The Deadly Percheron Read online

  He pushed her away from him. “What are you doing here? Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”

  She pretended to pout. That was one thing she could not do well, pout. All she accomplished was a crude parody of the childish expression. “I only wanted to see you, Jakey. I thought you could have dinner with us before the show.”

  “You could have telephoned me if you had wanted to do that. How many times have I told you not to come to my place without calling first? Do you want me to tell my man not to let you in?”

  Nan was angry now. She went into the foyer and took her wrap from the closet and flung it about her shoulders. Denise, embarrassed, followed her. Nan stood staring back at Jacob and myself, her eyes bright slits of green fire. But when she spoke, she spoke to me.

  “Do you see what I mean, doctor? He’s mad – stark, raving mad!”

  She even slammed the door on the way out – after holding it until her companion was safely outside. It was a good performance.

  “Weren’t you a little hard on them?” I asked Jacob as we were standing waiting for the elevator. “I think Miss Bulkely is really concerned about you. You’re concerned about yourself, you know. As for Denise, well, I think she was fairly embarrassed.”

  “It wasn’t that I minded so much Nan’s talking about me behind my back,” he said. “It’s that she has begun to follow me around. Everywhere I go, I see her – or that friend of hers. I feel like she’s trying to keep me leashed!”

  I could understand his resentment and, at the same time, I could see where Nan might have good reason for acting the way she did. Although I had sensed something wrong in her attitude, I seemed compelled to defend her to Jacob –yet I dared not do so more than I had already. If I were to help him, I would have to induce the belief that I was on his side, right or wrong.

  The taxi took us to a bar and grill in the Sixties on Third Avenue. This was the usual Third Avenue barroom with Rhein – gold neon signs in the windows and sawdust on the tile floor. I noticed, while I was waiting for Jacob to pay the cabby, that a large van had been parked in front of the place – a truck with deep sides and screened windows near the roof of its storage space not unlike an oversize paddy wagon. I wondered at the time what it was there for, but I forgot about it almost immediately.

  We went into the bar and ordered a couple of beers. Jacob looked around the smoke-filled room and then said, “I don’t think Eustace is here yet.”

  I looked about, too. I don’t know what I expected to see, surely not Eustace. There were a few booths along one wall, some tables in the rear – a few of which had been pushed aside to make way for a dart game. Most of the customers were clustered around the players, one of whom seemed to be an excellent shot. As I watched I saw three clean bull’s-eyes thrown into the target, a circle chalked on the wall. Then I looked back at Jacob.

  “Tell me,” I asked, “do you really expect Eustace to come?”

  “Oh, he’ll be here all right. He’s usually a little late. He sleeps a lot and has trouble with his alarm clock.”

  Was my patient pulling my leg? If he was, he was keeping a perfectly straight face and making a good show of turning around to look every time someone opened the door. I drank some beer and resumed my interest in the dart game.

  It was breaking up. Men were turning away, shaking their heads and emitting low whistles. I saw that the target now contained all of the darts – the bull’s-eye being particularly crowded. I peered to see who was the egregious marksman. It turned out to be Eustace.

  He was a midget scarcely more than three feet high. He had on a bottle-green velvet jacket, a tattersall waistcoat and mauve broadcloth trousers. He walked jauntily from out of the crowd of normal sized men, a broad grin on his face. Somebody yelled at him “Where did you learn to throw darts like that?” and, without turning around, he answered “Once I was one end of a knife – throwing act in a carnival.” Then he saw Jacob. He came over to the bar and held out ah and to be helped up onto the bar stool. When he was seated comfortably, he glowered and said to Jacob in a disproportionately bass voice: “Who’s this mug?”

  Jacob waved a hand in my direction. “This is Dr Matthews, Eustace. He’d like to go to work for you, too.”

  Before I could protest, Eustace had turned his back on me. “Can’t use him,” he said to Jacob. “He’s not our type.”

  This made me angry. Why couldn’t I give money away as well as the next one?

  “What’s so difficult about giving money away?” I said. My voice was loud. “I don’t see why I couldn’t do it!” I still hadn’t overcome my surprise at finding Eustace was real, and I had to find some way to express my resentment.

