The Investigations of Avram Davidson

by Avram Davidson

  He dropped to his knees and clutched the Father Superior’s hand. “Do not turn me over to the police! It was an accident!”

  “An accident,” murmured the old man. The monks muttered and crossed themselves. “Moses appointed cities of refuge for the manslayer to flee to,” the Archimandrite said. “Sanctuaries for those who had killed accidentally. You say you are sorry … I shall choose to believe you.” The Archimandrite disengaged his hands.

  “Oh, thank you, thank you,” Carpius said.

  The monks moved backward—moved away from him, away from the blood.

  “We shall not call the police,” the old man said. “But you must pray—pray for Divine forgiveness. You must repent. Pray without ceasing.”

  “I shall.” Carpius rose.

  It had been easy, after all. He turned to pick up the ikon, hiding it by standing between it and the monks. The copy lay on the floor beside the original. He slipped the real one in his pocket. A grating noise interrupted him. He turned to see the door swing shut. A key clattered in the lock. He looked through a small opening in the door. It was a thick door, bound with iron. He pressed his face to the opening, not understanding.

  “Pray without ceasing,” the Archimandrite repeated. “We shall bring you food and water twice a day, and oil for the lamp. We shall feed you as the ravens fed Elijah. As long as you live we shall feed you, and you must pray for forgiveness.”

  They moved away.

  Carpius stared at the walls around him. The roof was made of stone—he had noticed that; in order to support such a heavy roof, the walls must be very strong and thick.…

  THE COBBLESTONES OF SARATOGA STREET

  ALTHOUGH AVRAM DAVIDSON was born in the nearby suburb of Yonkers, and in his seventy years lived in many corners of the globe, from Belize to Beijing and from Jerusalem to Amecameca, I suspect that “Little Old New York” was really his favorite city. He studied its history and geography, as many of his stories show.

  “The Cobblestones of Saratoga Street” (Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, April 1964) takes place in a thinly disguised version of the tiny, tidy, very-very, upper-upper neighborhood surrounding Gramercy Park, located at the lower end of Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. If you’ve never been there and you get a chance, you should make it your business to amble through this quiet enclave where the New York of Stanford White’s era (or earlier) survives amidst the noise, dirt, and bustle of The City That Never Sleeps.

  As you stroll beside the park (you won’t be able to stroll in it unless you have a key!) you may wonder how this odd revenant persists in the modern world. It is not by chance, believe me, but by means of the determined efforts of the neighborhood’s well-to-do and tradition-loving residents.

  Avram Davidson was a man fascinated with the past; at times he affected deliberately anachronistic mannerisms and words. I think that his heart is truly in this warm and affectionate story.

  —RAL

  Cobblestones to Go said the headline. Miss Louisa lifted her eyebrows, lifted her quizzing-glass (probably the last one in actual use anywhere in the world), read the article, passed it to her sister. Miss Augusta read it without eyeglass or change of countenance, and handed it back.

  “They shan’t,” she said.

  They glanced at a faded photograph in a silver frame on the mantelpiece, then at each other. Miss Louisa placed the newspaper next to the pewter chocolate-pot, tinkled a tiny bell. After a moment a white-haired colored man entered the room.

  “Carruthers,” said Miss Augusta, “you may clear away breakfast.”

  * * *

  “WELL, I THINK it is outrageous,” Betty Linkhorn snapped.

  “My dear,” her grandfather said mildly, “you can’t stop progress.” He sipped his tea.

  “Progress my eye! This is the only decently paved street in the whole town—you know that, don’t you, Papa? Just because it’s cobblestone and not concrete—or macadam—or—”

  “My dear,” said Edward Linkhorn, “I remember when several of the streets were still paved with wood. I remember it quite particularly because, in defiance of my father’s orders, I went barefoot one fine summer’s day and got a splinter in my heel. My mother took it out with a needle and my father thrashed me … Besides, don’t you find the cobblestones difficult to manage in high-heeled shoes?”

