"Compulsion" - читать интересную книгу автора (Levin Meyer)

Book One: The Crime of the Century

Nothing ever ends. I had imagined that my part in the Paulie Kessler story was long ago ended, but now I am to go and talk to Judd Steiner, now that he has been thirty years in prison. I imagined that my involvement with Judd Steiner had ended when the trial was over and when he and Artie Straus were sentenced to life imprisonment plus additional terms longer than ordinary human life-ninety-nine years. And then as though to add more locks and barriers to exclude those two forever from human society, the judge recommended that they might permanently be barred from parole.

Walls and locks, sentences and decrees do not keep people out of your mind, and in my mind Judd Steiner and Artie Straus have not only stayed on but have lived with the same kind of interaction and extension that people engender in all human existence.

For years they seemed to sit quietly in my mind, as though waiting for me some day to turn my attention to them. Yes, I must someday try to understand what it was that made them do what they did. And once, in the war, I believed I understood. At that moment in the war – which I shall tell about in its place – those two, from their jail in my mind, and even though one of them had long been dead, rose up to influence an action of mine.

That was the last time, and I thought I was done with them, since Artie was gone and Judd too would eventually die in prison, doomed to his century beyond life. But now a governor has made Judd Steiner actually eligible for parole. He is to receive a hearing.

Somewhere in the chain of command of our news service an editor has remembered my particular rôle as a reporter on this story, and he has quite naturally conceived the idea that it would be interesting for me to interview Judd Steiner and to write my impression about his suitability to return to the world of men.

Now this is a dreadfully responsible assignment. For I am virtually the only one to confront Judd Steiner from the days of his crime. Not that we are old men; both he and I have only just passed that strange assessment point – the fiftieth birthday. But it was men older than ourselves who were principally active at the time of the trial-lawyers, psychiatrists, prosecutors, the judge – all then in their full maturity. The great Jonathan Wilk was seventy. All have since died.

I am an existing link to the actual event. What I write, it seems, may seriously affect Judd Steiner’s chances of release.

How can I accept such responsibility? Are any of the great questions of guilt, of free will and of compulsion, so burningly debated at the trial – are any of these questions resolved? Will they ever be resolved under human study? If I turn at all, with my scraps of knowledge and experience, to the case of the man who has been sitting in jail and in the jail of my mind, if I turn to him now in a full effort to comprehend him, will I do well or will I only add to confusion?

Much, much became known about Judd and Artie through psychiatric studies – advanced for that day – of their personalities. Intense publicity brought out every detail of their lives. And as it happened, I was, for a most personal reason, in the very centre of the case. I partly identified myself with Judd, so that I sometimes felt I could see not only into the texture of events that had taken place without my presence but into his very thoughts.

Because of this identification, it sometimes becomes difficult to tell exactly where my imagination fills in what were gaps in the documents and in the personal revelations. In some instances, the question will arise: Is this true; did this actually happen? And my answer is that it needed to happen; it needed to happen in the way I tell it or in some similar way, or else nothing can be explained for me. In the last analysis I suppose it will have to be understood that what I tell is the reality for me. For particularly where emotions must be dealt with, there is no finite reality; our idea of actuality always has to come through someone, and this is the reality through me.

Nothing ever ends, and if we retrace every link in causation, it seems there is nowhere a beginning. But there was a day on which this story began to be known to the world. On that day Judd Steiner, slipping into class late, took a back seat for McKinnon’s lecture in the development of law. Judd sat alone in the rear row, raised a step above the others, and this elevation fitted his inward sense of being beyond all of them.

There was still, from yesterday, a quivering elation, as when you catch your balance on a pitching deck. Not that he had ever for a moment felt in danger of being out of control. No. In the moment of the deed itself, he had been a bit shaken. Artie had been superb.

Judd only wished Artie were here with him now, so they could share a quick wink, listening to McKinnon’s platitudes.

McKinnon was being what the fellows thought was brilliant. He was producing one of his sweeping summaries, casting his eye over the entire structure of the law.

From the early and primitive Hebrew concept of an eye for an eye, McKinnon said dryly, “Rather bloodthirsty, these Semitic tribes” – from that early concept to our law of today, was there really a great advance? Instead of an eye, it was the value of an eye, the value of a tooth, the value of a life, that was now exacted from the criminal. And in some cases the ancient primitive code remained intact, a life for a life.

Many of the fellows were making notes – especially those who were taking the Harvard Law entrance tomorrow. Directly in front of Judd, Milt Lewis was feverishly putting it all down, the hairs standing disgustingly on his fleshy, bent neck.

As the professor talked, Judd’s pen too became busy in his notebook. Over and over he drew a hawk. The hawk was streaking down, talons open… Where was Artie? Judd had passed Artie’s house, and driven past the frat, and he had looked around on campus. Surely nothing had gone wrong. Artie was purposely putting him on pins and needles… Judd drew a vulture. The page filled; he turned it and drew a huge, elaborate cross, with an unfurled inscription. In Sanskrit, he wrote, “In Memoriam”. At the base of the cross, in elaborate Old English capitals, he drew his initials: F.S.

