The Nine Mile Walk

by Harry Kemelman

  According to Doble, Cartwright was a tight-fisted old skinflint who had remained a bachelor, probably to save the expense of supporting a wife.

  When I pointed out that paying a housekeeper to come in every day was almost as expensive as keeping a wife, and that in addition he had brought up his nephew Jack, Doble retorted that nobody but Mrs. Knox would take the job of Cartwright’s housekeeper and that she took it only because no one else would take her. She was almost stone deaf and general opinion was that her wages were small indeed.

  “As for Jack,” he went on, “the old man never let him see a penny more than he actually needed. He never had a dime in his pocket, and when he’d go into town of an evening, he’d just have to hang around—usually didn’t even have the price of a movie. Nice young fellow too,” he added reflectively.

  “He could have got a job and left,” I suggested.

  “I suppose he could’ve,” Doble said slowly, “but he’s the old man’s heir, you see, and I guess he figured it was kind of politic, as you might say, to hang around doing any little jobs at the bank that the old man might ask of him.”

  I was not too favorably impressed with the young man’s character from Doble’s description, but I changed my mind when he came down a few days later on furlough.

  He turned out to be a decent chap, quiet and reserved, but with a quick and imaginative mind. We grew quite close in those few days and saw a great deal of each other. We went fishing off the rocks, or lazed around in the sun a good deal talking of all sorts of things, or shot at chips in the water with an old rifle that he had.

  He kept his gun and fishing rod over at our house. And that gives some indication of the character of Cyrus Cartwright and of Jack’s relations with him. He explained that his uncle knew that he wasn’t doing anything during this week of furlough and didn’t really expect him to, but if he saw him with the fishing rod, that traditional symbol of idleness, it would seem as though he were flaunting his indolence in his face. As for the gun, Cyrus Cartwright considered shooting at any target that could not subsequently be eaten as an extravagant waste of money for shells.

  Jack came over every evening to play cribbage or perhaps to sit on the porch and sip at a glass of beer and argue about some book he had read at my suggestion. Sometimes he spoke about his uncle and in discussing him, he was not bitter—ironic, rather.

  On one occasion he explained, “My uncle is a good man according to his lights. He likes money because it gives him a sense of accomplishment to have more than anyone else in town. But that alone doesn’t make him a hard person to live with. What does make him difficult is that everything is set in a rigid routine, a senseless routine, and his household has to conform to it. After dinner, he sits and reads his paper until it gets dark. Then he looks at his wristwatch and shakes his head a little as though he didn’t believe it was that late. Then he takes his pocket watch out and checks the wristwatch against it. But of course, even that doesn’t satisfy him. So he goes into the dining room where he has an electric clock and he sets both watches by that.

  “When he’s got all timepieces perfectly synchronized, he says, ‘Well, it’s getting late,’ and he goes upstairs to his room. In about fifteen minutes he calls to me and I go up to find him already in bed.

  “‘I forgot to fix the windows,’ he says. So I open them an inch at the top and an inch at the bottom. It takes a bit of doing because if I should open them a quarter of an inch too wide, he says he’ll catch his death of cold, and if it is short of an inch, he’s sure he’ll smother. But finally I get them adjusted just right and he says, ‘My watch, would you mind, Jack?’ So I get his pocket watch that he had put on the bureau while undressing and I put it on the night table near his bed.

  “As far back as I can remember, I’ve had to do that little chore. I am sure he insists on it so as to fix our relations in my mind. While I was away, he must have remembered to do it for himself, but the first day I got back I had to do it.”

  (Chisholm looked from one to the other of us as if to make sure that we all understood the characters and their relations with each other. I nodded encouragingly and he continued.)

  Jack was scheduled to leave Sunday morning and naturally we expected to see him Saturday, but he did not show up during the day. He came over in the evening, after dinner, however, and he was hot and angry.

