by Ed Ifkovic
“Mr. Lupinski . . .” But he had resumed his walk, and I noticed a slight drag to one leg, an old man’s shuffled walk, a rocking side to side.
Walking back from my long stroll—I’d headed toward Hemlock Ridge, but disliked the dampness, the darkness, a shroud descending from the low-hanging branches over the lane—I fully expected to see Eben still planted in the center of the lane, a bucolic sentry fending off runaway hay wagons and the ghoulish folks who’d started riding by the murder scene, craning their necks, to see—what? Blood and mayhem? I felt weary. My morning walks—a mile, two, sometimes three, up Park Avenue, down Fifth—always invigorated me, set me in the direction of the typewriter, my fiction. They ushered me into my days. But this day, surrounded by the crisp October breezes and the cobalt-blue sky over shrill foliage, I felt exhausted. This was no land for murder, I thought suddenly, and the thought startled me. Indeed, what alien land was?
A state police car pulled alongside and Trooper Wolniak rolled down his window.
“Good morning, Miss Ferber.” He smiled broadly. “Up early?”
“You, too.”
“I’m being paid to get up early.” He looked away from me. “It’s a beautiful morning.”
I approached the vehicle. “Is it?”
“You look like you have something to tell me.”
“Really?”
“You have the look of someone who has a secret.”
Now I smiled. “You read me well.”
“So?”
“Officer Wolniak,” I sighed, “I begin every day of my life with a morning constitutional, sometimes up to three miles. It clears the brain, pumps the blood, and, reinvigorated, I approach my typewriter as though returning to a safe haven.”
“And that’s not possible with murder?”
“Exactly. I find myself restless, tossing in a strange bed, waking to a quiet house where people disappear in a flash. Worse, people share confidences I’d rather not know.”
“I guess you’re the kind of soul people tell things to.”
“Again, sir, you read me well.”
“I repeat. You look like you have something to tell me.”
“Actually, I do, though I think it’s worth may be minimal.”
“Do you want to meet me at the Inn?” He looked toward the house. “Kind of awkward here.”
I smiled. “Too much traffic, Officer Wolniak? It’s not Herald Square.”
“Wherever that is.”
“I can tell you now.” I looked around. “This morning Eben Travers, standing largely were we now are, planted in the center of this lane like a traffic post, felt the need to tell me that Carlotta, on many an occasion, has threatened the life of her sister.”
Wolniak nodded. “Yes, so I’ve heard.”
I was surprised. “From him?”
“From others. Eben’s told the story all over town. For years, actually. Nothing new. But not to Constable Marks when he was interviewed yesterday. Nobody tells Johnny anything.”
I wasn’t happy. “Well, there seems to be a concerted effort to accuse Carlotta Small. Without evidence, I might add. Marks, in particular, is dead set on crucifying her.”
He interrupted me. “I know, I know. He’s been hammering me with that story over and over.”
“How can you stand that young man?”
“I have no choice, Miss Ferber, given the politics of small-town policing. I’m here representing the state, but I gotta work with the locals.”
“What can you do with him?”
He smiled. “Let him play his constable game, but make sure he doesn’t get in the way.”
I made a disgusted sound and Wolniak shook his head. “I’m learning that diplomacy is the better portion of my job. I’m learning that fast.”
I leaned in. “Officer Wolniak, I know you have been thrust into a horrible, sad dilemma here, and unfortunately I find myself somehow your accomplice in investigating . . .”
He held up his hand. “Miss Ferber, this is, as you suspect, all new territory for me, and . . .”
“Let me finish, please,” I said, grimly. “I want no part of this . . .”
Now he interrupted me. “Miss Ferber, let me have my say. Please. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this. In fact, I actually had an interesting call from Millicent Wright. Quite the lady, that one. I know Carlotta Small and Miss Wright have great faith in you, and in my brief dealings with Miss Wright, I can tell you, I respect that woman. What she says counts. And frankly, she counts on you. She made that point clear to me on the phone. Over and over. I couldn’t get a word in.” He grinned widely. “Now Johnny Marks has registered an official complaint with some town officials—there are so many, I’m afraid, more than the population, it seems—maintaining that his investigation is being hampered by your presence. He mentioned that you were around for interviews with Miss Small and Miss Wright, and that’s wrong, he says. So I got a phone call from some local politician . . .”
