Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 6, No. 12, December 1961

A Reform Movement by Donald Martin

It is difficult, if not impossible, for members of two different generations to understand one another. Even when engaged in the same profession, so to speak, standards change with the passage of time, and what is acceptable to one generation is shocking to another.

As usual, Mrs. Grady read the morning paper with her breakfast. And again as usual, she skipped over the national and international news — it had become too vast and complex for her to understand — and read the local news on the inside pages. With morbid fascination she found the inevitable crime stories. Mayhem was flourishing with ever-increasing flagrance. She winced and cringed inwardly as she sipped her coffee and read the unblushing details of the latest brutal robbery or murder.

“It’s as Oliver always said,” she said aloud. Oliver was her late husband, dead these twenty years, but still orally referred to by his widow, for he had uttered many memorable things. Oliver had said once, and Mrs. Grady was remembering it now: “I tell you, Myrt, instead of civilization advancing, actually it’s the opposite. The very fact that people, in the face of scientific and intellectual progress still remain heartless brutes, means that they are going backwards.” Oliver had been a subway motorman and had come into daily contact with thousands of people, so his observations meant something. According to Oliver people were becoming less patient and less understanding, more cold and selfish. He was able to document these grim theories by tales of the incidents he saw daily. Perhaps Oliver had been too sensitive a man for such a position, but his tales of mankind’s thoughtless brutality had always made Myrt shudder, and she still shuddered today as she saw in the daily newspaper reports vindicating her late husband’s words.

Finishing her breakfast and folding away the paper (she was always careful to save half of it to read with her lunch), Mrs. Grady prepared to go downstairs to attend to her morning shopping. She put on her hat and coat and went out. As she was going down the hall stairs she noticed someone bent over the letter boxes. It was a youth. He was intent on what he was doing. His fingers were busily seeking entry into one of the little boxes on the wall.

Mrs. Grady froze on the steps watching the youth: she wished she could turn invisible, she wanted that much to continue to watch. The youth’s fingers were picking away at the box when he glanced around and locked eyes with the enthralled spectator. Mrs. Grady started, feeling a momentary guilt; the youth jumped back, gave Mrs. Grady an accusing stare, and then turned to run. There was a baby carriage standing near the door, and in his frantic flight he did not allow for its presence, as he ran with his head half turned. He crashed into the obstacle and fell to the floor with a bellow as the carriage rocked and giggled on its springs as if it had been tickled. He twisted on the floor, made an effort to rise but sank back with a gasp.

First alarm and then fear had swept through Mrs. Grady. Now she felt a certain cautious pity as she stared at the prostrate youth. She was uncertain what should be done. When the carriage had ceased to rock, she began a slow advance down the stairs, one hand riding the bannister, her eyes fixed on the youth.

As she passed her mailbox she glanced in. She saw there the familiar tan envelope with the cellophane window which contained her monthly check. So that was what he had been after. She looked down at him, savoring the superiority a standee feels, looking down on the fallen,

“Are you hurt?” she asked.

He groaned, not from pain alone, but because this was the most absurd question.

“What is it?” she asked. “Your leg?”

He nodded, grimacing. Now he managed to sit up on his hands. He looked down at his throbbing ankle. His face revealed considerable strain. As he peered at his foot, she examined him. He was not more than twenty. His long black hair had not been cut for some time. His black leather jacket had silver buckles. It hung apart over his T-shirt. His blue jeans bound tight around his thighs. His face changed; it reflected intense displeasure, self-directed. He looked up at Mrs. Grady.

“Now,” she said, “wasn’t that foolish of you. You ought to be more careful. You might have injured yourself seriously.”

“All right, lady,” he said. “Here I am.” His voice held a sour resignation to his bitter defeat.

“Can’t you move?” Mrs. Grady asked.

“No, I can’t move. If I could move...”

“Oh dear.” Mrs. Grady pinched her underlip. “It’s your ankle, isn’t it?”

“I fell on it,” the youth said.

They regarded each other. The youth seemed expecting to hear something which he could answer. His face showed a certain churlish anticipation.

“You probably have a sprain,” Mrs. Grady said. “Well, we can’t leave you just lying here. Here,” she said offering him her hand, “let me help you up. Easy now.” The youth extended his hand and clasped hers. Throwing his weight awkwardly on his good ankle, he managed to rise. He stood with the injured ankle folded back from the floor, one hand on the wall for balance.