Then he glanced through the mullioned window. Artie might pass. In any case, Artie had better be on hand after the ten-o’clock, as they had agreed. They had everything still to do.

McKinnon had come to a pause; he had lifted up the entire structure of human law and was holding it aloft for them to admire, perhaps not so much the structure itself as his Atlas feat in lifting it. Judd could not help, now, tickling the outstretched arm.

“But granted that the law applies to the ordinary person in society,” Judd said, “how would it apply in the case of the superman? The concept of an Übermensch in itself means that he must be above ordinary society. If he abided by ordinary laws he could never produce the actions that might in the end prove of the greatest benefit to humanity – not that even benefit to humanity should be a criterion.”

McKinnon smiled patronizingly. “By a superman I suppose you mean a powerful historical personality like Napoleon.”

Judd was going to interrupt, to debate Napoleon, for wasn’t Napoleon’s failure a proof per se that he was not a true superman? But Milt Lewis, always eager to hitch on to someone else’s idea, had filled in for McKinnon. “Didn’t many of the great American pioneers and industrialists consider themselves above the law?”

“Not exactly,” said McKinnon. “Often such a powerful figure, a conqueror or a revolutionist, considered that he was bringing law to the lawless, or adapting old laws to newer human ways. But always you will find such persons at pains to justify their actions in terms of law, rather than by pretending to be above the law.” And in the grand sweep of history, he pointed out, even these tremendous and commanding personalities were incorporated, for the general concept of right and wrong, of crime and punishment, remained organic with the social order, resisting individualistic innovations.

“In fact that’s a case in point – Crime and Punishment. The hero considered himself a kind of superman, and yet he broke down and yielded to the law,” parroted Milt Lewis, always ready to switch sides.

“But that’s no superman! That’s not the conception!” Judd cried. What was Raskolnikov after all but a weak sentimentalist, full of moral and religious drivel? What was his crime but a petty attempt at theft, motivated by abysmal poverty? Where was the superman conception? Raskolnikov’s was only a crime with a motive – his need for money. All he had done was to rationalize the murder by declaring that his need was greater than that of the miserly old female pawnbroker’s. To be above, beyond mundane conception, a crime had to be without need, without any of the emotional human drives of lust, hatred, greed. It had to be like some force beyond the reach of gravity itself. Then it became a pure action, the action of an absolutely free being – a superman.

Too dense to grasp a concept, they all began gabbling: How could there be such a person?… They didn’t get the concept at all; the whole idea was beyond them. Judd almost found himself yelling out the proof to them – “Look at Artie! Look at me!” But instead, he relished the situation inwardly. This was the true enjoyment. To see things from another area of knowledge, from a fourth dimension which none of them could enter.

“Well, it is an interesting speculation,” McKinnon was saying with his tight little smile; the hour was over. “As you put it, Steiner, it is a pure concept, something in the abstract. However” – he strove for his summarizing line – “a society of supermen would undoubtedly in turn evolve its own laws.”

“Superlaws!” Milt Lewis hawed.

In the corridor, Judd tried to dodge away from Lewis. He had almost got out of the Law building when he felt the thick paw on his arm. Always physically touchy, Judd over-reacted, wrenching away.

“Say, Junior, how about a little session, going over those notes?” Milton said.

“I never cram before an exam,” Judd stated. “My system is to go out and dissipate.”

Milton made some inane remark about geniuses.

Halfway across to Sleepy Hollow, Judd saw Artie – Artie stretched on his elbow on the grass amidst a group of coeds, who squatted with their legs folded under them. Myra was there and a stupid new little girl, Dorothea, who had a crush on Artie… Judd felt a surge of envy amounting almost to hatred. Judd raised his wrist, pointedly looking at his watch. Artie only rolled over, patting the ground for Judd to squat. This Dorothea was reading aloud from Jurgen, and all of them had on such knowing smirks, they tittered each time her pink tongue lingered on a reference to Jurgen’s sturdy “staff”, relishing the double meaning.

It was one of those moments when Artie looked so golden, so perfect, stretched in his powder-blue pullover, that Judd had an urge in front of all of them to call him Dorian. But he again restrained himself, saying, “Hey, Artie, we’re late.”

“Late for what?” Dorothea asked vapidly.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Artie said, rising to a sitting position.

Judd nearly giggled. If they knew!

“Don’t forget your staff!” Dorothea remarked daringly, rolling her eyes from her Jurgen to a silver Eversharp that had dropped from Artie’s jacket on to the grass.

“Thought you girls might want to use it,” Artie said, sending them all into a panic, even Myra smiling. Then Artie was coming along with him to the car. But that silly Dorothea jumped up, smoothing her swishing pleats, and came hurrying after them, calling to ask which way were they going…

“This is man stuff.” Artie gave her his dazzling grin, and they left her standing there, holding her Jurgen to her chest.

