Rose's Last Summer [= The Lively Corpse]

20

Greer returned to the main floor. There was no sign of the Goodfields in any of the front rooms but from the back of the house came a sound that Greer couldn’t identify, a loud whirring accentuated by little periods of silence. Greer followed the sound down the hall and through a swinging door into the kitchen.

Ethel was seated at a small built-in table that folded down out of a wall between two windows. On the table was a portable electric sewing machine and Ethel was bent over it with intense concentration.

The noise of the machine had covered Greer’s entrance, so he stood and watched her for a minute, surprised by her speed and efficiency. She had her long fair hair pinned back tightly out of the way, and in place of the trailing silk housecoat she’d had on in the morning, she wore a plain cotton dress with the sleeves rolled up. Greer had the impression that he was seeing Ethel for the first time without costume or disguise and without the mask of idiocy she assumed for self-protection.

“Mrs. Goodfield.”

She bent her head toward him with the alert inquisitiveness of a bird. “Oh, it’s you. Have those other men gone yet?”

“No.”

“I wish they’d go. They’re making Willett nervous. But then everything does, doesn’t it?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

She sighed. “I suppose you have to interrupt me?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve been sewing. That, is, I haven’t been sewing anything in particular, just practicing up in case — well, you never know what will happen, do you. I think every wife should be prepared to go out and take a job.”

“Are you going to take a job, Mrs. Goodfield?”

“No, but it’s nice to be prepared in case worst comes to worst. So I thought I’d practice up on my sewing. I used to do a lot of sewing back home. I even made all my brother’s shirts. So I thought, if worst comes to worst—”

“Do you think it’s coming?”

She looked at him blandly, assuming the mask again. “One never knows.”

“Sometimes one has a rough idea.”

“I don’t follow you. I’m not a bit subtle. Ask Willett.”

“I intend to ask Willett quite a few things. And you, too.”

“I’ve answered a thousand questions already today. Who does everybody think I am, Einstein?”

“What I think,” Greer said, “is that you’re an accomplished liar.”

“I consider that an insult.”

“You consider it correctly. It is an insult.”

“And if I’m such a liar, why do you keep asking me questions?”

“I’m hoping you’ll change your attitude and cooperate.” Greer took the maps out of his pocket and unfolded them. “Ever see these before?”

Ethel hesitated slightly before answering. “Of course. They belong to my mother-in-law.”

“Is this her writing in the margins?”

“Whose else would it be? They’re her maps. She kept them as a souvenir of the trip, I guess.”

“What trip?”

“I told you we’ve been traveling for the past six months, Mother, Willett and I.”

“Why?”

“Why do people travel? To see things and places.”

“For enjoyment, in other words.”

“I... yes, you might call it that.”

“Was it enjoyable traveling with a bedridden invalid?”

“It was hell,” Ethel said flatly. “Just plain hell. But she wanted to travel, so we had to.”

“It couldn’t have been very pleasant for her either. Why did she insist on it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is it possible that she had a very good reason for visiting these various places, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Minneapolis, and so on?”

“She never had to have a reason for doing anything. If she wanted to do it, that was enough.”

“Why did she consider it important to make these memos of dates and places? Take a specific example: Tucson, Dec. 10, Palace Hotel, Redlands Hospital. Did anything significant happen to Mrs. Goodfield in Tucson? Did she go to visit anyone, friend, relative?”

“She went into Redlands Hospital for a week for a rest and a checkup. The results of the checkup weren’t good at all. I wanted to come home but Mother refused. We went on to Colorado Springs and she entered a clinic there.”

“Why didn’t she stay in the hospital in Tucson?”

Ethel’s expression remained blank, but there was a thin, white line of anger around her mouth. “I told you, if she wanted to do something, that was enough. She never gave reasons. She didn’t have to, she was boss.”

“This checkup she had in Tucson — it showed she was gravely ill?”

“Yes.”

“And still she refused to go home?”

“She refused.”

“Is it possible,” Greer said, “that she was looking for someone?”

Ethel turned and looked out the window. “Practically anything is possible, but it doesn’t make much sense, her looking for someone all over the country in her condition. Who would she be looking for?”

“Some relative, perhaps. She was aware of her approaching death — she talked to me about it — and she may have wanted to make another will to include some relatives that she’d lost touch with.”

“She hasn’t any. We’re her relatives, Willett and Jack and Shirley and I. As for making another will, that would never have occurred to her.”

“You’re positive?”

“Of course. She had nothing to leave to anyone, not a thing.”

“I understood she was fairly well off.”

“She was once. She gave it all away to her children quite a while ago.”

“Why?”

“Why?” Ethel repeated with a dry little smile. “I guess she didn’t want any of us to sit around waiting for her to die.”

It seemed logical enough, and yet Greer had a feeling that it was not the true explanation. From what he knew and had heard of old Mrs. Goodfield, sensibility was not one of her characteristics. She was a hard woman with an iron will which she enforced on others by moral and financial pressure. Was she so sure of her moral force that she could afford to give up the advantage of financial pressure? And what kind of moral force was it that could compel free adults like Willett and Ethel to forego their own wishes and escort on a countrywide tour a woman who was gravely ill?

They were not traveling for enjoyment, Greer thought, but for a purpose.

He was certain that Ethel knew the purpose and was a part of it; equally certain that she would never tell. The maps were involved in some way. They were the connecting link between Rose and the Goodfields, and this suggested to Greer the possibility that Rose was the person Mrs. Goodfield had been searching for on her travels. But he had no evidence to support this theory; there was even evidence against it. Rose had not been in hiding. It would have been easy enough for anyone who seriously wanted to locate her to do so, either through her old studio connections, or, as Dalloway had, by a newspaper item. Why, then, should Mrs. Goodfield have been looking for Rose in Philadelphia or Minneapolis? Another and even more unanswerable question arose: if Mrs. Goodfield had wanted to find anyone, why hadn’t she hired a detective instead of undertaking the difficult task herself?