“You young people,” Mrs. Grady said with a doleful shake of her head, her voice soft with sad pessimism, with implied foreboding. “I don’t know what’s to become of you.”

She assisted him up the stairs. It was an agonizing journey. Finally they reached the top and the youth leaned against the wall. Mrs. Grady unlocked the door. She swung back the door and the youth limped in, setting careful weight on his injured foot. She directed him to a great cushion chair which he sank into, with a sigh. He watched his concerned hostess slide a footstool towards him. He extended his throbbing leg upon the footstool.

Mrs. Grady removed her coat. “We’ll have a look at that now,” she said. She knelt and unlaced his ankle-high work shoe and very lightly slid it off. Then she peeled down his sock and gazed critically at the ankle. She made a solemn humming sound. “There’s quite a swelling,” she announced. “You’ll have to soak it.”

“Look, lady...” the youth began, but he was overruled.

“Now you look, young man,” she said. “You have a very painful and incapacitating injury there. And I’m going to take care of it. Don’t worry, I know what to do. I’ll soak it for you and then bind it. After a little while you’ll be able to walk on it again.”

“Then what? You turn me in?”

Mrs. Grady stood up. “Turn you over to the police?” she said hesitantly. She hadn’t given any thought to that yet. It was in the back of her mind, a tantalizing temptation. She was reluctant to give it recognition. “We’ll talk of that later,” she said. “But first we have to see to your injury. That’s the most important thing.” And she bustled off to the kitchen, humming to herself.

The youth’s face registered puzzlement and suspicion. He looked as though he was confronted with something he had heard about, but had doubted.

He watched as Mrs. Grady heated kettles of water in the kitchen. Then she poured the hot water into a wide pan over which she then dipped a box of Epsom salts, releasing a thin stream which hissed into the water. She brought the pan in and put it down in front of him. He slid his foot from the stool and advanced it gingerly into the potion, then sprang it back.

“It’s hot,” he wailed.

“Oh, a grown lad like you,” Mrs. Grady said reproachfully. “Now come on,” she coaxed. “That’s what you want. Now just put your foot in there.” With a grimace the youth obeyed. “What’s your name anyway?” Mrs. Grady asked.

“Tobin,” the youth said sullenly.

“Well, Mr. Tobin, what were you doing downstairs at my letterbox?”

“It was obvious what I was doing.”

“Trying to steal my check. That wasn’t very nice.”

“You shouldn’t leave it there like that.”

“I was just coming down for it. Here, let me take your jacket,” Mrs. Grady said, rising from the chair she had taken opposite. The youth sat forward and squirmed his arms and shoulders from the jacket. Mrs. Grady took it and as she was about to hang it behind the door she felt an instrument in the pocket. Putting in her hand, she found a switch blade.

“Oh dear,” she said, holding up the knife. She pressed the button and the silver blade snapped out with a sharp click and poised rigidly. Mrs. Grady shuddered as though holding a snake. “What an awful thing,” she said.

“I need it,” Tobin said, embarrassed. “For protection.”

“For protection? From what?”

Tobin shrugged.

“That’s the trouble with you young people today,” Mrs. Grady said. “Switch blades, gangs, violence, brutality. Whatever goes on inside your heads, I don’t know. It was never that way when I was a young person. Oh, we had our share of crime all right, but it was never as brutal as what goes on nowadays. Thieves never carried things like that,” she said showing him the knife. Unable to close it she put it down.

Tobin shrugged again. He was not impressed. To him Mrs. Grady was merely detailing progress. It seemed proper.

“I used to do housework for the Hascombs,” Mrs. Grady said. “Do you know who the Hascombs are?”

“No,” said the youth.

“Well, they’re just some of the richest people in the world. That’s who they are. They have a Long Island estate that’s big enough for them to have their own polo field. In his later years Mr. Hascomb was a judge. He used to tell me of the young people that came before him — people like yourself, Mr. Tobin. He was shocked by the brutal nature of their crimes; but what was worse, he said, seldom did he ever see the slightest shade of remorse or any indication whatsoever that these people wanted to learn a better way of living. It was simply dreadful. Why today, may I ask, does it take eight or ten of you to rob an old man, and then why must you kick him senseless after you have his money?”

The youth shrugged again. “Everybody does it,” he said.

