Tuesday The Rabbi Saw Red (32 page)

“I’ve known similar cases.” said Ames.

“Yes, I imagine so, well, along comes Hendryx who had left Barnard’s Crossing in his early teens, and the Hendryxes were of the same social class as the Hanburys, she had known him, and it’s quite possible that in spite of the difference in their ages she could have had a crush on him.”

“Or because of the difference in their ages.”

“True, and now he comes to her for a job, and he is not married, she not only gets him a job, but manages to maneuver him into the position of acting head of the department.”

“He was a legitimate scholar?”

“Oh yes. Nothing outstanding. I gather, but he had a good degree and had even published some.”

“Then why was he out of a job when he came to Windemere?” asked Ames. “We backtracked him and found he’d had several jobs in the last ten years or so.”

“It could be a matter of personality.” said the rabbi. “He was proud and supercilious, given to making snide, cutting remarks. In a lot of places, one’s colleagues in the department decide on matters of tenure and promotion, and I’m sure these traits rubbed a lot of people the wrong way – as they did Fine. But I suspect that here at Windemere he at last decided to stay, he was no longer a young man, he was already in his forties, and unless you’ve made your mark it’s not so easy to get a job at that age.”

Ames nodded.

“I’m sure Miss Hanbury assumed they were going to be married. I just can’t imagine her – what’s the phrase, shacking up? – I can’t imagine her just shacking up with a man, her pride wouldn’t let her accept so anomalous a situation.”

Ames agreed. “When we questioned her, she said they were planning to get married as soon as Hendryx got tenure, then she could leave her job, would have to, in fact, because they have a rule here against husband and wife both on the staff.”

“Of course.” said the rabbi. “And as long as his was a temporary appointment, hers was by far the better job. So if they got married before he got tenure, he’d be the one to go and she’d be supporting him. I’m sure she wouldn’t care for that, and neither would he. So it was just a question of time.”

“But he couldn’t wait?”

“That’s what I think.” said the rabbi. “Hendryx decided to go for the president’s daughter as the quicker and more certain route to his goal, and it worked. But Millicent Hanbury was proud, too proud to permit herself to be used and then discarded.” He shook his head reflectively. “I wonder how he was able to manage it, courting one woman –”

“While diddling another?” Ames chuckled. “Oh, married men manage it often enough. It’s even easier for a bachelor.”

I hope you don’t mind my asking you to come this afternoon. Rabbi.” said President Macomber. “but on Friday afternoons the building is practically deserted, we can talk in privacy and without interruption. But first, are you enjoying your teaching here?”

“Oh yes. I had twenty-five in my class this afternoon.”

“Indeed.” murmured Macomber.

The rabbi realized the president had no idea what he meant and hastened to explain.

“I’m sure it’s the result of your teaching.” said Macomber politely, he fiddled with a pencil and appeared embarrassed. Finally, he cleared his throat and said. “You shared an office with Professor Hendryx. You talked with him?”

“Yes, occasionally. Not too often, and usually not at great length.”

“Tell me, Rabbi,” he leaned back in his chair, “in your opinion was Professor Hendryx anti-Semitic?”

The rabbi pursed his lips. “I wouldn’t say so, he was prejudiced, all right. Most people are against one group or another. It’s a natural reaction to the stranger, to the member of a minority, we Jews have suffered it more than most. I suppose, because we have been a minority in so many countries. But I don’t call it anti-Semitism if I am not liked, even if I’m not liked because I am a Jew. I don’t consider it anti-Semitism unless the prejudice is translated into action, political or legal or social. To work, a multiple society doesn’t require that every segment of the population like every other segment, that’s Utopian. It works if every segment accords equality to every other segment, whether they like them or not, as for Professor Hendryx, he made disparaging remarks about Jews on occasion, but he also made similar remarks about Irish and Italians and Negroes, he was given to making bitter, sarcastic remarks on almost anyone and anything. I considered him a vexed, unhappy man.”

Macomber nodded slowly. “I see.”

“You seem disappointed.”

