Гарри Кемельман - Wednesday the Rabbi got wet

A policeman came up from the wardroom in the basement, he walked by to go to the chiefs office and then stopped and did a double-take, "Hey, Arnold. I didn't recognize you. What are you doing here?"

"Hello, Purvis," said Arnold, smiling.

"You know him?" Lanigan called from his office, he came to the doorway.

"Arnold Aptaker? Sure, we went to high school together. Last time I saw him he had a beard like an old Jewish rabbi—" He blushed. "Sorry about that. Rabbi, it just slipped out."

"That's all right, officer, but nowadays it's the young ones that have the beards."

"And when was that. Purvis?" asked Lanigan.

"Last time I saw him? It was the night of the big storm. I was on duty patrolling the entrance to Route ‘ A, to slow cars down because of the broken branches on the highway ahead, and this car comes barreling along—"

"You mean he was speeding?"

The policeman colored as it occurred to him that he might be faulted for not having given Aptaker a ticket. "Well, not really speeding, well, maybe just a little speeding. I mean maybe not enough to hand the guy a ticket, but enough to make him think I might to get him to slow down. So I blow the whistle on him and walk over and it turns out we know each other."

"Where were you going, Arnold?" asked Lanigan.

"He said he was driving down to Philadelphia," the policeman volunteered.

"And what time was this?"

"Oh, around three o'clock in the morning. I'd say."

"Three o'clock Thursday morning and he said he was on his way to Philadelphia? Come in here, Purvis." Lanigan stood aside for the policeman and then shut the door of his office behind him.

"Now, Purvis, this is important. I want you to tell me, as well as you can remember, just what he said."

"Gosh, Chief, that was a couple of weeks ago. I just sort of walked over to where he'd stopped and said the usual— you know, like 'Going to a fire, buddy?' And he said something about how he was trying to make time getting to Philly, then he recognized me and then I recognized him, maybe I made some crack about his whiskers, the way anyone would."

"Of course."

"Then I guess we talked about what various people we knew in high were doing now, and he asked me about my brother Caleb, and I told him he was working on the town paper, then he takes out his billfold and hands me a fiver—"

"He tried to bribe you?"

"Oh no. Chief, nothing like that. You know me. If I thought he was trying to bribe me. I'd’ve hauled his ass right out of the car and taken him down to the stationhouse."

"Naturally."

"It was for a subscription to the Courier. You know about Caleb working on this campaign to get the old-timers that moved down to Florida to keep in touch with the town. I happened to mention it, and that's when he outs with the five-spot."

"I see, he wanted to get news of the town regularly." "That's right."

Lanigan flung open the door and called out to the sergeant on the desk. "Sergeant, book that man."

"What charge, sir?"

"Willful murder of Jacob Kestler."

While Akiva was being booked in the outer office, Lanigan in his own office was explaining to the rabbi. "Here's a young fellow who hasn't seen his folks in a couple of years, finally gets around to driving up here, he comes up Tuesday night and leaves Thursday, that's a mighty short visit for all that driving. You'd expect him to stay through Saturday, anyway, well, that made me a little suspicious of him. But now it turns out that he left in the middle of the night, he works at the store Wednesday evening and a few hours later, he's on his way to Philadelphia, the courts always regard flight as evidence of guilt."

"But—"

"Just a minute, there's more," said Lanigan. "Naturally I wondered about his coming back this time. I mean, if he'd done something and was running away, why would he come back? Well, he would if he thought it was safe. If we started to investigate Kestler's death, it wouldn't make the Philadelphia papers. Chances are it wouldn't even make the Boston papers. So how would he know? Why would he take the chance? Well, Officer Purvis just told me that your young friend gave him five dollars to subscribe to the Courier for him. What do you think of that?"

In the cell block in the basement, the rabbi tried to talk some sense into Akiva. "You've got to get a lawyer. You're just hurting yourself."

Akiva shook his head. "No lawyer." "Why not?"

"Because he'd just get in the way and mess things up, he'd tell me what to do or he'd start filing motions or something, and it would just interfere."

"Interfere with what?"

"With the natural course of events."

"But when you're arraigned tomorrow morning, the judge will assign you a lawyer if you don't have one."

"So he'll assign him, Rabbi. I can't help that, but it won't be me lacking faith and picking one on my own."

"How about your mother, akiva? Are you going to call her? Would you like me to go see her?"

"She's visiting my aunt in Boston, she's not due back until sometime tomorrow."

"Do you have the phone number? I'll call her for you if you like."

Again the young man shook his head. "No, she wouldn't be able to sleep all night for worrying. More likely, she'd come a-running. No, she'll find out soon enough."

"How about the store?"

"It's McLane's morning on, he's got a key."

The rabbi tried another tack. "Why did you start out for Philadelphia in the middle of the night?"

"I'd rather not talk about that, Rabbi."

"Then tell me why you subscribed to the Courier."

Akiva began to laugh. "I wasn't subscribing to no paper. Rabbi, that was a bribe I was giving Joe Purvis, he was being friendly and all that, but I still thought he might give me a ticket. If I offered him a bribe and he wasn't on the take, I could be in deep trouble. But when he told me about his brother taking these subscriptions I gave him a fiver for one. I figured sure he'd keep it. I was pretty surprised when I actually got the paper delivered." "It would have been better for you if you hadn't," said the rabbi gloomily. "I'm afraid I'll have to leave you now. If there's anything I can do..."

"Yeah, there is at that, Rabbi. If you could drop off a siddur —"

"You want me to get you a prayerbook?"

"Sure. I'd like to recite some prayer besides the Shema."

Ithought you'd forgotten we were due at the Bernsteins," said Miriam when her husband returned.

"No, I didn't forget." He told her what had happened. "Oh, his poor mother!"

"What's that, the women's lib point of view? What about his poor father? What about the poor young man himself?"

"Mrs. aptaker is the only one of the three I've really ever met. Do you think Akiva did it, David?"

He shook his head gloomily. "There's no question that Lanigan has a good case against him, there's motive— he had reason to hate Kestler, there's the weapon— the medicine, and there's opportunity— he was in the drugstore at the time when the prescription had to be filled, and it looks as though he filled it, at least, the other pharmacist says he did, and Akiva doesn't deny it, then there's the fact that he left town shortly after, which suggests guilt."

"But then he came back."

"True. But it was a couple of weeks later, and it could be argued that since there was no mention in the press that there was anything suspicious about Kestler's death he felt it was safe to return. Particularly damning is that he took the trouble to subscribe to the town newspaper, that way he could know if the police were investigating the death."

"It looks bad, doesn't it, David?" she asked soberly. "M-hm."