Damnation of Adam Blessing (18 page)

Mr. Arlington Partidge of Rochester, New York, asked Mrs. Arlington Partidge if she was falling for that fat, phony slob or what?

“I’ll be back in a minute,” she answered, handing him her shuffleboard mallet. I just want to ask him one thing, Arl!”

She left her husband behind and hurried across to the deck rail where Mr. Blessing was standing, his arms behind his back, watching the sea.

“Hello there, Mr. Blessing.” There was something almost saint-like about him, Mrs. Arlington Partidge often thought, and she did not mind it somehow that he showed no interest in who had spoken, but simply stayed in the same stance, touching his hand to his forehead in a slight salute, without looking to see who it was he was greeting.

“It’s Mrs. Partidge,” said Mrs. Partidge, “Ethel Partidge, remember? My t-bars tend to slant downward, and I have those broad r’s, remember?”

Mr. Blessing looked down at her. “Yes, I remember. You had very large handwriting, too.”

“You really are something, Mr. Blessing! Memory like an elephant,” she said. She thought when she said it that it was rather an unfortunate comparison. Mr. Blessing was so huge. “Yes, and you said I was an extrovert! Arl, my husband, tells me if I join just one more committee, he’s going to wring my neck. I’m always doing sum’thin!”

“It is good to serve.”

“Mr. Blessing, I feel like you know
all
my secrets. I mean, when you said that about my m, about the last stroke of my m, remember?”

“The fact that it was more angular than the other?”

“Wow-boy! You do remember everything! Well, yes, that’s what I mean. I mean, I doubt that my own husband knows I’m a little neurotic.”

“Mrs. Partidge, I did not say you were a little neurotic. I said it could be a sign of that, or it could simply indicate a desire for self-assertion.”

“I mean, what would
you
think of a woman who sits around wondering what it would be like to have dinner with Dave Garroway. I don’t mean just wonder, either, I mean set the table in my mind and everything, right down to what color linen napkins. Now!”

Mr. Blessing said, “I don’t know who Dave Garroway is, Mrs. Partidge, and anyway, I really can’t talk now. I’m thinking.”

“Lord, you mean you’re analyzing in your mind? I interrupted you analyzing in your mind?”

“It’s quite all right. It was a brief interruption.”

“Forgive me, Mr. Blessing. I’ll just run right along and not bother you with another word. I had no idea you were doing
that.
Please excuse me.”

At dinner that night Mrs. Partidge told Claire

Cottersley-Smith how she had come upon Mr. Blessing that afternoon when he was analyzing in his mind. Claire Cottersley-Smith said that was nothing, wait until she told Ethel what Al had to say when he got back to their stateroom last night. Claire said, “Al said, ‘well, I had a talk with your boyfriend, Claire,’ and Al said they stood on deck for nearly twenty minutes passing the time of day. Al said his guess was Mr. Blessing was a defrocked priest. Mr. Blessing talked a great deal about Rome, Al said, and Al said Mr. Blessing had a misty look in his eye.”

“Well, that’s the very same look we’ve seen two or three times. Like he was crying!”

“Exactly,” said Claire Cottersley-Smith, “and if you ask me Al is right. Ever notice how he avoids women? Well, he’s shy! He was a priest, and he’s not used to women!”

“He’s like a man without a friend in the world,” Ethel Partidge said. “It makes me want to die inside, does it you?”

“Yes,” said Claire … “A de-frocked priest! Imagine! Reduced to fortune-telling on a cruise boat!”

“Graphology, Claire! It’s more scientific. You should know what he told me about my m’s.”

Claire Cottersley-Smith was more interested in Mr. Blessing than in Ethel Partidge’s m’s. After the old Jerry Lewis movie in the William Penn Lounge, she nagged her husband into trying to have a second conversation with Mr. Blessing. “Ask him,” she said, “if he knows Latin. That’ll clinch it!”

