A Pain in the Tuchis

by Mark Reutlinger

  I tried hard to remember the same thing, but I could not, and I said so. I of course took Mrs. K’s word for it that Rena left the service early, but if so I did not see it.

  “What I do remember,” I said, “is that Rena was not one of the persons I hugged and wished l’shanah tova.”

  “Nor did I,” Mrs. K said. “Yes, I am certain she left early.”

  “And of course she is one of the people on our list of suspects,” I said. “And now that I think of it, she used to be a nurse, and would know about medicines and such, so…so what do we do now?”

  Mrs. K thought about that for a moment.

  “I think we should first talk with Rena,” she said. “Before we pass this along to Inspector Corcoran, I would like to hear what Rena has to say.”

  “Yes,” I agreed, “maybe we are making a mistake, barking at the wrong bush, as they say.”

  “Tree,” Mrs. K corrected. “Barking up the wrong tree. But yes, we shall have a talk with Rena.”

  If nothing else, I thought, considering how much Rena disliked Vera, it should be an interesting talk.

  Chapter 17

  That evening after dinner, I asked Mrs. K what she planned to do about Sol and Lily Lipman, not to mention Lily’s mother.

  “You did tell Sol you would try to think of something.”

  “Yes, I know. And I have been thinking about it, when I have not been thinking about Daniel, but the something has taken its time to appear. I do, however, have one little idea.”

  “Nu, what is that?”

  “Well, I was thinking that it would be helpful if we could convince Lily that it would be best if her mother left. Because like I told you the other day, if we somehow found a way to force her mother out, especially if it appeared to be Sol’s doing, it might leave Lily more upset with Sol than before, and blaming him for making her mother leave. So it would be better to have Lily make that decision.”

  “And how do we get Lily to do that? Why should she want her mother to leave, especially after Sol has been unable to convince her?”

  “Well, you know of course that Lily is the kind of woman who, as my mother used to say, would go to the store for five cents’ worth of vinegar, and bring her own bottle.”

  “Yes, that is Lily, all right. A nice woman, but tight like a fist with her money. Not at all like Sol that way.”

  “Exactly. And as the Yiddish saying goes, ‘A miser guards his money like a dog guards its bone.’ ”

  “Yes. But how does this help to make Lily evict her mother?”

  “It is just that I recalled when Rena had that trouble with Pupik over her cat, and I checked our agreement with the Home to see if it really forbids us to have pets, I noticed that the agreement also forbids us to have more people living in our apartment than we are paying for. Wait here and I will show you.”

  She got up and left the lounge, and a few minutes later she returned with some papers in her hand.

  “Here is the agreement. You know, Ida, a document like this is so important, containing all the rules and regulations, what we have agreed to and what the Home has agreed to, but I’ll bet not one in ten of us can remember most of what it says. We sign it and put it away somewhere safe and don’t look at it again until…well, until a time like this. And I only had a vague recollection of this….” She began to scan the papers in her hand, looking at them closely, the printing being quite small.

  “Now, somewhere here it says…” She looked carefully at each paragraph until she found what she was looking for. “Ah. Here it is. It says: ‘Paragraph Five: Exclusive Occupancy. This agreement is for the exclusive occupancy of the Resident(s) named in Paragraph One.’ ” Here she turns back to the first page and says, “In Paragraph One is written my name, ‘hereinafter referred to as the Resident(s).’ ” She flips pages forward again. “And then this Paragraph Five goes on: ‘No other person than the aforementioned Resident(s) is permitted to live in the Unit’—that is what they call an apartment—‘without the written permission of the Management’—that is Pupik, of course. ‘Should permission be granted and another person be added to the number of residents in said Unit, he or she shall be charged at the same monthly rate as the Resident, subject to the standard discount for multiple occupancy.’ ”

  “Yes, yes,” I said, “I understand. That is like Sol and Lily living together. They of course must pay for two people, not just one, but not quite twice as much. But what has that to do with Lily’s mother? She is not actually living there.”

