The Thanksgiving Day Murder (8 page)

“I'm not pushing.”

“But it would be nice to have an emptier basement.”

We had reached the corner of Central Park West, the Ethical Culture Society on the south corner. I remembered people lining the sidewalks and the stairs of buildings, hanging out of windows in apartment houses, standing on narrow balconies, all to see the parade. We had always stood on this corner, as close as we could squeeze to the curb.

“What do you remember about her?” Jack asked.

“Very little beyond her existence. But they knew each other. They smiled at each other. She knew my name.”

“Did she have a name?”

“If she did, it didn't stick with me.”

We turned back and I looked up at the statue, wondering how long it had been there. At the corner where Sixty-fourth crossed Broadway and Ninth Avenue in the jumble of streets, we could see some of the buildings of Lincoln Center.

“There are apartment houses on the far side of Lincoln Center,” Jack said. “Over on Amsterdam Avenue.”

“I remember.” I'd been up this way before. “Probably thousands of people living there.”

“Probably.”

“Something'll turn up,” I said.

“My wife the optimist. We done here?”

“I think so.”

He looked at his watch. “How about I take you to a cop bar to kill some time before our dinner reservation?”

“A place where cops go after work?”

“Right. Not much class but a good place to unwind. Let's get rid of the car first. There's a place I remember around here from my early days.”

It was nice for me to make a connection with Jack's life before he met me. He's been to St. Stephen's several times and met the nuns I grew up among, but aside from a small number of his friends on the job, I knew less of his early life than he knew of mine.

I kept my ears open while we sat at a table and had a drink, hoping to hear cop talk, department gossip, some clever political scheming, but it was all pretty mundane and I wasn't sure the voices I overheard even belonged to cops. But it was fun and relaxing and we did our own talking. About twenty minutes before our reservation, we left and took a leisurely walk down Broadway in the dark.

When the phone rang at five after twelve on Sunday, I had the feeling that the caller had waited till noon for the sake of politeness.

“Is this Christine Bennett?”

“Yes it is.”

“This is Steve Carlson from Hopkins and Jewell. I hope I didn't wake you up.”

I had already been to mass with Gene and taken him back to Greenwillow. “I've been up for hours.”

“I talked to Wormy yesterday. I called her at home. There's something weird going on.”

It's the kind of news that gives my skin a prickle. “Tell me about it.”

“Wormy knows everything about that shop. The legend is she was the first person hired when H and J opened their doors. She may even be related to one of them in some way, I'm not sure. But she knows as much about what goes on there as H and J do. Maybe more.”

“Then she's a good person to talk to.”

“She won't talk to you.”

“Did she say why?”

“She said it wasn't any of her business, that if Arlene spoke to you, what else was there to say?”

“I see. Well, I thank you for trying, Steve. Maybe on Monday I'll go down and ask to see her.”

“I'll give you her phone number.”

That surprised me. He had said on Friday that he wouldn't. “That's very nice of you.”

He dictated the number. From the area code I could tell she lived in Brooklyn, Queens, or Staten Island. “She has a husband and a couple of kids that are probably late teens or twenties. I'd appreciate if you wouldn't say straight out that I gave you the number, but she'll probably guess.”

“Do you have any sense of what she could be hiding or what she could be reluctant to talk about?”

“Not in the slightest. Natalie came to work in the morning and left in the evening like the rest of us. As far as I know, she did a hell of a good job.”

“I appreciate your help, Steve.”

I thought about it all day. I didn't relish talking to a hostile informant who would prefer not to be called at home. After a light lunch Jack went upstairs to the little bedroom we had fixed up as a study, so I went down to the basement and started looking through the dozens of boxes that were my inheritance. The ones with my mother's name on them were separated and pushed into a corner. I hadn't thought to bring a knife with me, so I untied the rope on one that said
SCRAPBOOKS AND ALBUMS
on the top.

It was an afternoon of nostalgia and even a few tears. All my baby pictures were there, my parents looking like a couple of kids, I like a bundle of blankets. There was the house I grew up in, Gene and I playing in a sandbox, Aunt Meg and Uncle Willy, lots of smiles. Events I remembered were recorded, my graduation from grade school, this time without my father present, a birthday party we had celebrated at a bowling alley and then later at home with cake and ice cream, a school play in which I had had a substantial part. There were no pictures of any Thanksgiving Day parade, but I had not recalled my father taking a camera with him. Not all the people in the pictures were identifiable,
but I was reasonably sure none was the mystery woman of the parade.