She and Ethel Partidge nursed green Stingers in the bar with Arlington Partidge, who was slightly miffed at the fact Al Cottersley-Smith had established contact with the mysterious Mr. Blessing, and not he.

“One day your Mr. Blessing will simply drop dead of a heart attack,” Mr. Arlington Partidge said. He was extremely thin, and he never allowed Ethel to say that he was skinny.

“I like a lot of meat on a man,” Claire Cottersley-Smith said.

After both women had had a third green Stinger and were right at that point of giggling hilariously at anything

Arlington Partidge said, as long as it was not funny, Al appeared.

“Not a priest,” he said sitting down. “Order me a whisky.”

“Why not a priest?” his wife said.

“Well, we were having this talk about people who take these cruises, see? I say people get along in years, kids grow up, get through college and all that, and folks decide to spend a little money on themselves for a change, go away, see some sights.”

“Yes? Yes? Go on.”

“I need a whisky … well, he says to me that it’s too bad money is so important to people. He says to me it used to be important to him, but he found out it wasn’t and then he says something I damn near died at.” He signaled the waiter for a whisky.

“What?” said Claire and Ethel together.

“He said he came into a great deal of money only a few years ago. A great deal, he said, repeating it, you know, like it was a million dollars or something? Well, this is the part that kills me…. He said he gave it all away, every nickle of it except for a small amount he had already spent selfishly on himself. He said he gave it all away to a worthy charity, and then he found peace!”

• • •

On Wednesday Ethel Partidge reported to Claire Cottersley-Smith that in a brief conversation with Mr. Blessing she learned this was the first time he had ever worked on a cruise boat, that he was not going to do it after the boat docked, that he had no “regular line.”

• • •

On Thursday Claire Cottersley-Smith reported to Ethel Partidge that Al said Mr. Blessing spoke with Al for a half an hour on Faith and Loyalty, and Al saw real tears in Mr. Blessing’s eyes, and AI was back to his original belief that Mr. Blessing was some kind of defrocked priest.

“Al said he said he had once done a terrible thing, but it was a beautiful thing too because it was necessary and true.”

“A woman!” Ethel Partidge said. “Oh, gaw, he got involved with a woman!”

“That’s what I think and that’s what Al thinks. He messed around with some woman!”

“What kind of woman would let a priest mess around with her? Would you?”

“I don’t know,” Ethel Partidge said. “I might … if it was one of those terrible passions, I might not be able to stop!”

“It’ll haunt him the rest of his days. I told Al that at breakfast. The rest of his days.”

“How come he said he’d found peace, if he got himself defrocked for messing around with a woman?”

That night Arlington Partidge came into dinner beaming like a Cheshire cat.

“You would all be interested in something that just happened to me,” he said. “In the radio room.”

“Oh, Arly, don’t play games!”

“Your shipboard Romeo was writing a cablegram. I just happened to see it over his shoulder. I just happened,” Arlington Partidge announced in a triumphant tone, “to jot down its contents.”

Ethel, Al, and Claire all made a dive for the slip of paper he set on the center of the table.

“A baby!” said Claire Partidge.

“Who did he send the cable to. Did you see her name?”

“No,” Arlington Partidge said, “he had not filled that in when I saw it.”

Friday was spent with Ethel and Claire sitting about on the shuffleboard deck, reconstructing how they imagined it had happened. Ethel favored the idea a young girl came to confess a slight sin to him, and he led her on to greater sin. Ethel said it could just as easily have happened to her, if she were single, say, and on this very cruise; it could just as easily have begun with her casual mention of her m’s to him, that day on deck when he was analyzing in his mind.

Claire favored the idea, that he had become involved with a fast whore, but she agreed with Claire that it most likely began in a confession box.

Arlington Partidge and Albert Cottersley-Smith, when asked their opinion, chorused that they were very nearly bored silly with the mere thought of Mr. Blessing, and on Friday night they stayed up long after their wives had gone to bed, drinking whisky and discussing the matter.

