Mrs. Kaplan and the Matzoh Ball of Death (18 page)

The morning after our adventure as burglars, Mrs. K and I were up early having our breakfast, because at ten o'clock we were to meet with Pupik and the policemen. No rest for the weary, as they say. Even though Mrs. K by now had answered all my questions and told me what she intended to do, I was still nervous; in fact, I was more nervous than Mrs. K, who seemed to be more relaxed than I had seen her since the
seder
.

I became even more anxious when we entered Pupik's office and I saw the two policemen already sitting at the table, Jenkins having some official-looking papers in front of him. I was sure they were there to arrest poor Mrs. K. It would be just like I have seen it on television: They would be “reading her her rights,” as they call it, and telling her she could make one telephone call…but of course I was jumping to too many conclusions. In fact, before we had even sat down, Mrs. K looked straight at Corcoran (the nice young man who reminded me of Dalgliesh) and said, “I know who took Daisy Goldfarb's earring, who put it in Mrs. Finkelstein's soup, and where the other earring is now. Do you want I should tell you, or would you rather play detective games first?”

I was glad that I had a good view of the table as Mrs. K made this statement, because the look on Mr. Pupik's face was not to be missed. His mouth, it was open as if he was about to say something, but nothing was coming out. A herring out of water he most resembled. Jenkins looked like he had just swallowed something very unpleasant and wished he could spit it out.

Corcoran, however, looked only amused. He smiled at Mrs. K and said in a pleasant voice, “Well, now, Mrs. Kaplan, that is indeed quite a statement. And although I have to admit to being a little skeptical that you can back it up, I have a feeling it would be best not to take what you say lightly.

“I thought that I would be telling you my theory of the case. But I'm sure that all of us will be most anxious to hear your version first.”

At this he looked around at the others in the room. He too saw the expressions that I'm describing, and I'm sure he did not think for a minute that either Pupik or Jenkins was at all anxious to hear Mrs. K's version. But as he was clearly the one in charge of the meeting, he did not ask their opinion on the matter, but nodded to Mrs. K, who smiled and proceeded:

“What we all know for certain is the following: Poor Bertha Finkelstein died at our
seder
when she choked on an earring that belonged to Daisy Goldfarb. I made the soup and matzoh balls that Mrs. Finkelstein was eating when she died. The earring had to be put there by either Daisy or by someone who stole it from her, and because she has reported her earrings to be stolen and we have no reason to suspect otherwise, we can assume it is the thief who was responsible for the earring ending up in Mrs. Finkelstein. Are we all agreed on these things?”

Mrs. K looked from one person at the table to another, and although no one spoke out, all either nodded or made no indication of protest. So she continued: “Now, because I know that I was the only one with access to the kitchen while the soup was made, and I also know that I did not steal the earrings from Daisy Goldfarb, God forbid, therefore in my mind it had to be someone else who was responsible, someone who also could have dropped the earring into the soup, either by accident or on purpose.”

Here Jenkins broke in, saying, “What do you mean ‘on purpose'? Are you suggesting someone not only stole the earrings, but then they deliberately put one in the victim's soup so she would choke on it? I think you've been reading too many mystery novels, Mrs. Kaplan.”

It looked like Corcoran was about to jump in and tell Jenkins to be quiet, but before he could do it Mrs. K looked right at Jenkins and said, “Not at all, Mr. Jenkins. If you'll let me continue, I'll explain just what I do mean.”

Jenkins looked over at Corcoran, who nodded, and Jenkins reluctantly said to Mrs. K, “Sure, go ahead.”

“Thank you,” she said. “Now as I was saying, the earring had to be dropped in the soup either accidentally or on purpose, and it had to be by someone in a position to drop it there. Again because I eliminated myself, that did not leave many other possibilities. For one thing, Mrs. Finkelstein was sitting at a table alone, because her usual table companions had not come to the
seder
.

“Although it was possible that the serving person who brought the soup to Mrs. Finkelstein, or even the cook, dropped the earring in, I tried to picture just how they would do that accidentally. But all of the pictures I imagined were too silly to take seriously, or at least they were extremely unlikely. And as you so clearly put it, Mr. Jenkins, it is not at all likely that someone trying to kill poor Bertha—and I cannot imagine a single possible reason anyone would have for doing such a thing—would choose this method to do it.”

