The Recycled Citizen Page 5

  “Sarah,” said her uncle, “marrying a personable member of the opposite sex and begetting a child upon her does not constitute a grand passion.”

  “In a word, Uncle Jem, balderdash. How did you get started on grand passions, anyway?”

  “Jem says Chet Arthur had one for Mary, which drove him to dealing in drugs so he could lure her away from Dolph with his ill-gotten gains,” Max explained. “Sounds reasonable to me.”

  “It’s positively brilliant,” Sarah agreed. “Of course Chet Arthur would have had to be stark raving to think it might work.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Jem argued. “Dolph’s no Rudolph Valentino, as Mary herself pointed out only last evening. I still cannot for the life of me understand what a woman like her ever saw in that oaf.”

  “Uncle Jem, Mary Smith was no Theda Bara, either. I do mean Theda Bara, don’t I? I’ll grant you Mary is a marvelous person, but can you honestly picture her in the role of a femme fatale?”

  “What has my picturing her got to do with it? The question is how this deluded goop Arthur pictured her. Look at Don Quixote and his Dulcinea.”

  “No fair. That’s only a book.”

  “Then look at Samuel Johnson and his Titty. Look at Dolph himself, confound it. He took one bug-eyed gander at Mary and fell for her like a ton of bricks. I was there, you know. I saw it happen. Strangers one minute, sweethearts the next. I was all set to fall for her myself, but Dolph beat me to the draw. Not that I couldn’t have cut him out if I’d turned on the old J. Lemuel Kelling charm, but noblesse obliged.”

  “The hell it did,” said Max. “You never had a prayer.”

  “Says who?”

  “Stop it, you two,” said Sarah. She read through the will again and shook her head. “I suppose Chet Arthur might have loved Mary as a mother.”

  Her uncle hooted. “What do you mean a mother? He must have been older than she is.”

  “Not necessarily. Anyway, a surrogate mother. A mother figure, as Cousin Lionel would say. A kind woman who gives you wholesome things to eat and talks to you nicely. A stabilizing influence.”

  Jeremy Kelling continued to be amused. “If Mary was a surrogate mother, Dolph would be a surrogate daddy.”

  “Oh, Uncle Jem! All right, then perhaps she was only a sister to him. What difference does it make?”

  “Quite a lot, I should think. You wouldn’t go out peddling heroin so you could woo your sister. Even Lord Byron didn’t go that far.”

  “He didn’t have to,” Sarah snapped back. “He was rich.”

  “So he was. Who knows, Chet Arthur might have been another Byron if he’d shown a bit more forethought in picking his ancestors. It’s a sobering thought, quite wasted on me at the moment since I haven’t had my first drink of the day. Speaking of which, would you care to join me for breakfast? Egbert could make us a pitcherful of nutritious, vitamin-rich Bloody Marys.”

  “Ugh,” said Sarah. “Not-for me, thank you. My child and I are abstaining for the duration.”

  “Hell of a way to bring up a kid, in my considered opinion. How about you, Max?”

  “Sorry, I’m working.”

  “Gad, what a depressing pair you turned out to be. What are you going to do now?”

  Max glanced at his watch. “Quarter past eleven. Loveday must be off to his skim milk by now. I think we might stroll back to the center. Unless you’d rather have me walk you home or stay here and watch Jem guzzle, Sarah?”

  “No, I’d rather go with you. Perhaps we could drop in at the Union Oyster House for a bowl of chowder afterward. I’m so sick of plain milk.”

  “Must you go using words like milk in my presence?” Jem groaned. “Take her away, Max. I’m in a delicate condition myself.”

  When they returned to the center, they found both Dolph and Mary there. Mary was helping Joan and another woman set out a lunch of soup and crackers. Dolph, much to Sarah’s surprise, was doing something to the coffee urn in a brisk and competent manner. The room was filling up; already a line had formed at the buffet table.

  As Sarah and Max hesitated, not wanting to break into the line, Mary caught sight of them and waved. “Hi. Come to have a bite with us?”

  “Not today, thanks,” said Max. “The little mother’s clamoring for pickles and ice cream. We just wanted to talk to you and Dolph for a few minutes, but it looks as if we’ve come at a bad time.”

