The word spread through the neighborhood. Maids and butlers and gardeners and chauffeurs were seen in little clusters talking from house to house, passing on the latest information. Blood. Bat. Body bag. Her dress up. Her pants down. By late afternoon, the gruesome story was the talk of The Country Club. I had been sent there by Gerald to retrieve Constant’s tennis racket from his locker. He had two more rackets at home and another two at Milford, but Gerald insisted that he would need the racket in his locker for the spring term at Milford. I knew that I was actually being sent to listen to what was being said at the club.
Leverett Somerset heard the news on the ninth hole of the golf course from Piggy French.
“They found her on my property?” he asked, shocked.
“Between your place and the Bradleys’,” said Piggy.
“I don’t know that I remember Winifred Utley,” said Leverett. “Was she at Weegie’s dance last Christmas?”
“Yes. They’d just moved here. Ray and Luanne Utley’s daughter. Veblen Aircraft,” said Piggy. “Chip Wadsworth drove Billy and Winifred home from the dance. They went to the Wadsworths’ house for a Coke with a few other kids, and Winifred walked home from there.”
“Oh, for God’s sake. Ray Utley’s daughter. What a terrible thing to happen in a place like Scarborough Hill.” Leverett immediately hopped in his golf cart and returned to the club.
Corky, the bartender in the men’s locker room, kept the members informed of the latest reports. He had played high school basketball at Our Lady of Sorrows High in Bog Meadow with one of the detectives assigned to the case and was up on everything. “She was beaten so brutally in the attack the baseball bat broke in half, but they only could find half of the bat,” said Corky, excited by his sudden prominence. “The other half’s missing.”
Ursula, the waitress, who was serving drinks in the ladies’ locker room, told Louise Somerset, Eve Soby, and Felicia French that she had seen the Utley girl only the night before at the junior dance. “She was wearing the prettiest pink dress,” she said. “Corky says it was pulled up to her waist when they found her. Winifred just loved to dance. You should have seen her and Constant Bradley dance together. Everyone in the place stopped to watch them. Of course, he’s the best dancer ever, if you ask me.”
At the mention of Constant Bradley’s name, Louise Somerset’s face darkened. When Ursula moved on to take orders at another table, Louise leaned forward and whispered something to Felicia French and Eve Soby.
“You never told me that before, Louise,” said Felicia.
“We decided not to talk about it at the time,” said Louise Somerset.
“Was Weegie hurt?” asked Eve.
“Scared mostly. You promise not to talk about that?” asked Louise. “Leverett would kill me if he knew I told.”
“Oh, darling, of course not,” said Felicia.
“My lips are sealed,” said Eve.
Reporters and television news people filled the area, ringing the doorbells of the great houses in Scarborough Hill, wanting to interview anyone who knew Winifred Utley. Buzzy Thrall’s gardener made the mistake of telling one reporter that “everyone” was at The Country Club, playing golf, and within a quarter of an hour the club veranda was crawling with reporters and photographers, trying to get inside.
“Don’t let any members of the press into this club,” ordered Leverett Somerset, acting in his capacity as club president. “You know how they make places like this sound when they write about them in the papers. They’ll say we don’t have any black members. They’ll say we don’t have any Jews—which we do, by the way, the Minskoffs—when what they should be writing about is who killed Winifred Utley.”
“How about the police?” asked Corky.
“What about the police?” replied Leverett.
“Can we let them in?”
“Of course. We welcome the police.”