The president laughed shortly. “In a way I am. It would make matters easier for me if Professor Hendryx had been anti-Semitic.” He was silent, then. “With the end of the term approaching, we are quite disorganized, we do not have a dean, and the English department does not have a chairman. Normally, that last would be no great concern, but we’re also short-handed there, and with Professor Fine leaving…”

“Does he have to leave?”

“Well, that’s just the point.” Macomber picked up a long white envelope lying on his desk. “Before his death. Professor Hendryx made grave charges against Professor Fine to Dean Hanbury, charges which she brought to me and which led to my decision not to renew his contract. I venture to speak of this because Mr. Ames intimated that you were familiar with the circumstances.” He looked questioningly at the rabbi.

The rabbi nodded.

“Well, I just can’t ignore these charges, even though Dean Hanbury could be considered – er – discredited by the events that have since transpired. It’s the sort of thing that a college president simply can’t ignore. Not if he has a conscience.”

“Let me understand. President Macomber, you would like to keep Fine on because you are short-handed –”

“And because I think he’s a good teacher.”

“But because you have reason to believe that he committed the sin of leaking an exam to a student, your conscience won’t allow you to overlook it?”

“Ye-es. I’d say that’s about right.” said Macomber unhappily.

“But if I had said that Hendryx was anti-Semitic, you would have considered that the charges had stemmed from bias and could dismiss them.”

“Considering that I knew of the situation only through Dean Hanbury. I didn’t talk to Hendryx.”

“But now you feel she’s been discredited.”

“Yes, but there’s this envelope, unfortunately. It contains proof of the charge,” he said. “It’s sealed as you see, with Fine’s name written across it, but I know what’s inside since I told Dean Hanbury just how I wanted it worded. I wrote it out for her to copy, in fact.” He pulled open a drawer and drew out a folder. It contained a single sheet of notepaper, he passed it across the desk. “Go on, read it.”

“It’s not signed.” The rabbi read. “No date.” He looked up inquiringly.

“That’s so we could add a recent date in the event Professor Fine went back on his promise,” he explained.

The rabbi read on: “I hereby admit of my own free will that I arranged to show a copy of the final examination of the course English 74 to a student taking that course, thereby permitting said student to get a higher mark at the end of the summer term. I regret this action and promise that I will not be guilty of a similar offense during the remainder of my tenure here.”

“The one in the envelope is of course signed by Professor Fine.” said Macomber.

The rabbi was silent for a moment and then said. “The traditional function of a rabbi is to sit in judgment. Did you know that?”

Macomber smiled. “Bradford Ames said something to that effect when he discussed – er – things with me, are you suggesting that if you were the judge you would view the charges differently?”

“If I were hearing the case. I would not admit this as evidence at all. It is contrary to Talmudic law.”

Macomber smiled. “Since Roger Fine is a Jew. I suppose there would be a certain justice in judging him by Talmudic law. Judging a man by his peers, you might say-All right, how would you proceed?”

“I would first hear from his accusers.”

“But that’s impossible, they’re both –

“Precisely.”

“But there’s his own admission.”

“But I could not admit it as evidence. By our law. ‘No man may call himself a wrongdoer.’ This is a fundamental principle with us in criminal law.”

“Come to think of it, I guess it is in our Common Law, too.” Macomber remarked.

“But there’s a difference.” said the rabbi. “In Common Law a man cannot be forced to testify against himself. In our law, he can’t even if he wants to.”

“I see, so if you were sitting in judgment on this case?”

“I would dismiss it.” said the rabbi promptly. Macomber smiled. “It’s a way out, to be sure, and yet –”

“And yet you are dissatisfied.”

“Well, yes I am.”

“I am too,” the rabbi admitted. “I suppose it’s because we’re involved not so much with law as with conscience. Yours and mine. I believe I first referred to it as a sin rather than as a crime. This sin of leaking an exam – as a college president you regard it as unpardonable?”

“Well, no sin is unpardonable, I suppose.” said Macomber.”

“Then how would someone go about getting his sin pardoned?”

“I guess that’s more in your province than mine. Rabbi. I suppose by confession – and repentance, and by promising not to repeat the offense.”

The rabbi brightened. “Well, isn’t that what Fine has done?”

“When? Now?”

