Read The Interpretation Of Murder Online
Authors: Jed Rubenfeld
Suddenly I became aware of her blue
eyes looking up into mine. When had they opened? She was mouthing a word. I
hadn't realized. The word was
stop.
I let go her throat, expecting her to
gasp desperately for breath. She did not. Rather, she said, so softly I could
barely hear it, 'Kiss me.'
I am obliged to admit I don't know
what I would have done with this invitation. But there came, at that moment, a
sudden loud rapping at the door, followed by the rattling of a key being worked
frantically in the lock. I released her immediately. In the space of a second,
she retrieved the teapot from the floor and placed it on the table, from which
she also seized the note I'd left there. We both faced the door.
'I remember,'
she whispered
urgently to me, as the knob turned.
'I know who did it.'
At noon the same day, September 1,
Carl Jung was taken to lunch by Smith Ely Jelliffe - publisher, doctor, and
professor of mental diseases at Fordham University - at a club on Fifty-third
Street overlooking the park. Freud was not invited; neither was Ferenczi, nor
Brill, nor Younger. Their exclusion did not perturb Jung. It was another mark,
he felt, of his rising international stature. A less magnanimous man would have
been crowing about such a thing, rubbing the invitation in the others' noses.
But he, Jung, took his duty of charity seriously, so he concealed.
It was painful, however, to have to
hide so much. It had started the very first day out of Bremen. Jung had not
actually lied, of course. That, he told himself, he would never do. But it was
not his fault; they drove him to dissemble.
For example, Freud and Ferenczi had
booked second- class berths on the
George Washington.
Was he to blame?
Not wanting to shame them, he had been obliged to say that, by the time he
bought his ticket, only first-class cabins were available. Then there had been
his dream the first night on board. Its true message was obvious - that he was
surpassing Freud in insight and reputation - so, out of solicitude for Freud's
sensitive pride, he asserted that the bones he discovered in the dream belonged
to his wife, rather than to Freud. In fact, he had cleverly added that the
bones belonged not only to his wife but also his wife's sister: he wanted to
see how Freud would react to that, given the skeletons in Freud's own closet.
These were trivialities, but they had laid the groundwork for the far greater
dissimulation that had become necessary since his arrival in America.
The lunch at Jelliffe's club was most
gratifying. Nine or ten men sat at the oval table. Intermixed with
knowledgeable scientific conversation and an excellent claret was a goodly dose
of ribald humor, which Jung always enjoyed. The women's suffragette movement
bore the brunt of the raillery. One of the men asked whether anyone had ever
met a suffragette he could imagine bedding. The unanimous answer was no.
Someone ought to notify these ladies, another gentleman said, that even if they
got the vote it didn't mean anyone would sleep with them. All agreed that the
best cure for a woman demanding the suffrage was a good healthy servicing; that
treatment, however, was so unappetizing one might as well give them the vote
instead.
Jung was in his element. For once,
there was no need to pretend to be less wealthy than one was. There was no
obligation to deny one's ancestry. After the meal, the members repaired to a
smoking room, where the conversation continued over cognac. Their ranks
gradually thinned until Jung was left with only Jelliffe and three older men.
One of these gentlemen now made a subtle signal; Jelliffe instantly rose to
leave. Jung stood as well, assuming that Jelliffe s departure indicated his
own. But Jelliffe informed him that the three gentlemen wanted the briefest of
words with him alone and that a carriage would be waiting when they had done.
In actual fact, Jelliffe was not a
member of this club at all. He yearned to belong to it. The men with authority
over the society and its membership were those now remaining with him. It was
they who had told Jelliffe to bring Jung to them today.
'Do sit down, Dr Jung,' said the man
who had dismissed Jelliffe, gesturing toward a comfortable armchair with one of
his elegant hands.
Jung tried to remember the
gentleman's name, but he had met so many, and was so unused to wine at lunch,
he could not.
'It's Dana,' the man said helpfully,
his dark eyebrows setting off his silver hair. 'Charles Dana. I was just
speaking of you, Jung, with my good friend Ochs over at the
Times.
He
wants to do a story about you.'
'A story?' asked Jung. 'I don't
understand.'
'In connection with the lectures
we've arranged for you at Fordham next week. He wants an interview with you. He
proposes a short biography - two full broadsheet pages.
You'll be quite famous. I didn't know
if you'd agree. I told him I'd ask.'
'Why,' answered Jung, 'I - I don't -'
'There is just one obstacle. Ochs' -
Dana pronounced it
Oaks
- 'is afraid you are a Freudian. Doesn't want
his paper associated with a - with a- Well, you know what they say about
Freud.'
'A sex-crazed degenerate,' said the
portly man to the right, smoothing his muttonchop whiskers.
'Does Freud actually believe what he
writes?' asked the third gentleman, a balding fellow. 'That every girl he
treats attempts to seduce him? Or what he says about feces - feces, for God's
sake. Or about fastidious men wanting sex through the anus?'