“Some little pest!” Artie lighted a cigarette, exhaled. Judd didn’t inquire how Artie felt. In a sense they were like two medical experimenters who have injected themselves with an untried drug. In himself, it had perhaps produced a slight quickening, but he was holding it well, Judd was sure. In Artie, there was not the slightest sign of an effect. But then, had not Artie secretly tried a dose once or twice before?

“Got the letters?” Artie asked in his voice of snappy action.

Judd tapped the pocket of his sports jacket. He had placed one letter on each side, to avoid any mistake. In the right-hand pocket was the letter telling the victim’s father to go to Hartmann’s drugstore and wait for a telephone call. In the left-hand pocket was the final letter that would tell him where to drop the ransom. Their job now was to prepare the treasure hunt, leading the father from place to place as he picked up these letters.

“You should have seen me shake your friend Milt Lewis,” Judd said. “He wanted to come over tonight and study for the exam.”

“That jackass would be a perfect alibi!” Artie said. “You should have let him.”

“I thought we’d have something better to do.” Judd glanced at Artie, and they both snickered. Then Artie told him to take Ellis Avenue.

The Kessler house was only a block out of their way. Judd would not have driven past that house; in fact, he would have gone out of his way to avoid it. But it was in just such boldness that Artie had it all over him.

As they neared the big yellow brick-and-timber residence, Artie leaned halfway out of the car to get a good look. By now their first letter, the special delivery demanding the ransom, had surely arrived.

The street looked normal. You’d never imagine anything unusual had happened to anyone in that house. Thus, the flash idea came to Judd that fourth-dimensional activities could be taking place within and through all human activity, and leaving no trace.

Even as they coasted slowly past, the Kessler’s limousine turned the corner and pulled into the driveway. “Stop! Hold it!” Artie snapped, but Judd drove on, swearing under his breath, “You gone daffy!”

Artie squirmed around on the seat so he could watch behind. Mr. Kessler got hurriedly out of the limousine – he was carrying a swelling brief case, Artie glowingly declared-and right after him came a tall man whose head angled forward. Artie recognized him – old Judge Wagner – guessed he was the Kessler’s family lawyer.

“He’s just been to the bank and got the money!” Artie bounced around, laughing, and squeezed Judd’s knee. “He’s got Judge Wagner with him. Hey, I forgot to tell you, Jocko. Mums told me this morning. The two of them were tearing around the neighbourhood last night looking for Paulie. They even came to our tennis court – wanted to know if the kid had been playing with Billy!” Billy was Artie’s little brother, of the same age as the boy they had kidnapped. “Old man Kessler and the old Judge even dragged out Fathands Weismiller!” That was the gym teacher at the Twain School. “They had him bust into the building with them. I think Fats crawled through the window!” Artie leaned back and laughed at the image. “They thought maybe the kid got locked in taking a leak. I told Mums my theory is, Paulie’s run away from home.”

Judd felt slightly piqued that Artie had not come over, first thing in the morning, to share all this with him. “Mums was in a stew this morning,” Artie said. “She was even worried if she should send dear little Billums off to school!”

They had by now reached Judd’s house, an ornate, gabled mansion on Greenwood Street. But instead of stopping, Judd drove on a block to where they had last night, after the deed, parked the rented Willys.

“Every mamma with a brat in Twain is a-twitter.” Artie laughed.

But this disturbed Judd. Surely all the worried mothers would be telephoning the Kesslers. “They’ll keep the phone line busy,” he pointed out.

It was a detail they had only partly foreseen. For to carry out their carefully timed ransom schedule, the Kessler line had to be open for their call. Indeed, their special-delivery letter had instructed Charles Kessler to keep his line unused.

“Ishkabibble,” said Artie.

It was an expression Judd hated. He had wanted this to be a perfect day between them. Sometimes – even in a big thing like this – Artie could suddenly act as if he didn’t care a damn.

But as Judd pulled behind the Willys, Artie glanced up and down the street in his professional way. He was in the game again.

They approached the rented car. It stood in front of a nondescript apartment house, for this block was already outside the exclusive Hyde Park area of mansions. How anonymous, how perfectly innocent the car looked! Gratification arose in Judd at the correctness of their planning. The rented car, the fake identities, were masterful ideas. And just as this car, this shell of metal that contained their deed of yesterday, had been left a totally unaltered entity by the deed, so was the deed meaningless within themselves.

“You want to drive, Mr. Singer?” Judd used the alias, giving Artie a you-first-my-dear-Gaston bow while opening the door. But as he took hold of the door handle, Judd noticed a few small, dark blotches. No, they were surely from something else. But suppose on the wildest chance the car were discovered and under chemical analysis the spots proved…? Last night, in the dark, the washing they had given the automobile, using Artie’s garden hose, had been altogether hasty.

Conquering the sickening repugnance that blood always raised in him, Judd looked into the rear of the car. There were stains on the floor.

“Aw, it could be any kind of crap. Every car is dirty,” Artie said.

“They’re brownish.” Judd felt suddenly depressed.