  Betty smiled—not sweetly. “I don’t find them difficult at all. Mrs. Harris does—but, then, if she’d been thrashed for going barefoot … Come on, Papa,” she said, while her grandfather maintained a diplomatic silence, “admit it—if Mrs. Harris hadn’t sprained her ankle, if her husband wasn’t a paving contractor, if his partner wasn’t C. B. Smith, the state chairman of the party that’s had the city, county, and state sewn up for twenty years—”

  Mr. Linkhorn spread honey on a small piece of toast. “‘If wishes were horses, beggars would ride—’”

  “Well, what’s wrong with that?”

  “‘—and all mankind be consumed with pride.’ My dear, I will see what I can do.”

  * * *

  HIS HONOR WAS interviewing the press. “Awright, what’s next? New terlets in the jail, right? Awright, if them bums and smokies wouldn’t of committed no crimes they wouldn’t be in no jail, right? Awright, what’s next? Cobblestones? Cobblestones? Damn it, again this business wit the cobblestones! You’d think they were diamonds or sumpthin’. Awright. Well, om, look, except for Saratoga Street, the last cobblestones inna city were tore up when I was a boy, for Pete’s sake. Allathem people there, they’re living inna past, yaknowwhatimean? Allathem gas lamps in frunna the houses, huh? Hitching posts and carriage blocks, for Pete sakes! Whadda they think, we’re living inna horse-and-buggy age? Awright, they got that park with a fence around it, private property, okay. But the streets belong to the City, see? Somebody breaks a leg on wunna them cobblestones, they can sue the City, right? So—cobblestones? Up they come, anats all there is to it. Awright, what’s next?”

  His comments appeared in the newspaper (the publisher of which knew what side his Legal Advertisements were buttered on) in highly polished form. I yield to no one in my respect for tradition and history, but the cobblestoned paving of Saratoga Street is simply too dangerous to be endured. The cobblestones will be replaced by a smooth, efficient surface more in keeping with the needs of the times.

  As the Mayor put it, “What’s next?”

  Next was a series of protests by the local, county, and state historical societies, all of which protests were buried in two- or three-line items in the back of the newspaper. But (as the publisher put it, “After all, C.B., business is business. And, besides, it won’t make any difference in the long run, anyway.”) the Saratoga Street Association reprinted them in a full-page advertisement headed PROTECT OUR HERITAGE, and public interest began to pick up.

  It was stimulated by the interest shown in the metropolitan papers, all of which circulated locally. BLUEBLOODS MAN THE BARRICADES, said one. 20TH CENTURY CATCHES UP WITH SARATOGA STREET, said another. BELOVED COBBLESTONES DOOMED, HISTORICAL SARATOGA STREET PREPARES TO SAY FAREWELL, lamented a third. And so it went.

  And it also went like this: To the Editor, Sir, I wish to point out an error in the letter which claimed that the cobblestones were laid down in 1836. True, the houses in Saratoga Street were mostly built in that year, but like many local streets it was not paved at all until late in the ’90s. So the cobblestones are not so old as some people think.

  And it went like this, too:

  Mr. Edward Linkhorn: Would you gentlemen care for anything else to drink?

  Reporter: Very good whiskey.

  Photographer: Very good.

  Linkhorn: We are very gratified that a national picture magazine is giving us so much attention.

  Reporter: Well, you know—human interest story. Not so much soda, Sam.

  Photographer: Say, Mr. Linkhorn, can I ask you a question?

  Linkhorn: Certainly.

  Photographer: Well, I notice that on all the house
s—in all the windows, I mean—they got these signs, Save Saratoga Street Cobblestones. All but one house. How come? They against the stones?

  Reporter: Say, that’s right, Mr. Linkhorn. How come—?

  Linkhorn: Well, gentlemen, that house, number 25, belongs to the Misses de Gray.

  Reporter: de Gray? de Gray?

  Linkhorn: Their father was General de Gray of Civil War fame. His statue is in de Gray Square. We also have a de Gray Avenue.

  Reporter: His daughters are still living? What are they like?

  Linkhorn: I have never had the privilege of meeting them.

  * * *

  MISS ADELAIDE TALLMAN’S family was every bit as good as any of those who lived on Saratoga Street; the Tallmans had simply never cared to live on Saratoga Street, that was all. The Tallman estate had been one of the sights of the city, but nothing remained of it now except the name Jabez Tallman on real estate maps used in searching land titles, and the old mansion itself—much modified now, and converted into a funeral parlor. Miss Tallman herself lived in a nursing home. Excitement was rare in her life, and she had no intention of passing up any bit of attention which came her way.

