Sunday the Rabbi Stayed Home (20 page)

“Sure Mr. Paff We all have them.”

“Well, in case anybody comes down to make inquiries – not likely to, you understand, but just in case – I’d rather you wouldn’t mention I was planning to fire the kid. They might get the wrong impression.” He laughed – a deep bass burble. “Hell. I wouldn’t have fired him, not a kid from my hometown.”

“Sure, Mr. Paff. What they don’t know won’t hurt them.”

“I want you to cooperate with them, understand? Tell them everything, but there’s no need to tell them anything unimportant. Now if they should ask when I left here, you remember it was sometime after eight o’clock –”

“Oh, No, Mr. Paff, it was quite a bit before –”

“No. it was after, almost quarter past. This friend of yours – you think he’d work out?”

“Oh, he’s smart, Mr. Paff.”

“All right, I guess you’re a pretty good judge of character.

Tell him to come down tomorrow night, and I’ll put him on.”

“Gee, thanks, Mr. Paff. You leave him to me, and I’ll show him the ropes. You won’t be sorry.”

Chief Lanigan knew that the youngsters in his living room were there by coercion and that if he tried to appear friendly, they would only mistrust him more. So he tried candor.

“I won’t ask you to make yourselves comfortable because I know you can’t until this business is cleared up. That would be asking a lot. But there’s coffee here and some cookies and for those who want something cold, Coke. Help yourselves.”

“I’ll have a cup of coffee,” said Adam Sussman.

“So will I,” said Bill Jacobs.

“I’d like a Coke, please,” said Betty Marks.

Chief Lanigan, with the rabbi helping, passed out drinks and cookies. Then, when they were settled, he began again. “All of you participated in a cookout on the beach at Tarlow’s Point last Monday evening –”

“Just a minute,” said Jacobs. “There was someone else,”

“You’re referring to Adam Jenkins?”

“That’s right.”

“I asked the Boston police to contact him for us. He lives in a boarding house, and his landlady said he had gone off to New York. We have also contacted the New York police and asked them to look him up for us. In the meantime I’m afraid we’ll have to do without him. Now, sometime during the evening you were joined by Moose Carter. And a little while later Gorfinkle here had to leave to pick up his folks, thus leaving you without transportation when the storm started. You ran for cover to Hillson House, forced a window, and took shelter inside.”

“Just a minute,” said Adam Sussman. “I’m not admitting anything.”

Lanigan sighed. “Let’s get one thing straight, Sussman: I’m not trying to trap you. Everything I have said and everything I’m going to say I can prove easily. I’m just trying to find out what happened. The point I was trying to make is that you were all guilty of breaking and entering. Under the circumstances your behavior has some justification. That was a pretty frightening storm. What’s more, it seems that you did nothing but take shelter. There is no evidence of vandalism, and as far as we can make out, nothing was taken. But it was breaking and entering, and I can hold you for it.” He looked around at them pointedly.

“That’s blackmail isn’t it?” said Jacobs. “Yes.” said Lanigan pleasantly. “So what do you want to know?”

“Let’s start from the beginning.”

“All right, so you. Jacobs, and Sussman marched him into the study/ said Lanigan. “Just a minute.” He went to the hall closet and came back with a package. “I stopped off at the hardware store earlier and got one of those plastic drop cloths. It’s just about the size of the plastic dust cover in the study at Hillson House.” He unfolded it and spread it on the floor. “Now. Gorfinkle, suppose you lie down on that, and Jacobs can show us how he wrapped Moose.”

Stu lay down on the sheet as everyone craned forward to watch. But Bill Jacobs shook his head. “The sheet was draped sort of catty-cornered on the couch, so that Moose was lying on the diagonal. Move your carcass around. Stu. That’s right.” Suiting the action to the words he proceeded to demonstrate. “First, we picked up this corner and covered his feet. Then we picked up this corner and wrapped it tight around his body and kind of tucked it in. Then we picked up the opposite corner and wrapped it over that and tucked it under him, like this.”

“And was anything said at the time, or had Moose passed out?”

“No, he was swearing, mostly at Jenkins.”

“And Jenkins, did he say anything?”