  “Oh no, we’re all set up. Annie and Joan can serve. Would you mind, girls? Harry, could you take over for Dolph at the coffee urn?”

  “Glad to.”

  A shortish man in a wrinkled but clean plaid shirt stepped out of the line. He was the one who’d been reading the church magazine earlier, Sarah noticed, and he made an almost laughable contrast to the man directly behind him. Whereas Harry was spruce and shaven, the other had carried dirtiness almost to the point of becoming an art form. His hair looked as if he’d washed it in used crankcase oil, powdered it with grit, then combed it backward to achieve the maximum effect of spiky dishevelment. His face and hands were so thoroughly begrimed that his bright blue eyes came almost as a shock. His clothes—but Sarah didn’t want to think about his clothes. She turned her eyes to Mary and kept them there.

  Mary gave the clean man a smile and a nod of thanks, then came around from behind the serving table, rolling down the sleeves of her cheery green smock. Dolph was right after her.

  “Now then,” said Mary, “why don’t we go into the kitchen? Nobody’s there at the moment. Is it about Chet?”

  They were still too close to the waiting members. “About the funeral,” Sarah said quickly. “Theonia wants to know what to bake.”

  Mary hustled them into the back room and over to the area that had been partitioned off from the salvage depot to hold a stove and a sink. “What did I do?” she asked when she’d got the door shut. “Open my mouth and put my foot in it as usual? What’s the matter?”

  “Now dear,” said Dolph, “don’t you start worrying. Whatever it is, Max and I can take care of it. Why don’t you go out to the desk and call Theonia?”

  “I’ve already spoken to Theonia, she’s making brownies, and you needn’t go thumping your manly chest at me, Tarzan of the Apes. Come on, Max, spill it.”

  “Okay, Mary. Chet Arthur left you some money.”

  “You’re joking!”

  Dolph gave his wife a puzzled look. It was inconceivable to him that anybody would joke about money. “How much?” he said simply.

  “Over forty thousand dollars.”

  Max showed them the will, the savings certificates, and the wad of cash. Dolph gaped.

  “My God! Where did he get all that?”

  “Good question.”

  Mary, quicker on the uptake, saw at once what Max was driving at. “Did you find out what that powder was you got from his bag?”

  Max gave them the chemist’s report. Mary answered him first.

  “So you think Chet was using the SCRC as a front for peddling drugs.”

  “Max didn’t say that, dear,” Dolph objected.

  “I know he didn’t say it. I say that’s what he’s thinking. Isn’t it, Max?”

  He shook his head. “At this stage all I’m thinking is that we ought to get these papers into Redfern’s hands as soon as we can.”

  “Can we?”

  “Why not? He’s named Dolph as executor. I’d also like to talk to the two women who signed the will. Joan Sitty and Anne—looks like Bzkmz or something. Do you know them?”

  “Yes, of course. It’s Annie Bickens. Osmond Loveday could have told you that when you were here earlier.”

  “We didn’t have the will then,” said Sarah. “Anyway, Mr. Loveday doesn’t even know who she is. He got her mixed up with Joan.”

  “I suppose that’s understandable,” Mary replied. “They’re usually together. Anyway, Osmond’s not good at names.”

  “Depends on whose names they are,” Dolph grunted. “If they’re names he can drop, he remembers them well en
ough.”

  “In any event, I’d rather leave Loveday out of this,” said Max. “The fewer people who know anything about this matter, the better off you’ll be. I hate to say this, but you’ve got to realize not only the SCRC but also you personally are in a highly dangerous position. The heroin found with the body was trouble enough, but this will is a disaster.”

  “What’s so disastrous about forty thousand dollars?” Dolph demanded.

  “Don’t you see, dear?” said Mary. “If the police get hold of this, they’ll suspect we put him up to running heroin to make money for our building fund. Max, can’t we just tear up this will and forget we ever saw it? Then the state will get his money, and who cares?”