  “I am getting to that. Let me find the other paragraph. Yes, here it is: ‘Paragraph Seven: Visitors. A visitor or visitors may stay in a Resident’s Unit without charge for a maximum of two weeks in any twelve-month period. Any visitor staying in a Resident’s Unit longer than said maximum shall be considered an additional Resident within the meaning of Paragraph Five and shall thereafter be charged accordingly.’ ”

  Oy, so many “hereinafter”s and “aforementioned”s, it made my head swim. I suppose they are paying the lawyers by the word, and longer words are more expensive than shorter ones. “So please, in English, what does it mean?” I asked.

  “It means that after Lily’s mother was staying in their apartment more than two weeks, and I believe Sol said she has been there now for almost a month, according to the residency agreement, she must start paying rent just like everyone else.”

  “Yes, I see now,” I said. “How clever of you to have remembered that. And of course treating Lily’s mother as a resident would be quite expensive.”

  “Yes, and expensive for Lily and Sol, as I am pretty sure Lily’s mother is not a wealthy woman.”

  “So do you plan to tell Lily this? Or better yet, tell Pupik?”

  “No, no. That would be almost like Vera telling him about Rena’s cat. It is not my business to…to snitch on Lily. And it is also not my business to tell Lily myself.”

  “Well,” I said, “you could tell Hannah.” That is Mrs. Bissela, you will recall, the yenta. “It would take less than a day for it to make its way around the Home and reach Lily’s ear.”

  Mrs. K laughed. “No, Ida, that would be worse than just telling Lily or Pupik directly. It would be like announcing it over the loudspeaker they use to tell us things like when the bus is leaving. No, it is not our job to reveal the Lipmans’ little secret to the whole world.”

  “But if you don’t tell anyone, what good is it that Lily’s mother staying would be so expensive? How does that help Sol?”

  “I didn’t say I would not tell anyone, just I would not tell Lily or Pupik or the entire Home. I shall simply tell Sol. He is the one who asked for our help. And after all, it is his apartment and his money too that is at risk, and his mother-in-law that is the problem. It is almost my duty to alert him to this. I will merely remind him of what the agreement says. What he chooses to do with the information is up to him.”

  I was pretty sure I knew what Sol would do with this information.

  I knew for certain what I would do with it in his place.

  “Yes, I see what you are saying. But we also did not want to put Sol in the position of being responsible for Lily’s mother leaving. It should be Lily’s doing, you said.”

  “Oh, I’m sure it will be. I will suggest to Sol he tell Lily what he has discovered, but leave it up to her to decide whether they should pay for another tenant or send her mother home. I am quite certain what Lily will choose to do, and she will not need any urging from Sol to do it. On this I would be willing to bet.”

  When Mrs. K is as certain as she sounded on this, taking that bet would be most unwise.

  Chapter 18

  It was not difficult arranging a talk with Rena Shapiro. After all, most of us at the Home do not have very busy schedules, and finding us usually means merely knocking on our door or, if we are not there, checking a few places like the lounge, the library, and the recreation room. And the restroom, of course.

  It was in the library that we found Rena the next
morning after breakfast. She was reading some very large book that looked like the encyclopedia, resting it on the long table that runs down the middle of the room. She looked up when we entered and nodded slightly, then went back to her reading.

  Mrs. K sat down quietly next to her. I pulled out a chair and sat down across the table from them. As Rena was turning a page, Mrs. K said, “Rena, dear, when you are finished with your reading, could Ida and I have a brief talk with you?”

  Rena looked up with a slightly puzzled expression and said, “A talk? That sounds a bit formal, like you don’t just want to shmooze, but you have something on your minds. Is that right?”

  “Well, actually we do. Have something on our mind, that is. And it is quite important, so when you are finished…”

  Rena put the page she had been turning down, took off her reading glasses, and looked at Mrs. K.

  “Let us talk now. If it is important, the book can wait.” She looked expectantly from Mrs. K to me and back.

