Harry Kemelman - Sunday the Rabbi Stayed Home

“Well. Jews have never been known as a passive people.” Miriam said gently. “And what makes you think their sons and daughters in the colleges will be any different?”

“Perhaps not, but I’m hoping their disagreements would be over issues of greater moment than whether or not to have permanent seating arrangements, say. But it’s more than that. A rabbi is primarily a student, a scholar. And for scholarship, a certain amount of leisure is necessary. In Hillel work. I’m hoping I would have the time—”

“But here you’re doing things; in the college you’d only be reading about them.”

“Well. I’d like a chance to do a little reading.”

“Oh, you—” She controlled herself. “Your head is in the clouds. David. What about the immediate future? The community seder on Sunday, for instance. Will you be running it? Have you thought of that?”

“No. I haven’t. But now that you mention it, I suppose that until I resign or am voted out I’m still the rabbi officially, and I would preside. Of course. Gorfinkle through his new Ritual Committee could decide to have the cantor run it, or Brooks, for that matter. It wouldn’t bother me too much. As a lameduck rabbi. I might find it embarrassing. Besides, the seder is not really a community affair. It’s a family affair. The only reason we have a seder in the temple is because a lot of our members are either too lazy to run their own or feel that they can’t.”

“But if they did arrange for someone else to run it, what would you do?”

“Do? I’d stay home.”

“But—”

The doorbell rang.

“Who can that be at this hour?” exclaimed the rabbi. “It’s eleven o’clock.”

Miriam hurried to the door. “Why, it’s Mr. Carter. Come in, won’t you.”

He permitted himself to be led into the room and sat down on the chair that was drawn up for him. He sat on the edge, his back straight and not touching the chair-back. “My son is dead.” he announced.

A shocked glance passed between the rabbi and his wife. “Oh, Mr. Carter. I’m so sorry,” said Miriam.

“How did it happen?” asked the rabbi quietly. “Tell me about it. Is there anything I can do?”

“Maybe there is.” said Carter. “They called me tonight. I was out, and they called just as I was coming in the house. Asked me to wait until some police sergeant got there. When he came, he wanted me to go down the station with him. I kept asking him what is the matter, and all he would say was that I’d find out when I got to the station house. The chief was there when I got there, and he told me. He wanted me to identify the body.” He gave a short bitter laugh. “My boy’s picture was in the paper practically every week last year. I’ll bet that most people in town knew him better than the chairman of the Board of Selectment. He was the guest of honor at the annual banquet of the Junior Chamber of Commerce at the end of the football season. But they needed me to identify him.”

“That’s just necessary formality. I believe,” remarked the rabbi.

“Yuh. I guess so.”

“Did they tell you how he had met his death?”

“They didn’t say positive except that he had been drinking, that it looked like he had been drinking an awful lot. Well, that stuff is poison. He was intoxicated, that’s what he was. That’s a Latin word, and it means poison. Did you know that?”

The rabbi nodded.

“They took the body down to the police station.” Carter went on, “in the police ambulance. They opened the door and there he was, with a blanket over him. The head was toward the front of the car, so I had to climb right in. Lanigan got in after me, and he pulled back the blanket. ‘Is that your son?’ he asks. And I says. ‘Yes, that’s my son.’ So then they told me how they found him at Hillson House. He was lying on a couch there, and they could smell the whisky on him. Lanigan said how if you drink the stuff fast enough before the body has a chance to get rid of it, it can be very dangerous. So I guess that’s what must have happened.”

“You said you thought I could help,” said the rabbi. “Did you want me to try to get further information on just how it happened?”

The carpenter shook his head. “No. I guess that’s how it happened, the way Lanigan said. I knew that Moose drank even when he was in high school.” He paused again and then went on. “Lanigan drove me home and left me to break the news to Mrs. Carter. She carried on something dreadful. Lanigan called a doctor, and he gave her something to quiet her. I didn’t have the heart to prevent it, God forgive me.”

“And how is she now?” asked Miriam gently.

“Well, right now she’s asleep. My oldest girl is with her.” He knuckled his eyes, as if to wipe the sleep out of them. “Then I went back to the station house—Lanigan had left earlier—to make arrangements to get the body so I could give it decent burial. And Lanigan told me that they might have to do an autopsy on him to find out for sure what the cause of death was.”

“I suppose that’s the law.” said the rabbi.

“Well. I don’t hold with it. I know the cause of death. Lanigan told me. So why do they have to cut him open?”

“I suppose they have to be sure.”

“How much surer do they have to be than they are right now? The body is the temple of the spirit. Rabbi. Even if the spirit is gone, do you have a right to destroy the temple? I don’t hold with it. It’s against my religious beliefs.” He fixed piercing eyes on the rabbi. “Now. I’m not looking for a fight with the police department or with the town, but if I have to fight. I will. But I’ve heard that you’re friendly with Lanigan and have been almost since you came. I thought maybe you could speak to him about it for me.”

“I have no legal standing in the matter.” said the rabbi. “I mean. I’m not a lawyer, and I couldn’t act as your legal representative. Have you thought of getting a lawyer?”

Carter shook his head. “It’s not a fight I want right now. Rabbi. When it comes to going to court. I’ll get a lawyer. Right now I’m thinking whether you could persuade him for my sake and my wife’s sake.”

“All right, I’ll talk to him,” said the rabbi. “But I wouldn’t expect too much. Lanigan isn’t the sort of man who would refuse a request of this kind unless he had a very good reason and saw it as a necessary duty. And if that is so, then I don’t think I could persuade him. But I’ll talk to him if you like.”

“When?” asked Carter pointedly.

“Anytime you like.”

“How about now? Tonight?”

Did you make contact with the Hillsons?” asked Lanigan.

Lieutenant Jennings nodded. “Sort of contact.” he amended. “I spoke to the housekeeper. A regular battleax. She said the girls—girls, the younger one is seventy-five!—anyway, they were asleep and she wasn’t going to wake them, and I ought to be ashamed to be calling this time of the night, and she didn’t care if I were the police or the United States Army.”

“She said that? The United States Army?”

“Her words. Hugh. She even banged the receiver down once, but I called back”—he nodded in self-satisfaction—“and I told her that she better stay on the line until I got through with her, or I’d notify the local police to go out there and pick her up and bring her here. She must have believed me, because she didn’t try it again. Then she wanted to know what had happened, and when I told her that I didn’t have time to give her all the details, she said she was going to call the police, her police. Anyway, she finally told me that the house was up for sale and was in the hands of the Bellmore Realty Company of