Transgressions

by Ed McBain

  Mr. Z! Maybe he’d smelled her underarms. She hoped he had not smelled her crotch.

  Mr. Z. in computer lab making his way along the aisle answering kids’ questions most of them pretty elementary/dumb ass she’d have liked to catch his eye and exchange a knowing smirk but Mr. Z. never seemed to be looking toward her and then she was stricken with shyness, blood rushing into her face as he paused above her to examine the confusion on her screen and she heard herself mutter with childish bravado Guess I fucked up, Mr. Zallman, huh? wiping her nose on the edge of her hand beginning to giggle and there was sexy/cool Mr. Z. six inches from her not breaking into a smile even of playful reproach giving not the slightest hint he’d heard the forbidden F-word from an eighth grade girl’s innocent mouth.

  In fact Mr. Z. had heard. Sure.

  Never laugh, never encourage them. If they swear or use obscene or suggestive language.

  And never touch them.

  Or allow them to touch you.

  The (subterranean) connection between them.

  He had leaned over her, typed on her keyboard. Repaired the damage. Told her she was doing very well. Not to be discouraged! He didn’t seem to know her name but maybe that was just pretense, his sense of humor. Moving on to the next raised hand.

  Still, she’d known there was the (subterranean) connection.

  As she’d known, first glimpsing the Corn Maiden in the seventh grade corridor. Silky blond corn-tassel hair. Shy, frightened.

  A new girl. Perfect.

  One morning she came early to observe the Corn Maiden’s mother dropping her off at the curb. Good-looking woman with the same pale blond hair, smiling at the girl and hastily leaning over to kiskiss.

  Some connections go through you like a laser ray.

  Some connections, you just know.

  Mr. Z. she’d sent an e-message you are a master mister z. Which was not like Jude O. to do because any message in cyberspace can never be erased. But Mr. Z. had not replied.

  So easy to reply to a fucking e-message! But Mr. Z. had not.

  Mr. Z. did not exchange a knowing smile/wink with her as you’d expect.

  Ignored her!

  Like he didn’t know which one of them she was.

  Like he could confuse her with those others her inferiors.

  And so something turned in her heart like a rusty key and she thought calmly, You will pay for this mister asshole Z and all your progeny.

  Thought of calling the FBI reporting a suspected terrorist, Mr. Z. was dark like an Arab, and shifty-eyed. Though probably he was a Jew.

  Afterward vaguely he would recall you are a master mister z but of course he’d deleted it. So easy to delete an e-message.

  Afterward vaguely he would recall the squirmy girl at the computer with the frizz hair and glassy staring eyes, a startling smell as of unwashed flesh wafting from her (unusual at Skatskill Day as it was unusual in the affluent suburban village of Skatskill) he had not known at the time, this was January/February, was Jude Trahern. He had no homeroom students, he met with more than one hundred students sometimes within days, couldn’t keep track of them and had no interest in keeping track. Though a few days later he would come upon the girl in the company of a fattish friend, the two of them rummaging in a waste basket in the computer lab but he’d taken no special note of them as they’d hurried away embarrassed and giggling together as if he’d opened a door and seen them naked.

  But he would remember: the same frizz-haired girl boldly seated at his computer after school one day frowning at the screen and click-clicking keys with as much authority as if the computer were her own and this time he’d spoken sharply to her, “Excuse me?” and she’d looked up at him cringing and blind-seeming as if she thought he might hit her. And so he joked, “Here’s the famous hacker, eh?”—he knew it was the kindest as it was the wisest strategy to make a joke of the audacious/inexplicable behavior of adolescents, it wasn’t a good idea to confront or embarrass. Especially not a girl. And this stunted-seeming girl hunched over like she was trying make herself smaller. Papery-thin skin, short upper lip exposing her front teeth, a guarded rodent look, furtive, anxious, somehow appealing. Her eyes were of the no-color of grit, moist and widened. Eyebrows and lashes scanty, near-invisible. She was so fiercely plain and her unbeautiful eyes stared at him so rawly . . . He felt sorry for her, poor kid. Bold, nervy, but in another year or so she’d be left behind entirely by her classmates, no boy would glance at her twice. He could not have guessed that the tremulous girl was the lone descendent of a family of reputation and privilege though possibly he might have guessed that her parents were long divorced from one another and perhaps from her as well. She was stammering some feeble explanation Just needed to look something up, Mr. Zallman. He laughed and dismissed her with a wave of his hand. Had an impulse, out of character for him, to reach out and tousle that frizzed floating hair as you’d rub a dog’s head partly in affection and partly to chastise.