  Mrs. K looked around the small room. “Well, I suppose this is as good a place to talk as any. We are alone, and the room is soundproof.”

  Now Rena looked positively alarmed. “Soundproof? Why should soundproof matter? What do you want to talk about that needs soundproof?” Her voice was rising.

  Mrs. K gestured with her hand that Rena should be quiet. “Sha, Rena. It is just that what we have to say is…is somewhat confidential.”

  “So tell me already. Is it bad news?”

  “No, nothing like that. Let me explain. You of course remember that poor Vera Gold passed on Yom Kippur, or just after.”

  “Of course.” Rena’s tone now sounded more wary than alarmed. “We all know that. Very sad.” She didn’t sound like she meant that at all.

  “Yes, well you probably also know that the police suspect that Vera was…was…that she met with foul play. That someone, shall we say, hurried her along to passing.”

  “You mean that she was murdered? I have heard the rumor, but I ignored it. Sometimes the rumors that get started around here…”

  “Yes, that is so. But it happens that this rumor is true; at least the police believe it is.”

  “All right, so Vera Gold was murdered. A terrible thing. Nu, what has that to do with me?”

  Now, Mrs. K had decided beforehand that the best approach to Rena would be to assume it was she who entered Vera’s room in the afternoon. If we were right, Vera just might admit it. And if we were wrong about that, it would be a bit embarrassing, but no real harm done. So Mrs. K came right out and said, “It is just that you were seen going into Vera’s room in the late afternoon.”

  You could see plainly on Rena’s face the effect this statement had on her. Although she tried not to show it, it was as if someone had given her a potch on the tuchis—a slap on the behind—when she did not expect it.

  She said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was in services all afternoon.”

  “Not all afternoon,” Mrs. K said. “We saw you leave during Neilah, and you did not come back.”

  Rena was silent for a while, as if deciding what to say or do next. Apparently she decided that it was better to tell the truth than to try to make up a story then and there. It is difficult enough to tell a good lie, much less a lie that one has not rehearsed. She put one hand on her forehead and shook her head slowly from side to side. Finally she said, looking at both of us, “Yes, yes, I did go into Vera’s room. I am ashamed to admit that ever since she told Pupik about my cat…well, I have let my anger build up. And I saw what other hateful things she had done to others, like that poor man who was waiting on her.”

  “Yes, we all seem to have suffered in some way from Vera,” Mrs. K said.

  “Anyway,” Rena went on, “I was not sorry to hear of Vera’s illness and that she might soon pass on, and I was not happy to hear that she seemed to be getting much better. Again, I am ashamed of having these feelings, they are sinful, but they would not go away.”

  “We all have feelings from time to time that we would not like to admit,” Mrs. K said. “It is what we do about them that matters.” I nodded in agreement.

  “That is just it. That afternoon, I left the service to get a drink of water. As I was passing Vera’s room, I had this crazy idea that I might somehow…might somehow…as you said, hurry her along.”

  “Do you mean…?”

  Rena just nodded. I could see tears were forming in her eyes, and she took a pretty silk handkerchief from her pocket and dabbed at them.

  “Hurry her along…how?” Mrs. K asked.

  “Oh, I didn’t have any particular plan in mind. It was just a spur-of-the-moment thing. Everyone was in shul and no one was around to see me—or so I thought—and so I opened the door and looked in. Vera was asleep, so I went in quietly and shut the door. I went over to her bed—I could hear her breathing—and just stared down at her for maybe a minute or two. I could so easily have smothered her with a pillow or…or anything….”

  “But you didn’t,” Mrs. K said.

  Rena looked up. “No, I didn’t. I would like to think it was because whatever I might think about doing, I was too good a person to actually do such a terrible thing. And maybe I am. But I think in this case it was also a matter of…of timing.”

  “Timing?” I said. “I do not understand.”

  “I mean when this all happened. Suddenly I realized that it was not just any day, but Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. I had been spending most of the day asking God to forgive me for the sins of the past year, and promising to do better in the next year. Even assuming I was capable of such a terrible thing in the first place—kholile, God forbid—how could I do it on Yom Kippur?”