“All right, we’ll wash it out!” Artie jumped behind the wheel, heading for Judd’s driveway. Judd hesitated; but it was the noon hour, and Emil would be upstairs at lunch. Anyway, what he did was none of the chauffeur’s business.

Artie pulled the Willys up to the garage entrance. Judd glanced at the house. Huge, silent, with most of the shades drawn, the way his father insisted since his mother had died, it had an unoccupied air.

Artie had seized a pail and was running water into it. The maid came out of the house to ask if Cook should fix lunch for the two of them.

Judd felt spied on. “We’re busy,” he said, keeping his voice polite. “Thanks, but never mind. We’ll pick up a sandwich downtown.”

“I’ll just put some cold chicken on the table.” And she gave him that devoted smile of a female who knows better than men what men want.

Artie sloshed the pail of water on to the rear floorboards. Taking a rag, Judd began to rub the spots around the door handle. How could they ever have got there? The image from yesterday, the jet of blood, the whole dreadful mess, intruded for an instant, but he ruled it out from his mind. It was instantly supplanted by an image of himself as a child watching a doctor with a syringe starting to take blood from his mother’s arm, and a swooning sick feeling echoed up in him. Judd ruled it all out, out from his mind. He had full control; he could master his emotions completely. He held his mind blank, like breath shut off.

Artie was swearing – the bloody crap wouldn’t wash out – and at that moment Emil came down the garage stairs, still chewing on something. “Can I help you boys?” he said through his food.

“No. Never mind. We’re just cleaning up a car I borrowed,” Artie said, pulling his head out of the tonneau. “Boy, some party! I guess we kind of messed it up.”

“What are you using, only plain water?” Emil asked, coming close and looking. “You could use some Gold Dust.”

“It’s wine spots. We spilled some Dago red,” Artie said, laughing.

Emil turned to fetch a box of Gold Dust. “Let me do it for you.”

“No, this is good enough,” Judd said. “It’s nothing. Don’t let us interrupt your lunch.”

“Oh, that’s all right,” said Emil. But finally the stupid Swede seemed to get the idea; he started back upstairs. Yet he paused to ask if Judd’s Stutz was running all right today, if the squeak that Judd had complained about when he left it in the garage yesterday was gone. “I put a little oil on the brake,” Emil said. “Not too much.”

“It’s fine now – fine, thanks,” Judd said. And to Artie: “Let’s go.”

Artie took the wheel and backed out with a roar. “Christ, you never could back a car! Watch out!” Judd complained.

They drove to Vincennes. The corner they had selected for the first message relay was a large vacant lot at 39th and Vincennes. At the curb stood one of Chicago ’s metal refuse boxes, about the size of a hope chest, painted dark green. On one side, stencilled in white, were the words, HELP KEEP THE CITY CLEAN.

They got out. Judd drew the letter from his pocket. There were few people on the street, and anyone observing them might think they were only throwing some junk into the box.

Judd lifted the lid. He had brought along a small roll of gummed stationery tape, and now he tried to tape the letter to the underside of the lid. The tape didn’t stick. “Hold the damn lid!” he snapped at Artie.

“That junk will never hold,” Artie criticized. “Jesus, I can’t leave a single thing to you! Where’s the adhesive, that roll of adhesive!”

It was a roll Judd had taken from the bathroom yesterday, to wind around the chisel blade, the way Artie said, so the wooden end could be used as a club. “You told me to use the whole roll, to make it thick.”

“You stink!”

“We’ve got time to drive over and buy some.”

“Hell with it!” Artie cried. He let the lid drop, nearly catching Judd’s hand. He snatched the envelope from Judd. “We’ll leave out this stop.”

“Then how’ll he know where to go next?” Judd objected.

“When we phone him at home,” Artie snapped, “instead of sending him to this box we send him straight to Hartmann’s Drugstore for the next instruction. That’s all this crappy letter tells him to do anyway.”

“We can’t make any last-minute changes – everything will get all balled up!” Judd felt suddenly panicky. The spots on the car had been dismaying. Now he was becoming depressed.

This Help Keep the City Clean box had seemed to give the entire adventure the proper sardonic flavour, this garbage box of life. The idea had been his own contribution, too. It had come to him a few months ago during one of their sessions. How to make the ransom collection foolproof had been the problem.

Artie, half tight, had got off the subject, telling about some asinine frat party with a new stunt, a “treasure hunt” in which kids were sent all over town to the craziest places, and in each place they picked up a clue to where they had to go next.

Suddenly Judd had seen it. An actual treasure hunt in reverse! The father chasing from one place to another for his instructions to deliver the ransom! And in the same instant, as the idea itself came to him, Judd had visualized the refuse box. First stop! A portly man, he had imagined him, because during that time they had figured Danny Richman as the victim, and Danny’s father – that stuffed shirt, who never opened his mouth except to make a speech full of noble precepts, Polonius in person, even worse than Judd’s own old man, if possible – Danny’s father was it!

Artie had loved the idea. They could just see Richman pére waddling toward the Help Keep the City Clean box, bending his carcass, pulling up the lid, putting on his pince-nez to read the instructions!