Saturday the S.S. “Quaker City” docked on time, on the dot of noon. Up until then the morning had been spent in frantic fashion by both the Partidges and the Cottersley-Smiths, who were not weathered travelers, and were anxious with thoughts of things they forgot to pack, mislaid passports, and the exchange of adieus and addresses with other passengers. They all decided to have a drink together at a bar near the wharf, as a farewell gesture, and it was while they were deciding on the bar to meet in that they got a last glimpse of Mr. Blessing.

“Look!” Ethel Partidge gasped. “He’s coming down the ramp now, see? Carrying his duffle, the lower ramp, see?”

“His woman should be meeting him,” said her husband.

“Oh gaw, you mean we’ll see her. Meeting her right out in open, hah? Oh, gaw, Arly, hold my hand!”

The Partidges and the Cottersley-Smiths looked after the enormous figure. They saw his hand raise suddenly, then they watched while he flagged his arm wildly. He was smiling and laughing, and it was the first time any of them could remember him doing either. But there was neither a young virginal type waiting on the wharf for Mr. Blessing, nor was there a more experienced-looking type waiting for him. In fact, a woman was not meeting Mr. Blessing at all.

Standing in the square with his legs apart and his hands on his hips — a straw hat resting back slightly on his head (as though he had pushed it back in anger or disgust) was a man. He was dressed immaculately in a white linen jacket with navy-colored linen pants, white shoes, and a red twill silk tie which was almost the same shade as his hair. Mr. Blessing was rushing toward him; a grin cut across his whole huge face, his free arm reaching out to the man. The man was alone. He did not see Mr. Blessing at first, but when he did see him, there came over his countenance one of the sourest expressions that the Arlington Partidges and the Albert Cottersley-Smiths had ever seen. It made the warm Caracas sun seem suddenly, unbelievably chilly.

From
The New York Daily Journal —

WHO WAS WIN’S MURDERER?

Many people did not like Win Schneider. When the police interviewed close friends and servants of the dead woman, their list of suspects ran to two pages. There were many who might have done the deed.

Two months ago she was found strangled in the bedroom of the $99,000 home on Lerch Road in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and the police are still trying to discover who was the one person who hated her enough to kill her. She was murdered shortly after noon on December 31, New Year’s Eve day. The housekeeper was marketing in New Hope, and young Timmy Schneider was on his way to visit with his grandmother and father in New York. The Schneiders were estranged. Luther V. Schneider, President of Waverly Foods, was at his mother’s house at the estimated murder-time.

There were many rumors. Talk of a fat man in a rented car being seen in the vicinity, as well as suspicions that a bitter former chauffeur had taken revenge on his ex-employer. A dazed Puerto Rican suffering from a mental illness confessed to the crime, and a brother of the murdered woman made the statement that he might have done it himself, if he had ever found time.

It was a greatly publicized case, certainly the most colorful crime in a decade.

While the murder itself was not particularly unusual, most of the people involved in the known circumstances of the case, are unusual. Luther Schneider is a millionaire. His son, Timmy, was once kidnapped and returned after Schneider paid a ransom of $100,000. The Schneider
vs
Schneider court battles still leave judges and lawyers involved in the litigation, with red ears. The murdered woman, the former Win Griswold, was a society beauty of some twenty years back. The Griswold family is well known to Eastern society circles.

WHO
was Win’s murderer? Who dropped the receipt near her body, the only tangible clue there is in the case, a simple piece of ordinary receipt-book paper, marked across it:
PAID IN FULL?

THE END

If you liked The Damnation of Adam Blessing check out:

The Hare in March

At ten o’clock that warm March night, the Far Point, New York, prowl car turned into Grandview Park. Patrolman Burroughs yawned and tried to find a more comfortable position on the seat. He said, “Hey, Hopkins, it’s a little early for a stroll down lovers’ lane. There won’t be anything doing here for another hour.”

His partner said, “I feel generous tonight.”

“I know what you mean. They’re better off coming here to do a little necking than going into the city to booze it up.”

