The Odd Job (26 page)

But somebody had to do something about Melanson, and who else was there? Dolores was dead. The only one with any power at the Wilkins now was Turbot, and Turbot had done this terrible thing to an inoffensive man who had meekly and faithfully served the museum for most of his life. And Turbot had done it, moreover, for no reason except to swell up like a bullfrog and croak his greatness to a largely uninterested world.

Sarah wondered whether Lala had been told of her husband’s coup, and what she’d said about it. Nothing complimentary, Sarah hoped, not that she had much time for Lala either. That seemed an odd marriage, but then marriages did tend to be. She rather wished she’d asked Anne a little more about the Turbots, just out of curiosity. Well, there’d be time for that; she’d better eat.

The meal was wonderful, as Miriam’s meals always were. Sarah would have liked to stay for dessert but she and Ira had a fairish drive ahead of them and it would hardly do to leave Harris twiddling his handcuffs at the jail when she herself had been so peremptory about setting the time. She pushed back her chair and took Davy in her arms.

“Give me a good-night kiss, darling. Uncle Ira and I have to go now.”

“Will you be coming back tonight?” Miriam asked her.

“I’d love to, if it’s possible. I don’t know, Miriam. I’ve never bailed anybody before, I have no idea how long it might take. Maybe Ira had better just drop me off at the jail and come straight back here by himself. I can always phone Tulip Street and have Charles pick me up.”

“Nothing doing,” said Ira. “Mim, you and Davy will be all right by yourselves, won’t you? We can call Mike to come and keep you company, he won’t mind.”

“Huh,” snorted his wife. “Then Mike will show up with Tracy and you two will come back ten minutes later and there won’t be enough beds. Which wouldn’t bother Mike and Tracy, I don’t suppose, but it bothers me. What I think is that Sarah had better stay as far away from Tulip Street as she can get and come back here with you, no matter if it’s three o’clock in the morning. Just phone if it’s late so I’ll know. Okay?”

“Okay.” Ira kissed his wife with efficiency and thoroughness. “I’ll give you a buzz when we get to the jail. I believe we’ll be allowed one phone call.”

“That’s only if you’ve been pinched.”

“So I’ll commit a misdemeanor. You going to be warm enough in that thin jacket, Sarah? It gets chilly once the sun’s gone down.”

As always, Miriam had what was needed. “Why don’t you take my blue shawl, Sarah, the one Mother Rivkin knitted for me when Mike was on the way. It’s showing its age, but that’s what you want, isn’t it? You’ll look like somebody’s mother.”

“Well, I am, you know,” Sarah reminded her sister-in-law gently. “Take good care of Aunt Mimi, Davy. I’ll be back but you’ll be asleep. Tomorrow we can go to see the heron. Maybe he’ll show us how to flap our wings so we can fly down to get Daddy.”

Moments later, Sarah and Ira were in the borrowed car, a mid-sized sedan of no impressive pedigree but reasonable power and comfort. Sarah offered to drive but Ira demurred. Since this was not his car, he preferred to take the responsibility of driving it, which was understandable enough. Having said his piece, he switched on the radio to a classical-music station and they listened to Brahms and Beethoven most of the way to Boston.

Neither of them talked much. Ira must have been wondering what he’d let himself in for, and so was Sarah. Both took it as a good omen when, as they were crawling toward the jail and wondering where it might be possible to park, a taxi rolled up and Jacob Bittersohn rolled out.

Sarah rolled down her window and stuck out her head.

“Uncle Jake! How dear of you to come. Here, let me pay for the cab.”

“Don’t be meshugge.” Lawyer Bittersohn walked over and opened the car door for Sarah to get out “We’re here on behalf of one Joseph Herbert Melanson, security guard at the Wilkins Museum since April 14, 1965, right? Booked as a material witness to the murder of one Dolores Agnew Tawne, right?”

“If you say so. I didn’t know his first name was Joseph,” Sarah confessed.

“So you didn’t do your homework. Come on, take that foolishness off your head so you won’t scare the guards, and give Ira a chance to park the car so he doesn’t land in the jug himself. We’ll see you inside, Ira. With any luck, we’ll see you outside as well.”

Since he was double-parked outside a jail, Ira was only too willing to move on. Sarah and her uncle-in-law went inside, where they were met by two guards and a small, thin man with a briefcase who walked like Groucho Marx and resembled him too. This must be the bail bondsman. Jacob Bittersohn greeted him affably by name and insisted on introducing him to Sarah, who was in no mood for socializing. She found him somewhat unnerving. Having disposed of her improvised wig and wiped the unbecoming makeup off her face, she got down to business.