  Eustace turned around slowly on his stool and gave me a disdainful look. I began to dislike the little man intensely.

  “Money?” said Eustace. “Who’s giving away money?”

  “Why, Eustace,” said Jacob, “haven’t I been giving money away for you everyday for the past six months?”

  “Oh, that! That stopped yesterday,” said Eustace. “Now you’re giving away horses. Percherons.” He turned and whistled at the bartender. “Hey, Herman,” he called in his deepest voice, “how about a hooker of that lousy hog dip you call rye?”

  “Horses?” said Jacob.

  “Yeah, percherons,” said Eustace. “The kind they use on beer wagons.”

  I had been examining Eustace carefully. I was sure he was only a midget. He had the typical cranium of a dwarf, the compressed features, the dominant forehead, the prematurely wrinkled skin. I pointed a finger at him.

  “He’s only a midget, Jacob,” I said. “He’s not what you think he is. Someone is playing a joke on you.”

  Eustace got very angry. He began to jump up and down on his stool like a kid at the circus. His small face got bright red and then dark purple.

  “Midget!” he croaked. “Who the hell’s a midget? I’m a leprechaun. Me father came from the County Cork!”

  Jacob was exasperated, too. “Now, look what you’ve done!” he exclaimed. “Now you’ll never get to work for them!”

  I refused to be abashed. “He’s not a leprechaun, Jacob!” I insisted. “Leprechauns are tiny men only six inches high. He’s only a midget pretending to be a leprechaun.”

  “You’re thinking of Irish leprechauns,” said J acob. “Eustace is an American leprechaun. His father came over from Ireland and Eustace was born on this side of the water. Leprechauns, like everything else in America, are bigger and better than anywhere else!”

  Eustace had quieted down. He contented himself with delivering a withering glance in my direction that was intended as a coup de grâce. Then he ignored me.

  “Isn’t there someplace we can go to talk business in private?” he asked Jacob.

  “You can talk in front of Dr Matthews,” Jacob replied. “I’ve told him about our work.”

  The bartender set the hooker of rye down in front of the preposterous little fool. He grabbed it greedily and tossed it down his throat skillfully. Then he gave me another scornful look.

  “Well, if you’ve told him the harm’s already done,” he said. “But you really ought to be more careful who you talk to!”

  If Jacob Blunt had not been a patient of mine, I would have walked away and never seen him again after that. Still it was plainly my duty to stay and see what this hoax would put him up to next.

  “You said I’m not to give quarters away anymore,” Jacob was saying. “You said I was to give away horses. But to whom?”

  “That’s right,” said Eustace. “Percherons. The big ones. Tonight you’re going to give Frances Raye a percheron.”

  “Franees Raye!” I said. “The star of ‘Nevada! ’ Why, she’s the most successful actress on Broadway!”

  “That’s the one,” said Eustace. “We leprechauns have decided that it’s about time she had a percheron.”

  “How am I going to get it to her?” asked Jacob. He was frowning – I could see he was not too pleased with this l
atest assignment.

  “I’ve got it in a truck outside,” said Eustace. “I’ll drive you over with it, and then you can take it out and tether it, go ring her doorbell and present it to her. You get twenty-five dollars for that instead of ten.”

  Jacob was decidedly unhappy. I had not seen his grin in some time. Eustace must have noticed it, too.

  “Look,” he said, “what’s eating at you? Here I give you a promotion–take you off of quarters and put you onto percherons – and to look at you I’d think I’d fired you! I don’t get it!”

  Jacob tried to smile. “You mean I’m to give away a horse every night to – to somebody like Franees Raye?” he stammered.

  Eustace nodded his absurd head waggishly. “That’s right. That is, if you do a good job. It all depends on whether you’re cut out for percherons. You may be just a good man on quarters.” Here he paused, significantly, and looked at me. “Some people can’t even give quarters away!” he scoffed.

  I did not like Eustace at all.

  Jacob regarded me over Eustace’s head. “Did you hear what he said, Dr Matthews?”