'What about boys wanting to penetrate
their own mothers?' rejoined the portly man, with an expression of utmost
disgust.
'What about God?' asked Dana, tamping
the tobacco from his pipe. 'Must be hard on you, Jung.'
Jung was uncertain exactly what was
being referred to. He didn't answer.
'I know you, Jung,' said Dana. 'I
know what you are. A Swiss. A Christian. A man of science, like us. And a man
of passion. One who acts on his desires. A man who needs more than one woman to
thrive. There is no need to hide such things here. These so-called men who
don't act, who let their desires fester like sores, whose fathers were
peddlers, who have always felt inferior to us - only they could dream up such
vile, bestial fantasies, theorizing God and man into the sewer. It must be hard
on you to be associated with that.'
Jung was finding it increasingly
difficult to absorb the flow of words. The alcohol must have gone to his head.
This gentleman did seem to know him, but how? 'Sometimes it is,' Jung answered
slowly.
'I am not in the least anti-Semitic.
You need only ask Sachs here.' He indicated the balding man on his left. 'On
the contrary, I admire the Jews. Their secret is racial purity, a principle
they have understood far better than we. It is what has made them the great
race they are.' The man referred to as Sachs gave away nothing; the portly man
merely pursed his fleshy lips. Dana continued: 'But last Sunday, when I looked
up at our bleeding Savior and imagined this Viennese Jew saying our passion for
Him is sexual, I found it difficult to pray. Very. I should think you might
have encountered similar difficulties. Or are Freud's disciples required to
give up the church?'
'I go to church' was Jung's awkward
reply.
'For myself,' said Dana, 'I can't say
I see it: this rage for psychotherapeutics. The Emmanuels, the New Thought,
mesmerism, Dr Quackenbos -'
'Quackenbos,' harrumphed the
muttonchops.
'Eddyism,' Dana went on,
'psychoanalysis - they are all cults, to my thinking. But half the women in
America are running around demanding it, and it's best they don't drink from
the wrong well. They'll be drinking from yours, believe me, after they read
about you in the
Times.
Well, the long and short of it is this: we can
make you the most famous psychiatrist in America, but Ochs can't write you up
unless you make clear in your lectures at Fordham - unmistakably clear - that
you don't go in for the Freudian obscenities. Good afternoon, Dr Jung.'
The rapping on the door of Miss
Acton's hotel room continued as the doorknob turned this way and that. At last
the door flew open, and in rushed five persons, three of whom I recognized:
Mayor McClellan, Detective Littlemore, and George Banwell. The other two were a
gentleman and lady of evident wealth.
The man looked to be in his late
forties, fair in complexion but sunburned and peeling, with a pointy chin,
deeply receding hairline, and a white gauze bandage over most of his left eye.
It was instantly clear that he was Miss Acton's father, although the long limbs
that were so graceful on her frame looked effete on him, and the features so
softly feminine in her case conveyed diffidence in his. The woman, whom I took
to be Miss Acton's mother, was at most five feet tall. She was of greater girth
than her husband, had a deal of jewelry and paint on her face, and wore shoes
with dangerously high heels, presumably to add a few inches to her height.
Possibly she had been attractive once. It was she who spoke first, crying out,
'Nora, you piteous, unlucky girl! I have been in agony since I heard the
monstrous news. We have been riding for hours. Harcourt, are you just going to
stand there?'
Nora's father apologized to the stout
woman, extended his arm to her, and conducted her safely to a chair, into which
she dropped with a great cry of exhaustion. The mayor introduced me to Acton
and his wife, Mildred. It turned out their party had just arrived in the lobby
when someone called down to the front desk complaining about noises in Miss
Acton's room. I assured them we were quite safe, rather wishing the teacup was
not lying in pieces against the far wall. Their backs were to it; I think they
didn't see.
'Everything's going to be all right
now, Nora,' said Mr Acton. 'The mayor tells me there has been nothing in the
press, thank goodness.'
'Why did I listen to you?' Mildred
Acton asked her daughter. 'I said we should never have left you behind in New
York. Didn't I say so, Harcourt? Do you see what has happened? I thought I
would die when I heard. Biggs! Where is that Biggs? She will pack for you. We
must get you out of here, Nora, at once. I do believe the rapist is here in
this hotel. I have a sense for these things. The moment I walked in, I felt his
eyes on me.'
'On you, my dear?' asked Acton.
I cannot say I observed in Miss Acton
the warm affection or the sense of protection you might wish to see in a girl
greeting her parents after a prolonged and eventful separation. Nor could I
blame her, given the tenor of the remarks made to her so far. The odd thing was
that Miss Acton had not yet said a word. She had made several starts at
speaking, but none of these efforts had eventuated in speech. A furious influx
of blood now came to her cheeks. Then I realized: the girl had lost her voice
again. Or so I thought, until Miss Acton said, quietly and evenly, 'I have not
been raped, Mama.'
'Hush, Nora,' her father replied.
'That word is not spoken.'