“As far as I can make out, this whole debacle started merely because the Wilkins’s new head of trustees wanted to play Perry Mason. Having been subjected to one of Elwyn Fleesom Turbot’s totally unfounded harangues this past Sunday myself, I know how devastating it must have been for Mr. Melanson to be yelled at and berated and bullied into confessing that he’d murdered a colleague whom in fact he wouldn’t have dared to touch with a ten-foot pole. Mr. Melanson’s a very timid middle-aged bachelor, compulsively afraid of putting a foot wrong and easily cowed by practically anybody. I’m told he’s already tried to commit suicide and I’m not surprised, not because he’s guilty of anything but because he’s been mistreated to the point where he just couldn’t handle the stress. We’ll have to bring suit, Uncle Jake.”

“So? How do you know about the suicide?”

“Uncle Jem told me over the phone, while Miriam was getting supper. He said Lieutenant Harris wanted to talk to me. I’m afraid I did most of the talking. Harris was supposed to meet us here on the dot of eight, blast him. I don’t want to spend the night twiddling my thumbs, either bring Melanson out or show me where to find him.”

“Oy, such a
macher
.” Lawyer Bittersohn gazed upon this embattled niece-in-law with wonderment and delight. “How come Miriam didn’t join the war?”

“She had to stay and baby-sit my child for me, which is another thing I’m cross about. Never mind that now, it’s Melanson I want to talk to. Where do I find him?”

One of the guards made the mistake of trying to placate her. “I don’t think he’d want to see you. He’s clammed up.”

“More likely he’s slipped into a catatonic fit,” she snapped back. “Has he been seen by a doctor?”

“Well, no.”

“Please make a note of that, Uncle Jake. We may have to sue his jailers also. Come along, all of you. I want to see Joseph Melanson right now, no matter what state he’s in.”

“Hi, Mrs. Bittersohn.” By now the voice was familiar. “Am I late?”

“Yes,” snapped Sarah. “Oh, Lieutenant Harris, do you know my husband’s uncle, Attorney Jacob Bittersohn? He’s going to arrange about bail, should that prove necessary. In the meantime, I’m going to see Mr. Melanson.”

“You said something about a doctor,” one of the guards ventured.

“We can’t wait for a doctor. Just seeing one might be enough to push him over the edge, if he’s in the kind of shape I suspect he is. He knows me, I’m not at all a threatening person.”

“You couldn’t prove it by me,” murmured Lieutenant Harris. “Okay, Mrs. Bittersohn. This way, please.”

S
ARAH SAW MELANSON THROUGH
the bars. He looked just about as she’d expected to see him, a gray wraith sitting slumped over on the edge of an iron cot, his head bowed down by weight of woe, hands hanging loose between his knees, his eyes seeing nothing. Even when the guard opened the cell door, he didn’t move a muscle.

“Thank you,” Sarah told the guard. “I’ll go in alone. Please move back where he won’t be able to see you.”

“Doesn’t look to me as if he’s seeing anything,” the guard replied.

“Yes, that’s our big problem, isn’t it. You’ll need to lock the door, I expect.”

“With you in there? He’s a murderer!”

“Oh, I don’t think so. I’ll call you if I need you.”

Shaking his head slowly from side to side, the guard turned his key in the lock and backed away. Sarah sat down on the cot beside Melanson and, with the same delicate touch she’d have used if she were trying to pat a field mouse, felt for a pulse in his wrist.

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Melanson.” She tried to keep her voice as gentle as her touch. “You’ve been given a bad time, haven’t you? You know me, I’m Brooks Kelling’s cousin Sarah, you’ve seen me at the Wilkins lots of times. Brooks is away on vacation just now, but he’ll want to see you as soon as he gets back. So will my husband, Max Bittersohn. Max has always liked you.”

She could barely feel the pulse, a faint thread of life; she tried harder to rouse him. “Do you remember the day when poor old Joe Witherspoon fell over the balcony? All the other guards left their stations, which they shouldn’t have done, but you stayed right where you belonged. You always do the right thing, Mr. Melanson. You were the one who noticed those two paintings that had been changed around. Do you remember that? That’s how we found out that the museum was being robbed and Dolores’s copies hung in place of the old masters.”

