would ever have been called a murder.”
I thought about this for a moment. “But on the other hand,” I said, “it turns out it was a murder, and if there had been no autopsy, the murderer, whoever he is, would have gotten away with it.”
Mrs. K sighed. “Yes, I suppose so. But as they say, it is better ten guilty men go free than one innocent man be condemned.”
“And what if the policemen are right, and it really was Daniel?” I hated to say this, but nu, it was hardly impossible, whatever we might want to believe.
“Then we will have at least done everything possible to be sure there is no stone that was not turned over.
“Yes, we must work even harder to win Daniel’s release.”
I nodded in agreement, but secretly I was not so much worrying about our winning, but that we were playing for the right team.
Chapter 14
Inspector Corcoran had told us that Daniel was free on bail, and we learned that, until this terrible mess was straightened out, he was what I think they called “on leave” from his job. So we gave him a call and asked if we could stop by his house on our way back.
It was a different Daniel we saw this time. He looked, as we say in Yiddish, farmisht and farmatert, confused and tired, and who can blame him? Being charged with murder will certainly put a damper on anyone’s spirits.
“This is a terrible thing,” Mrs. K said when we had all sat down in Daniel’s living room, “that you have been arrested. Of course, the police have made a big mistake.”
Daniel put his head in his hands, then looked up at Mrs. K and said, “I don’t understand. Why would anyone think I would want to harm my mother, much less kill her?” His eyes were red like he had not slept.
Mrs. K put her hand on Daniel’s and said, “They do not know you. They only know a few facts that they think point in your direction.”
“Yes, my lawyer told me. And it’s true that I’m in her will, as I already told you, and that I owe some money. But that hardly…”
He stopped talking and again put his head in his hands. When he looked up, he said, “Rose, could you help me? I know you’ve dealt with the police before and know something about how they work. I mean, I have a lawyer, and I’m sure he knows all the legal stuff, but he probably thinks I’m guilty and is just going to try to get me a lighter sentence or something. He won’t…he won’t ‘investigate’ for me, if you know what I mean.”
Mrs. K again patted Daniel’s hand. “Of course, Ida and I will do what we can.”
Which of course meant we had agreed first to help Fannie find how her sister died, and now to help the person the police say killed her. Oy, was it getting complicated.
“We have already been to see Inspector Corcoran,” Mrs. K continued. “He is a fair-minded man, and I’m sure if we can show him that he has made a mistake, he will want to correct it.”
Daniel nodded his head a few times but said nothing. In fact, we all just sat there quietly for a minute, until Mrs. K said, “So, Daniel, do you have any idea at all who might have done this? As I’m sure you know, the police are convinced it had to be someone who gave your mother this bad medicine late in the afternoon or in the evening. That is why they are so sure it was you, of course. Can you think of anyone else who was in your mother’s room about that time?”
Daniel scratched his head. “No, I really can’t think of anyone, not while I was there. But of course I arrived a bit late because services didn’t end until sundown.”
“That’s right,” Mrs. K said. “Everything was on a different schedule on Yom Kippur, wasn’t it? Yes, we’ll have to consider that as well. Then is there anyone who you know to have threatened your mother or in any way indicated they would like to harm her?”
He shook his head. “I know she wasn’t very popular there. She could be a real bitch at times, especially to people she didn’t particularly like. But want to kill her? I can’t imagine it.”
“No, of course not,” Mrs. K said. “Well, you can be sure we will do what we can to learn the truth. Meanwhile you must try to keep up your spirits. And get some sleep. You look like you were up all night.”
Daniel rubbed his eyes. “I was, or practically all night. I probably got an hour or two of sleep. And of course it’s been devastating to my wife as well, as you can imagine.” Daniel’s wife I have not met, but there is no doubt it is an awful thing for one’s husband to be accused of murder.
We stood up to leave. Daniel stood too and said, “It’s such a nightmare. I mean, to be charged with murder, and of my mother…” He seemed on the verge of breaking down, but then he regained his composure and said with a try at a smile, “I really appreciate your offering to help. Please let me know if you learn anything useful. Anything at all.”
“We will,” Mrs. K said. She gave Daniel a hug, and I did also, and we left him looking perhaps a bissel more hopeful than when we arrived.
Now all we needed was to find out something to make us more hopeful as well.
Chapter 15
When we returned to the Home, my niece Sara was waiting for us in the lobby. A shayna maidel is Sara, such a pretty girl. She does not usually visit without calling first, so I immediately assumed she had done so and I had forgotten. At my age, it is the most likely thing.
“I’m sorry, Sara,” I said when I saw her. “Did you tell me you would be coming to visit? It is so hard to remember anything these days….”
“No, no, I didn’t call or anything, Auntie Ida. I wasn’t expecting to be here, but something came up.”
“Came up? Is something wrong?”
“No, nothing like that.” Just then she noticed Mrs. K standing behind me and said, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Kaplan…Rose…I didn’t mean to ignore you. How are you?”
“I’m fine, Sara. It’s good to see you. Please don’t mind me. Go right ahead with what you were telling Ida.”
A Pain in the Tuchis Page 11
