Archie Goes Home

Chapter 11

Renson’s Garage occupied a single-story, ivy-covered brick building that I vaguely remembered from my childhood. It doubled as a filling station with gas pumps in front and had two bays for auto repairs. I pulled up in front and walked into the small office, which was unoccupied.

“Be with you in a minute,” a voice called out from one of the bays. In fact, it was less than a minute when a chunky, balding man in coveralls stepped in with a questioning look. Being the perceptive detective that I am, I recognized him from my mother’s description. And it did not hurt that the word Charles was stitched in red on the front of his soiled coveralls.

“I’m getting a rattling sound somewhere in the rear of my car,” I told him, gesturing toward the dusty convertible that sat in front.

“I’ve got nothing urgent going on here right now, so let’s take a look,” he said, wiping off his hands with a rag that he kept in his back pocket. “I’ll drive her on in and put her up on the rack, okay?”

“Fine by me,” I replied, handing him the car keys. Less than a minute later, the car was inside and off the ground, as the two of us looked up at it, one of whom knew what he was doing. Purcell played the beam of his flashlight around the car’s undercarriage, then nodded. “Aha,” he said, winking at me and nodding.

“What is the verdict, Doctor? Will the patient survive?”

“Oh, I think so. See right there?” he said as he held the flashlight steady.

“To be honest, I’m not sure what I’m looking at.”

“A loose bolt, that’s what. Nothing that would likely have caused an accident, but still, it needs to be tightened up or you’d have to live with the rattling, which would have gotten a lot worse when the bolt finally fell off.”

“I’ll bet you’ve looked at the underbellies of a lot of automobiles in your time.”

“Enough,” Purcell said with a scowl. “This is not how I figured I would end up, but it’s the hand that I’ve been dealt. I don’t think I’ve seen you around here before, have I? I noticed you’ve got New York plates, something of a rarity in these parts.”

“I’m visiting family in town. I grew up here a long time ago.”

“I think that I’ve been here too long myself,” the banker-turned-mechanic said.

“Well, you seem to know your way around cars, so mark me down as impressed. I know enough to turn the key in the ignition, and that’s about the extent of it.”

Purcell snorted as he stood under the convertible and tightened the errant bolt with a wrench. “It’s a good thing I do, because my previous career crashed and burned, in a way.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Not half as sorry as I am,” Purcell said bitterly, shaking his head.

“If you don’t mind my asking, what was your previous career?”

“No, I don’t mind your asking. Everybody in town knows all about it. I had been in banking since I got out of school — that’s right, an auto mechanic with an actual college degree — two degrees, in fact. Anyway, I had worked my way up in a couple of banks around the state and felt like I had gotten to know the business pretty well. So... I got the bright idea to open my own bank, and right here.”

“And why not, since you had already gotten experience in the world of finance?”

“I found out why not,” Purcell said as he hit the switch that lowered the convertible gently to the garage floor. “Somebody didn’t like having competition and made damned sure that I failed.”

“Sounds to me like there was some dirty business involved.”

“You could call it that. I found out just how easy it is to start a rumor, or maybe calling what happened a whispering campaign is more accurate.”

“So I’m to take from your experience that not all bankers are upright pillars of the community?”

That brought a mirthless laugh from Purcell. “That is a fair statement, Mr...?”

“Goodwin, Archie Goodwin.”

“Well, Mr. Goodwin, there was a man here who had a bank that he had owned and run for many years. It had been the only bank in town for decades, and he was determined to keep it that way.”

“Had anyone else tried to open another bank here before?”

“Not that I am aware of, at least not in recent times, certainly not since the Depression. This area has experienced at least modest population growth in the last few years, and there is certainly room for more than a single bank now.”

“But one individual doesn’t think so?”

“Didn’t think so. That individual, Logan Mulgrew by name, is dead. If I told you I was sorry about that, I would be lying.”

“Oh yeah, Mulgrew. I heard that he killed himself, didn’t he?”

“Uh... so I’ve also heard. Say, your name is Goodwin, right?”

“It is.”

“If I remember right, a woman by that name opened an account in my bank.”

“You remember right. That would be my mother, who lives in a farmhouse out on the Portsmouth Road. I’m here visiting her.”

“Well, please thank her for me, will you? I wish there had been more people like her. I believe she did get her money back when we had to close our doors, didn’t she?”

“That’s my understanding. Just how did this Mulgrew put you out of business?”

“The rumor mill and the power of suggestion are both alive and well in this town, Mr. Goodwin,” Purcell said. “And Logan Mulgrew knew just how to manipulate them. Oh, he was subtle, at least in the beginning, when he pointed out in casual conversations to his customers and anyone else in hearing distance how well funded and insured his institution was.

“Then he began to send out inserts with his customers’ monthly statements that carried a headline reading ‘Bank Where Your Dollars Are Safe,’ along with text that specified how well protected money was at Farmer’s State Bank & Trust. Never mind that at my own bank, the money was just as safe and just as highly insured.”

“Nasty piece of business,” I remarked.

“Yeah, and it got nastier,” Purcell said as he pulled off his work gloves. “Mulgrew then started a whispering campaign to the effect that it was just a matter of time before my bank would close down. Many of those people who had opened accounts with me rushed in to withdraw their money.”

“Shades of the kind of runs on banks that were common back in the Depression,” I remarked.

“That’s exactly right, Mr. Goodwin. I managed to get everyone their dough, but I was wiped out, ruined, in the process. I had to sell my house, and my life fell apart. Oh hell, you don’t need to listen to this tale of woe. I leave that to my fellow drinkers in the bar where I hang out. We all cry on one another’s shoulders, for a variety of reasons.”

“Sounds like you have plenty of cause to beef. Why do you think Mulgrew killed himself?”

Purcell paused several beats before answering. “I really couldn’t say,” he replied with a finality that sent the clear message that our conversation was at an end.

When I asked how much I owed him, he said a sawbuck would cover it. I handed him the money and we shook hands briefly, then I drove off as he stood in the entrance to the bay, hands on hips and wearing a grim expression.