“You’re a square, you know that, Burroughs? The kids don’t say ‘necking’ anymore. The expression is ‘making out.’ “

“Oh, yeah? I was sure it was ‘spooning.’ ”

“My kid is always talking about making out. In my day, that meant going all the way. Only we didn’t say we made out with a girl, we said we made a girl.”

“You, Hopkins?
You
made girls? I bet you had to put bags over their heads first.”

Hopkins chuckled. “What’d
you
do, Burroughs, date girls from the blind school? Did any of them get a look at you?”

They had been riding together for four years. Both of them were veterans, with over ten years in the department. They had a lot of other things in common too. In Far Point they lived within walking distance of one another; they were men in their middle forties, who had seen action in World War II. Burroughs had a nineteen-year-old son, and Hopkins had two boys under ten, and one fourteen-year-old. Far Point was in Rockland County, on the Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge. Except for the war years, neither man had spent much time out of this part of the country.

It was against the law to stop in Grandview Park after seven at night. The local people knew that the winding road was a shortcut to Far Point from Route 9W, and there was no law forbidding traffic to pass through. Not more than twenty or thirty drivers a night used the shortcut; the others who turned into the park were usually headed for one of the little dead-end side roads, where picnickers stopped during the day. Most of them were students from Far Point College, a medium-sized, coeducational college located just outside the city, on a hill overlooking the Hudson River.

There were some Far Pointers who complained bitterly about these young strangers in their midst. They felt the college was too progressive: the students were allowed to have cars, and while there was a rule prohibiting intoxication, there was none prohibiting drinking. The local tavern owners were in sympathy with the complainers. There were not more than six bars near Far Point, all of them noisy with television and pinball machines, for Far Point was basically a factory town; none of the six would serve students. They argued that they did not want the responsibility—there were too many students with falsified credentials boosting their age; then too, kids could not hold their liquor. They were rowdy inside, and a menace on the road outside…. The truth was somewhere in between these facts, and the fact that the bars’ best customers were workers from the Far Point Bag Company, and F.P.B.ers were notorious enemies of F.P.C.ers.

But the majority of Far Point’s populace lived on the outskirts of the city. They were commuters to New York City. They were media people, lawyers, doctors, brokers—people of a sophisticated disposition. While they usually chose Ivy League schools for their own children, they enjoyed having F.P.C. in the community; they felt that the college added color to an otherwise dreary little area, whose prime feature was its proximity to Manhattan.

Burroughs and Hopkins were for the college, too. Burroughs’ boy was a sophomore there; it looked as though Hopkins’ oldest would not be admitted when he was college age, for his grades were only average, and the school demanded better of “townies.” But there were two more at home; Hopkins would be delighted if even one of his boys made it.

Years of dealing with F.P.C.ers had shown them to be no different from any other group of young people, despite the fact most of them were brighter than local kids, and carried more pocket money. The majority were better drivers than most Far Pointers, and as for the drinking, the patrolmen had brought in many more factory workers on a 390, than collegians.

Still, there was reason for concern. The state of New Jersey’s legal drinking age was twenty-one; New York’s was eighteen. Most of the land on this side of the George Washington Bridge was in New Jersey. The narrow part that was New York, was cut up into little towns like Far Point, which were either hostile to the students or too seedy to attract them. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights they took off in their cars, bound for the other side of the bridge. Having made that much effort to be served alcohol, they often drank too much, and the liquor began catching up with them during their journeys back, along the Palisades Parkway. The situation was not crucial, but every month three or four students were stopped and warned, and sometimes charged.

This was the reason the police were not always meticulous about enforcing the law against after-dark parking in Grandview. The young people were safer going there. The police would make their patrol early in the evening, before the kids got there, or they would simply cruise very slowly by the parked cars, and flash their spotlight at the embracing couples. A few less stalwart ones would take the beam of light as a notice to evacuate, but most knew that it was merely a we’ve-got-our-eye-on-you warning, and they limited their action to the front seats, and refrained from tossing their beer cans out onto park property.

