Murder Is A Girl’s Best Friend

Chapter 18

I GOT UP FORTY-FIVE MINUTES EARLIER than usual the next morning, figuring I’d need extra time at the office to deal with the mess from the day before. I knew what the results of my one-day absence would be: a Coffeemaster full of burnt coffee grounds, a slew of dirty cups, a pile of unsorted mail, stacks of unfiled photos and unrecorded invoices, and several unopened deliveries from the typesetter and the printer, which would yield reams of unproofread proofs and heaps of photostats that should have-but no doubt wouldn’t have-been logged in and distributed to the art department.

And to top it all off, I knew I’d have to spend a good part of my lunch hour (assuming Pomeroy allowed me to have one) buying cookies and eggnog (and a bottle of bourbon, I hoped) for the office Christmas party, which had been scheduled for that same afternoon. And somehow-while juggling all the cup-cleaning and the coffee-brewing and the proofreading and the paperwork and the party preparations-I would have to find a way (preferably a safe way) to hook up with Gregory Smythe.

Trying to perk myself up for the difficult day ahead, I took an extra hot shower, applied an extra dab of red lipstick, and put on one of my favorite outfits-a deep green flare skirt and a white angora twinset with tiny pearl buttons. To add a festive touch, I tied a red chiffon scarf around my neck. Then-making a goofy Marilyn Monroe-style smoochy face at myself in the foggy bathroom mirror-I scrambled down the stairs, put on all my winterwear, grabbed my purse and the bag with Lenny’s Christmas present in it, and hurried to the subway.

The platform was unusually overcrowded, even for the rush hour. It seemed that everybody in the Village had decided to travel uptown at the exact same moment. Wanting to make certain that I was able to board the very next northbound train, I squeezed into the crowd at the south ernmost end of the station and worked my way up to the front line-to the extreme edge of the cement ledge overlooking the tracks. It was so cold the other commuters didn’t mind my heated intrusion. We all stood as closely and docilely together as cows in a too-small corral-breathing steam into the frigid air, stamping our feet to improve circulation, and straining our restless ears for the chug, clatter, and clank of the next string of stock cars.

After just a few minutes I heard a loud whistle. Leaning slightly forward, I craned my neck to the left, peering southward, hoping the approaching choo-choo would be coming from that direction. It was. Due to a wide curve in the tunnel, I couldn’t actually see the train, but the glare of the engine’s headlight foretold its imminent arrival. Stepping back from the ledge a bit, I straightened my shoulders and prepared myself for the big push forward-when the train would pull into the station and screech to a stop, and all the prospective passengers would try to crush through the open doors at once.

But the big push came before the train arrived, and I was the only one who moved forward. Way too far forward. So horribly and hideously far forward that my feet flew off the platform and I sailed out over the tracks like a clown shot from a cannon. Then I plummeted six feet down to the train bed, landing on my hands and knees in a layer of jagged gravel, both shins thwacking-like slender tree limbs-against a steel-hard metal rail.

The pain was so great and the shock so severe that I almost passed out. I surely would have, too, if the train whistle hadn’t shrieked again, and if the glare of the madly onrushing headlight hadn’t grown much brighter, filling me with terror and making any kind of blackout-however beckoning-next to impossible. The train was coming around the bend at the speed of sound. I had to move!

I vaulted to my feet, leapt back over to the crowded platform, lifted my arms, and grabbed hold of the ledge. Then I jumped as hard and high as I possibly could, desperately trying to swing my weight up onto my arms and haul the rest of my body back up to the floor of the boarding deck.

I couldn’t make it. The cliff was too high. And the train was bearing down fast. The people right above me began screaming and crying and scrambling to get out of the way. I guess they didn’t want to get splattered. For lack of a better idea (or any idea at all), I flattened the front of my body against the side of the platform, held my arms up over my head (I thought they’d be safer up there), squeezed my eyes shut, and sent a frantic mental telegram to Bob, telling him to meet me at the pearly gate, I’d be there in a minute.

But my train trip to heaven was canceled abruptly. By a large muscle-bound Negro wearing a tan wool jacket, a black porkpie hat, and the world’s sweetest smile-details I didn’t discover until several harrowing moments later, when I finally found the courage to open my eyes.