  Didn’t touch her, though. Mikal Zallman wasn’t crazy.

  “101 DALMATIANS”

  Is she breathing, d’you think?

  She is! Sure she is.

  Oh God what if . . .

  . . . she is. See?

  The Corn Maiden slept by candlelight. The heavy open-mouthed sleep of the sedated.

  We observed her in wonder. The Corn Maiden, in our power!

  Jude removed the barrettes from her hair so we could brush it. Long straight pale blond hair. We were not jealous of the Corn Maiden’s hair because It is our hair now.

  The Corn Maiden’s hair was spread out around her head like she was falling.

  She was breathing, yes you could see. If you held a candle close to her face and throat you could see.

  We had made a bed for the Corn Maiden, that Jude called a bier. Out of beautiful silk shawls and a brocaded bedspread, cashmere blanket from Scotland, goose-feather pillows. From the closed-off guest wing of the house Jude brought these, her face shining.

  We fumbled to remove the Corn Maiden’s clothes.

  You pull off your own clothes without hardly thinking but another person, even a small girl who is lying flat on her back, arms and legs limp but heavy, that’s different.

  When the Corn Maiden was bare it was hard not to giggle. Hard not to snort with laughter . . .

  More like a little girl than she was like us.

  We were shy of her suddenly. Her breasts were flat against her rib cage, her nipples were tiny as seeds. There were no hairs growing between her legs that we could see.

  She was very cold, shivering in her sleep. Her lips were putty-colored. Her teeth were chattering. Her eyes were closed but you could see a thin crescent of white. So (almost!) you worried the Corn Maiden was watching us paralyzed in sleep.

  It was Xanax Jude had prepared for the Corn Maiden. Also she had codeine and Oxycodone already ground to powder, in reserve.

  We were meant to “bathe” the Corn Maiden, Jude said. But maybe not tonight.

  We rubbed the Corn Maiden’s icy fingers, her icy toes, and her icy cheeks. We were not shy of touching her suddenly, we wanted to touch her and touch and touch.

  Inside here, Jude said, touching the Corn Maiden’s narrow chest, there is a heart beating. An actual heart.

  Jude spoke in a whisper. In the quiet you could hear the heart beat.

  We covered the Corn Maiden then with silks, brocades, cashmere wool. We placed a goose-feather pillow beneath the Corn Maiden’s head. Jude sprinkled perfume on the Corn Maiden with her fingertips. It was a blessing Jude said. The Corn Maiden would sleep and sleep for a long time and when she woke, she would know only our faces. The faces of her friends.

  It was a storage room in the cellar beneath the guest wing we brought the Corn Maiden. This was a remote corner of the big old house. This was a closed-off corner of the house and the cellar was yet more remote, nobody would ever ever come here Jude said.

  And you could scream your head off, nobody would ever hear.

&n
bsp; Jude laughed, cupping her hands to her mouth like she was going to scream. But all that came out was a strangled choked noise.

  There was no heat in the closed-off rooms of the Trahern house. In the cellar it was a damp cold like winter. Except this was meant to be a time of nuclear holocaust and no electricity we would have brought a space heater to plug in. Instead we had candles.

  These were fragrant hand-dipped candles old Mrs. Trahern had been saving in a drawer since 1994, according to the gift shop receipt.

  Jude said, Grandma won’t miss ’em.

  Jude was funny about her grandmother. Sometimes she liked her okay, other times she called her the old bat, said fuck her she didn’t give a damn about Jude she was only worried Jude would embarrass her somehow.

  Mrs. Trahern had called up the stairs, when we were in Jude’s room watching a video. The stairs were too much for her, rarely she came upstairs to check on Jude. There was an actual elevator in the house (we had seen it) but Jude said she’d fucked it up, fooling with it so much when she was a little kid. Just some friends from school, Denise and Anita, Jude called back. You’ve met them.