  “I knew the de Gray girls well,” she told the lady from the news syndicate. This was a big fib; she had never laid eyes on them in her life—but who was to know? She had heard enough about them to talk as if she had, and if the de Gray girls didn’t like it, let them come and tell her so. Snobby people, the de Grays, always were. What if her father, Mr. Tallman, had hired a substitute during the Rebellion? Hmph.

  “Oh, they were the most beautiful things! Louisa was the older, she was blonde. Augusta’s hair was brown. They always had plenty of beaux—not that I didn’t have my share of them, too, mind you,” she added, looking sharply at the newspaper lady, as if daring her to deny it. “But nobody was ever good enough for them. There was one young man, his name was Horace White, and—oh, he was the handsomest thing! I danced with him myself,” she said complacently, “at the Victory Ball after the Spanish War. He had gone away to be an officer in the Navy, and he was just the most handsome thing in his uniform that you ever saw. But he wasn’t good enough for them, either. He went away after that—went out west to Chicago or some such place—and no one ever heard from him again. Jimmy Taylor courted Augusta, and William Snow and Rupert Roberts—no, Rupert was sweet on Louisa, yes, but—”

  The newspaper lady asked when Miss Tallman had last seen the de Gray sisters.

  Oh, said Miss Tallman vaguely, many years ago. Many years ago … (Had she really danced with anybody at the Victory Ball? Was she still wearing her hair down then? Perhaps she was thinking of the Junior Cotillion. Oh, well, who was to know?)

  “About 1905,” she said firmly, crossing her fingers under her blanket. “But, you see, nobody was good enough for them. And so, by and by, they stopped seeing anybody. And that’s the way it was.”

  * * *

  THAT WAS NOT quite the way it was. They saw Carruthers.

  Carruthers left the house on Sunday mornings only—to attend at the A.M.E. Zion Church. Sunday evenings he played the harmonium while Miss Louisa and Miss Augusta sang hymns. All food was delivered and Carruthers received it either at the basement door or the rear door. The Saratoga Street Association took care of the maintenance of the outside of the house, of course; all Carruthers had to do there was sweep the walk and polish the brass.

  It must not be thought that because his employers were recluses, Carruthers was one, too; or because they did not choose to communicate with the outside world, he did not choose to do so, either. If, while engaged in his chores, he saw people he knew, he would greet them. He was, in fact, the first person to greet Mrs. Henry Harris when she moved into Saratoga Street.

  “Why, hel-lo, Henrietta,” he said. “What in the world are you doing here?”

  Mrs. Harris did not seem to appreciate this attention.

  Carruthers read the papers, too.

  “What do they want to bother them old stones for?” he asked himself. “They been here long as I can remember.”

  The question continued to pose itself. One morning he went so far as to tap the cobblestones story in the newspaper with his finger and raise his eyebrows inquiringly.

  Miss Augusta answered him. “They won’t,” she said.

  Miss Louisa frowned. “Is all this conversation necessary?”

  Carruthers went back downstairs. “That sure relieves my mind,” he said to himself.

  * * *

  “THE NEWSPAPERS SEEM to be paying more attention to the de Gray sisters than to the cobblestones,” Betty Linkhorn said.

  “Well,” her grandfather observed, “people are more important than cobblestones. Still,” he went on, “House of Mystery seems to be pitching it a little stronger than is necessary. They just want to be left alone, that’s all. And I rather incline to doubt that General M. M. de Gray won the Civil War all by himself, as these articles imply.”

  Betty, reading further, said Hmmm. “Papa, except for that poor old Miss Tallman, there doesn’t seem to be anyone alive—outside of their butler—who has ever seen them, even.” She giggled. “Do you suppose that maybe they could be dead? For years and years? And old Carruthers has them covered with wax and just dusts them every day with a feather mop?”

  Mr. Linkhorn said he doubted it.