Since I didn’t actually see what happened, I can’t describe it firsthand. All I can tell you is what one of the breathless eyewitnesses told me (while I was still lying on my back in a near stupor on the platform floor): that the huge, strapping Negro kneeling over me in such sweet-faced concern had risked his own life to save mine. That he had leaned out over the edge of the boarding deck (thereby placing his own head and shoulders in the direct path of the incoming train) and grabbed both of my wrists in his big meaty paws. Then he had pulled me-like a sack of potatoes-up and over the ledge of the platform, onto the dirty, cold cement floor of the loading area. A split second later, the train had streaked in… and come to a dead stop for a moment or two… and then streaked out again, loaded to the gills with new passengers-most of whom hadn’t (like the engineer himself, apparently) even caught a glimpse of what had just happened to me.

“You mean I’m still alive?” I asked, not sure that I believed it. It seemed far more likely that I had come face to face with Saint Peter, who just happened to be a smiling Negro wearing a porkpie hat.

After being assured that I was, indeed, still a resident of Earth, I pulled myself up to a sitting position on the floor and began thanking (and rethanking and rerethanking!) the man who had lifted and dragged me to safety. I choked and sputtered and spilled out my heartfelt gratitude. I kissed his enormous hands and patted his sweet cheeks and showered him with a thousand blessings. And then I looked around for my purse. I wanted to give my rescuer a cash reward, and though I knew all I had with me was some loose change, I wanted to write down his name and address so I could send him a substantial gift later. (From the holes in his thin tan jacket, I could tell he needed it.)

I didn’t see my purse or shopping bag anywhere, and I didn’t have the slightest idea what had happened to them, so I asked one of the concerned eyewitnesses (several of whom had stuck around to make sure I was all right) to see if he could find them. The first place he looked was down on the tracks, but neither of the bags was there, so he walked up and down the length of the platform, looking under benches and around the trash bins.

He never found the shopping bag, but he did find my purse, right near the spot where I had fallen, wedged under the bottom rim of a large, standing, sand-filled ashtray. I figured I had dropped it when I fell; that it had been inadvertently kicked under the ashtray by one or more of the frantic onlookers. I took my notepad out of my purse (all diligent detectives carry one, you know!) and wrote down my savior’s name and address: Elijah Peeps, 248 East 139th Street. Then I thanked the brave, shy (and, luckily, very strong) man yet again and told him he’d be hearing from me soon.

They helped me to my feet and asked me if they should call a doctor. I told them no, I was okay-which wasn’t exactly the truth. Though my palms were fine (they had been protected by my gloves), my knees were scathed and bloodied and embedded with bits of gravel, and both of my gashed shins were beginning to swell and hurt like hell. Still, I could tell that no bones were broken. And the last thing in the world I needed was to waste the whole morning having my wounds cleaned up in a doctor’s office when I could do that perfectly well myself, in the ladies’ room at my own office, using the first aid kit I kept well-stocked and on hand in the supply closet. My nylons were ripped to shreds, but I had a spare pair in my desk.

They asked me if they should call the subway authorities, or a lawyer, or the police. Did I want to report the incident, or file some kind of claim? I told them no; that nobody was to blame but me; that the accident was entirely my own fault since I had been standing too close to the platform’s edge.

I was lying, of course. I knew I had been pushed. I also knew that the monster who’d pushed me had-for some utterly unfathomable reason-stolen Lenny’s lunchbox.

AS SHAKEN AND BRUISED AND BLOODIED AS I was, I insisted on boarding the next uptown train, which pulled into the station a few minutes later. (If you fall off a horse, blah, blah, blah…) Elijah Peeps and my other new friends and protectors got in the same car with me. We all had to get to work (except for Elijah, who was on his way home from work), and we were glad to go together. I was the gladdest of all, to be sure. The comforting presence of my band of kindly caretakers kept me from having a nervous breakdown when the train lurched forward-or passing out when the shrill whistle blew.

Two members of our group got off the train before I did-one at 14th Street, the other at 23rd. Two others got off with me at Times Square. As soon as we had squeezed our way out of the crowded car, I turned and peered back through the train window, fastening my eyes on Elijah Peeps’s bashful brown face.

I smiled and waved at him; he smiled and waved back. I folded my hands in a prayerful gesture in front of my heart for a second, then blew him a soulful kiss. He gave me another shy smile and then bowed his head in embarrassment (certain unwritten racial restrictions prohibited him from blowing me a kiss). I waved again and so did he. And several highly emotional eons later-long after the train had whisked away, spiriting my incomparable hero totally out of sight-I was still waving.