Artie had been wonderful that night, planning all sorts of mad surprises for the father. “Hey, how about he pulls up the lid – we have a jack-in-the-box, a great big jock that jumps up at him!”

Judd improved on it. They could rig up a spring, so that when the box was opened it squeezed a bulb and-right in the face! – a fountain!

But even as Artie had gone on, with more and more ghoulish ideas, another image had crowded into Judd’s mind. He had seen the box as the place for the body itself. He had no thought of it as something dead. He had merely visualized the shape, curled up, fitting inside snugly. Of course he had dismissed the image as impractical. In a street box like this, nothing could remain hidden for more than a few hours; someone would come along and open the lid. And afterwards, Judd had thought of the real place, the perfect receptacle for the body. Nevertheless, more than once the image had returned, the curled boy in the box.

“C’mon!” Artie was already in the car. He was tearing up the letter that should have been in the box, letting bits of it fall to the street.

“Hey! For crissake!” Judd grabbed for his arm. Artie started the car with a jolt and let the bits of paper flutter out a few at a time from his hand, laughing goadingly.

He drove to the main I.C. station at Twelfth Street. There the other letter, containing their final instructions, had to be placed in a certain spot on a certain train.

THAT MORNING I may have passed Artie as he lolled in Sleepy Hollow with his little harem of co-eds. I may even have waved to him and smiled at Myra Seligman, may have wanted to linger on the chance of getting better acquainted with her, even though I had a girl, my Ruth.

I see myself as I was in those days – eighteen, a sort of prodigy, my long wrists protruding from my coat sleeves, always charging across the campus with a rushing stride, as if I were afraid I’d miss something, and with my Modern Library pocket edition of Schopenhauer banging against my side as I rushed along.

I was eighteen and I was already graduating, having taken summer courses to get through ahead of time. For I had a terrible anxiety about life. I had to enter life quickly, to find out how I would make out. Already I was a part-time reporter on the Globe; besides covering campus news I would rush downtown afternoons and wait around the city room for an assignment.

On graduating, I would work full time on the Globe. I would test myself against the real world. And I would try to write, too.

That day I had a little feature story. I remember that it was about a laboratory mouse that had become a pet, too precious to kill. And when I telephoned, the city editor said, as he said only rarely, “Can you come in and write it?”

I skipped my ten-o’clock class, half running the five blocks to the I.C. station, hoping that people I knew would see me rushing downtown with a story.

I was lucky. A train pulled in as I reached the ramp, and I was in the office in twenty minutes. I used a typewriter at the back of the large newsroom, near the windows from which you could almost touch the El tracks. I carried the story up to the desk myself, and as I hovered there for an instant, the city editor, Reese, glanced up and said, “Going back south?” And without waiting for a reply he circled a City News report on his desk. “Drowned kid. Take a look at him.”

In Chicago the papers jointly used the City News Agency to cover routine sources like neighbourhood police stations.

This item was from the South Chicago police station. An unidentified boy, about twelve, wearing glasses, had been found drowned in the Hegewisch swamp at the edge of the city.

I saw my feature piece already, a tender, human little story about a city kid who had tried too soon in the season to go swimming and had caught a cramp in the cold water.

“Better check with Daly,” said Reese. He blinked up at me with the ragged, sour little smile he had. “He’s on a kidnapping. They say it can’t be the same kid, but you better take a look.”

Tom Daly was to me a “real” reporter; he always knew whom to call, where to go. More, Tom had a brother on the police detective force; thus Tom Daly belonged to that inner world I then thought of as “they” – the people who were really a part of the operation of things.

I spotted Daly in one of the phone booths that lined the wall. He had a leg sprawled through the partly open door, and kept tapping his toe as he worked on the difficult phone call. I heard a man’s voice, a thread of it escaping from Tom’s receiver, “No, no, a drowned boy – how could it be Paulie? We have just heard from… those people. We are sure our own boy is safe.”

Tom cut in. What had he heard? How had he heard?

“Please don’t put anything in the paper as yet. Please, you understand? Your editor gave us his word of honour – your chief, Mr. Reese. In a few hours we hope it will be all over. We will give you the full story the moment our boy is returned to our hands.” The voice was not exactly pleading; it retained a reminder of authority. A rich man, a millionaire. A self-made man who could control himself and deal with a dreadful emergency. Tom promised co-operation.

“Thank you. I appreciate it in this terrible thing. But this other boy you speak of – he cannot be our boy. Our boy is safe. We have a message. Besides, this boy you say has glasses. Paulie does not wear glasses.”

Still trying to keep the father on the line, Tom Daly protested that although the Globe would co-operate, we might be of real help if we were meanwhile trusted with the fullest details. Glancing up at me, he said into the phone, “Mr. Kessler, we are sending a reporter out to look at the poor kid that was drowned out there in South Chicago, and if we could have a picture of your son to go by… Yes, I know you said he doesn’t wear glasses, but there might always be a mistake.”