“Not that I remember, except when we finished wrapping him up and he fell asleep. Jenkins said – but it was just in time –”

“What did he say?”

“Oh, something about we ought to put it over his flippin’ head.” And then Jacobs added quickly, “But he was just joking.”

“Of course.” said Lanigan easily. “Now, when you came back to Hillson House, how did you find Moose? Any change in the way he was wrapped?”

“Well, this top corner had been pulled over and tucked in where the folds of the plastic met.”

“Show me.”

“Hey!” from Stu.

“Don’t worry, Gorfinkle, we won’t leave you there,” Lanigan reassured him.

Bill Jacobs lifted the upper corner of the sheet and folded it over Stu’s head and tucked it in.

Sue Arons shrieked. “Take it off,” she cried hysterically, “take it off!”

In company Pearl Jacobs was gay, almost giddy, but in the privacy of her home, with her family, she could be sober and shrewd. When her husband had finished describing the meeting of the parents at the rabbi’s study, she said, “I don’t understand why the rabbi called you. I should think it would be Gorfinkle he’d call. He’s the president.”

“He said it was because our Bill was the only one who had been involved with the affair from beginning to end, but of course, his real reason was that he was probably embarrassed about calling Ben Gorfinkle after he had threatened to give him the ax.”

“I’ll bet Ben wouldn’t be elected now if he were to run.”

“Why? Because he ticked off the rabbi? You think he’s so popular?”

“No. I mean. I don’t know how popular the rabbi is. I know he doesn’t have a special following. And some of those parents may feel sore at him for getting the kids to tell the police what they knew.”

“You think so?”

She nodded. “I felt that way myself when I first heard of it, but then I realized it was bound to come out sooner or later. Besides, I didn’t like the idea of a murderer running around loose and –”

“What’s that got to do with Ben Gorfinkle?” said her husband patiently.

She looked at him in surprise. “Simply that a lot of the girls feel that this fight in the congregation he started is not such a good idea.”

“Yes, but the girls don’t vote.”

“Maybe not.” she said, “but a lot of them can influence those who do vote, and in Reform congregations they do vote, and I think it’s a good idea. Anyway, a lot of the women I talked to, they don’t like the idea of building an organization like this and then breaking it in two over a silly business of who is to sit where.”

“Look, Pearl, I hope you don’t talk that way outside. We weren’t trying to split the organization. And it isn’t over the seating business; that’s just incidental. We have a program and a damn good program, and at every step of the way we were blocked by Paff and his group. Since we can’t get them to agree, wouldn’t it be better if the two views, the two philosophies, should each have their own machinery for doing what they consider important, instead of each preventing the other from doing anything?”

“Isn’t that just like a man?” She shook her head. “You say we don’t want to split; we just want to do the things that cause a split. And that satisfies your conscience. Well, let me tell you that women are a lot more realistic. You’re like a bunch of kids who think if you don’t give it a name, it doesn’t exist. But you know what a split does? It isn’t just that you get two temples where you only had one before. It means that you get two groups that tend to keep away from each other. The people of one temple tend to stay away from the people of the other temple. It doesn’t make so much difference to the men – they’re away all day, and most evenings they’re too tired to do anything. But the women are around here all day long. Take me and Marjie Arons; we’re both in Women’s League. And we’re close. All right, the temple splits, and I’m in one temple and Marjie is in the other. Don’t you think that will put up a wall between us?”

“But we don’t see them socially, anyway,” he protested.

“We don’t as a couple see them as a couple because you don’t like him, and I’m not crazy about him either. But Marjie and I see each other. And how about the kids?”

“What about them?” he asked.

“Well, if there are two temples, there will be different affairs, and the kids from one temple will feel funny about going to affairs from the other place. Here’s Bill out in this dinky little college in a town in Minnesota that nobody has ever heard of. From what he tells me, there are less than a dozen Jewish families in the whole town and practically no eligible Jewish girls. Do you think that doesn’t worry me? But at least when he comes home for his vacations here, there are plenty of Jewish girls. He can play the field. And you now want to cut off half of them. Do you want your son to marry a Gentile, God forbid?”

“Come on, Pearl, you’re making a big deal – do you think if Bill wants to take a girl out, he’s going to bother about what temple her folks go to?”

