That Day the Rabbi Left Town (25 page)

“And the night. I'm not due in Monday morning until eleven.”

“Your car was seen in your driveway Friday afternoon, but it was not there during the evening, and then it was. I thought you didn't drive on your Sabbath.”

“Well, I wanted to go to the temple, and walking was almost impossible, especially for Miriam. We have an old fable about a famous rabbi who found himself in his carriage on the road when the Sabbath fell. So he ruled that it was Sabbath everywhere except where his carriage was; that there it was still a weekday. So I thought I'd make the same ruling.”

“It's a good trick. Maybe I'll get you to do it for me when Town Meeting rolls around and I find myself having to do a week's work in one day.”

“Look, Chief, I want to see you.”

“Well, I'm tied down here at the station house until five. Why don't you come down here and—”

“Fine. But Miriam is here and—”

“Tell you what, David, you come down here and we'll talk. Then we'll go to your place and pick up Miriam and you'll come to my house. I'll call Amy and tell her you're coming over for the evening. She baked some doughnuts. We'll have coffee and doughnuts and I'll give you a drink.”

“Sounds fine. I'll be down in a few minutes.”

“See, I cleared my desk for you,” said Lanigan as Rabbi Small entered his office.

“That's very decent of you, Chief. I didn't mean to interrupt your work.”

Lanigan grinned. “Nah, I didn't have anything to do, but I'm on duty one Sunday a month, and this is it. I called Amy and she's expecting us. Now, what's bothering you?”

“This business of Professor Kent, of course. I talked to Rabbi Selig Friday night. He's been getting phone calls, and so has Al Bergson, and others, too.”

“David, David, you've seen letters in the newspaper from crazy people. Well, for every letter there are a hundred phone calls. To write a letter you at least have to know how to write. You need paper. You need a stamp. And anything you say is there in black and white so it can't be denied later. But to make a phone call, all you have to do is lift the receiver. No reasonable person believes that the young rabbi deliberately pushed Kent off the ledge. Besides, Bradford Ames is convinced he was dead before he got here.”

“So that's why Sergeant Schroeder questioned Ira Lerner about his daughter's friend, Mord Jacobs.”

“Did he now?”

“Yes, and Lerner said he seemed to doubt whatever he told him.”

“Ah, David, that's just Schroeder's way. If his salary had to be passed on every year by a town meeting, he'd be a lot friendlier in dealing with the citizens who do the voting.”

“Did you know he was going to question Lerner? Did he check with you?”

Lanigan shook his head. “He may have stopped by and spoken to the desk sergeant.”

“You mean you're out of it completely?”

“Pretty much. Ames asked me to interview a Tony Donofrio in Lynn, but that's probably because he didn't want him subjected to the Schroeder type of interview.”

The outside phone rang, and as he reached for it, Lanigan said, “That's probably Amy to tell me to pick up something at the supermarket.”

But it wasn't. It was Bradford Ames. “I called your house, but your wife said you were on duty at the station house.”

“Yeah, one Sunday a month—”

“Look, Chief, we found Kent's car. It was parked on Blossom Street, in Lynn.”

“That's right near the train station.”

“Right. And Tony Donofrio and his wife occupy a flat on that street. Sergeant Schroeder thinks if we pull him in and question him for a while, we might get something interesting. Now, you questioned Donofrio, so I'd like to talk to you about him. I'm here in Barnard's Crossing in my place on the Point. If you could come over—”

“I'm here with Rabbi Small. You remember him, don't you?”

“Oh, sure, I certainly remember Rabbi Small. Look, have him come, too.”

“But he's here with his wife. And my wife is expecting him and his wife for the evening.”

“Oh, I see. Well, how about tomorrow morning? Will you be free? Can you come in to Boston, say at ten, not at my office, but at Kent's house next to the college? I've made it my temporary headquarters while we go through his stuff.”

“I guess I can make it.”

Chapter 40

Although they were ready to leave by eight o'clock, the rabbi puttered around, and Miriam, sensing that he was reluctant to drive to Boston while traffic was at its heaviest, suggested that they have another cup of coffee. It was half past before they finally set out.

“You taking the old Boston Road, David?” she asked.