  “The hottest day of the summer,” he exclaimed, “and today of all days my uncle suddenly finds a bunch of errands for me to do. I’ve been all over the county and I couldn’t even take the car. I’ll bet you fellows were lying out on the beach all day. How about going in for a dip right now?”

  Well, of course, we had been in and out of the water all day long, but it was still hot and muggy, and besides we could see that he wanted very much to go, so we agreed. We took some beer down and we didn’t bother with bathing suits since it was already quite dark. After a while, however, it began to get chilly. It had clouded up and the air was oppressive as though a storm were impending. So we got dressed again and went back to our house.

  The atmosphere had a charged, electric quality about it, and whether it was that or because he was leaving the following day, Jack was unusually quiet and conversation lagged. Around half past eleven, he rose and stretched and said he thought he ought to be going.

  “It’s been good meeting you,” he said. “I didn’t look forward to this furlough particularly, but now I’m sure I’m going to look back on it.”

  We shook hands and he started for the door. Then he remembered about his fishing rod and his rifle and came back for them. He seemed reluctant to leave us, and Doble, understanding, said, “We might as well walk down with you, Jack.”

  He nodded gratefully and all three of us strolled out into the darkness. We walked along slowly, Jack with his fishing rod over one shoulder and his gun over the other.

  I offered to carry the gun, but he shook his head and handed me the rod instead. I took it and walked on in silence until we reached the gate of his uncle’s house. Perhaps he misinterpreted my silence and felt that he had been ungracious, for he said, “I’m a lot more used to carrying a rifle than you are.” And then lest I take his remark as a reflection on my not being in the service, he hurried on with, “I’m kind of fond of this gun. I’ve had it a long time and had a lot of fun with it.”

  He patted the stock affectionately like a boy with a dog and then he nestled the butt against his shoulder and sighted along the barrel.

  “Better not, Jack,” said Doble with a grin. “You’ll wake your uncle.”

  “Damn my uncle,” he retorted lightly, and before we could stop him, he pulled the trigger.

  In that silence, the crack of the rifle was like a thunderclap. I suppose we all expected one of the windows to fly up and the irate voice of old Cartwright to demand what was going on. In any case, instinctively, like three small boys, we all ducked down behind the fence where we could not be seen. We waited several minutes, afraid to talk lest we be overheard. But when nothing happened, we straightened up slowly and Doble said, “You better get to bed, Jack. I think maybe you’ve had a little too much beer.”

  “Maybe I ought at that,” Jack answered and eased the gate open.

  Then he turned and whispered, “Say, do you fellows mind waiting a minute? I think I may have locked the door and I haven’t a key.”

  We nodded and watched as he hurried down the path to the house. Just before he reached the door, however, he hesitated, stopped, and then turned and came hurrying back to us.

  “Could you put me up for the night, Doble?” he asked in a whisper.

  “Why sure, Jack. Was the door locked?”

  He didn’t answer immediately and we started down the road to our house. We had gone about halfway when he said, “I didn’t check to see if the door was locked or not.”

  “I noticed that,” I remarked.

  There was another silence and then as we mounted the porch steps, the moon, which had been hidden by clouds, suddenl
y broke through and I saw that he was deathly pale.

  “What’s the matter, Jack?” I asked quickly.

  He shook his head and did not answer. I put my hand on his arm and asked again, “Are you all right?”

  He nodded and tried to smile.

  “I’ve—I’ve—Something funny happened to me,” he said. “Did you mean what you said the other day about believing in spirits?”

  At first I could not think what he was referring to, and then I remembered having argued—not too seriously—for belief in the supernatural during a discussion of William Blake’s Marriage of Heaven and Hell which I had lent him.

  I shrugged my shoulders noncommittally, wondering what he was getting at.

  He smiled wanly. “I didn’t really have too much beer,” he said and looked at me for confirmation.

  “No, I don’t think you did,” I said quietly.

