Jed Rubenfeld - The Interpretation of Murder

'What is the matter with you?' She looked at me furiously. 'Why would I be to blame?'

'There is no reason. But you sound as if you are blaming yourself.'

Miss Acton went to the window. She parted the curtain, revealing a balcony behind a pair of French doors and opening up a panoramic view of the city below. 'Do you know who that was?'

'No.'

'That was George Banwell, Clara's husband. My father's friend.' The girl's breathing became unsteady. 'It was by the lake at his summerhouse. He proposed to me.'

'Please lie down, Miss Acton.'

'Why?'

'It is part of the treatment.'

'Oh, very well.'

When she was on the couch again, I resumed. 'Mr Banwell asked you to marry him — when you were fourteen?'

'I was sixteen, Doctor, and he did not propose marriage.'

'What did he propose?'

'To have — to have — ' She stopped.

'To have intercourse with you?' It is always delicate to refer to sexual activity with young female patients, because one cannot be sure how much they know of biology. But it is worse to let an excess of delicacy reinforce the pernicious sense of shame that a girl may attach to such an experience.

'Yes,' she answered. 'We were staying at his country house, my whole family He and I were walking along the path around their pond. He said he had purchased another cottage nearby, where we could go, with a lovely large bed, where the two of us could be alone and no one would know.'

'What did you do?'

'I slapped him in the face and ran,' said Miss Acton. 'I told my father — who did not take my side.'

'He didn't believe you?' I asked.

'He acted as if I were the wrongdoer. I insisted he confront Mr Banwell. A week later, he told me he had. Mr Banwell denied the charge, according to my father, with great indignation. I am sure he wore very much the same look you saw just now. He only conceded mentioning his new cottage to me. He maintained that I had drawn the wicked inference myself, because of — because of the kind of books I read. My father chose to believe Mr Banwell. I hate him.'

'Mr Banwell?'

'My father.'

'Miss Acton, you lost your voice three years ago. But you are describing an event that occurred last year.'

'Three years ago, he kissed me.'

'Your father?'

'No, how disgusting,' said Miss Acton. 'Mr Banwell.'

'You were fourteen?' I asked.

'Were mathematics difficult for you at school, Dr Younger?'

'Go on, Miss Acton.'

'It was Independence Day,' she said. 'My parents had met the Banwells only a few months earlier, but already my father and Mr Banwell were the best of friends. Mr Banwell's people were rebuilding our house. We had just spent three weeks with them in the country while they finished all the construction. Clara was so kind to me. She is the strongest, most intelligent woman I have ever met, Dr Younger. And the most beautiful. Did you see Lina Cavalieri's Salome?'

'No,' I answered. The famously beautiful Miss Cavalieri had performed the role at the Manhattan Opera House last winter, but I had been unable to get down from Worcester to see it.

'Clara looks just like her. She was on the stage too, years ago. Mr Gibson did a picture of her. In any event, Mr Banwell had one of those enormous buildings of his going up downtown — the Hanover, I think. We were planning to go to the roof of that building to watch the fireworks. But my mother took ill — she always takes ill — so she remained behind. Somehow, at the last moment, my father couldn't come downtown either. I don't know why. I think he was also ill; there was a fever that summer. In any event, Mr Banwell volunteered to take me to the rooftop, since I had been looking forward to it so very much.'

'Just the two of you?'

'Yes. He drove me in his carriage. It was night. He made the horses canter down Broadway. I remember the hot wind in my face. We rode up in the elevator together. I was very nervous; it was the first time I had ever been in an elevator. I couldn't wait for the fireworks, but when the first cannons burst out, they scared me terribly. I may have screamed. The next thing I knew he had clasped me in both arms. I can still feel him pulling my — my upper body — against him. Then he pressed his mouth upon my lips.' The girl grimaced, as if she wanted to spit.

'And then?' I asked.

'I tore myself from him, but there was nowhere to go. I didn't know how to escape from his roof. He motioned me to calm down, to be quiet. He told me it would be our secret and said we would just watch the fireworks now Which is what we did.'

'Did you tell anyone?'

'No. That is when I lost my voice: that night. Everyone thought I had caught the fever. Perhaps I had. My voice came back to me the next morning, just as it did this time. But I have told no One until this day. After that, I would not consent to be alone with Mr Banwell again.'

A long silence ensued. The girl had evidently come to the end of her immediately conscious memories. 'Think of yesterday, Miss Acton. Do you remember anything?'

'No,' she said quietly. 'I'm sorry.'

I asked her permission to convey what she had said to Dr Freud. She agreed. I then informed her that we should resume our conversation tomorrow.

She seemed surprised: 'What else do we have to converse about, Doctor? I have told you everything.'

'Something more may occur to you.'

'Why do you say that?'

'Because you are still suffering your amnesia. When we have uncovered everything connected with this event, I believe your memory will come back to you.'

'You think I am concealing something?'

'It is not concealment, Miss Acton. Or rather, it is something you are concealing from yourself.'

'I don't know what you are talking about,' the girl replied. When I was a step from the door, she stopped me with her clear, soft voice. 'Dr Younger?'

'Miss Acton?'

Her blue eyes had tears in them. She held her chin high. 'He did kiss me. He did — propose to me by the lake.'

I hadn't realized how anxious she was over the possibility that I too, like her father, might not credit what she told me. There was something indescribably endearing in the way she used 'propose' instead of 'proposition.' 'Miss Acton,' I replied, 'I believe every word you say.'

She burst into tears. I left her, wishing Mrs Biggs a good afternoon as I passed her in the hallway.

In a private corner of the saloon at the Hotel Manhattan,

George Banwell sat with Mayor McClellan. The mayor remarked that Banwell looked as if he had been in a fist- fight. Banwell shrugged. 'A little problem with a filly,' he said.

The mayor withdrew an envelope from his breast pocket and handed it to Banwell. 'Here's your check. I advise you to go to your bank this afternoon. It's very large. And it's the last one. There won't be any more, no matter what. Do we understand each other?'

Banwell nodded. 'If there are additional costs, I'll bear them myself.'

The mayor then explained that Miss Riverford's murderer had apparently struck again. Did Banwell know Harcourt Acton?

'Of course I know Acton,' Banwell replied. 'He and his wife are at my summerhouse now. They joined Clara there yesterday.'

'So that's why we have not been able to reach them,' said McClellan.

'What about Acton?' asked Banwell.

'The second victim was his daughter.'

'Nora? Nora Acton? I just saw her on the street, not one hour ago.'

'Yes, thank God she survived,' answered the mayor.

'What happened?' asked Banwell. 'Did she tell you who did it?'

'No. She's lost her voice and can't remember a thing. She doesn't know who did it, and neither do we. Some specialists are looking at her now. She's here, in fact. I've put her up at the Manhattan until Acton gets back.'

Banwell took this in. 'A good-looking girl.'