Tom had a round, pinkish face, the kind that is typed as good-natured Irish. Now he was evading telling where he got wind of the kidnapping – “of course we have our exclusive sources of information” – and he was trying to find out how the mother was taking it. Then with a final offer of our help, he hung up. Without emerging from the booth, Tom told me all that was known. Charles Kessler was a South Side millionaire. Last night his boy, Paulie, had not come home from school. They had searched for him. About ten o’clock someone had phoned the Kesslers to say that the boy was kidnapped and that there would be instructions in the morning. This morning a special-delivery letter had come demanding ten thousand dollars. The police were being kept out of it. Only the Detective Bureau had been notified, by the family lawyer, ex-Judge Wagner. Kessler seemed sure his boy was safe. “Still, you’d better take a look,” Tom said.

“How will I know if it’s he?” I asked. Tom shrugged.

I was to call him back, with a description.

So the story began, with a routine police-blotter report about a drowned boy in the Hegewisch swamp, and with an inside tip on a kidnapping. On the city editor’s desk the two items came together, belonging to the clichés of daily headlines – kidnapping, ransom, unidentified body.

And hurrying back to the I.C. I saw myself, a Red Grange of the press, open-running through Loop traffic. Would other reporters be there? Were some there already? I became tense with the dreadful fear of being scooped that permeated newspaper work, I think more then than now.

We passed the University, came to the edge of the city where Chicago dissolved away into marshes and ponds, interspersed with oil tanks and steel mills.

The police station was in an area of small shops with side streets of frame houses inhabited by Polish mill workers. There was grit in the air; I could see a few licks of flame coming out of the smokestacks that rose off toward Gary – pinkish, daylight flame.

Inside the station, one glance reassured me there were no other reporters. I assumed the casual air of the knowing newsman. “Say, Sarge, I’m from the Globe. You got the kid they found drowned in Hegewisch?”

The policeman looked at me for a moment without answering.

“I’m looking for the kid-”

“Swaboda’s Undertaking Parlour,” he said, and gave me the address. It was nearby, an ordinary store with a large rubber plant in the window. Inside, there was the roll-top desk, the leather chair, the oleo of Christ on the wall. And not a soul.

I opened the rear door. A cement-floored room, smelling like a garage. Nobody. A zinc table, covered.

There was scarcely a bump under the cloth. A child has little bulk.

I approached, and, with a sense of being a brazen newspaperman, drew back the cloth. For the truth is that until that moment I had never looked at a dead human being.

I noted, rather with pride, that no feeling arose in me. Was this because of my rôle of observer, I asked myself, or was it because life had so little value in the modern world? We had shootings in the streets; we rather boasted of Chicago as a symbol of violence. And I thought of the 1918 war, when I had been a kid, and every day the headlines of the dead; the numbers had had no meaning.

The face of the child had no expression, unless it was that curious little look of self-satisfaction that children have in sleep. It was a full, soft face; the brown hair was neatly cut, and the skin showed, I thought, a texture of expensive breeding. I drew the cover farther down to find out one thing immediately. A Jewish boy. Surely Paulie Kessler?

I experienced the irrational, almost shameful sense of triumph that comes to newsmen who discover disaster.

“Say, you!”

I jumped. Another reporter?

There stood a paunchy man in a brown suit. Hastily I asked, “You the undertaker? I’m from the Globe. The door was open so I… The cops said you had the boy here.”

Mr. Swaboda advanced, frowning, but not antagonistic.

“Any other reporters been here?” I asked.

“Oh. You are from the newspapers.”

“Did anybody identify this boy? Do you know who he is?”

He shook his head. “Maybe you know? In the papers?”

“All we got is a report of a drowned boy.”

Again Swaboda shook his head. A glint of clever knowingness came into his eyes. “He is not drowned.” He pointed to the boy’s scalp, moving closer. “Even the police officer don’t see this. I am the one to show them.” Brushing back a lock of hair, the undertaker disclosed two small cuts above the forehead, clotted over, like sores.

The scarehead flashed into my mind – ABDUCTED, MURDERED. MILLIONAIRE’s SON! And this time, surely, there was a sense of exultation in me.

“Can I use your phone? I’ve got to phone my paper.”

“Help yourself.” He followed me to the roll-top desk. “You know who is this boy’s family?”

He might give away my story. I should have gone outside to phone. While hesitating, I noticed a pair of glasses on the desk, tortoise-shell. I picked them up. “They said he was wearing glasses. Are these the ones?”

The undertaker took the glasses from me and smiled again. “These are not his glasses.” He carried them into the back room; I followed. Swaboda placed the glasses on the boy and turned to me triumphantly. I could see that the glasses were a poor fit; the earpieces were too long. “Police put these glasses on him,” he said. “I take them off.”

I hurried back to the phone and got Tom Daly. “It’s him!” I said.

“He’s been identified?”

“No, but looking at the body, I got a hunch.”

His voice dropped. “Look, kid, just tell me what you know for sure.”

“For one thing, he’s a Jewish kid,” I said. “Anyway, he’s circumcised.”