  Max shook his head. “I’m afraid we’d be taking a still worse risk if we did that, Mary. Two of your people know Chester Arthur made a will. Annie and Joan may have read it before they signed it. We don’t know whom they might have told, or whether Chet Arthur himself mentioned what he was doing to somebody else. If the will doesn’t show up, there’s bound to be a hue and cry. Those two women may not realize that being asked to sign as witnesses means there’s nothing in it for them, and think they’re entitled to an inheritance. Or they may know he was leaving it all to you and don’t want you cheated out of your rights.”

  “But nobody knows the will’s been found, except us.”

  “Okay, I’ll grant you that. The guy Chet rented his room from doesn’t know anything about the will and the money, or that roll of bills would have disappeared before we got there. He does know, however, that a man and woman representing themselves to be from the SCRC went and searched the room this morning. He can identify us and you can bet he will if anybody puts up a squawk, because otherwise he’d be the prime suspect himself.”

  “Now look here, Mary”—Dolph had been checking the totals and finding them good—“Chet meant for you to have his money. It’s our duty to carry out his wishes whether we like it or not.”

  “Well, I don’t like it,” Mary insisted, “and I’m not going to say I do. We don’t need the money that badly.”

  “Who says we don’t? Tell me a better way to spearhead our fund drive. Hot damn, if Uncle Fred were alive, he’d be on the phone already. Loyal SCRC member leaves savings of a lifetime to establish fund for seniors’ boardinghouse. That’s no good, it needs more zing. Sarah, you’ll have to write a publicity release.”

  “Me? Dolph, I’ve never written a publicity release in my life.”

  “Then draw a picture. We’ve got to start this drive rolling while the iron’s hot. Come on, Max, let’s get over to Redfern’s and make sure we shan’t have any trouble getting this will through probate.”

  “While you’re at it,” Mary sniffed, “you might ask him if he can see any way to save our necks. You’re right, Max, I was foolish to think of destroying the will, and you’d be even sillier not to let the police know about the heroin. You mustn’t lose your detective license on account of us, not with a baby coming along. Only I know darn well they’ll be at us to close the center as soon as they find out what Chet was up to, then what will happen to our members? Not to mention what’s going to happen to us. I wouldn’t mind going to jail if I had to, but Dolph would absolutely hate it.”

  “I could stand it if you could,” Dolph insisted.

  “I’m not so sure of that, dear. I’ve had firsthand reports from a few of our members. They say the beds are hard and the food’s just awful. And they don’t even let husbands and wives stay in the same prison.”

  “You’re dreaming, Mary. Surely no judge would separate a man from his lawfully wedded wife. It’s—it’s indecent!”

  “Happens all the time,” said Max. “Okay, Dolph, we’ll go see Redfern. Only I’d like a word with those two witnesses first.”

  “Why don’t you leave Annie and Joan to me?” Mary suggested. “They’ll be busy for a while yet, and they wouldn’t open up for a stranger, anyway. As soon as they’re finished serving, I’ll sit down with them for a cup of tea and lead the conversation around to Chet. That won’t be hard. He’s the big excitement around here today. You two take Dolph along to lunch with you and buy him a martini before you see Mr. Redfern. Make sure he eats something that’s not fried. Dolph, you’ll come back here as soon as you’re through at the lawyer’s, won’t you?”

  “We all will,” Sarah promised.

  “Not to be rude, but I’d rather you didn’t, if you want the honest truth. It’s not that I don’t like having you, but the members are going to smell something fishy if you keep popping in and out. Why don’t I give you a call at the apartment later and we’ll get together and compare notes. Darn it all, why did this have to happen, just when everything was going so well?”

  Chapter

  6

  “THIS IS REAL NICE of you, Mrs. Bittersohn,” said Annie Bickens.

  They were in a restaurant on Canal Street. Rather than endure a boring visit to the lawyer’s office with the two men, Sarah had suggested a compromise arrangement. Mary had agreed. With a little conniving, she and her two assistants had bumped into Sarah coming from the Oyster House, and Sarah had invited the three of them to join her for the dessert Max allegedly hadn’t let her eat.

  “Not at all,” Sarah told Annie. “Frankly I’m hoping to pick your brains a little. Mary’s been asking me for advice on decorating the new housing facility and I’m wondering what colors the tenants would like best. We want the rooms to be cheerful and homey, but it would hardly be practical to paint each one to suit the particular tenant of the moment. Should I be thinking about neutral shades or bright colors?”