  “Look,” he went on, “I’m cold sober. And I was sober a few minutes ago when I started for my uncle’s house. But as I came near the door, I felt something like a cushion of air building up against me to block my progress. And then, just before I reached the door, it became so strong that I could not go on. It was like a wall in front of me. But it was something more than an inanimate wall. It did not merely block me, but seemed to be pushing me back as though it had a will and intelligence like a strong man. It frightened me and I turned back. I’m still frightened.”

  “Your uncle—” I began.

  “Damn my uncle!” he said vehemently. “I hope he falls and breaks his neck.”

  Just then Doble’s kitchen clock chimed twelve. The brassy ring, coming just as he finished, seemed to stamp the curse with fateful approval.

  It made us all a little uncomfortable. We didn’t seem to feel like talking, and after a while we went to bed.

  We were awakened the next morning early by someone pounding on the door. Doble slipped his trousers on and I managed to get into my bathrobe. We reached the front door about the same time. It was Mrs. Knox, Cartwright’s housekeeper, and she was in a state of considerable excitement.

  “Mister Cartwright’s dead!” she shouted to us. “There’s been an accident.”

  Since she was deaf, it was no use to question her. We motioned her to wait while we put on our shoes. Then we followed her back to the house. The front door was open as she had left it when she had hurried over to us. And from the doorway we could see the figure of Cyrus Cartwright in an old-fashioned nightgown, lying at the foot of the stairs, his head in a sticky pool of blood.

  He was dead all right, and looking up we could see the bit of rumpled carpeting at the head of the stairs which had probably tripped him up and catapulted him down the long staircase.

  He had died as he had lived, for in his right hand he still clutched his precious pocket watch. The watch he was wearing on his wrist, however, had smashed when he fell and it gave us the time of his death. The hands pointed to just before twelve, the exact time as near as I could judge, that Jack had uttered his curse!

  There was a minute of appreciative silence after Chisholm finished. I could see that no one’s opinion had been changed materially by the story. Those who had been skeptical were scornful now and those who were inclined to believe, were triumphant, but we all turned to Professor Rollins to see what he thought and he was nodding his head portentously.

  Nicky, however, was the first to speak. “And the pocket watch,” he said, “Had that stopped, too?”

  “No, that was ticking away merrily,” Chisholm replied. “I guess his hand must have cushioned it when he fell. It had probably been badly jarred though, because it was running almost an hour ahead.”

  Nicky nodded grimly.

  “What about Jack? How did he take it?” I asked.

  Chisholm considered for a moment. “He was upset naturally, not so much over his uncle’s death, I fancy, since he did not care for him very much, but because of the fact that it confirmed his fears of the night before that some supernatural influence was present.” He smiled sadly. “I did not see him much after that. He had got his leave extended, but he was busy with his uncle’s affairs. When finally he went back to the Army, he promised to write, but he never did. Just last week, however, I got a letter from Doble. He writes me occasionally—just the usual gossip of the town. In his letter he mentions that Jack Cartwright crashed in his first solo flight.”

  “Ah.” Professor Rollins showed interest. “I don’t mind admitting that I rather expected something like that.”

  “You expected Jack to die?” Chisholm asked in amazement.

  Rollins nodded vigorously. “This was truly a supernatural manifestation. I haven’t the slightest doubt about it. For one thing, Jack felt the supernatural forces. And the curse, followed almost immediately by its fulfillment even to the manner of death, that is most significant. Now, of course we know very little of these things, but we suspect that they follow a definite pattern. Certain types of supernatural forces have what might be called an ironic bent, a sort of perverted sense of humor. To be sure, when Jack uttered his fervent wish that his uncle fall and break his neck, he was speaking as a result of a momentary exasperation, but it is the nature of evil or mischievous forces to grant just such wishes. We meet with it again and again in folklore and fairy tales, which are probably the cryptic or symbolic expression of the wisdom of the folk. The pattern is familiar to you all, I am sure, from the stories of your childhood. The wicked character is granted three wishes by a fairy, only to waste them through wishes that are just such common expressions of exasperation as Jack used. You see, when supernatural forces are present, a mere wish, fervently expressed, may serve to focus them, as it were. And that is what happened at the Cartwright house that fateful evening.”