By now even Corcoran was getting anxious to hear where Mrs. K was heading, and he said to her, “That is all true, but it does seem to lead back to you, does it not, Mrs. Kaplan?”

“Not at all,” she replied, with another nice smile for Corcoran. “Remember, because I know I did not take the earrings, I have to look farther for the answer, even if you would be willing to stop here and blame me.” She is no longer smiling when she says this. “And so I ask myself, have I eliminated absolutely everybody who was in a position to put that earring into the soup? And after much thinking, I conclude I have not. There is one more person, and that person was in the best position of all to do this.”

“And just who is that, Mrs. Kaplan?” Corcoran asked, and I knew it was everyone at the table who wanted to know the same thing.

Mrs. K looked directly at Corcoran and said softly (she is quite good at the dramatics, our Mrs. K), “It is Bertha Finkelstein herself.”

There was complete silence in the room. I could hear the electric clock on the wall tick-tock the seconds, maybe ten times, before it was Corcoran who asked, speaking slowly like he was very confused, “Are you saying that Mrs. Finkelstein stole Mrs. Goldfarb's earrings and then used one of them to commit suicide?” He was, I think, trying to keep from laughing. He controlled himself, however, and waited for an answer.

“Yes, and no,” she told him. “Or perhaps I should say partly yes, and absolutely no.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I shall explain. Yes, it was Mrs. Finkelstein who stole Daisy's earring. One earring, not both. And although she did choke herself on the stolen earring, it was not on purpose, but an accident.”

This time it was Pupik who piped up. “Mrs. Kaplan, this is all a waste of time, and I for one have better things to do than listen to some patently ridiculous theory that couldn't possibly have happened. If you think you will save yourself by blaming the poor dead woman, when she obviously cannot defend herself, let me tell you…”

But before Pupik could rant further, Corcoran put his hand on Pupik's arm and said in a soothing voice, “Please, I'd like to let Mrs. Kaplan finish her explanation before we pass judgment on it. I'm sure she is going to tell us just how she came to this rather…ext
raordinary conclusion. Is that correct, Mrs. Kaplan?”

“Of course, Mr. Corcoran,” she said to him. “I know it seems improbable, but as my own favorite detective used to say, ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, you should look very closely at the not so likely.' ”

“Well,” said Corcoran with a smile, “I'm not sure Mr. Holmes said it quite that way, but I think we see the point. Please proceed.”

And Mrs. K did: “As I was saying, Mrs. Finkelstein was the only other person who had a good opportunity to both steal the earrings and put them in the soup. And she was in the best position of all to do it, as no one else was sitting near her.”

Here Mrs. K paused. She raised a finger as if correcting herself, and said: “Actually it is not completely true that no one sat next to Mrs. Finkelstein. Ida told me that someone dressed as a clergyman sat down briefly and spoke with Bertha, so I asked our receptionist about it, and she told me it was indeed the new assistant priest at the Catholic church, just as Ida had guessed.” She looked over and nodded in my direction. “He had come by unexpectedly and was looking for Mr. Pupik to introduce himself and wish him a happy Passover, which was nice of him, I'm sure. He apparently saw Bertha sitting there all by herself and sat down just to be friendly and introduce himself. In any case, he certainly did not steal Daisy's earrings.”

With this, at least, no one argued, so Mrs. K continued: “So that left Bertha herself. But even if I could suspect her of being a thief, which knowing her I could not, like you I could not think of any reason she would put one of the earrings in her soup. Certainly not to commit suicide! So I gave up on this for the moment and concentrated on whether Bertha would have any likelihood of stealing Daisy's earrings in the first place. I add her to the list I am preparing of persons about whom I would like to know if they have criminal records.”

“You were going to check on their criminal records?” interrupted Corcoran in an incredulous tone. “How…”

“This I cannot tell you, so it is no use asking.” Corcoran started to say something but apparently decided to wait and let Mrs. K finish. “But I managed to get this information, and it was very surprising to me. There in black and white is at least a possible motive for Bertha Finkelstein as a thief. Or if not exactly a motive, at least an explanation.”