  * * *

  COMPARISONS WITH THE Collier brothers were inevitable, and newsreel and television cameras were standing by in readiness for—well, no one knew just what. And the time for the repaving of Saratoga Street grew steadily nearer. An injunction was obtained; it expired. And then there seemed nothing more that could be done.

  “It is claimed that removal would greatly upset and disturb the residents of Saratoga Street, many of whom are said to be elderly,” observed the judge, denying an order of further stay; “but it is significant that the two oldest inhabitants, the daughters of General M. M. de Gray, the Hero of Chickasaw Bend, have expressed no objection whatsoever.”

  Betty wept. “Well, why haven’t they?” she demanded. “Don’t they realize that this is the beginning of the end for Saratoga Street? First the cobblestones, then the flagstone sidewalks, then the hitching posts and carriage blocks—then they’ll tear up the common for a parking lot and knock down the three houses at the end to make it a through street. Can’t you ask them—?”

  Her grandfather spread his hands. “They never had a telephone,” he said. “And to the best of my knowledge—although I’ve written—they haven’t answered a letter for more than forty years. No, my dear, I’m afraid it’s hopeless.”

  Said His Honor: “Nope, no change in plans. T’morra morning at eight A.M. sharp, the cobblestones go. Awright, what’s next?”

  At eight that morning a light snow was falling. At eight that morning a crowd had gathered. Saratoga Street was only one block long. At its closed end it was only the width of three houses set in their little gardens; then it widened so as to embrace the small park—“common”—then narrowed again.

  The newsreel and television cameras were at work, and several announcers described, into their microphones, the arrival of the Department of Public Works trucks at the corner of Saratoga and Trenton Streets, loaded with workmen and air hammers and pickaxes, at exactly eight o’clock.

  At exactly one minute after eight the front door of number 25 Saratoga Street, at the northwest corner, swung open. The interviewers and cameramen were, for a moment, intent on the rather embarrassed crew foreman, and did not at first observe the opening of the door. Then someone shouted, “Look!” And then everyone noticed.

  First came Carruthers, very erect, carrying a number of items which were at first not identifiable. The crowd parted for him as if he had been Moses, and the crowd, the Red Sea. First he unrolled an old, but still noticeably red, carpet. Next he unfolded and set up two campstools. Then he waited.

  Out the door came Miss Louisa de Gray, followed by Miss Augusta. They moved into the now absolutely silent
crowd without a word; and without a word they seated themselves on the campstools—Miss Louisa facing south, Miss Augusta facing north.

  Carruthers proceeded to unfurl two banners and stood—at parade rest, so to speak—with one in each hand. The snowy wind blew out their folds, revealing them to be a United States flag with 36 stars and the banner of the Army of the Tennessee.

  And while at least fifty million people watched raptly at their television sets, Miss Louisa drew her father’s saber from its scabbard and placed it across her knees; and Miss Augusta, taking up her father’s musket, proceeded to load it with powder and ball and drove the charge down with a ramrod.

  After a while the workmen debated what they ought to do. Failing to have specific instructions suitable to the new situation, they built a fire in an ashcan, and stood around it, warming their hands.

  * * *

  THE FIRST TELEGRAM came from the Ladies of the G.A.R.; the second, from the United Daughters of the Confederacy. Both, curiously enough, without mutual consultation, threatened a protest march on the City Hall. In short and rapid succession followed indignant messages from the Senior Citizens’ Congress, the Sons of Union Veterans, the American Legion, the B’nai Brith, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, the D.A.R., the N.A.A.C.P., the Society of the War of 1812, the V.F.W., the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, and the Blue Star Mothers. After that it became difficult to keep track.

  The snow drifted down upon them, but neither lady, nor Carruthers, moved a thirty-second of an inch.

  At twenty-seven minutes after nine the Mayor’s personal representative arrived on the scene—his ability to speak publicly without a script had long been regarded by the Mayor himself as something akin to sorcery.

  “I have here,” the personal representative declared loudly, holding up a paper, “a statement from His Honor announcing his intention to summon a special meeting of the Council for the sole purpose of turning Saratoga Street into a private street, title to be vested in the Saratoga Street Association. Then—” The crowd cheered, and the personal representative held up his hands for silence. “Then, in the event of anyone sustaining injuries because of cobblestones, the City won’t be responsible.”