“Right here in this paper. ‘I admit of my own free will’ – that’s confession. ‘I regret this action’ – that’s repentance. ‘And promise that I will not be guilty of a similar offense’ – that’s the third element.”

Macomber considered, then he smiled. “Yes, I think that will do it, and that will take care of our problem with the English Department at the same time.” He sat back in his chair and beamed. “Tell me, Rabbi. I don’t suppose you’d like to try your hand at being a dean, would you?”

“You start digging and you find things.” said Sergeant Schroeder with grim satisfaction as Bradford Ames finished reading his progress report. “For instance, why didn’t the dean tell us about Hendryx getting appointed head of the department?”

“Because when you first questioned her she didn’t think it germane, I suppose, and the reason President Macomber gave is probably correct.”

“I don’t get it, a man’s been killed.”

“They’ll have to appoint somebody to the job, won’t they?”

said Ames. “Why tell him he was just second choice?”

“Well…” The sergeant was not convinced. “Of course, I’ve still got more to question.”

“Yes, you said you’d speak to the cleaning woman again.”

“You wanted to be in on that one, sir.”

“That’s right. I certainly do, anything on the missing student, this Ekko?”

Schroeder smiled complacently. “I think we’ve got a lead on him. Late Friday afternoon a young fellow hops the bus to Albany, he sits down next to a man who turns out to have a barber shop in Springfield, well, it seems the barber was telling one of his customers about this young fellow, how he was bulling him and how he puts him in his place by spotting that he was wearing a wig and a phony moustache. Just our good luck, this customer happened to be a plainclothesman with the Springfield police and he’d seen our flyer on this Ekko, who’s bald as an egg. So the plainclothesman had their artist add some hair and a moustache to the picture on the flyer and got a positive ident from the barber. I expect we’ll be picking him up in a couple of days.”

“That’s good work.” said Ames. “Are you about through at the college?”

“All except this Professor. Fine and the remainder of the rabbi’s class and the rabbi, of course. I figure I’m going to have to bear down on him a little.”

“Bear down? On the rabbi?” Ames looked up in surprise.

“You bet, that man has a lot of explaining to do. I told you about the first time I called him and he wouldn’t talk to me on his Sabbath, well then, when I finally did get to talk to him, not a word about walking out of his class right after it started.”

“And what significance do you attach to that?” asked Ames.

“Well, think about it, sir. If he left his class a few minutes after one and didn’t leave the school until after two, then he was with Hendryx for an hour or more. Now what were they doing there together?”

“What anyone would do. I suppose – talking.”

“Right!” said Schroeder, as if this was conclusive. “But remember what this Barton woman said about Hendryx being anti-Semitic.”

“What are you suggesting, Sergeant?”

“Well, if the rabbi admits he left around ten past two, and the M.E, puts the time of death at between two-ten and two-forty, and the rabbi was alone with Hendryx right up to that time, and with Hendryx a known anti-Semite and the rabbi a rabbi and all. Suppose they argue. Suppose the M.E.‘s a little off – the ten, fifteen minutes you yourself mentioned, sir – only it’s earlier not later, the point is, sir, if it’s easy, if it involves no planning, just a spur-of-the-moment thing…”

Bradford Ames stared at the officer as though he were seeing him for the first time, the man obviously was still aggrieved at the rabbi’s refusal to talk to him when he first called.

“And how does he go about pulling the statue down. Sergeant?” Ames asked gently. “Have you thought of that?”

“Yup, I have,” Schroeder said smugly. “There’s old books and papers on those shelves. Suppose the rabbi spots a book he wants to read or just look at. Now if it was on the top shelf the only way is to climb up and get it. So he climbs up right next to the statue, then all he’s got to do is give a little shove. Or maybe it was really an accident.” A sudden thought occurred to him. “That may be what he wanted to see the dean about, to tell her there was an accident and to call a doctor, but the door shuts, he’d be all in a stew, not thinking clearly. Now I put it to you, would a man who’d just been through an experience like that go right home?” He shook his head. “No, sir, he’d ride around for a while, trying to make up his mind what to do, that’s why he got home late, and then when I call up, he’d heard about the bombing. Naturally he wouldn’t want to talk to me until he’d figured out what line to take.”

“But –”