“And what was that?” Corcoran asked.

“It seems that Mrs. Finkelstein had been arrested at least twice in the past for theft, but each time she was let off when it was found that she suffered from kleptomania. She could not help herself taking something very attractive, not for her profit, but just to have it. In both cases she returned the items and received treatment and she was not charged. But I know that there have been small things, shiny trinkets mostly, that have disappeared from time to time here at the Home, and I would not be at all surprised if Bertha Finkelstein was responsible for at least some of those.”

“Did you know about this, Mr. Pupik?” Corcoran asked, turning toward him.

Pupik looked uncomfortable and squirmed a little, which I did not mind at all seeing, and he said, “Well, yes, it's on her confidential record. She has received psychological counseling and I'm not aware of any incidents where it has been proven that she has taken anything here at the Home. And in any case, I don't see how that concerns Mrs. Kaplan or how she found out about it…”

“Yes,” Corcoran said, “I'll also want to know how she found out about it, but not at the moment. Meanwhile, I wish you had told us this earlier, as it does possibly put things in a different light.” He looked not very pleased with Pupik. He turned again to Mrs. K and asked her to continue.

“So now I had a possible connection between Bertha and the theft, and I tried to reconstruct in my mind how it might have occurred. As you know, the theft, if it occurred, could have happened anytime between about 2
P.M
., when Miss Zeiss helped Daisy to remove the earrings and put them on the table by the door, and the time we are going to the
seder,
about 5
P.M
., because Daisy does not remember putting them away or even noticing them on the table. I also know that Daisy is absentminded and sometimes leaves her door not only unlocked, but open, when she leaves her room. Finally, I recalled that Bertha Finkelstein was one of the last persons to come to the
seder,
as my friend Ida remarked to me on the nice blue dress she was wearing when she came in.” And here she looked at me again and smiled, and I was pleased to be included in the story.

“So I put two and three together and I had my answer. Daisy left her door open when she left for the
seder
. The earrings were on the table by the door, in plain sight of someone passing by. Bertha Finkelstein has always admired the shiny earrings, and when she sees them there on the table as she is walking to the
seder,
she cannot resist the taking.”

“Wait a minute,” interrupted Jenkins, getting red in the face. “If Mrs. Finkelstein took the earrings, then where's the other one? We didn't find it on the victim's person, or near her chair, or in her room. Where is it?”
Oy,
he was working himself up into a real tizzy like he was about to
plotz
!

But Mrs. K just looked at Jenkins and said, quite calmly, “I shall tell you where is the other earring. It is in Daisy Goldfarb's closet.”

“I beg your pardon,” Corcoran said.

“I did not say that Bertha took both earrings. She took only one. She did not take the earring because she wanted to wear it, but because she could not resist this pretty object that she has admired. The other earring she left behind. It was no doubt a thing she did on impulse, without really thinking about it.”

“And you say the other earring is still in Mrs. Goldfarb's possession?” Corcoran said.

“Yes, on the shelf behind some sweaters. I expect you will want to check that I am right when we are finished here.”

Jenkins began to say something, but it seemed as if he could not find the words, so Corcoran spoke first. “Mrs. Kaplan, you are full of surprises. Now you are telling us that Mrs. Goldfarb still had the other earring when she reported both of them stolen? That is what you told us, isn't it, Mr. Pupik?”

Pupik, who was looking even more confused and much more uncomfortable than even Jenkins, only nodded. Corcoran then said to Mrs. K, “And why did she report two earrings stolen if only one was taken?”

Mrs. K shook her head slowly at Corcoran and said, “Now, I know you are smart enough that you have figured that out already. Mrs. Goldfarb has a wonderful pair of earrings. She loves to wear them and show them off. One is stolen. Now she has only one earring, and although in theory it is worth the same as the stolen one, it is of no use to her without its mate. On the other hand, she will receive more money from the insurance company for the loss of two earrings than just one. Better she should say both earrings were stolen and end up with the money and also an extra one.”