It hadn’t been that simple, but no matter. “Nobody ever tried to steal anything from your station, did they? You have the longest and best record of any guard the Wilkins ever had. You know that, don’t you?”

Sarah felt a small tremor in the wrist she was touching. Melanson turned his head a tiny fraction, slowly, carefully, like a rabbit wondering whether it was safe to move. Sarah froze. He put out the tip of his tongue and ran it around his parched lips. Sarah went and beckoned through the bars to the guard.

“Mr. Melanson is thirsty. Could you bring him a drink of water, please?”

The guard went down the hall a short way and came back with a small paper cup. It wasn’t much, but it was something. Sarah took the cup from him and held it to Melanson’s lips. He took a tiny sip, then another, then emptied the cup. “Thank you,” he whispered.

“Would you like something to eat, Mr. Melanson?”

“I—I—”

“I know, this is all strange to you. Let’s see what we can do.”

Sarah signaled through the bars again. “Mr. Melanson thanks you for the water. Do you think you could find him something to eat?”

“He had his supper but he wouldn’t eat it. Just sat there and wasted good food.” The guard was, however, human. “There’s hot coffee in the guards’ room. I guess it would be okay to give him a cup.”

“That would be splendid. Cream and sugar in the coffee, don’t you think? Luckily I’ve brought a sandwich. It’s chicken, Mr. Melanson. My sister-in-law made it for you in case you might be hungry. Ah, here’s your coffee, and here’s the sandwich, you’ll feel better when you’ve got something inside you. Just take your time. Your lawyer is outside with a bail bondsman. As soon as the formalities have been dealt with, we’re going to get you out of here.”

Out, that was the magic word. The prisoner accepted the sandwich, took an avid bite and chewed. And chewed and chewed. Thirty chews, Sarah counted. At least this compulsive mastication gave the coffee time to cool. Another bite, another thirty chews. A vague hint of animation was starting to show in Melanson’s face, but the pulse still felt awfully weak to Sarah. He took another sip of coffee, another bite from the sandwich. It was slow going; at least he was back among the living. He finished the first half. That was as much as he could manage, he closed his eyes and flopped over on the cot.

“Guard!” Sarah thought Melanson’s collapse was most likely plain exhaustion, but this was no time to take chances. “We must get him to the hospital.”

“You’re the one that gave him the sandwich.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? Call my lawyer, he’s with the clerk of the court. Now!”

Sarah spent some anguished moments alone in that cell with a body that looked like a waxwork. She kept her finger on Melanson’s pulse, she couldn’t feel that it was any stronger but it wasn’t any worse. The hospital, thank God, was just next door. Uncle Jake would know what to do. If he didn’t come right away, she’d scream until he did. She was pumping up to wake the whole jail if she had to when both Jake and Ira came thundering down the concrete, the guard running a poor third.

“What’s the matter?” panted Jake.

“I think he’s just been through more than he could handle. He was in a stupor when I got here. I talked to him a bit, he rallied enough to drink some coffee and eat half a chicken sandwich that Miriam sent, then he passed out. He looks to me now as if he’s merely asleep, but his pulse is still weak and he’s barely said a word. Hadn’t we better get him into the hospital?”

“Yes.”

Jacob Bittersohn was gone as fast as he’d arrived; he was back in a blessedly few minutes with an intern, an orderly and a gurney. The intern listened to Melanson’s heart, raised an eyebrow, injected something into one flaccid arm, helped the orderly to get him on the gurney, and ate the other half of Miriam’s excellent sandwich.

“Nothing wrong with the food,” was her verdict. “I think the guy’s just plain pooped. Has he been through a particularly bad time lately?”

“He certainly has,” said Sarah. “He’s been falsely accused of murder and summarily fired from a job that he’d held for over thirty years by a bullying half-wit who’s about to get slapped with a lawsuit. Right, Uncle Jake?”

“Right, Sadele.”

“When did this happen?” the intern asked.

“Just this afternoon,” Sarah answered. “Is Lieutenant Harris still around, Ira? He’s the one who booked Melanson as a material witness, whatever that’s supposed to mean. Melanson is one of those compulsive neurotics who are perennially afraid of doing the wrong thing. Unfortunately it was he who spotted the body of that woman who was killed with a hatpin Sunday afternoon at the Wilkins Museum, where they both worked. He’s been carrying that around; and today the new head of trustees, who knows nothing whatever about Melanson’s long record as a thoroughly reliable employee, jumped on him simply because he’s the type who wouldn’t dare fight back. Is that enough for you?”