“Have you done it?” Mrs. Grady asked. She looked at him with sad disapproval. “Shame on you,” she said.

Tobin sighed. He took his thumbnail between his teeth. He had heard this kind of talk before and it bored him. But then he heard something else that caught his attention quickly.

“You want to know if I’m going to tell the police about you,” Mrs. Grady said. “Suppose I don’t? Lord knows I don’t want to. But if I let you go how do I know I won’t be subjecting some innocent person to your deviltry? How do I know that tonight or tomorrow night you won’t be out preying on people?”

The youth pondered this. He looked down at his reddened foot in the water. It symbolized his helplessness.

“You young people are absolutely awful,” Mrs. Grady said. “Suppose I were to take a club and beat you now, because you’re sitting helpless? Would that be right? And I could have every justification, you know — you tried to steal the money I need to live on. I’m a widow, alone in the world.”

“I can’t help it, ma’am,” Tobin said, letting his hand drop. “It’s the way things are. That’s how it is.”

“Does that mean you have to give in to it? Didn’t it ever occur to you that you might try to make it a better place?”

“These things have been going on a long time. Some get caught, some don’t.”

“Of course crime is as old as the world. But what I’m saying is how terribly brutal it’s become. There’s really no need for it to be that way. It’s senseless. When I was young, crime was different. There were a lot of gentlemen in it. It was done with more finesse, less brutality.”

The youth pondered again, gnawing at his thumbnail once more. How many people had tried to reform him so far? It began in school with his teachers, then his parents, his older brother, then certain city officials. He had listened cynically and skeptically to it all. Words came easy to people. Some people uttered them so smoothly and effortlessly it seemed they did not really care, that they were speaking only because they felt it an obligation, that they were relieved when they could stop, when Tobin was removed from their presence. He had always supposed they would be shocked and disbelieving if he had promised reformation. He never did. He only listened, because he had sensed the hollowness behind their words.

“If I turn you over to the police,” Mrs. Grady said gravely, “it will be very bad for you. I suppose you have a record.”

“I’ve been mentioned,” Tobin said laconically.

“Robbing the mails. It’s quite a serious charge. You’d be put behind bars for a long time. How old are you?”

“Twenty.”

She seemed to be stricken by this. She said it to herself. Twenty. It was a tragedy.

“But then,” she said, “if I let you go, who knows what innocent person might suffer for it?”

“Perhaps no one would suffer,” the youth said suddenly.

Mrs. Grady felt elated. But she dared not show it. She studied him, testing his sincerity. She tried to appear casual, lest her thoughts be revealed in her face.

“How do I know you mean that?” she asked.

“I’ve been in jail before,” Tobin said. “I’ll be honest with you. I didn’t like it. I don’t want to go back, ever. I suppose eventually I will go back, if I keep on like this.”

“So, you do see that much,” Mrs. Grady said. She felt a flicker of excitement. “Are you man enough to make a promise and hold to it?”

“Yes,” the youth said.

“To promise to change your ways and lead a decent life?”

“Yes,” the youth said. “You’re right. I know you’re right. It’s never been put to me this way before. I feel you really mean it, that it means something to you to have me go straight.”

“It does,” Mrs. Grady said. “I can’t hear the thought of you going around hitting people over the head.”

“I’ll be honest with you — it won’t be easy.”

“But you will try?”

Change your ways, Tobin, old boy, the youth thought. Find the right path and adhere to it. The new life. It amused him, in a sardonic way.

“Yes,” he said. “I’ll try.”

Mrs. Grady didn’t know what to do. Her mind devoted itself completely to the problem. It became extraordinarily complex. She saw the whole world involved. It was as though she were to make a judgment of universal proportions. She began to wonder if fate wasn’t taking unfair advantage of her, considering the magnitude of this dilemma; but then she realized that a duty had fallen upon her and that she would have to make a decision.

She frowned like a magistrate. She did not want to send this youth to jail. His destiny was now in her hands. This great power made her feel humble. Then she thought: What would Oliver do? Oliver had been a very stern man. But he also had his compassionate side. He had often announced that men did not have sufficient understanding for each other. She looked up at where Oliver was frowning from the wall in a tarnished gold frame. But his expression never changed. The problem remained with Mrs. Grady.

She had the youth’s promise. Suppose it was a genuine promise? Suppose she sent him to jail at the very moment he was seeking to redeem himself? If this happened, then such an action on her part would be unforgivable.