“And you’re saying what here?” I was impatient.
He clicked his tongue. “I’m saying that, as an old farm boy, growing up on a truck farm owned by my papa, I learned from him an important fact: when you gotta collect the eggs in the morning and you gotta battle the indignant hens, the best advice is to deal with those hens that seem to understand why you’re there in their henhouse. Some chickens, I’ve noticed, are more savvy than others.”
I laughed, with real delight. “And I’m one of those chickens?”
“’Fraid so. At first your presence bothered, sitting in on those interviews, but as a farm boy I gotta hold back judgment.”
I noted the color rising in his clean-cut blond looks, running from his neck to his temples, a pink hue that reminded me of squawking toddlers.
“You’re an interesting young man, Officer Wolniak.”
“Interesting may not be the word.” His eyes flickered: I thought of Eben Travers’s comment. “Is that your favorite word?”
“But what I’m saying,” he went on, “is that I think we’re in this together, and I’d take it kindly if you’d accompany me on some of the interviews around here, especially this afternoon when I get to approach Eben Travers and maybe Stanley Lupinski, ornery types on their best days.”
“I’m the bright hen in the coop, Trooper Wolniak?”
“Sometimes hens know how to deal with troublesome roosters.” He grinned again. “That’s my mama talking.”
I hesitated. “I don’t think I have a choice, do I?”
“Not really.” He shook his head, staring at me. “Otherwise you’d have to deal with Miss Small and Miss Wright.”
“Miss Small I can deal with.”
Now he laughed, a rich baritone, full and deep. “Yes, I wouldn’t want to cross Miss Wright.”
“Who would?”
“A man without any smarts, I’d say.”
“And what will you do with Johnny Marks?” I asked. “He’s not going to be happy with my presence.”
He clicked his tongue. “Let me worry about that. He’s like a puppy dog, I think. Nipping at your heels but if you raise your voice, he scurries away.”
“But puppy dogs keep coming back.”
He drummed the steering wheel with his fingertips. “Let me worry about that.”
“I hope we can have a long conversation when this is all over, Officer Wolniak.”
“Am I an interesting person?” He was having fun with me, I realized. And I found it disarming—and charming.
“I would hazard a guess, yes, Officer Wolniak.”
“Ma’am, if we’re to be casual partners in crime here, on the right side of the law, at least for now—until you decide to take up lawbreaking instead of writing—could you call me Stas? ‘Officer Wolniak’ is the way my mama introduces me to all her friends.”
“Stas. All right. My friends call me Edna.”
“I’m more comfortable calling you Miss Ferber.”
“Then call me what Aleck Woollcott calls me when he
’s being pleasant, one day a month, contrary to customary biological cycles.”
“What’s that?”
“Ferb.”
“Ferb,” he said. “All right. I like that.”
“Good day, Stas,” I said, feeling chipper. “I’m off to breakfast. “
“I’ll see you this afternoon about visiting Eben Travers.”
“To be sure.”
He threw the cruiser into gear. “I think you should know, Stas, that in some circles writing fiction is considered a crime.”
“Then we should hang all the publishers.” He drove away.
In the early afternoon, sitting with Carlotta on the enclosed sun porch, we talked about Martha in fragmented phrases, finally lapsing into silence. “I can’t bear to think of what happened,” Carlotta whispered. When I went to say something, she held up her hand. “No more. Not now.”
I nodded. But I brought up my morning’s conversations. Yes, she said, Stanley Lupinski hated her. “He believes we’re lazy, we old Yankees, and we are, I suppose. His farm once flourished, when he was younger. Now it’s crabgrass and chicory, like ours.” What about the threatened lawsuit? “There is no lawyer. I hate lawyers. But I want that shed torn down. The Inn has always had magnificent view of the river and mountains. The shanty is a travesty, an eyesore. Eventually it will come down.”