“No, I'll take the State Road; road conditions are apt to be better.” And that was the last they spoke while he leaned forward, his hands clutching the steering wheel until they reached their apartment in Brookline and he parked in his usual place along the car tracks. He boarded the streetcar that took him to Kenmore Square, walked the few short blocks to the college, and noted that it was not yet ten when he reached his office.

He had no sooner hung his coat on the rack than there was a knock on the partly open door. He called, “Come in,” and noted with surprise that it was Bradford Ames who entered.

“I was hoping to find you in, Rabbi,” said Ames. “I'd like you to join us at Kent's house.”

“Why? I gathered from Hugh Lanigan that you were going to talk about Donofrio. I never met the man. I know nothing about him.”

“Well, yes, I wanted to talk about Donofrio, but I also wanted to talk about all aspects of the case, all we know, and it occurred to me that you knew Kent—”

“Just barely.”

“But the rest of us didn't know him at all. And you know the college, the atmosphere—Why are you laughing?”

“I came out to Barnard's Crossing at the urging of Al Bergson, the president of the temple. He wanted me to note the change in the Friday evening service. When I told him that I had seen no change, he told me that I had no sense of atmosphere. And here you want me to come to your meeting as an expert on the atmosphere of the college.”

“You know what I mean. The gossip, the talk—”

“The departments don't fraternize much.”

“Yes, but you hear talk in the cafeteria when you have lunch—”

“I bring my lunch. But I do go to the cafeteria for a cup of coffee now and then. Sometimes alone, sometimes with Mord Jacobs, or Roger Fine—you remember him—sometimes with Sarah McBride, all from the English Department. Sometimes Dr. Cardleigh, the dean, joins me for a cup of coffee with his pipe.”

“Well, there you are, Rabbi; you've at least met Professor Kent, and you've occasionally had coffee with various members of his department. So why don't you put your coat on and come across the street to Kent's house with me?”

“All right, I'll be happy if I can be of any use. Something tells me this might take a while, so I'll leave a note on the door saying I won't meet my class today.”

There was a uniformed policeman who was sitting on one of the kitchen chairs just inside the door who admitted them. They repaired to the study and deposited their overcoats on the couch and then sat down to await the arrival of Schroeder and Lanigan. Schroeder arrived a minute or two later. He said, “Good morning,” and then with a nod in the rabbi's direction, he asked, “What's he doing here?”

Ames chuckled. “I thought he might be useful. He'd met Kent, and he knows the college. Besides, I'm sure you remember how useful Rabbi Small was the last time we were involved with the college.”

Lanigan arrived soon after. He was carrying a battered old briefcase, which he deposited on the floor beside his chair. “Sorry I'm late,” he said. “I stopped off—”

“It's all right, Chief,” said Ames. “Let's get started. We might as well stay here; it's the most comfortable room in the house and the only one besides the kitchen that's properly heated. I suspect that Kent spent most of his time here. Some of his clothes are in that closet, and I wouldn't be surprised if he slept on that couch at times. I'll have to ask Mrs. Bell.” He opened a drawer of the desk and took out a sheet of paper. “All right, let's see what we've got. When was Kent last seen alive?”

Schroeder flipped the leaves of his notebook. “He was in the school, just leaving to come here to finish dressing for this party he was going to.”

“Who saw him?”

“His friend Miller, who was in the English office, and Ms. McBride, who came in just as he was leaving.”

“All right,” said Ames. “Now, Mrs. Bell said she called at five past four, and there was no answer. I have the feeling that when Mrs. Bell says she called author-oh-five, that was exactly when she called. There was no answer, which I assume means that he hadn't got home yet. When next did someone try to make contact with him?”

“Donofrio took the train in Lynn at three-forty,” said Lanigan. “He said he came straight here and rang and knocked on the door. If the streetcar to Kenmore came right away, it would still be around half past four, because the three-forty out of Lynn gets to North station at four-o-two.”