The youth spoke. “Are you going to turn me over to the cops?” he asked.

The question flustered Mrs. Grady. It pushed her forward to her decision before it had quite matured in her mind.

Mrs. Grady knew quite well that some people became helplessly caught up in a life of crime. She also knew that some found such a life irresistible.

“Do you realize what you’re promising?” she said.

“Of course.”

“You’re promising to change your way of life. Perhaps it might be asking too much of you.”

Tobin looked at her dubiously.

“At least promise me you’ll stop hitting people over the heads, and stop carrying those awful knives and guns,” she said.

“Why sure,” the youth said.

Mrs. Grady clasped her hands. She was immensely pleased.

“You’ll be doing yourself a great service,” she said. “Oh, dear, I must sound like some old lady preacher or something. Has the water cooled? Here, I’ll heat some more. You just sit there and relax. You’re going to be all right now. I can just see that you’re going to be all right.” She took the pan away.

Tobin watched her. When she had gone into the kitchen, he braced his arms and pushed himself forward, up from the great chair. He kicked away the footstool and carefully got to his feet. He let gradual weight shift to the injured foot. To his immense delight he could stand on it with a minimum of pain. He took a few steps and pronounced himself healed. Quickly then he put on his sock and shoe, lacing the shoe with lightning fingers. He straightened up, and his eyes began to fly about the room. Spotting a bureau he went to it and opened the top drawer. A flat tin box lay in one corner. He opened it and a wave of excitement swept over him as he saw jewelry resting regally on some fluffy cotton. He lifted a sparkling bracelet and let it dangle before his greedily appreciative eyes. He dropped it into his pocket. Then he took up the rest of the jewelry.

When he turned around he saw Mrs. Grady standing in the doorway watching him, the pan of water held before her. Her face was filled with dismay. For a moment he felt ashamed; but that soon melted.

“All right, mom,” Tobin said. He moved toward her. He had a slight limp, but that was a minor impediment now with the jewelry burning in his pocket like a torch. He picked up the open switch blade. “I don’t want to hurt you, mom,” he said. The knife lay loose in his hand, the light glancing off the blade.

Mrs. Grady’s eyes filled with reproach. “Why must you carry that horrible weapon?” she demanded. “Why don’t you throw it away?”

“I’m getting out of here,” the youth said. “I want to leave quietly. I want you to keep your mouth shut until I’m gone. You gave me a break and now I’m giving you one. If you say a word to the cops about me I’ll come back and get you.” With this ugly threat on his lips he backed toward the door. They stared at each other with the intensity of duelists, Mrs. Grady still with the pan of water held up before her like an offering. Then he was gone. She heard him running down the stairs.

Mrs. Grady gasped and put down the pan of water and rushed to the bureau. She knew what she would find. She looked into the gaping top drawer, into the empty tin box, at the cotton cushion where the jewelry had rested. She clasped her hands.

“Oh,” she said aloud. “Oh, damn him.”

Tobin stepped out into the glaring sun. He looked up at the old woman’s windows. He expected to hear a scream at any moment. So he ran. He ran one block and turned a corner, running with a perceptible limp. This grotesque appearance — a man running with a limp suggested the darkest of devious behavior — attracted the attention of two policemen in a squad car. They set after him immediately. They jerked to the curb just ahead of him and leaped out of wide-flung doors. Tobin gasped. Then he cursed to himself.

Shortly after, he was sitting in the police station, a figure of dejection.

“We found this on him,” said one officer, dropping the switch blade onto his superior’s desk. And now the officer said something that he had evidently been preparing as a great presentation, for he said it as though introducing a royal person. “And these.” Following this pronouncement he laid on the desk before his startled superior a handful of splendid jewelry.

The superior officer almost leaped.

“Well, I’ll be damned!” he whispered.

“It checks out,” said the officer who had presented the jewelry, smiling like the father of twins. “Some of it’s the Hascomb stuff. And the rest looks like it’s from some of the other Long Island jobs.”

The youth heard and whirled, first to his right and then to his left. All he could say was:

“Listen, I didn’t pull those jobs!”

But all he heard were voices that sounded deceptively paternal, but which he knew were warming up for sterner things:

“Sure, kid. Sure. It’s a tough break. Tell us all about it, now.”