At the Bradley house, Bridey Gafferty answered the door over and over and said each time to the reporter or newscaster that none of the family was at home. Johnny Fuselli, who had returned from dumping the garbage bag, across the border in a nearby state, offered to stand guard at the gates at the end of the driveway and keep out the reporters, but Gerald declined the offer, saying it might be misinterpreted by members of the media. My clothes were moved from Constant’s room. I was back in the room that I had come to think of as my own, next to Constant’s, the one that Grace Bradley once referred to as Agnes’s room, although Agnes had not rested her head on those pillows for many years. Constant remained in his room throughout the day, visited from time to time by his father and brothers. Jerry, when he wasn’t in the dining room with his father, sat most of the time in the upstairs sewing room with a pair of field glasses watching the police at work on the far side of the tennis court. What would come to be known as the Bradley family machine began to move into action. Sandro arrived from Washington. Desmond appeared and told his father that the autopsy was being performed at St. Monica’s Hospital by Dr. Liu, the state’s chief medical examiner. Johnny Fuselli moved all the cars to the back of the house so that they could not be seen from the street. Then he changed into trunks and hopped into the pool and began swimming laps furiously. In no time, Jerry appeared at the side of the pool.
“Pa wants you out of the pool. It doesn’t look right, you swimming in the pool when they’re looking for a body out there,” said Jerry.
“They found the body,” replied Fuselli.
“Pa wants you out of the pool. Now.”
When Jerry told his father that Johnny Fuselli was out of the pool, Gerald said, “Get Fuselli out of the way completely. I don’t want him around the house or on the grounds if the cops should come to call.”
“Where did he dump that garbage bag, Pa?” asked Jerry.
“I don’t know. I don’t want to know. And you don’t want to know either,” said Gerald.
Twice I was asked to go into the dining room and talk with Gerald and his sons, the first time to go over detail by detail the conversation we had had after breakfast, and the second time to report on what was being said at the club. I listened to them as they directed my beliefs and future actions. The atmosphere was tense, at times disagreeable, in the room.
After being dismissed the second time, I was told by Jerry to wait in my room. I stood in the guestroom looking out the windows. An endless phalanx of police and photographers and cameramen and newspaper reporters roamed the area from estate to estate, like posses. Should an identical crime have occurred in a less affluent place, it would have attracted far less media attention. But the houses in Scarborough Hill were big, the grounds sprawling, and the residents rich. The rich residents remained indoors, by choice, peering out at the unwelcome intruders. The Wadsworths’ split rail fence collapsed under the weight of reporters’ behinds leaning against it. The Somersets’ prized boxwood hedges were uprooted by a television crew from Hartford. Grace Bradley’s daffodils were trampled, irretrievably lifeless now, and the gate to the Bradley tennis court was pulled off its hinges when a fallen branch from a tree was momentarily mistaken by a reporter for the missing part of the baseball bat. Everyone in every house called the intruders vultures. Only at the Utley house was proper respect shown.
I longed to talk to Constant, but I knew the family wanted me to stay away from him until all the stories were in sync. I wandered into the kitchen to look for a Coke in the refrigerator. The maids were having an early supper in their dining room off the kitchen before setting up the family dining room for the evening meal where Father Murphy was expected. I could hear their conversation.
“I thought I heard something, Bridey,” said Colleen.
“No, you didn’t,” replied Bridey.
“I did. They were standing outside, under my window. Two o’clock in the morning. I looked at my clock. The voices traveled right up. I could hear, clear as a bell.”
“Who?”
“Constant, and the friend. What’s his name? Harrison? The qui
et one. ‘Go inside. Turn off the lights,’ I heard Constant say. Something like that. And Corinne tells me—”
“Who’s Corinne?”
“Mrs. Somerset’s maid next door. She says Constant hit Weegie Somerset last summer.”
“No.”
“I swear.”
“Do you want my advice, Colleen?”
“Sure.”
“Do you have your green card yet?”
“No.”
“Then keep your damn mouth shut. Or the first thing you know, you’ll be on Aer Lingus, right back to Roscommon where you come from. The Bradleys are the finest family in this city. And don’t you ever forget it.”
“Yes, Bridey.”
“And I’d keep away from that Corinne, if I was you. Too many people here got too much to say about things they don’t know nothing about.”