  He held up a forefinger to ward off the questions that leaped to our minds.

  “There is another element in the pattern,” he went on soberly, “and that is that whenever a person does profit materially through the use of evil supernatural forces, even though unintentionally on his part, sooner or later, they turn on him and destroy him. I have no doubt that Jack’s death was just as much the result of supernatural forces as was the death of his uncle.”

  Professor Graham muttered something that sounded like “Rubbish.”

  Dana Rollins, who could have gone on indefinitely I suppose, stopped abruptly and glared.

  But Professor Graham was not one to be silenced by a look. “The young man died as a result of a plane crash. Well, so did thousands of others. Had they all been granted three wishes by a wicked fairy? Poppycock! The young man died because he went up in a plane. That’s reason enough. As for the old man, he tumbled down the stairs and cracked his skull or broke his neck, whichever it was. You say his nephew’s curse must have been uttered about the same time. Well, even granting that by some miracle Doble’s kitchen clock was synchronized to Cartwright’s watches, that would still be nothing more than a coincidence. The chances are that the young man uttered that same wish hundreds of times. It was only natural: he was his heir and besides, he didn’t like him. Now on one of those hundreds of times, it actually happened. There’s nothing supernatural in that—not even anything out of the ordinary. It makes a good story, young man, but it doesn’t prove anything.”

  “And Jack’s sensing of a supernatural force,” asked Chisholm icily, “is that just another coincidence?”

  Graham shrugged his massive shoulders. “That was probably just an excuse not to go home. He was probably afraid he’d get a dressing down from his uncle for shooting off his rifle in the middle of the night. What do you think, Nicky?”

  Nicky’s little blue eyes glittered. “I rather think,” he said, “that the young man was not so much afraid of his uncle asking him about the rifle as he was that he would ask him what time it was.”

  We all laughed at Nicky’s joke. But Professor Graham was not to be put off.

  “Seriously, Nicky,” he urged.

  “Well then, seriously,” said Nicky w
ith a smile as though he were indulging a bright but impetuous freshman, “I think you’re quite right in calling the young man’s death an accident. Parenthetically, I might point out that Dr. Chisholm did not suggest that it was anything else. As for the uncle’s death, I cannot agree with you that it was merely coincidence.”

  Professor Rollins pursed his lips and appeared to be considering Nicky’s cavalier dismissal of half his theory, but it was obvious that he was pleased at his support for the other half. I could not help reflecting how Nicky automatically assumed control over any group that he found himself in. He had a way of treating people, even his colleagues on the faculty, as though they were immature schoolboys. And curiously, people fell into this role that he assigned to them.

  Professor Graham, however, was not yet satisfied. “But dammit all, Nicky,” he insisted, “a man trips on a bit of carpet and falls downstairs. What is there unusual about that?”

  “In the first place, I think it is unusual that he should go downstairs at all,” said Nicky. “Why do you suppose he did?”

  Professor Graham looked at him in aggrieved surprise like a student who has just been asked what he considers an unfair question.

  “How should I know why he went downstairs?” he said. “I suppose he couldn’t sleep and wanted a snack, or maybe a book to read.”

  “And took his pocket watch with him?”

  “Well, according to Chisholm he was always checking his wristwatch against it.”

  Nicky shook his head. “When you’re wearing two watches, it’s almost impossible not to check the other after you’ve glanced at the one, just as we automatically glance at our watches when we pass the clock in the jeweler’s window even though we might have set it by the radio only a minute or two before. But for Cyrus Cartwright to take his pocket watch downstairs with him when he had a watch on his wrist is something else again. I can think of only one reason for it.”