Howard Engel - A City Called July

“There’s a gang over at the Geller house throwing things and tearing up the place!”

“Did she call the cops?”

“I don’t know. Shouldn’t we do something?”

“Yeah, put in a call to the cops while I collect my car. I’ll be back in two minutes. Meet me outside.” And I was off.

I don’t know why I reacted that way. It was clearly a dab of vindictive violence levelled at Geller’s house and family because Geller himself had so successfully fled the scene. So why was I getting involved? I guess I thought it might put me somewhere close to a word or phrase uttered in the heat of the moment that might give me a clue about where this investigation was going next. The Olds, parked in my father’s old spot behind my office on St. Andrew Street, started up and I backed out of the alley without sending more than half a dozen slow pedestrians to the hospital. Because of the one-way system it took me longer to get from my office back to Geller’s office by car than I could have covered the direct route on my hands and knees. Rose Craig was waiting outside the office looking the wrong way for me on Queen Street. I honked. She crossed the street, got in and swung the door closed behind her, smelling of Chanel No. 5.

It took about eight minutes to drive across the canal bridge and find Burgoyne Boulevard. It took longer to make it to 222. I counted at least three police cars and about fifteen other cars blocking the street. A crowd of people were standing on the lawn listening to a cop with a bull-horn telling them to go back to their houses. It was like walking into a scene in the movies. Usually it’s staged in front of a jail with one of the mob waving a rope suggestively. But this was no mob. No ordinary mob, I mean. I recognized Mr. and Mrs. Sokolov, the Wagners, the Epsteins, the Shapiros and even Mort and Cindi Katz. None of them were carrying ropes, but they looked mad and frustrated. I could see blood in many eyes, and for a minute I couldn’t be sure whether the cops standing on the Geller porch, in the driveway and about six feet away from the mob were sufficiently intimidating. They all looked serious, and sweat was standing out on the forehead of the cop nearest Rose and me as we pushed our way into the front rank. From here I could recognize other faces. Some were from the Jewish community, but not all. There was Doug Spiers and Michael Rainsbury, neither of whom had ever been inside the shul as far as I knew, and Tobi and Frank McLure along with the Helmsels and Digbys. It was a show for everybody, and as I thought that, I saw a microphone pass under my nose at the end of a familiar arm. It was Wally Skeat, late of the Niagara Falls TV Station. I hadn’t even heard he’d moved back to Grantham. But nobody consults me about these things any more. The whole world comes apart and reassembles without a whisper to me about what it has in mind. Wally didn’t see me. He kept looking over my shoulder, and when I turned I was looking into the bright lights of a truck with a camera crew on top leaning over the railings at us. To me it seemed that the timing was unfortunate. The cop with the bullhorn shouted something at the truck and once again told the crowd to disperse. Somebody lobbed a cabbage at the Geller porch, but it was such a lazy, defeated pitch that I knew that the forces of law and order had triumphed again. The crowd buzzed and turned retreating towards the tangle of cars. The camera truck followed, hurrying them up. The news media chased the event out of sight The cops breathed a sigh of collective relief, and the top cop passed the bullhorn to a junior man who carried it around like a newly won badge of authority.

We joined the huddle to hear what we could of the post-mortem.

“What set this thing off?” I asked, trying to separate us from the disassembling hoard, and at the same time get them talking louder.

“You’re Cooperman, right?” asked a uniform with a red head sticking out the collar. “I’ve seen you with the sergeant.”

“This is Mr. Geller’s secretary. She sent in the alarm.”

“Her and half a dozen others. Geller had good neighbours. Nobody likes seeing property threatened. On that they stick together.”

“What started the fuss?” I asked again. The policeman looked at the departing mob.

“I guess it was the paper. It could have been on the noon news too. I don’t know about that.” Another cop confirmed that he had heard the whole story on the radio. Whether the paper had the scoop or not was something for the likes of Wally Skeat to argue.

“Who’s the officer in charge?”

“That’s Chalice.” The red-headed cop hoisted his thumb in Chalice’s direction. “He’s good, isn’t he? I think he likes it. I wouldn’t give three cents to be holding a bull-horn when a crowd really decides to get ugly. Give me cruiser duty any day.”

Ruth Geller, who must have slipped out of the house without anyone noticing, came into sight and grabbed Chalice by the arm. “We can’t go on living like this,” she said. “Anything could have happened. What about my kids?” The rest got louder and shriller without making more sense. Chalice was talking to her, his voice low but steady. Ruth nodded to the tune of his words until she caught sight of Rose Craig standing near me. “Rose!” she called, tears overflowing. “Thank God for you, Rose. You are such a friend.” They were hugging and crying in that way women have. I didn’t hear what they said, they were both talking at the same time.

“Benny drove me over while I called the police.” I made out the words but the sense was obscure. Ruth looked over at me and tried on a smile for size. It didn’t fit and the colour was wrong. I took advantage of it, though, and ambled over to join the ladies just as the policeman moved off to other duties near one of the cruisers. I was standing on a crushed tomato.

After picking up three green garbage bags full of dead oranges, cabbages and other missiles, Rose and I were invited into the house for coffee. Nathan Geller was in the living-room putting a square of cardboard over a window that had been broken. Ruth Geller looked like a zombie; she walked around the living-room touching the corners of tables and lamp-shades. I thought she was going to fall on the floor and melt. With a fragile smile at the corners of her mouth, she seemed to be listening in to a stereo station on Mars. Her sister hovered over her like a protective, stronger other self. Although we had been asked in for coffee, no one in fact made a movement in the direction of the kitchen. Nathan was working on his window; the task seemed to occupy him totally. Work was liberating. Debbie made an attempt to make Rose Craig comfortable, although I couldn’t hear what they were saying. Ruth kept glancing from the window and Nathan to the stairs, whose broadloomed steps led to the second floor. Nobody noticed when I went into the kitchen to put the kettle on.

A few minutes later, Rose sat with her heavily tweeded knees close together balancing her cup and saucer, watching Nathan now applying masking tape to the spider-lines of a cracked window-pane. He took a professional pride in his work, and kept commenting on each step as though we were a film crew watching and recording the artist at work. “That’s good enough for the moment. I’ll try to get a man to come around to replace both panes in the morning.” Then he took the measurements and made a notation on the inside of a package of cigarettes.

From upstairs I heard the voice of a child calling. Ruth bounded up the stairs without a word. A few minutes later, two kids, a boy and his older sister, appeared with a strange woman and their mother, each carrying a suitcase. Debbie, Ruth and Nathan rallied long enough to try to make the send-off look like an event. They hugged and kissed the children, tried to make a flourish of it, but they weren’t up to it and the kids didn’t want it.