When I was walking back up the stairs, the doorbell rang again. Bridey rushed in from the kitchen, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, and answered the door. The conversation at the front door was different from the usual conversations of that day, with Bridey telling reporters no one in the family was at home. I heard her say, “Oh, yes, sir. Come in, sir. Mr. B. told me you was coming.” In a moment, a tall, distinguished-looking man wearing a gray chalk-stripe suit entered the hall. He headed toward the dining room.
“I wouldn’t go in there if I were you,” I said from halfway up the stairs.
“Oh, why not?” he answered, looking up at me.
“It’s the family. They’re locked in together. There will be a lot of Bradley bad temper to deal with if you walk in when there is a family conference going on. I know. I have just had the experience.”
“Oh.”
The door of the dining room opened, and Jerry came out. For an instant, before he closed the door behind him, the faces of the family members could be seen, their attention focused on Sandro, the congressman, at the head of the table.
“Harrison, I need you,” said Jerry.
I knew when Jerry called me Harrison rather than Harry that I was going to be asked to do something that I did not want to do.
“We’ve been talking,” said Jerry. “The family, that is. We have something else for you to do. We thought that you would be the perfect one to do it for us in this terrible time.”
With a motion of my head, I indicated that there was another person present.
Jerry turned and looked at the stranger in the hallway.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
“I wanted to see Gerald,” said the man.
“And who are you?”
“Sims Lord.”
“Oh, Mr. Lord, excuse me for not recognizing you. I know we’ve never met, but I have certainly heard a great deal about you from my father. I am Jerry Bradley, the oldest son.”
The two men shook hands. “Actually, we have met,” said Sims Lord.
“Oh? When?” asked Jerry.
“You were slipping in and out of consciousness at the time. It was in St. Monica’s Hospital after your accident. Your father brought me in to handle the settlement for young Miss McBride.”
“Oh, right,” said Jerry, looking over at me. It was a story he did not want me to know. He turned back to Sims Lord. “I know that my father will want to see you immediately. May I take you into the library? He is having a meeting at present, but I know he will want me to disturb him to let him know that you are here. Wait here, Harrison. I need to talk to you. Come this way, Mr. Lord.”
When Jerry returned a moment later, he said to me, “Look, what we want you to do is go over to the Utley house and pay a call. People are apparently dropping in, leaving food or cakes. It’s better that you go, rather than a member of the family. Bridey has prepared a ham and a casserole. Take those with you. See what the attitude is. Listen to what is being discussed, that sort of thing.”
“They won’t know who I am. How should I identify myself?” I asked.
“A houseguest. Say you saw Winifred last night at the dance. Say how sorry you are. Say Mrs. Bradley is out of town for the day, bringing her daughters back to the convent. Say the family will be coming to call later. We’re counting on your charm, Harrison.” There was a slight tone of sarcasm in his voice. We looked at each other with dislike. “Do it the way you eeled your way into this family. Oh, I beg your pardon, charmed your way into this family is what I meant.”
* * *
The ham and casserole were taken from me at the door by a maid. She said that the Utley family were seeing no one, except the police.
“This is from the Bradleys,” I said.
“Oh, yes, the Bradleys,” repeated the maid. “I’d better write it down. I’m getting confused with all these names and who’s bringing what. Mrs. Utley wants me to keep track. Now let me see here. You’ve got the casserole. Tuna, isn’t it, and the ham?”
“Yes. From the Bradleys. They will be by to call later.”
“Yes.”
As she started to close the door, I could hear voices behind her in the hall. “Thank you, Captain. Thank you, Officer,” a woman’s voice said. “We’ll be in constant touch, Mrs. Utley,” said a man’s voice. “Call us at any time, night or day, if you have any questions or you think of anything.”
The door opened all the way, and two police officers came out.
“I was just delivering some food to the Utleys,” I said in explanation of my presence on the doorstep, although they had asked me for no explanation. They continued on their way toward the street, where their police car was parked.
“May I help you?” asked a woman. She was dressed in black. I had not remembered what Mrs. Utley looked like from our car ride with her, when she picked up Constant and me hitchhiking to Scarborough Hill the first time I went there, but I recognized her immediately. Although her face was mostly hidden by dark glasses, I could see that in other circumstances than these she would be pretty, but there was an indication of utmost despair in the slope of her shoulders.