Deep in the box was a framed picture of my parents on their wedding day, probably the only existing picture of the occasion. I did not remember ever seeing an album or hearing of a large wedding, but they were dressed as a traditional bride and groom. I rubbed the glass with the bottom of my sweater and blew away dust. It would be nice to keep this where I could look at it, upstairs in one of the bedrooms.

A box a little smaller than a shoe box held many pictures of varying size and quality, most of them unfamiliar to me. Both sets of my grandparents were there in formal, unsmiling portraits as well as some more casual ones. Many pictures had dates and names on the back, but many others did not. Who was Joe Formica? Who was Mrs. Elsevere? I went through them one by one, turning them over into the top of the box to keep the order the same. There was my mother as a child with three unidentified children. There was my father with my aunt Meg—they were brother and sister—as little children at the beach, in the country, plowing happily through snow.

I was sitting under a naked lightbulb, on an old wooden folding chair I had found down there, renewing my family relationships. From time to time the furnace would go on and then, some time after, switch off. After I'd been downstairs for a long time, I heard the hot water heater go on and I figured Jack must be taking a shower, but I was as transfixed, as hooked, as I ever get and I kept turning over picture after picture, no longer looking for anything or anyone special, just looking with interest and nostalgia and an aching sense of being too late. Why had I not asked Aunt Meg years ago, during the time I was visiting regularly, if such pictures existed, if she could help me put a name or some kind of identity on them? It had not occurred to me.
I had been in my twenties and I had looked forward, not back, and now I was sorry.

Dimly I heard my name called and I started out of my reverie.

“Chris? You home?”

“I'm down here, Jack.”

The door to the basement opened. “Down where?”

“I'm looking at old pictures.”

“You been down there all afternoon?”

“I guess.”

He came down the stairs. “You like spiders or something? I could have carried this stuff up and you could have sat in the living room.”

“It was better this way.” I stood up and took the framed wedding picture. Then I pulled the chain on the lightbulb and followed Jack up to civilization.

He had put lamb shanks in a pot with wine and herbs and vegetables before his shower, but cooking odors only go up and I had been unaware. He poured me a glass of sherry and took some of his favorite Scotch for himself.

“Find anything?” he asked.

“Lots and lots of stuff but no mysterious woman. I didn't find any papers anywhere. As I remember, there are baptismal certificates and birth certificates in the box in the bank. I was a co-owner with Aunt Meg and I just kept it after she died.”

“The woman probably worked with your father and came out to say hello at the parade.”

“I'll find out. I'll go down during the week. Right now I have to decide whether to call this Wormholtz woman at home.”

“I'd say go for it.”

“That's my feeling, too. I hope she doesn't hang up on me.”

“Want some Scotch to stiffen your resolve?”

“The sherry's fine, thanks. It's mellowed me.”

“Ah, Christine Bennett Brooks, normally the world's most unmellow woman.”

I smiled and went to the kitchen to make my call.

“Do I know you?” The voice was the one I remembered, firm, tough, unbending.

“My name is Christine Bennett, Mrs. Wormholtz. We spoke on Friday.”

“Refresh my memory.”

“I called Hopkins and Jewell to make an appointment. You got me one.”

“If you say so. What are you doing calling me at home?”

“I'm working on something very important and I think you can help me.”

“I work at the office five long days a week. You can reach me there any time from—”

“Mrs. Wormholtz, this isn't advertising business. This is life and death. Natalie Miller Gordon disappeared over a year ago and I am trying to find out what happened to her. The receptionist at H and J refused to let me speak to you, and I know you can help me.”

“That's who you are.”

“That's who I am, yes. Please, give me a few minutes. Please try to help me.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Did you know Natalie?”

“I know every person who's ever worked for H and J including the cleaning crew.”

“Did you know her personally? Did you ever talk to her? Did you have lunch with her?”

“A qualified yes to all three questions. We talked. She seemed like a nice enough person. I knew when she met the man she eventually married. I had lunch with her occasionally when we had a business party and a group went together. We weren't friends. We didn't meet after hours.”

“Did you like her?”

She took a breath before she said, “I liked her.”

“Do you know where she worked before she came to H and J?”

“No idea.”

“I understand you're the office manager.”

“That's right.”

“Can you tell me why you got rid of the material in Natalie's personnel file?”

“What material?”