  Those times Mrs. Trahern saw us downstairs with Jude she would ask politely how we were and her snail-mouth would stretch in a grudging little smile but already she wasn’t listening to anything we said, and she would never remember our names.

  101 Dalmatians Jude played, one of her old videos she’d long outgrown. (Jude had a thousand videos she’d outgrown!) It was a young-kids’ movie we had all seen but the Corn Maiden had never seen. Sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the TV eating ice cream from a bowl in her lap and we finished ours and waited for her and Jude asked would she like a little more and the Corn Maidden hesitated just a moment then said Yes thank you.

  We all had more Haagen Dazs French Vanilla ice cream. But it was not the same ice cream the Corn Maiden had not exactly!

  Her eyes shining, so happy. Because we were her friends.

  A sixth grader, friends with eighth graders. A guest in Jude Trahern’s house.

  Jude had been nice to her at school for a long time. Smiling, saying hello. Jude had a way of fixing you with her eyes like a cobra or something you could not look away. You were scared but sort of thrilled, too.

  In the 7-Eleven she’d come inside to get a Coke and a package of nachos. She was on her way home from school and had no idea that two of us had followed her and one had run ahead, to wait. She was smiling to see Jude who was so friendly. Jude asked where was her mom and she said her mom was a nurse’s aide across the river in Nyack and would not be home till after dark.

  She laughed saying her mom didn’t like her eating junk food but her mom didn’t know.

  Jude said what our moms don’t know don’t hurt them.

  The Sacrifice of the Corn Maiden was a ritual of the Onigara Indians, Jude told us. In school we had studied Native Americans as they are called but we had not studied the Onigara Indians, Jude said had been extinct for two hundred years. The Iroquois had wiped out the Onigaras, it was survival of the fittest.

  The Corn Maiden would be our secret. Beforehand we seemed to know it would be the most precious of our secrets.

  Jude and the Corn Maiden walked ahead alone. Denise and Anita behind. Back of the stores, past the Dumpsters, we ran to catch up.

  Jude asked would the Corn Maiden like to visit her house and the Corn Maiden said yes but she could not stay long. Jude said it was just a short walk. Jude pretended not to know where the Corn Maiden lived (but she knew: crummy apartments at 15th Street and Van Buren) and this was a ten-minute walk, approximately.

  We climbed the back way. Nobody saw. Old Mrs. Trahern would be watching TV in her room, and would not see.

  If she saw she would not seriously see. For at a distance her eyes were too weak.

  The guest wing was a newer part of the house. It overlooked a swimming pool. But the pool was covered with a tarpaulin, Jude said nobody had swum in it for years. She could remember wading in the shallow end but it was long ago like the memory belonged to someone else.

  The guest wing was never used either, Jude said. Most of the house was never used. She and her grandmother lived in just a few rooms and that was fine with them. Sometimes Mrs. Trahern would not leave the house for weeks. She was angry about something that had happened at church. Or maybe the minister had said something she found offensive. She had had to dismiss the black man who’d driven her “limo-zene.” She had dismissed the black woman who’d been her cook and house cleaner for twenty years. Groceries were delivered to the house. Meals were mostly heat up in the microwave. Mrs. Trahern saw a few of her old friends in town, at the Village Woman’s Club, the Hudson Valley Friends of History, and the Skatskill Garden Club. Her friends were not invited to the house to see her.

  Do you love your mom? Jude asked the Corn Maiden.

  The Corn Maiden nodded yes. Sort of embarrassed.

  Your mom is real pretty. She’s a nurse, I guess?

  The Corn Maiden nodded yes. You could see she was proud of her mom but shy to speak of her.

  Where is your dad? Jude asked.

  The Corn Maiden frowned. She did not know.

  Is your dad living?

  Did not know.

  When did you see your dad last?

  Was not sure. She’d been so little . . .

  Did he live around here, or where?

  California, the Corn Maiden said. Berkeley.

  My mom is in California, Jude said. Los Angeles.

  The Corn Maiden smiled, uncertainly.

  Maybe your dad is with my dad now, Jude said.

  The Corn Maiden looked at Jude in wonderment.