• • •

Burroughs looked out at the philodendron bushes which banked the road, and yawned again. “I don’t envy these kids any. When I was their age, we had a
real
war, and a real excuse to speed up things in the romance department.”

“I may never see you again, baby, and I love you so much, too.”

Burroughs laughed. “Yeah.” He sang, “’Oh give me something to remember you by, when I am far away from you.’ “ “How about ‘You’d be
so nice
to come home to, you’d be

so nice
by the fire; you’d be
so nice,
you’d be
par-a-dise,
to come home to and
love.’
That was Helen’s and my song.”

“And she married you after she heard you sing it? What’d you do, dope her?”

Hopkins sighed. “Those were the days!”

“The songs the kids sing today—I don’t envy them.”

“Me neither,” Hopkins said. “My fourteen-year-old sits around singing this garbage about these footsteps running through an open meadow. What does it say? You know what the name of the band is, that the college hired for the Rabbit Hop tomorrow night? The Freaks. How do you like that?”

“What footsteps running through a meadow?” “It’s a song. It goes: ‘If the sleep has left your ears you might hear footsteps running through an open meadow.’ “ “You pulling my leg, Hopkins?”

“That’s the way the song goes. Then it says not to be shook up if you hear these footsteps on the meadow, because it’s only some guy chasing butterflies of love.”

“And I suppose a bunch of long-haired pansies are singing it?”

“Listen, my kid’s trying to grow his hair. I tell Helen if his hair gets—“

Burroughs interrupted. “What’s that?”

Hopkins slowed up. “It looks like a car on the wrong side of the road. It’s just sitting there.”

“Yeah. Anybody inside?”

They pulled closer. Hopkins fixed his searchlight on the car.

“Someone’s behind the wheel,” said Burroughs. “He’s got someone with him, too.”

Hopkins drew alongside the car. It was a 1957 Thunder-bird. Hopkins recognized the year and the model right away. He was a car buff, and this was the classic Thunderbird, the two-seater with the round windows.

Neither man made a move to get out of the prowl car; there was seldom any occasion for it in the park. Usually it just took a word or two. Hopkins rolled down his window and called out, “Hey!”

The young man behind the wheel of the Thunderbird stared straight ahead, without acknowledging Hopkins’ or Burroughs’ presence. A girl with long blond hair spilling to her shoulders was leaning against the young man’s chest.

Hopkins yelled again, “Hey!”

“Too much in love to say good night,” said Burroughs. “I suppose I better get out.” “Check his license.”

They rarely bothered with the procedure, but Hopkins had a funny feeling that the young man was stone drunk. He sat there like a stone, even when Burroughs went over and rapped on the window.

Burroughs said, “Come on, kid! Roll her down!”

Finally, the young man gazed up at Burroughs and very slowly unrolled his window.

“You asleep with your eyes open?” said Hopkins.

Burroughs said, “Let me see your license.”

The boy didn’t say anything. He wore a sports coat and a tie; he was a good-looking youngster, eighteen or nineteen, with a pleasant expression on his face. He was not smiling, but he did not have a sullen look either. He seemed quiet and cooperative, and not too surprised at the intrusion; certainly not frightened by it.

As he fumbled for his wallet, Burroughs said, “Do you know you’re parked on the wrong side of the road?”

“Yes.”

“How’d you get on the wrong side of the road?” “I’m sorry.”

“Have you been drinking?” “I just had two drinks.” “You wouldn’t kid me?” “Just two.”

“Then what the hell are you doing on the wrong side of the road?”

“The car stopped. I started it, and it stopped.”

“Why didn’t you go for help?”

“Where?”

“Go for help? Go into Far Point? Did you plan to sit here all night?”

“I don’t know.”

“Wake up your girl friend.”

“She’s very tired.”

“Has she been drinking too?”