“Her references, her records of past employment—”

“Slow down, Ms. Bennett. Who exactly told you I got rid of that stuff?”

No one had. “I was led to believe—”

“By whom?” she interrupted.

“Arlene Hopkins said—”

“Arlene Hopkins never told you I removed any papers from that file because I didn't and she knows it.”

“She said a lot of files were thinned out to save space when you moved to your present location.”

“No doubt that's true. I didn't do any thinning. And I definitely didn't do any thinning of that file.”

“Do you have any idea who did?”

“I have an opinion on almost everything.”

There was little doubt that was true. “Will you tell me?” I was starting to feel like a trial lawyer, phrasing a new question to elicit each molecule of information.

“I will not. I'm the office manager, not the president of the company. It's not my place to tell you something Arlene Hopkins won't tell you.”

“How am I going to find out?”

“Talk to Marty Jewell.”

“Mr. Jewell?” I had half expected Jewell to be another woman. “How can I get to see him?”

“I'll arrange it. When do you want to come?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Be there at ten. You may have to wait a while, but I'll see to it he gives you your fifteen minutes.”

“I'll be there. Thank you, Mrs. Wormholtz.”

“Good afternoon.”

The receptionist recognized me and gave me a plastic smile. Then she made a phone call and said, “She's here.”

I waited a long time. Maybe I was being taught a lesson; maybe they were as busy as they seemed. People came in with deliveries, arrived for appointments that were kept pretty punctually, people left. At ten to eleven a woman appeared in the reception area.

“Miss Bennett?”

I stood up. “Yes.”

“Come with me.”

She was fortyish, thick in the middle, had dark hair she had forgotten to brush for several days, and she was dressed in a black skirt and blouse of an unidentifiable fabric that did nothing to enhance her looks, but she didn't seem to care. She never introduced herself, just started to walk briskly, and I followed because I had been promised fifteen minutes of someone's time and I didn't want to waste any of it walking.

Jewell had the other corner office and he was on the phone when we got there. The woman stood in the doorway till he hung up, then said, “This is Christine Bennett.”

“Thanks, Wormy,” Mr. Jewell said with a sincere smile. “Come on in.” As I entered, he turned back to her. “You take care of that Goodman thing, OK?”

There was no acknowledgment, but I assumed her silence meant she was about to do some taking care of.

“Please sit down, Miss Bennett. Can I take your coat?” He rushed to make me comfortable.

As surprised as I had been to see Arlene Hopkins in her pin-striped suit and hair, I was equally surprised to see Martin Jewell. He looked as informal as his partner was formal, wearing a tieless white shirt and no jacket, the sleeves rolled up a couple of turns. He had a round face that at rest looked cordial and relaxed, ready to spring a joke on a willing listener.

“I understand you're looking into Natalie's disappearance.”

“That's right. I'm not a professional, but I've had some experience, and her husband asked me if I'd try to find out what happened to her.”

“It was shocking,” he said. “She was crazy about him. You couldn't talk to her five minutes without hearing Sandy this and Sandy that. I don't know how she could have done it.”

“Done what?”

He looked a little confused. “Walked away from him like that.”

“Why do you think she did?”

He shrugged. He was sitting behind his desk again, a desk as cluttered as his partner's was empty. “What else could have happened? I heard they went to the Thanksgiving Day parade and she walked away.”

“You think she just kept walking?”

“It's not very likely someone grabbed her, is it?”

“It's too soon for me to say what is and isn't likely. Do you have any idea where she would have gone if she ran away?”

“Not a clue.”

“Do you know where she was from?”

“She was living in New York when she worked here. I couldn't tell you whether she was a native or came from
somewhere else. She didn't sound like a New Yorker, but maybe she was from upstate.”

“Was she friendly with anyone in the office?”

“Uh, yes, there was someone. Susan, I think. Susan left before Natalie got married. I don't know where she is now.”

“Susan Diggins,” I said.

“That's the one.”

“Anyone else?”

“We all knew her. I just wouldn't call anyone else a friend of hers, but I could be wrong. I don't always know what goes on after hours.”

“What concerns me is that information from Natalie's file seems to be missing.”

“Have you seen the file?”

“No. Arlene Hopkins told me.”

“What did she say happened to it?”

When someone starts asking me the questions, I get the feeling they're checking out my source, perhaps trying to shape their own answers and not put themselves or anyone else on the spot. “Can you tell me what happened to those papers?”

“Which papers exactly?”