  In Hell, Jude said.

  Jude laughed. That way she had, her teeth glistening.

  Denise and Anita laughed. The Corn Maiden smiled not knowing whether to laugh. Slower and slower the spoon was being lifted to her mouth, her eyelids were drooping.

  We would carry the Corn Maiden from Jude’s room. Along a corridor and through a door into what Jude called the guest wing, where the air was colder, and stale. And down a stairway in the guest wing and into a cellar to the storage room.

  The Corn Maiden did not weigh much. Three of us, we weighed so much more.

  On the outside of the storage room door, a padlock.

  Anita and Denise had to leave by 6 P.M., to return to their houses for supper. So boring!

  Jude would remain with the Corn Maiden for much of the night. To watch over. A vigil. She was excited by the candle flames, the incense-smell. The pupils of her eyes were dilated, she was highhigh on Ecstasy. She would not bind the Corn Maiden’s wrists and ankles, she said, until it was necessary.

  Jude had a Polaroid camera, she would take pictures of the Corn Maiden sleeping on her bier.

  As the Corn Maiden was being missed the next morning we would all be at school as usual. For nobody had seen us, and nobody would think of us.

  Some pre-vert they’ll think of, Jude said. We can help them with that.

  Remember, the Corn Maiden has come as our guest, Jude said. It is not kidnapping.

  The Corn Maiden came to Jude on the Thursday before Palm Sunday, in April of the year.

  BREAKING NEWS

  Dial 911 your life is no longer your own.

  Dial 911 you become a beggar.

  Dial 911 you are stripped naked.

  ______

  She met them at the curb. Distraught mother awaiting police officers in the rain outside Briarcliff Apts., 15th St., South Skatskill, 8:20 P.M. Approaching officers as they emerged from the patrol car pleading, anxious, trying to remain calm but her voice rising, Help me please help my daughter is missing! I came home from work, my daughter isn’t here, Marissa is eleven years old, I have no idea where she is, nothing like this has ever happened, please help me find her, I’m afraid that someone has taken my daughter!—Caucasian female, early thirties, blond, bare-headed, strong smell of beer on her breath.

  They would questio
n her. They would repeat their questions, and she would repeat her answers. She was calm. She tried to be calm. She began to cry. She began to be angry. She knew her words were being recorded, each word she uttered was a matter of public record. She would face TV cameras, interviewers with microphones out-thrust like sceptors. She would see herself performing clumsily and stumbling over her lines in the genre missing child I pleading mother. She would see how skillfully the TV screen leapt from her anxious drawn face and bloodshot eyes to the smiling innocent wide-eyed Marissa, sweet-faced Marissa with gleaming blond hair, eleven years old, sixth grader, the camera lingered upon each of three photos of Marissa provided by her mother; then, as the distraught mother continued to speak, you saw the bland sandstone facade of the “private”—“exclusive”—Skatskill Day School and next you were looking at the sinister nighttime traffic of 15th Street, South Skatskill along which, as a neutral-sounding woman’s voice explained, eleven-year-old Marissa Branty normally walked home to let herself into an empty apartment and begin to prepare supper for her mother (who worked at a Nyack medical clinic, would not be home until 8 P.M.) and herself; then you were looking at the exterior, rear of Briarcliff Apts. squat and ugly as an army barracks in the rain, where a few hardy residents stood curious staring at police officers and camera crews; then you saw again the mother of the missing girl Leah Bantry, thirty-four, obviously a negligent mother, a sick-with-guilt mother publicly pleading If anyone has seen my daughter, if anyone has any idea what might have happened to Marissa . . .

  Next news item, tractor-trailer overturned on the New Jersey Turnpike, pile-up involving eleven vehicles, two drivers killed, eight taken by ambulance to Newark hospital.

  So ashamed! But I only want Marissa back.

  It was BREAKING NEWS! which means exciting news and by 10 P.M. of that Thursday in April each of four local TV stations was carrying the missing Marissa story, and would carry it at regular intervals for as long as there were developments and as long as local interest remained high. But really it was not “new” news, everyone had seen it before. All that could be “new” were the specific players and certain details to be revealed in time, with the teasing punctuality of a suspense film.