He said finally, “There’s nothing more you’d like to tell me?”

“Oh, but there is. I’d like to tell you a lot of things, I’d like to tell you the whole messy story of my life.” She laughed, sharply, as if it hurt. “But I’m not going to. It’s so futile, don’t you see? There’s nothing I can do for my mother-in-law now, nothing I can do for anybody, really. I’m completely, utterly, absolutely useless. My sole function is to shut up and play dead like a possum and I don’t even do that very well.”

“Well enough. You had me fooled for awhile.”

“I ruin things by talking too much, don’t I? I can’t help it, I’m lonely, I like to talk to people. Normal people. Not Goodfields. For years I haven’t talked to anybody but Goodfields, and all they ever cared about was their stinking money and their stinking hides. Well, now there’s a lot less money and a lot less hide.”

“What happened to the money?”

“Nothing drastic. It just keeps getting less. And less. The factory’s going downhill and nobody seems able to stop it. Neither Jack nor Willett could operate a popcorn stand without losing their shirts.”

“Thank you, Ethel,” Willett said from the doorway.

She was not startled. She didn’t even turn to look at him. “You’re welcome.”

“What have you been telling this policeman?”

“The story of my life.”

“Is it as dull as you’ve always led me to believe?”

“Duller. Much, much duller. Especially the last ten years. I wouldn’t wish the last ten years of my life on a dog.”

“I suggest that if you can’t control your emotions in front of strangers, you go up to your room.”

“You suggest. Well, I suggest that you go jump in the lake. There’s a lake back home near the farm, only a small lake but it has a quicksand bottom. When you go down, you stay down. So I suggest—”

“Ethel, are you drunk or something?”

“I’m something but I’m not drunk. I wanted a drink, I went to get one, only there isn’t any.”

“That’s absurd. I bought a whole case of Scotch when we moved in. What happened to it?”

“I suggest that you ask your old lady.”

“Don’t talk like that.” He advanced on her, his chubby hands clenched into fists, held tightly against his ribs. “She couldn’t have— She never left her room.”

“She didn’t have to. She sent Murphy to get it for her.”

“When?”

“How should I know when? All I know is, the liquor’s gone.”

“Ortega might—”

“He’s never been inside the house.”

“Murphy took it for herself, not for—”

“Let’s not kid ourselves.”

“But she promised.”

“Her promises aren’t worth the oxygen they use up.”

“Ethel, I’ve got to talk to you alone.” He took a tentative step toward Greer. “Would you excuse us, Captain? We... this is a private matter, nothing to do with your investigation. Would you mind if we just stepped out for a minute?”

“Go ahead. I’ll wait here. I have to make a phone call.”

“The telephone is right there by the—”

“I see it.”

“I... come on, Ethel.”

She didn’t move.

“Ethel, please.”

He stretched out a hand to touch her shoulder. With a swift, neat movement she ducked out of his way and strode ahead of him through the swinging door. The door swung shut in his face. He pushed it open again, slowly, as if against the pressure of Ethel’s weight.

Greer went over to the telephone and dialed a number.

A man’s voice answered on the fifth ring. “Hello?”

“Dr. Severn?”

“Yes.”

“Jim Greer. Are you busy?”

“I’m not in the middle of an autopsy if that’s what you mean. I’m always busy.”

“Have you got your notes handy on the Rose French case?”

“Why?”

“I’m rechecking.”

“Why all this sudden new surge of interest in poor old Rose?”

“What do you mean, all?”

“I’ve had several calls about her this morning, one of them from the local paper, the other two anonymous. And Frank Clyde’s right here in my office now. You know Clyde, he’s one of the Psych boys.”

“The name,” Greer said, “sounds familiar.”

“A lot of people seem to be getting back to the idea that Rose was murdered. You, too?”

“I tell you, I’m just rechecking.”

“Well, you heard my testimony at the inquest. I’m not changing it.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“You know how I work, Greer. I commit nothing to memory; everything is written down on the spot. I’ve done over two thousand autopsies, counting those I did in the army.”

“I realize all this. So?”

“So I repeat, it’s my conviction that Rose died a natural death that was, to be blunt, overdue. Probably the only thing that kept her alive with a heart in that condition was the fact that she was slender, had no excess weight to haul around. She certainly had at one time — there were unmistakable evidences of obesity. Very likely her physician spotted her heart condition and put her on a rigid diet. Speaking of diets, Greer, it wouldn’t be a bad idea if you—”

“All right, all right. Starting tomorrow.”

“No need to get huffy about it. Wait a minute, Clyde wants to talk to you.”

“Put him on.” Greer waited, tapping the stem of his pipe against the phone. The noise sounded like the rattle of bones. “Clyde? I thought you had a living to make.”

“I worked this morning,” Frank said. “These are my lunch hours.”

“Hours?”

“I’m taking a little extra time off.”

“It seems to me you’ve been taking a lot of extra time off. Better watch it or they’ll toss you out.”

“They can’t toss me out until they have somebody to toss in.”

“You’re invaluable, are you?”

“No. Merely valuable.”

“Well, you’re not so valuable to me, Clyde. You might just as well carry on with your own job and let me do mine.”

“You may regret those words,” Frank said. “I found out something very interesting this morning about a friend of yours.”

“Who?”

“Mr. Dalloway.”

“Spill it.”

“Not over the phone. Why not pick me up and we’ll pay Dalloway a visit?”

“It’s that interesting, is it?”

“I think so.”

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” Greer said.