“Then he came to the English office and spoke to Professor Sugrue,” said Schroeder after a glance at his notebook. “Asked if Kent might be teaching. And when told that he wasn't, went back to knock on the door again. Figured Kent might have been busy or been in the john when he knocked the first time. When Mrs. Bell came at five o'clock, the house was empty. Professor Miller called at a quarter past, and she told him Kent was not there. He had her look in the garage in back, and sure enough, the car was gone. So I figure that Donofrio is our man. I spoke to him after we found the car on his street, and he was pretty nervous.”

It occurred to the rabbi that almost anyone might be nervous when Schroeder questioned him, but he said nothing. Lanigan, however, remarked, “I spoke to him and he didn't seem the least bit nervous.”

“From what you told us of your conversation with him, I thought I'd better have a talk with him when Kent's car turned up on his doorstep, so to speak,” said Schroeder. The implication was that the amateur having opened the door, it was time for the professional to step in. “He wasn't too willing to talk to me; said he'd told you everything. When I pointed out that the car was found on his street, he claimed he knew nothing about it. My guess is that he parked and then went off to booze it up with his buddies, and forgot all about it. He admitted that he got home pretty late. Or maybe when he got back to move it, he found it plowed in and couldn't.”

“Seems to me,” Lanigan offered, “that if I had a hot car, my street would be the last place I'd park it.”

“Sure,” the sergeant agreed, “but with the storm we had that Wednesday, it wasn't easy to find a parking place, so he took the first one that showed up. But it wasn't just the car on his street that made me suspicious of him. See, we checked Kent's safe-deposit box, and it had an insurance policy of fifty thousand dollars, and the beneficiary was Donofrio's wife. There was also a will leaving everything to Donofrio's daughter. And what with a savings account and a checking account, there was over twenty thousand that he had in the bank, plus other property that he might have. To Donofrio some seventy thousand dollars would be a pretty good reason for wanting him dead.”

“Is that all that was in the safe-deposit box?” asked the rabbi.

“Oh, there was some jewelry and there was a doctor's dissertation on—”

“Simeon Suggs, whom I've never heard of,” said Ames.

“Aha!”

Ames turned to the rabbi. “And what does that ‘Aha' portend? Is it rabbinical or merely professorial?”

“It's neither.” He laughed. “But my first day here I met with the dean, Dr. Cardleigh, who talked of the stupidity of requiring a dissertation for the Ph.D. His own degree is an M.D., by the way. It takes two or three years to do one, and since it had to be original, it was usually about a subject that wasn't worth doing. He mentioned that someone here had written on Simeon Suggs, a poet he'd never heard of. I didn't like to inquire, but I've wondered off and on which member of the English Department it was. Now I know it was Professor Kent.”

“But it wasn't Professor Kent's dissertation, Rabbi. It was a photocopy issued by a microfilm company in Michigan that specializes in that sort of thing. It was written by—er—Sergeant?”

Schroeder, grinning at the idea of scoring off the rabbi, thumbed his notebook and announced, “Oscar Horton, University of Nevada, 1953.”

“Hmm.” The rabbi stared up at the ceiling in disregard of the smiles on the faces of the others. Then he lowered his gaze and said, “Then I am prepared to make a wager.”

Ames emitted a gurgly chuckle. “All right, Rabbi, you're covered. What's your bet?”

“I am willing to bet that Professor Miller is the one Dr. Cardleigh referred to.”

“You mean—”

“I mean that Professor Miller copied that Horton dissertation and submitted it as his own. And further, that Kent found out about it somehow and used it to coerce Miller.”

“To do what?”

“Anything he asked of him; to invite him to his house in Barnard's Crossing practically every weekend, to be his chauffeur, to be his constant companion. Kent was a bore whom no one liked. His colleagues were leery of him, even feared him because of his influence with the trustees through his wife, Matilda Clark. Friendless and alone, he forced Miller to be his friend. The Odd Couple, they called them. He even got Miller tenure, to be sure that he'd stay on at Windermere.”

“Are you suggesting that Miller might have killed him?” asked Ames.

The rabbi nodded. “Mm-hm. I think it very likely. I suspect he was going to leave him here in the house, because he assumed the body would not be found until Monday at the earliest. But then he discovered that the housekeeper was coming in at five. He didn't answer the phone when she called, but he played it back on the answering machine, and he knew she had a key. So he brought the body out to the car in the garage.”