'You cannot know, poor thing!' her
mother exclaimed. 'You have no memory of the crime. You will never know.'
Now was the moment when, if she were
going to, Miss Acton would have said that she had recovered her memory. She did
not do so. Instead, the girl replied, 'I will stay here in the hotel to
continue my treatment. I don't want to go home.'
'Do you hear her?' cried her mother.
'I will not feel safe at home,' said Miss
Acton. 'The man who attacked me may be watching for me there. Mr McClellan, you
said so yourself on Sunday.'
'The girl is right,' the mayor
replied. 'She is much safer in the hotel. The murderer does not know she is
here.'
I knew this to be false, because of
the note Miss Acton received in the street. Miss Acton obviously knew the same.
In fact, at the mayor's words I saw her right hand clench; a corner of the note
was sticking out from her fist. Yet she said nothing. Instead, she looked from
McClellan to her parents, as if he had quite vindicated her position. It came
to me that she was avoiding Mr Banwell's scrutiny.
Banwell had been eyeing Nora with a
peculiar expression. Physically, he dominated the others. He was taller than
anyone else in the room with the exception of myself and had a barrel chest.
His dark hair was smoothed back with an unguent of some kind and graying
handsomely at the temples. His gaze was fixed on Nora. It will seem
preposterous, and another observer would no doubt have denied it, but the best
way I can describe his expression is to say that, to me, he looked like he
wished to do her violence. He now spoke, but his voice betrayed no such
feeling. 'Surely the best thing is to get Nora out of the city,' he said with what
sounded like gruff but genuine concern for her safety. 'Why not my country
place? Clara can take her.'
'I prefer to stay here,' said Nora,
looking down.
'Really?' replied Banwell. 'Your
mother thinks the murderer is in the hotel. How can you be sure he isn't
keeping watch on you even now?'
Miss Acton's face reddened as Banwell
spoke to her. Her whole body, to me, seemed tense with fear.
I announced that I would be leaving.
Miss Acton looked up at me anxiously. I added, as if just recalling something,
'Oh, Miss Acton, your prescription - for the sedative I mentioned. Here it is.'
I withdrew a script from my pocket, quickly filled it out, and handed it to
her. On it was written,
Was it Banwell?
She saw my message. She nodded to me,
slightly but definitively.
'Why don't you give that to me?'
asked Banwell, narrowing his eyes on me. 'My man downstairs can run to the
pharmacy right now.'
'Very well,' I replied. From Miss
Acton's hand, I took my note. I handed the latter to him. 'See if your man can
fill that.'
Banwell read it. 1 half expected him
to crush it and glare at me menacingly, revealing himself like the villain in
some cheap romance. Instead, he exclaimed, 'What the devil is this -
Hold
your tongue
? You'd better have an explanation, young man.'
'This is a warning Miss Acton
received on the street this morning,' I said, 'as you well know, Mr Banwell,
since you wrote it.' A stunned silence followed. 'Mr Mayor, Mr Littlemore: this
man is the criminal you are looking for. Miss Acton remembered the attack on
her just minutes before you came in. I advise you to arrest him at once.'
'How dare you?' said Banwell.
'What is this - this person?' asked
Mildred Acton, referring to me. 'Where does he come from?'
'Dr Younger,' said Mayor McClellan,
'you do not appreciate the gravity of a false accusation. Withdraw it. If Miss
Acton has told you this, her memory is playing a trick on her.'
'Mr Mayor, sir - ' began Detective
Littlemore.
'Not now, Littlemore,' the mayor said
calmly. 'Doctor, you will withdraw your accusation, offer Mr Banwell an
apology, and tell us what Miss Acton has said to you.'
'But Your Honor - ' said the
detective.
'Littlemore!' the mayor barked so
furiously it drove Littlemore back a step. 'Didn't you hear me?'
'Mayor McClellan,' I broke in, 'I
don't understand. I have just told you Miss Acton remembers the attack. Your
own detective seems to have something confirmatory to add. Miss Acton has
positively identified Mr Banwell as her assailant.'
'We have only your word for that,
Doctor - if that's what you are,' said Banwell. He looked hard at Miss Acton;
it seemed to me he was laboring strenuously to restrain a powerful emotion.
'Nora, you know perfectly well I have done nothing to you. Tell them, Nora.'
'Nora,' said the girl's mother, 'tell
this young man he is under a misimpression.'
'Nora dear?' said her father.
'Tell him, Nora,' said Banwell.
'I won't tell him,' answered the
girl, but that is all she said.
'Mr Mayor,' I said, 'you cannot allow
Miss Acton to be cross-questioned by the man who attacked her - a man who has
already murdered another girl.'
'Younger, I am convinced you mean
well,' replied the mayor, 'but you are wrong. George Banwell and I were together
Sunday night, when Elizabeth Riverford was murdered. He was with me - do you
hear it,
with me
- all that evening and night and well into Monday
morning as well. Two hundred fifty miles out of town. He could not have killed
anyone.'