Striding back to me, he said, “You’re going to take me to your uncle.”
Alarmed, I glanced at Mrs. Pickett, who looked satisfied by this demand. “What about Joe McInerny?”
“You know where he lives?” the officer asked.
“Allen, near the park. I don’t know the building.”
“Maybe your uncle does.” He took me by the arm. “Let’s go.”
I removed my arm from his grasp; I would go, but I would not be pulled. “You stay with Sadie,” I told Berthe.
On the walk to the refuge, I offered up a prayer: Let my uncle be home, let my uncle be home, let my uncle be home. Behind me, I could sense the crowd, led by Mrs. Pickett. They followed at a distance as if they were going home as Nolan had told them to. But I knew that when we reached the refuge door, I would stop and so would they. I glanced at Nolan to see if he understood this, but his face told me nothing.
I looked down to see the faint traces of red on the pavement. There was blood on the soles of my shoes; I must have stepped too close. How long before people started to clean the streets? How long before they came for Sadie’s body? Burial, we should think about burial. Did she have family to do it? I could not remember.
Let my uncle be home, please let my uncle be home.
But he was not at home. Instead I was greeted by Sal Karlsson, who broke away from the other women who had stayed downstairs to hear word of Sadie. The punch bowl and plates were still out, the decorations hung on the walls. But the phonograph was silent, the mood of the room fractured and anxious.
Sal began to cry the moment she saw the officer. When she was ten, she had come back from work to find the neighbors gathered outside her home. That’s when she knew this was not ordinary bad, but “something real bad, something you don’t go back from.” The door to her apartment was open, the neighbors clumped together. Everyone, she said, was in the wrong place. She knew before they told her that her mother was dead and her father arrested.
Officer Nolan asked if the reverend was home, and the women slowly shook their heads. My arm around Sal, I said, “He’ll be back soon, I’m sure.”
His eyes stayed on the group of women. “Any of you know where Miss Ellis was going tonight?”
They glanced at one another; the faces went blank, arms folded. Answering a policeman’s questions was not an easy thing. They had been tricked too many times, led into implicating friends or lovers, or sometimes arrested for providing a policeman with a service that, once he was finished, he remembered was illegal. Eyes slid to Ruth Renehan, who was a little older and more assertive than some; she was chosen to speak.
“I think … we all thought … she went to see that Joe she always talked about.”
“That would be Joe McInerny?” Nolan asked me.
“Yes,” I said, thinking he would be halfway to New Jersey at this point.
There was an eruption as the crowd outside began shouting. I heard Mrs. Pickett calling for calm, of all things. Then the door opened and my uncle stepped into the foyer with the words “Jane, why is this door not locked?”
Then he noticed the policeman. “Officer.”
It was my uncle’s habit never to say more than absolutely necessary; he neither asked the reason for the officer’s presence—that would come—nor offered his assistance. I could see Nolan resented it.
Nolan tried to regain the upper hand, saying, “Are you the Reverend Prescott?” My uncle nodded. “Did a young woman named Sadie Ellis reside at this address?”
I thought I saw something flicker in my uncle’s eyes. Not wanting the women to hear the blunt details of Sadie’s death, I said, “Maybe we could continue this conversation upstairs. The hallway isn’t the place.”
My uncle glanced at the women as if he had just noticed they were there. “Yes. Will you come upstairs, Officer?”
When we were in the office with the door shut, I said, “Sadie’s dead, Uncle. She went to meet Joe McInerny, and—”
Officer Nolan didn’t let me finish, asking, “Where were you this evening, Reverend?”
“I am afraid I cannot tell you.”
“Can’t remember?”
“My memory is fine, thank you. No, perhaps I should have said, I will not tell you.”
The officer’s eyes slid in my direction. “If it’s a matter of your niece’s sensibilities…”
“Her presence makes no difference to me,” said my uncle.
My uncle was not a sentimental man, but this was offhand even for him. He was angry, I realized. Angry to be questioned by the police, angry that Sadie had disobeyed, angry that she was dead. Or … angry that it was late and he wished to go to bed, who could tell. But he had to stop this game, and if my leaving would help, so be it.
“I’ll go,” I said. “Then you and the officer can talk.”
“About what?” my uncle wondered as I left the room.
Berthe was back. I found her in the kitchen. The lights were off, but she was kneading dough in the moonlight, throwing it with concentrated rage onto the counter. She did not look up as I came in, but she sniffed harshly and knuckled her eyes to keep back tears. Pulling out a chair, I sat down at the table and pressed the heels of my hands hard into my eyes. Dear God, what McInerny had done to that poor girl.
When had she realized, I wonder? That the man on whom she put all her hopes was going to kill her? She had once said there were two Joes, the nice one who talked sweet and bought her presents, then the other—who you had to be careful with. The one who snarled at her for the littlest thing, punched her, then hit her again harder when she screamed Don’t. Yes, they would catch Joe, and they would put him in jail or give him the chair and it would all be one big waste.
Berthe’s voice came to me in the darkness. “He’s talking to the police?”
Startled, I said, “I think so. I hope so. Did he tell you where he was going tonight?”
The briefest pause. “No.”
I took a deep breath, gazed at the table’s edge. “He’s not wandering again, is he?”
Berthe turned, I think about to speak. But then Officer Nolan knocked and came through the door. His eyes were bruised, his shoulders slumped, his aspect disappointed. Some policemen trifled with their job, thinking their mere presence—drunk or sober—deterred crime. But if you did not think that way, policing would be a thankless, heartbreaking task.
“Would you like some coffee, Officer?”
“No.” Manners beget manners, and he added, “But thank you.”
“My uncle told you where he was, I hope. I would imagine it was Mrs. Emmeline Roberts or maybe Mr.…” The name did not come, and I was left gaping.
“No. He wouldn’t tell me.” He took a seat at the table, glancing briefly toward the window to see the crowd still gathered outside, as if he did not relish having to walk through them when he left.
“Joe McInerny,” he said. “What can you tell me?”
“Not much,” I admitted. “The only jobs Sadie ever mentioned him having were ones he’d lost. Docks, factory work, a tannery, I think. He didn’t sound like a man who got on well with others.” The officer grunted, familiar with the type. “She said it made more sense for her to work; it was easier for her.”