  “You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to,” I told him. “There’s no way he can make you do it.”

  “Have another beer, kid,” said Eustace. “It’ll make you feel better! Percherons are no different from quarters – only bigger. It ain’t difficult once you learn the trick to it. Aaah – you’ll be good at it I tell you!”

  Jacob was not listening to him. He was still watching me. “Dr Matthews,” he said, “tell me – am I crazy?”

  I was in no mood to answer that question.

  Jacob and I had another beer apiece, and Eustace had another rye, before we went outside to see the percheron. It was in the van I had seen when we went into the saloon. This truck was actually a stable on wheels: the rear doors opened downwards to form a runway, the inside walls were padded, there was a stall and a bale of fodder – it was something to see. And the percheron itself was a gorgeous animal. It stood at least nineteen hands high and it had the most beautiful white mane I’ve ever seen. I was impressed.

  “You mean I have to ring Frances Raye’s doorbell and then just give this thing to her?” Jacob gasped. He was really worried. “What if she isn’t home?”

  Eustace was casually lighting a cigarette. “Then you go back tomorrow night,” he said. “I’ll give you another twenty-five dollars. If she isn’t home it won’t be your fault.”

  “What will I do with the horse then?”

  “If you can’t deliver it, the driver will take it back to the stables. Then you can tell him when you want it tomorrow night and he’ll bring it around to your door.”

  They locked up the back of the truck and Eustace went around to the front, and stood talking to the driver. Jacob had thrust his hands deep into his topcoat pockets and was looking glum.

  “I’m not crazy, doc – am I? You see him, too – don’t you? He’s real-isn’t he?”

  “You don’t have to go through with this absurd joke, you know,” I told him. “You don’t need the money. It’s my opinion that one of your friends is trying to make a fool of you. I wouldn’t let him get away with it if I were you.” I spoke quickly, angrily. Jacob’s vacillating attitude was aggravating – particularly as I was not sure that the joke was not being played on me.

  Jacob stood there, fingering the hibiscus in his hair. “Oh, I’ll have to do it tonight,” he said. “Eustace is counting on me and I can’t let him down! But I’m not so sure I’ll do it after this…Percherons are a little too big…”

  I was exasperated. He still might be a neurotic, and I still might be a physician bound by my Hippocratic oath – but the odds were that he was only a silly, impressionable youth that someone was playing a long, drawn-out, unfunny practical joke on. And there I was, standing on a street corner, trying to reason with him. I felt insulted!

  “At least you can take that silly flower out of your hair!” I said peevishly, knowing well that it was the last thing I should have said at that time but not being able to keep myself from saying it. “You don’t have to make yourself doubly ridiculous!”

  That did it. If I still stood a chance of arguing him out of his foolish task, I threw it away by taunting him. He was immediately on his dignity – I saw his shoulders stiffen – although he was too proud to let me know I had hurt him. Instead he let me have the full benefit of that off-center grin. “Oh, no, I couldn’t do that,” he said. “That wouldn’t be fair to Joe. Besides I’m used to having a flower in my hair. I sort of like it.”

  I gave up. There is never any point in arguing with a neurotic about his obsession–not that I was convinced J acob was a neurotic. If he ever changes, the change will come from within himself. All the doctor can do is to point it out. Jacob was either a foolish youth who was too absurdly proud to admit he was an object of ridicule, or his neurosis was so ingrown that I could not instill a desire for change. Perhaps he preferred to be neurotic. It would not be the first time I had met the symptom. If later he thought differently, he knew where he could get in touch with me. As for now, he could go ahead and give Frances Raye a percheron if that gratified any hidden urge in his psyche. I’d be damned if I’d have anything more to do with it!

  I said good-bye, turned up my coat collar against the drizzle and walked down Third Avenue towards 59th Street and the crosstown car. I felt very put upon and badly used. As I ate a lonely dinner in the Columbus Circle Child’s, it occurred to me that the police might be interested in Eustace’s crazy scheme. Annoying an actress by tethering a percheron to her doorstep might easily be a misdemeanor, if not something worse. I thought about telephoning my old friend, Lieutenant Anderson of the Homicide Division, and reporting the whole silly routine to him. But I soon decided against that. If nothing came of it, and no one ever tried to give Frances Raye a horse, Anderson would never stop laughing at me. So, instead, I went down to Penn Station, walked to Sixth Avenue and caught the tubes to Jersey.