I could feel, in his instant hesitation, the stoppage people always had before things Jewish.

“What about the kid’s glasses? Kessler said his boy didn’t wear any.”

“They don’t fit him. Listen. They must be the murderer’s. He must have dropped them. Listen. He’s got bruises on his head-”

“Wait, wait!” I heard him yelling my news to Reese. Then: “Stay there. I’ll call the Kesslers to come and identify him.”

It was even said afterwards that but for my going out there just then, the murderers might never have been caught. It’s not a question of credit; indeed it has always bothered me that I received a kind of notoriety, a kind of advantage out of the case. Obviously what I did that morning was only an errand, and if I hadn’t gone there, the identification would have been made in some other way, perhaps a day later.

In any case, the journalistic credit should have gone, not to me, but to Reese for connecting the two items on his desk. And the discovery goes back after all to the steelworker who walked across the wasteland and happened to see a flash of white in some weeds – the boy’s foot.

There was much moralizing to come; providence was mentioned. I believe I have grown beyond the cynical pose of the twenties; I would not argue today that all existence is the random result of blind motion.

It did happen that Peter Wrotzlaw, a steel-mill worker who usually went to his job by another path, deviated that one morning to pick up his watch from a repairman. At 118th Street there was a marshy area, a pond, with the water draining through a culvert under a railway embankment. Wrotzlaw mounted this embankment to cross the pond, and then he noticed the flash of white at the opening of the drainpipe.

It was even said to be providential that Wrotzlaw had once lived on a farm, for in a submerged way his nature sense knew something strange was there, neither animal nor fish. He climbed down and, parting the weeds, recognized a boy’s foot. Bending low, he made out the whole body, crammed into the cement pipe.

Just then, up on the tracks, a handcar appeared. Wrotzlaw shouted. The two railway workers stopped their car and came down. One spoke Polish.

“Here, look!” Wrotzlaw explained. “Just this minute, I saw something white. I found this!”

The railwaymen were wearing boots. The Polish one stepped into the water; it came just to his knees. He took hold and pulled out the body of the boy; he carried it to the water’s edge and put it down, the face turned to the grey, misty morning sky. “Is drowned. Poor kiddo.”

How could the boy have got into the culvert? Maybe foolish kids, trying to play a game, crawl through the pipe. And this one got stuck and drowned.

A kid of someone. A pity. “You ever seen him around here?”

The two railroad men lifted the body to carry it up to their handcar. But then they asked, Where are his clothes?

Wrotzlaw searched in the weeds. “Hey!” He picked up the pair of glasses, glinting there, and placed them on the boy. He searched farther along the downtrodden grass. “Stocking.”

He held it up, a knee-pants stocking, a good one, new, not like the black cotton stockings of the neighbourhood kids, with mended holes at the knees.

But no other clothing could be found. “Other kids maybe got scared, ran away, took everything.” Now the railwaymen said Wrotzlaw should come with them, to bring the body back to their railway yard. He would be late for his job, he protested, but the other Pole insisted.

By the freight platform, men gathered. The yard boss called the police. A patrol wagon removed the corpse. “Unknown boy, drowned” was marked on the blotter, and the body was sent to Swaboda’s.

Tom Daly called Kessler. Almost before Tom could hear it ring, the phone was picked up. “Yes? Yes?”

“This is the Globe.”

“Please. We are expecting an important message. Please don’t call this number. Please leave the line clear.”

“But our reporter believes he has identified your boy, Mr. Kessler.”

Charles Kessler had been sitting with his hand ready to the phone, waiting for the call promised in the special-delivery letter. He was a small-made man, always keeping himself neat and correct looking. In his solid house with his solid furniture it seemed an impossible thing that a kidnapping should have happened to him.

He had always dealt with everyone to the penny, exact. Even when he had been a pawnbroker, long years ago, he had been proud of his reputation for honesty and exactitude, ninety-five cents on the dollar. In Chicago ’s wide-open days, when elaborate gambling saloons had studded the downtown area, he had kept his elegant little pawn office open far into the night to accommodate the princelings of the first great Chicago meat and wheat fortunes, who would pledge their diamond studs in order to go on with a game. It was thirty years since he had gone out of the loan business into real estate, but could this crime be some long-nurtured, crazed act of revenge for a fancied wrong?

A man accustomed to dealing correctly and exactly in mortgage notes and debentures, how could he deal with a ransom letter? He wanted to deal with it precisely, not to deviate, not to take any risk. The letter lay there on the mahogany table, unfolded. It said he must keep the telephone line clear – a call would come.

The letter itself proved that the kidnapping was real and not some crazy joke, as he had hoped it might be when he had come back from searching the school building last night-he and Judge Wagner-to find his wife sitting dazed by the phone. “Someone – a man. He said, Kidnapped, instructions in the morning. He said a name. I don’t know. A name…”

A joke? Paulie was not a boy to play such jokes. Maybe some of his schoolmates? Or should the police be called? An alarm be sent out?