“I’m a houseguest of the Bradleys, Mrs. Utley,” I said. “Mrs. Bradley has taken the girls back to the Sacred Heart Convent, and I was delivering some food from the family. They’ll be by to call when Mrs. Bradley returns.”
“Thank you,” she said. She removed her dark glasses. Her features were slack in her face.
“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Utley. I’m so terribly sorry,” I said.
“It’s out of order. It’s out of order,” she said. Her voice was barely above a whisper. “It shouldn’t be this way.”
“I know. I won’t keep you, Mrs. Utley.”
“My husband’s at the funeral home, picking out the casket. I couldn’t go. I couldn’t deal with it.”
“Yes.”
“I remember you,” she said, looking at me.
“You gave us a ride, Constant Bradley and me, when we were hitchhiking home from Milford.”
“Yes. I remember you that day in the car. I don’t think you said a word the whole ride, except thank you when we arrived,” she said. “What’s your name?”
“Harrison Burns. I’m so sorry, Mrs. Utley,” I said.
Our eyes met.
Returning from Mrs. Utley’s house, I held myself together as I walked past the reporters at the end of the Bradleys’ drive. Once inside the front door, however, I collapsed on the bench in the curve of the winding stairway and began to cry. The memory of Mrs. Utley’s tragic face would haunt me for years to come.
The doorway to the dining room opened, and Jerry came out. “Someone get him upstairs,” he said. “Get him out of the way. We don’t want the maids to see him.”
I rose and walked up the stairway as fast as I could and went into my room and closed the door. I lay on the bed and buried my face in a pillow, trying to blot out my memory of Mrs. Utley’s face. After a few minutes, there was a knock on the door.
“Please, please, let me alone,” I called out. “Please.”
The door opened. Des came in and closed the door behind him. He sat on th
e bed.
“This is a terrible thing that has happened, Harrison,” he said. He spoke in a gentle voice. “You mustn’t mind Jerry, you know. He means well. Sometimes he is abrasive in his manner, I know. He did not mean it when he said that you had eeled your way into this family. Believe me. We, his brothers, have all had to deal with his manner through the years. But his heart is in the right place. You see, he has missed out on his life. It is what makes him the way he is. Pa, though, cannot do without him, and no one can doubt that he loves his family.”
I was in no mood to listen to excuses for Jerry. I had never liked Jerry, from the first day I met him. Nor had he liked me. Des must have sensed that, for he proceeded in a different direction.
“Listen to me, Harrison,” he said. “It is important that you pull yourself together. At some point, the police will come here. As they will come to every house in the neighborhood. As they will come to talk with everyone who was at the club last night at the dance. It is simply procedure. There is nothing to worry about. But it would not do at all for you to be hysterical. It will present a wrong picture.
“Let me get you a glass of water.” He rose from the bed and went into the bathroom. When he returned, he was holding out a glass.
I took it from him. “Thanks,” I said.
“I have here some Valium, Harrison. It is a tranquilizer. Very mild. It is important that you be calm. I suggest that you take two now.”
“No. I don’t need a Valium. My mother took Valium,” I said.
“Let me explain to you about us, Harrison. Our family, I mean. We are the disappointments, you see. Kevin, who was killed in Vietnam. There were great hopes for him. Jerry, who got maimed in a car accident. He is the most like our father. There were great hopes for him. And then me, who married a maid and became a doctor. I flunked in my father’s eyes. Sandro has done all the right things. He will do well in Congress. He will go on to the Senate. He will hold the seat for years to come. But Sandro is not a leader. Sandro is a second-in-command. And very good at that. The best, probably. But a second. He lacks that thing that it takes to go all the way, like my father has. Constant has it. You know that better than anyone. You are his friend, his very best friend. Constant is the hope.
A Season in Purgatory Page 11