  “So what did you do?” Mrs. K asked in a gentle voice.

  “Do? I quietly left Vera’s room and I went to my own room and lay down on the bed. All I could think of was how close I had come to doing a horrible thing. But at the same time I was very glad that I had not done it. God stopped me. I know He did.”

  Silence. What could one say?

  Then Rena looked up, tears now rolling down her wrinkled cheeks, and said like she was pleading, “Rose, I didn’t kill her, did I? I mean, you say it’s true she did not die of…of natural causes, that someone killed her. Could I have done it and then not remember? Have I somehow erased it from my memory because it was such a terrible sin?” No doubt this fear had been in the back of her mind ever since Vera died.

  Mrs. K took Rena’s hand. “No, Rena dear,” she said, “that at least is absolutely certain. What killed Vera, according to the police doctors, was…well, let’s say it was something like poison. It was nothing you did or could have done. Whether it was God who stopped you or just your own good conscience, you definitely were not responsible for Vera’s death.”

  Rena said nothing but gave Mrs. K a hug. She again took out her hanky and wiped her eyes. She even smiled now a little. Finally she spoke:

  “Thank you, Rose. And you too, Ida. I am glad I told someone about this; it has been such an awful thing to keep hidden in my mind. And I am even happier you have assured me that I did not do what…what I almost did.”

  And that was all she seemed to be capable of saying.

  —

  “Ida, I think Rena was telling us the truth,” Mrs. K said as we closed the library door behind us. “I think it happened just the way she said: she had the evil intent and even got close to acting on it, but she couldn’t carry it out. She is just not that kind of person. What do you think?”

  “I agree,” I said, “and I think she has suffered a lot just from having had that intention. So do we tell Inspector Corcoran what we have learned, so he does not pursue the mysterious woman with the glass of water any further?”

  “Hmm, that is a good question. On the one hand, it would save Corcoran a lot of tsuris if he could cross Rena—or the person he doesn’t know is Rena—off his list. But on the other hand, if we tell him it is Rena he is looking for, he may not take our word f
or it that she is innocent, and she will be dragged into the investigation.”

  “But won’t he eventually figure out it is her? After all, we did.”

  “You’re right, he will. But if we can solve this case before he does, there will be no problem.”

  “I suppose so. But it seems to me if we now cross Rena off our list, that leaves only Daniel as someone who could have given Vera that bad medicine, does it not?”

  Mrs. K didn’t answer right away. Finally she said, “No, there is also the zaftig man seen near Vera’s room who was mentioned to us by Inspector Corcoran. Besides, even if it seemed to leave only Daniel, it only means there is someone else who could have done it, and who actually did do it, who we just have not discovered yet. And that is what we must do very soon.”

  Chapter 19

  In the afternoon Mrs. K and I are sitting on a sofa in the lounge, sipping our tea and reflecting on the events of that day, when I see Moses Klein heading in our direction. You remember Moishe Klein—“Motorcycle Moishe”—who I told you was suggesting I should go riding with him on his motorcycle and maybe we should get to know each other better.

  I nudged Mrs. K and nodded in Moishe’s direction. She patted my arm and said, “Don’t worry. He is probably just looking for a place to sit. I still think he has forgotten all about inviting you to go riding with him.”

  That is what I thought too, since he had not mentioned it the last time we met, so I relaxed and went back to sipping my tea.

  But Moishe was not just looking for any place to sit; he was looking to sit next to me! And that is what he did.

  “So, Ida,” he said immediately upon sitting down, “are you coming riding with me?” Apparently Moishe is one of those people who can forget something completely, and then remember it the next day.

  “No, Moishe, I don’t think so,” I replied. “It is not something I would enjoy doing.” I refrained from adding “with you,” not wanting to hurt his feelings, but perhaps that was a mistake, because he was not discouraged at all by my refusal.