“Neither of us had more than two. I’m sure of that.” “Why are you having such trouble talking then?” “I’m not.”

“It takes you a long time to say anything. Why is that?” “I don’t know for sure. But I can’t find my wallet.” “Have you been driving without a license?”

“She was driving. Then I tried, and the car stopped.” Burroughs turned to Hopkins. “No license.” “I heard.”

Hopkins had the same reluctance Burroughs had about making an arrest…. Still, no license, the wrong side of the road…. Hopkins said, “Tell him to get out of the car and walk in front of my headlights. See if he walks straight.”

“Do it,” Burroughs ordered the young man.

Gently, the boy eased the girl back so that her head rested against the seat, and her body leaned into it. She did not wake up. She was wearing a mink coat, a double-breasted sports style, with a belt in back. There was a blue chiffon scarf tied around her neck.

“Won’t the car start?” Burroughs asked the boy, as the boy got out.

“Well, it did. Then it stopped.”

“Walk!” Burroughs ordered.

The boy seemed to move in slow motion.

Hopkins said, “Ask him what his name is, if he goes to F.P.C.”

Instead, Burroughs said, “Okay, son, let’s go to the station.” Burroughs turned to Hopkins. “He’s got a lump on his head, and he’s barefoot.” “What?”

“He’s barefoot. He’s got a lump on his head the size of an egg.”

Burroughs turned back to the boy, who stood there in the shine of the spotlight, holding his sports coat to his neck. “Come on, son. You’ve got yourself a snootful, haven’t you? Did you fall?”

“I don’t know why I took my shoes off. I’m not drunk.”

“You’re not some nut from Rockland State, are you?”

“No.”

“Okay. You’re not loose from the funny farm, so you have to be drunk, don’t you? Or do you always go around like this?”

“It’s just tonight.”

“I see. Well, I wouldn’t take you in any other night, son. Just tonight. Now c’mon. I have a car waiting for us.”

“Her car goes,” said the boy, walking very slowly toward Burroughs.

“We’ll take my car,” Burroughs said. “See? I got me a nice chauffeur named Hopkins, so leave the driving to us.”

“All right.”

“Do your feet hurt? Something wrong with your feet?” “No.”

“Then move, buddy. The pavement’s nice and smooth.”

The boy inched toward the prowl car.

Hopkins got out and went across to him. He said, “Are you glued together, or what?” He took the boy’s arm, to help him.

The boy smiled. “I feel as though I’m coming unglued.”

“Where’ve you been, boy?”

“At the house. I think I was, earlier.”

“The house? Do you mean a fraternity house?”

“Yes.”

Burroughs opened the door of the Thunderbird. He called in, “Wake up, little Suzy.”

“She won’t,” the boy said. “She’s too exhausted.” Hopkins said, “What fraternity do you belong to, kid?” “Pi Delta Pi.” “A Pi Pi, huh?” “Yes.”

“Burroughs? Did you hear this? He’s a Pi Pi.” Burroughs was saying, “Come on now. Rise and shine, little lady.”

Hopkins said, “Do you know Bud Burroughs?”

“Yes. Bud.”

“That’s his old man.”

Then Burroughs called out, “Hopkins?”

“What?”

“Put the cuffs on him.” “He’s okay.”
“Put them on!”

Hopkins had often heard an angry tone in Burroughs’ voice, but never one with this edge of panic added.

Quickly, Hopkins reached to his side for the handcuffs. The boy waited, holding up his wrists to make it easier for Hopkins.

Then Hopkins walked over to the Thunderbird, pulling the boy with him, as though he were drag weight.

Burroughs’ voice cracked. “I’m pretty sure she’s dead.”

She was also naked under the fur coat, slumped back against the right car door, with blood running from her breasts down the white skin of her body.

“Oh, Jesus Christ!” Hopkins said.
“Oh, God!”

He turned his head away, found himself staring into the boy’s face.

“She couldn’t help it,” the boy whispered. There were tears flooding his eyes.

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