“No,” she said, “but he’ll have less chance of meeting them.”

“Well, a temple is not a matrimonial bureau.”

“There are lots worse things that it could be, especially in a Yankee town like Barnard’s Crossing. Why do you suppose the Sisterhood works so hard to make a go of it? You think it’s so that you men can go there two or three times a year to mumble your prayers? We put on bazaars, and we put on shows. We have luncheons and brunches and whatnot. We have a big educational program. And at the end of the year, we hand the temple organization a whopping big check. We do it. I suppose, because some of it is fun and keeps us busy. But Marjie Arons does it partly to increase the chances of her Sue marrying a Jewish boy, and I do it to help insure that Bill marries a Jewish girl.”

“The rabbi –”

“He doesn’t know any more about it than you do. He’s a man, too. I’ll bet the rebbitzin understands though.”

“I see.” Jacobs said with a laugh. “And how long have you girls been plotting? When do you plan to take over?”

“Who needs it? You men want to run things? Go ahead. Big shots! You’re like kids with a toy. You play with it, and then you get tired of it and leave it lying around or break it. You go ahead and plan and appoint committees,

take votes, pass resolutions, make – what did Ben Gorfinkle call it? – ‘an active voice for social reform in the community’ or what the rabbi is always talking about, ‘a house of study and prayer’ – but don’t break it. Because it isn’t only for you; it’s for us – and for the kids.”

“I see, so the kids are in on it, too?” he asked sarcastically.

“Don’t run down the kids. Sometimes they show more sense than their parents. Our Bill is no fool. He was talking to me about it. He was concerned that the rabbi might leave. Now the kids like him and respect him. That’s why Bill told the police – because the rabbi said he ought to, and Bill trusted him.”

“Does Mrs. Paff think the way you do?”

“She has no children, so she doesn’t feel about these things the way I do, I suppose. But Paff himself – if I were in his business that depends so much on kids. I wouldn’t go out of my way to antagonize them.”

“Well, what do you think?” asked Lanigan.

“I don’t think you learned too much, did you?” the rabbi countered. “Still, there were a number of points brought out that I thought interesting. They seemed quite unanimously agreed that it was the Carter boy who first suggested that they invade Hillson House and who assured them that they would not be seen.”

Lanigan grinned. “Sure, it was safe to blame him; he can’t answer back.”

“There is that, of course –”

“I found that little dig by the Epstein girl about the Marks girl having dated Moose quite a bit last year interesting.”

“You attribute any significance to that? You didn’t pursue it at the time.”

“I thought it would be more profitable to inquire about it later on.”

“Really? I regarded it as normal female cattiness.” observed the rabbi. “About the only other bit of evidence I found worthwhile was the matter of the front door.”

“What was that?”

“Bill Jacobs saying that he remembered fixing the latch on the front door so that they could come back and get Moose.”

“Oh yes.” said Lanigan. “Why do you regard that as especially important?”

“Because it means that after they left, anyone could have got in.”

“If they had known.” Lanigan interjected swiftly. “But it wouldn’t have made any difference to someone with a key.”

“Like who?”

“Like a man named Paff. Know him? He’s a member of your temple.”

“Meyer Paff?”

“That’s right. He had a key to the place and was around there that night at about the right time.”

Rabbi Small did not answer immediately. “Look here,” he said at last, “obviously there’s much about this case I don’t know. There’s no reason for me to know it. It’s police business. But if it concerns members of my congregation and you want me to cooperate –”

“Keep your shirt on. Rabbi. I was planning to give it all to you.” He went to the hall closet and returned with an attaché case. “Here’s a copy of Paff s statement.”

The rabbi read it through and then looked up and said mildly, “It seems straightforward enough.”

“Oh, it is.” said Lanigan hastily. “And yet, there are some interesting aspects to the very fact that he was there. For one thing, he knew the boy. Moose worked for him.”

“Mr. Paff is an active member of the Boosters Club here in town and knows most of the high school athletes. He would certainly know Moose Carter.”

“It’s just a little detail. Here’s another. The Lynn bowling alley has been under the surveillance of the Lynn police.