“Her references, her record of previous employment, her education. I would imagine you wouldn't hire someone off the street if you were a new business with limited funds to throw around.”

He gave me a smile. “You know, that's exactly what we did. We put a very clever ad in the
Times
—we did the ad ourselves—and we did the interviewing and we made all the decisions. We were pretty much our own personnel department, and to tell you the truth, in the old office, we kind of policed the grounds, too, if you know what I mean. We couldn't afford a cleaning service, so it was do it yourself or live knee-high in dust.”

I don't know why I liked him, but I did. He had managed
for several minutes now not to answer my question, but there was something very appealing about his manner, as there was something very forbidding about Arlene Hopkins's. “But she wrote to you applying for the job and she supplied you with references,” I said, not asking.

“I guess she must have.”

“And those papers are missing from her file.”

“Yes.”

“What happened to them, Mr. Jewell?”

“They disappeared a long time ago,” he said.

Finally. “How long ago?”

“Years.”

“Can you tell me the circumstances?”

“Wormy was—that's Mrs. Wormholtz, who brought you in here—she was looking for something in the personnel files and she found Natalie's almost empty. All the things you mentioned were gone.”

“So there had been records in the file.”

“There had been records.”

“Was Natalie working here at that time or had she left?”

“She was working here.”

“Did you talk to her about it?”

“Wormy did.”

“And?”

“And Natalie was upset.”

“Did she have any idea why someone would want to raid her file?”

“No idea at all.”

“Was anyone else's file raided?”

“I think Wormy made a spot check and found things pretty much in order. She's a great office manager and she really took it personally that her files were incomplete.”

“Did you ask Natalie to replace any of the missing papers?”

“Wormy probably asked her. I think she said she'd try to get copies, but I don't think she ever did.”

“Was there evidence of a break-in before this happened?”

“We've never had a break-in.”

“Who interviewed Natalie before she came to work here?”

“I did. I told you, we—”

“I understand,” I said, sparing myself a repetition. “Only you?”

“She was going to be my secretary. Arlene didn't have to approve. I'm sure Wormy talked to her, too.”

I hadn't realized that Natalie had been Martin Jewell's secretary. “Then Natalie worked only for you?”

“Listen, we opened in disarray and we progressed to chaos. Nominally she was my secretary, but she did work for anyone who needed her. Like Wormy. Natalie could do anything.”

“Did Arlene Hopkins have someone like that working for her?”

“She found someone, yeah.”

I was getting strange feelings of incomplete answers and withheld information. “Was Natalie still your secretary when she left to get married?”

“You know, our whole present structure is different. It's evolved a lot from those early days. Natalie hadn't been my private secretary for a long time and I don't really have one now. We don't need one anymore, now that we've got a whole pool of people.”

“Mr. Jewell, who do you think took those documents out of the file?”

“I don't know.”

“Who had access to the personnel files?”

“All four of us did, Arlene, Natalie, Wormy, of course, and me. We were like charter members of a club.”

“So any of the four of you could have stolen those documents?”

“I guess so. Or someone hired later who got into Wormy's office while she was out of it.”

“Why would anyone do that?”

“Maybe there was something there someone didn't want us to know.”

“Like what?”

“Like who she worked for before she came here, but don't ask me why because I don't know.”

“Or what high school she went to or where she used to live.”

“You can make it anything you want. I don't know what was in that file. I looked at it once, maybe five years ago when I interviewed Natalie, and I never looked again.” He glanced at his watch and I knew I had used up my promised fifteen minutes, and then some.

I wrote my name, address, and phone number on a piece of paper and handed it to him.

“I know the drill,” he said. “If I think of anything, you'll hear from me.”

“Would you mind if I talked to Mrs. Wormholtz?” I asked.

“I wouldn't mind at all. She probably remembers a lot more than I do. I think she sends birthday cards to everyone who works here. Shall I call her?”

“I'd appreciate it.” I got up and took my coat off the hook while he telephoned. At least he was letting me talk to Wormy. Arlene Hopkins had done her best to keep us apart. It had to be Hopkins who had prevented me from talking to Wormy last Friday.

“She's on her way.” He was on his feet, extending his hand. “Look, anything I can do to help, let me know. Natalie was one of us, we all liked her, it took three people to replace her, and we'd all like to know what happened to her.”

“I'll keep you posted.”

There was a knock on the door and Wormy came in. “Right this way,” she said, sparing no extra syllables.

I followed.