I asked about Eben’s snide comment on Martha as harsh schoolmistress. Carlotta grumbled. “Eben is a cranky dear. Pay him no mind, Edna. He’s all talk. Me, he finds vain and foolish. Martha, well, that’s a different story. He did not like her. What he didn’t say was that Martha had Julia as a student at the Manners School, a scholarship girl, and in her senior year, she met Stanley’s son, Paulie, who was doing handyman stuff at the school. This was years back, before Eben moved to the tenant house out back, when his wife was alive and they all lived in Riverton. Well, Martha encouraged the romance of Paulie Lupinski and Julia Travers. Not a good idea, since Paulie was a womanizer and a scoundrel. And Julia was lovestruck. Hence Eben’s dislike of Martha. After Eben’s wife died and Paulie drifted away, going out West for a while, Eben lost his house and had to move here to work for us. Suddenly Paulie returned from his wandering, spotted Julia living virtually next door and, voila! Romance bloomed. Eben blamed it on Martha who . . .”
Rapping on the side door. “Julia will get it,” Carlotta said, but the rapping persisted. She stood and looked out the side window. “Oh, my God, it’s Stanley Lupinski.” She shook her head. “What does he want? I can’t deal with one more strained condolence call.” A pause. “Julia must have seen him.” She lowered her voice, “She won’t answer the door when Eben is here or when Stanley comes calling. Which is almost never.”
I was suddenly intrigued by Julia Lupinski, the housekeeper alienated from two families, and yet, oddly, planted here in the middle of their fragmented and suffering worlds. A widowed father as handyman, living steps away. A widowed ex-father-in-law, next door. Why did she stay on? What Purgatory had she chosen for herself? I wondered. Well, of course: the Depression, now capitalized. A need to feed a child. But still and all. I would have to review that scenario with . . . Stas. But for what reason? How could that relate to the murder?
Call me Ferb. Lord, that was the opening line of a bad novel.
Carlotta invited Stanley in. “Mr. Lupinski. Welcome.” He stood there, half bowing, sloppy farmer’s hat in hand, shuffling his feet. He avoided eye contact.
“Ma’am, I don’t mean to intrude but I mean to express my deep sympathy.”
Carlotta seemed surprised. “Well, thank you.”
“We ain’t been the closest of neighbors, true.” He speckled his sentence with ahs and ers. “But your sister was my neighbor and . . .” He stopped.
I wondered just how Carlotta herself had treated the man. Carlotta’s face was set in a rigid frieze, emotionless, tight, the careful makeup on the alabaster skin still unblemished, the glossy lipstick a little too carmine for the rural day.
“Thank you,” Carlotta said again. I waited for her to invite Lupinski to sit, perhaps to have a cup of tea. But, of course, she understood the dynamics of the household and neighborhood, especially with Julia making beds upstairs.
Stanley started to leave, fumbling with his hat.
“Has Trooper Wolniak talked to you, Mr. Lupinski?” I asked him.
He nodded at me. “Nope. Not yet, ma’am. I seen Johnny Marks in the front yard and he said they’d be taking my statement, but I said I ain’t got no statement. What for?” He looked from me to Carlotta. “I didn’t kill her.” But he must have realized the harshness of his words because, at that moment, glancing back at Carlotta, he blushed and stammered an apologetic “I’m sorry. I mean . . .”
Carlotta interrupted. “Edna, just what are you after?”
“Only that Wolniak wants to talk to the neighbors, just to see if they heard or saw anything. That’s only common sense, Carlotta.”
Stanley actually took a step back, as though in a hurry to leave. He mumbled, “The neighbors?”
I realized how foolish that sounded, there being only Eben and Stanley and Miss Millicent within walking distance. The four homes—if you counted Eben’s tenant house on River Road—constituted a tiny isolated community, tucked into a valley, hidden from the larger farms that fronted River Road, down from Eben’s house, and from the farms that lay on the other side of Hemlock Ridge.
“Sometimes something that strikes you as innocent or unimportant can actually have value to the police.”
Carlotta looked irritated, twisting in her seat, clearing her throat. She seemed to want Stanley out of the peaceful, sunny room. She reached over to pluck a dead leaf from one of the gardenia plants that lined the window ledge. Then she half-rose in her chair, fiddled with the tea set, and accidentally dropped a cookie onto the floor. She left it there, in plain view. She didn’t take her eyes off me.