Mr. Pupik now stood up and shook his finger at Mrs. K, saying, “Now wait just a minute. It's bad enough you accuse poor Mrs. Finkelstein of having stolen Mrs. Goldfarb's earring. Now you are impugning the integrity of Mrs. Goldfarb as well. I wouldn't be surprised if she decided to sue you for slander!” He was really working himself up here.

Mrs. K did not seem ruffled, however. She turned to Pupik and said, “Daisy Goldfarb is a friend of mine and I have a hard time thinking of her as cheating the insurance company. But I also know that her no-good son Barry, a real
ganif,
has already been convicted before of doing just that. It is not at all difficult for me to imagine Daisy's son seeing the chance to cheat the insurance company and convincing his mother to go along with it. She has always made excuses for Barry and protected him when she should have let him suffer the consequences of his bad acts, and I have never heard of her saying no to him on anything he asked. And that,” she said to Corcoran, “is why you will find the second earring just where I told you, at least if you look for it before Daisy has a chance to put it somewhere else.”

Everyone was silent again as they tried to digest this latest information. Finally, it was Corcoran again who spoke up: “Before we start searching people's rooms, Mrs. Kaplan, you haven't told us yet how Mrs. Finkelstein, assuming she took Mrs. Goldfarb's earring, came to choke on it.”

“Yes, I was getting to that. I was thinking very hard about the
seder
and everything I could remember about it, such as who came in and when, who said and did what. I was also thinking that although we are all assuming that the earring that choked Mrs. Finkelstein was either in the matzoh balls or in the soup, that is not necessarily the only possibility. All we really know is that it ended up in Mrs. Finkelstein. And suddenly it was like a lightbulb went on in my head, just like you see in the newspaper cartoons.”

Here she made a gesture with her hand over the top of her head, to indicate this lightbulb. Then she said, “Just after Bertha Finkelstein sat down at her table, in comes Benjamin, Mr. Taubman's son.” She turned to Pupik and said, “You know Benjamin—he is the policeman.
Oy,
there could not be a bigger contrast than between Mr. Taubman's son and Daisy Goldfarb's: one is a policeman, a real
mensch,
and the other is a
ganif
!”

“Yes, but please get to the point,” Pupik said. I noticed that his tone was not as belligerent now as it was a few minutes earlier.

“Well, when Benjamin came in, all dressed in his fine police uniform with the shiny brass buttons, Ida remarked to me that she still gets a little nervous when she sees a policeman in uniform approaching. It is a force of habit from when she was growing up in a country where a visit from the police could only mean bad trouble.” And again Mrs. K gave me a nice smile, and I was again glad I had been of help, even if I did not know it at the time.

“Now Bertha Finkelstein had also grown up in such a bad country, Poland, before coming to America, so one might assume it is likely that she too felt some panic when a policeman appeared unexpectedly, even if she knew who he was. Furthermore, as we learned from the rabbi at the memorial service for Bertha, she had a particularly terrible experience with the police as a child, when they took away her parents and she never saw them again.” She paused for a moment at this sad thought, then continued: “And remember, I am also assuming that Bertha had just taken one of Daisy's earrings, on her way to the
seder,
and she had it in her hand—stolen goods, you might say.

“What does someone who is holding a small incriminating object do when they suddenly see the police coming toward them?”

She looked around the table for an answer. Corcoran said what we are all thinking: “I suppose she tries to hide it.”

“Exactly,” Mrs. K said. “I have read where people who are holding narcotics try to flush them down the toilet, or throw them out the window, or—and this is where I am coming to—swallow them. Is that not correct?” This was directed at both Corcoran and Jenkins.

“Well, yes, sometimes…” said Corcoran slowly, “but might she more likely have dropped the earring into her pocket? Or even down the front of her dress?”

“Ah! We are thinking the same way, because that is exactly what I thought. That is why we had to bur…that is, I remembered that Bertha's pretty blue dress had no pockets—and a high neckline buttoned at the top. She was a modest person and did not wear dresses that were open across here.” Mrs. K gestured with her hand across her chest.