  And as I sat in the half-light of the underground, my cars filled with the rushing roar of pent-up steel on steel, I kept turning the whole wild muddle over and over in my mind. Soon I found I had lost my carefully nurtured objectivity, and with it my scoffing attitude. I was as much apart of Jacob’s mental crisis as I believed Nan to be. This is not supposed to be a healthy state of mind for a psychiatrist, but I am not too sure. How can one understand or appreciate the trauma of a neurotic if one has never experienced similar trauma oneself? I knew I would not sleep well that night –I was all but resigned to the fact that I would not sleep well any night until my patient showed definite improvement. And I was ashamed of myself for leaving him alone with his dilemma.

  If I forgot for an instant the disturbing fact that at least Eustace, and that part of Jacob’s story was real, it would be a simple matter to name his complaint. He was verging on schizophrenia, if he weren’t already a schizoid. But Eustace was real (and I had to admit to myself that later experience might prove Joe and Harry to be equally real); he and his peculiar proclivity for paying Jacob to give away silver quarters and blooded horses were not an irrational fancy. At this point, I could not get past that improbable fact unless I doubted my own sanity.

  And a psychiatrist must never doubt his own sanity.

  I did fall asleep that night, but only after tossing for what seemed hours. I did not get to sleep for long though. Sara’s voice, sleepy and irritable, awakened me.

  “The telephone is ringing, George!” she said. “Ringing its head off! Please go answer it!”

  I groped for my slippers, threw my bathrobe over my shoulders and stumbled down the stairs. The voice over the wire was Nan’s. If I had been sleepy before, as soon as I understood what it was she was saying I was instantly awake.

  “Jacob’s been arrested, doctor!” she said. “In connection with the murder of Frances Raye! They found her dead in her apartment, and him, outside, drunk, ringing her doorbell, trying to get in! Oh, doctor, they think he killed
her!”

  All I could think to ask her was: “What did he do with the horse?”

  THREE

  A Question of Motivation

  I reached Centre Street about six o’clock in the morning. Before I saw Jacob I had a talk with Lieutenant Anderson of the Homicide Division. Anderson was a man I liked; I had served as consultant on several cases with him and I respected his intelligence. He was a dour, middle-aged man with sparse gray hair. His face had a certain lean spareness that was the only trace of the officer of the law to be found in his manner or appearance; otherwise he resembled a dyspeptic businessman.

  I was not prepared for the cold way he greeted me. He did not look up when I came into his office. He was bent over his desk writing; I stood for a minute or so waiting for him to ask me to sit down, and then I sat down anyway. I had used the same technique myself on occasion and I knew its uses and why it was sometimes necessary – it was one of the best ways to give yourself an initial advantage in an interview. Perhaps, this was why it angered me. I already felt rather put upon about the entire affair, but I had not expected Anderson – whom I considered a personal friend – to treat me this way. I decided I could keep silent as long as he could. I refused to allow myself to be restless or to look at him. Yet I knew he was watching me.

  “They tell me Jacob Blunt is a patient of yours, George.” Anderson spoke when I least expected him to and, despite myself, I was startled.

  “Since yesterday afternoon. I saw him for the first time yesterday,” I answered.

  “What was the matter with him last night? Was he drunk or is he crazy?”

  “I shall have to see him and examine him before I can say that,” I said.

  “Cautious, aren’t you?”

  Anderson’s way of speaking had always been terse, drily humorous on occasion, but never impolite. He was not being impolite now, for that matter. In his last curt question, I detected a hint of amused recognition of my own confusion. The difference in his manner, I decided, lay in the difference in our relationship – perhaps, even in the difference in my own point of view. Heretofore I had been a consultant working with him on equal terms, but now I was a witness. With this thought I allowed myself to relax, to drop my defenses. “It might help me if you told me what happened last night,” I reminded him.