“Ma’am,” Stanley began, “all I can say is that I was wandering outside, back in my fields, checking out the last the good pumpkins, but it was still daylight then. A half hour away from twilight or dark. My understanding is that your sister”—he looked uncomfortably at the fidgeting Carlotta—“passed away, you know, at darkness. Like when she left Miss Wright’s.”
“So?” I asked.
“Well, by dark I was in my house, opening some beans to heat for supper. Then feeding Wolf his meal in the kitchen . . .”
“So you heard nothing? Saw nothing?”
“Edna, for God’s sake, you’re so—shrill,” Carlotta exploded.
Inwardly, I fumed. Shrill? I’ve never been shrill. Stentorian, yes. Loud, granted. Volcanic, as need be. Shrill was what I expected from slobbering fishwives on the lower Hudson docks or old miserable crones hen-pecking their hapless husbands in railroad flats downtown.
“Well,” Stanley admitted, “before going in, I seen Eben outdoors, but he’s always outdoors, it seems. Only soul I spotted.”
“Where was he?”
“Edna,” Carlotta exclaimed, looking toward the doorway that led to the parlor.
“Well, I was gathering up some pumpkins in a wheel barrel, you know, and I seen him in his backyard.” He hesitated. “But by the time I was wheeling my pumpkins to the cellar, he was already up to the Inn, side of the house, looked like he was heading to the road out front. Just, you know, ambling along.”
“So he was near to Miss Wright’s house?”
“Like on the property line, you know, but moving past.”
I bit my tongue. This was curious, and bizarre. This supposedly guileless man was dispensing some crumbs of information that could be dangerous for his hated neighbor, Eben. Casually spilling the beans, as it were. Was he aware of what he was doing? Here was this man, bumbling through his delivery, looking from Carlotta to me with the bewildered, wide-eyed ah-shucks wonder of a bumpkin, basically placing the despised Eben near Millicent’s backyard, admittedly earlier than Martha’s moment of surprise, but certainly within the
hour. Did he do this consciously? How cagey was Stanley Lupinski? How clever?
“Could he have been by her back door?” I asked, abruptly.
Stanley seemed to realize what he’d said—or his overstepping some line. His voice rose. “Oh my God, no. Not that, Miss Ferber. Now I don’t talk to the man, and we glare at each other over fences, but I can’t accuse him of nothing. When Eben heads out, especially to walk his dog or to go hunting across the road in the state forest, well, that’s the way he walks, between the properties.” He was rambling now, and as he spoke he was withdrawing, still facing us, but retreating, half-bowing, nodding his head. It was a curious exit, some denim-and-flannel withdrawal that reminded me of the leave-taking of fawning servants in costume dramas. Well . . .
With that, he was gone. Looking out the window, I noticed he was walking fast, and he had pulled that sloppy broken hat tight over his forehead, his head down.
“Edna, really,” Carlotta said with an artificial laugh. “You really take this sleuthing seriously.”
“And you don’t?”
Carlotta frowned.
Trooper Wolniak called to say that he was on his way. I’d been sitting in the library, nestled in a chair, idly pursuing an old tome on New England architecture, and when Carlotta called me to the hallway telephone, I found myself trying to hold him on the telephone. I mentioned Stanley Lupinski’s abrupt and strange condolence call, hoping he would offer some explanation.
“I know his family,” Wolniak told me.
“Can you explain this animosity between Pole and native?” I asked, though I felt I had some inkling. I’d seen natives resenting interlopers all my life. Back in Ottumwa, Iowa, I could recall, some narrow townspeople, filled with unfocused venom, had called me, the little girl carrying lunch to my hard-working father, a sheeny, a kike, whole categories of names I soon learned were directed toward my people.
“Well,” Wolniak answered, “you got some impoverished old-timers, some folks that feel dispossessed of land and power and heritage, I guess. Like Eben. Old Yankees. Bloodlines winnowed down through centuries, pale shadows of their Bible-thumping forebears. Leastwise that’s my take on it. No power now, and one time they had all the power. They called the shots. These are the folks around here they call swamp Yankees.”