  “Just don’t make them pea green,” said Joan. “When I was in the hospital for two months that time, everything was yucky pea green, even the orderlies’ uniforms. It got me so down, I used to just lie there and cry.”

  “What gets to me is that awful tobacco-spit brown,” said Annie. “My old man used to chew tobacco and spit in the sink, then he’d make me clean it out. I ran away when I was thirteen, but I still feel sick to my stomach thinking about it.”

  She was making Sarah sick too. “Let’s talk about what you do like,” she begged. “How about a cheerful sunshine yellow, for instance?”

  Joan said yellow was okay, but she liked peach better. Annie said peach was too blah and what about a nice purple? Purple was her favorite color. Joan made a crisp comment on the kind of women who preferred purple walls and said, “Why not shoot the works? Paint them in rainbows.”

  “That’s not a bad idea, you know.” Sarah was beginning to feel she’d bitten off a good deal more than she’d anticipated having to chew. “We might think about using the rainbow as a decorative theme for the entire building. We could do the rooms in order, each in a different rainbow shade, have rainbow stripes painted along the corridors, hang rainbow-striped curtains in the dining rooms and lounges. There are various ways it might be done.”

  “They got cute rainbow stickers at Woolworth’s,” Annie suggested, “and rainbow decals you stick on the windows and they look like stained glass.”

  Sarah tried not to wince. At any rate, she’d given them a reason for her sudden involvement with the center and got them talking. From here it was only a step to choosing rainbow-hued chairs for the Chester A. Arthur memorial lounge, and thence to Chet himself.

  “How many do you expect at the funeral tomorrow?”

  “We’ll get a good turnout,” Joan replied. “Nothing like a funeral to bring out the old folks, you know. He got in the papers, that’ll count. Annie cut out the piece and stuck it up on the bulletin board. It’s not much of a write-up, considering, but something’s better than nothing, I always say.”

  Annie said that was what she’d always said too. “I wouldn’t miss it for anything, not that I was ever any great pal of Chet’s.”

  “Who were his pals?” Sarah asked her.

  Annie shook her head. “Far as I know, he didn’t have any. Chet wasn’t mean or ugly or anything, he just wasn’t muc
h of a mixer. Like when Harry Burr was getting up the checker tournament, for instance. Chet just grunted and said he had better things to do with his time. Which didn’t stop him from hanging around down by the Broken Zipper, I noticed.”

  “When did you see Chet at the Broken Zipper?” Joan sounded quite put out. “You never told me.”

  “Because I knew what you’d say if I did, honey. Okay, so I drop over there myself once in a blue moon, to see if there’s any of the old gang around. What the hey, I worked there twenty-three years, didn’t I? That was before they went topless,” Annie explained to Sarah. “I’d still be shovin’ the drinks if them bra burners hadn’t come along.”

  “Sure you would,” said Joan. “What was Chet doing at the Zipper? Not picking up girls, for God’s sake?”

  “Picking up muscatel bottles out of the gutter, any time I saw him.”

  “Yeah? How often did you see him?”

  “Once or twice. It was no big deal. I don’t see what you’re getting all steamed up about, Joanie.”

  Mary Kelling shook her head. “I don’t know, Annie. That’s an awfully rough section these days. I’m surprised Chet Arthur would trust his precious hide in it. He was always so careful. Do you remember how he’d never set foot in the Back Bay?”

  “I sure do,” said Annie. “I was saying to Joan a while ago, how come his body turned up way over near Mass Ave? He used to rant and rave about them big buildings like the Hancock and the Pru getting washed away underneath and falling down on top of everybody. That’s about the only thing he ever did talk about.”

  “He talked about his will,” Joan reminded her friend.

  “Not what I’d call talked about it. All he said was would we witness it for him, and we did.”

  “That was nice of you,” said Mary. “When did Chet make a will?”

  “Maybe a month ago. He was all hush-hush about it, like as if he was the spy that came in from the cold or somebody. He got me and Joanie in the kitchen one morning, about a quarter to ten. You know, that little quiet spell after breakfast and before we start getting ready for lunch. Anyway, nobody was around but us, and he took out this will he’d written up.”