Judge Wagner, a wise man, a man with connections, said, Wait. A big alarm might prove dangerous for Paulie – if it was really a kidnapping. Then all night long they had tried on the phone to reach important people – the Chief of Detectives, the Mayor, the State’s Attorney.

And early in the morning, Kessler himself had run to the door to answer the bell. A special-delivery letter. A name, Harold Williams. No use trying to recall anyone with such a name; it was surely a fake. “But why me?” All morning long Charles Kessler kept asking this of his friend Judge Wagner, of his brother Jonas. “Why me? I never hurt anybody. Why me?” And: “Who would do such a thing? Who? To a decent honest man, to a poor innocent woman, the boy’s mother…”

There lay the letter. It was typewritten.

DEAR SIR:

As you no doubt know by this time your son has been kidnapped. Allow us to assure you that he is at present well and safe. You need fear no physical harm for him provided you live up carefully to the following instructions, and such others as you will receive by future communications. Should you, however, disobey any of our instructions even slightly, his death will be the penalty.

1. For obvious reasons make absolutely no attempt to communicate with either the police authorities or any private agency. Should you already have communicated with the police, allow them to continue their investigation, but do not mention this letter.

2. Secure before noon today ten thousand dollars ($10,000). This money must be composed entirely of OLD BILLS of the following denominations:

$2,000.00 in twenty-dollar bills.

$8,000.00 in fifty-dollar bills.

The money must be old. Any attempt to include new or marked bills will render the entire venture futile.

3. The money should be placed in a large cigar box, or if this is impossible in a heavy cardboard box, SECURELY closed and wrapped in white paper. The wrapping paper should be sealed at all openings with sealing wax.

4. Have the money with you, prepared as directed above, and remain at home after one o’clock P.M. See that the telephone is not in use.

You will receive a future communication instructing you as to your future course.

As a final note of warning-this is a strictly commercial proposition, and we are prepared to put our threat into execution should we have reasonable grounds to believe that you have committed an infraction of the above instructions. However, should you carefully follow out our instructions to the letter, we can assure you that your son will be safely returned to you within six hours of our receipt of the money.

Yours truly,

HAROLD WILLIAMS

Charles Kessler had hurried to the bank the moment it opened, and he had told them to make no record of the bills; he did not want to take any chances. What was ten thousand dollars for a life, his son’s life? Then there had been no sealing wax in the house, and he had almost sent his older boy Martin out to buy the wax, but caught himself in time and sent Martin and little Adele with the chauffeur to his brother Jonas’ house. Perhaps they would be safer there. And he had run out himself for the wax.

One o’clock. Waiting for the call. Jonas with him, Judge Wagner with him. Poor Martha upstairs; the doctor had given her sedatives.

The cigar box, wrapped in white paper, sealed, on the table.

And now came this call from the newspaper, saying that Paulie was dead. How could it be possible that the boy was dead when the letter said he was safe and unharmed?

Judge Wagner took the phone. He pleaded, “Please co-operate. Do not call…”

But the newspaperman insisted there was good reason to believe the dead boy was Paulie. It seemed to be a Jewish boy.

Then the Judge said, “I see.” He took the address of the mortuary.

At that moment, Judd was sitting on a bench in the waiting-room of the grimy old I.C. station. A bareheaded college boy, alert-looking, with intense dark eyes, he kept one hand in his jacket pocket, on the final instruction envelope. He had just printed on it the words MR. CHARLES KESSLER, PERSONAL. Now he kept his eyes on Artie, who was at the ticket window. Artie would come toward him in a moment for the letter. And then Artie would board the Michigan City train, staying only long enough to deposit the letter in the telegraph-blank box in the last car. Then Artie would get off the train. They would phone Kessler, giving him only the address of the drugstore near the 63rd Street station. Kessler would have precisely enough time to get to the store and receive their second call, instructing him to board this train as it arrived at 63rd Street and to look in the telegraph-blank box in the last car.

The man would just have time to rush aboard, find the letter, and read its instructions to go out to the rear platform and watch for the large building on the right-hand side, with CHAMPION MANUFACTURING printed on the wall. When the train came alongside that building, near 75th Street, the father was to toss the ransom package, as hard as he could, toward the factory. By then, Judd and Artie would be waiting in the Willys near where the package must fall.

Having the package thrown from the moving train had been Artie’s contribution. He had come running over with the idea, all excited, one night about a month ago. “I’ve got it! I’ve got it!” The perfect end to the relays. And the beauty of it, Artie had explained, was that even if the victim’s father tipped off the cops, the two of them could be watching at 63rd Street to make sure no one but the father got on the train. And even if the cops knew what train it was, how could they, in that last moment, watch the entire length of the tracks all the way to Michigan City? The cops couldn’t drive alongside, either; there was no road directly alongside! Foolproof!

All evening they had examined the plan. Great – the work of a mastermind, a superman! Judd had congratulated his friend while suppressing, in himself, the little question, Hadn’t Artie got the idea out of one of his detective magazines?

Then, once this main part of the problem was solved, the foolproof system found, Artie had become impatient to set the day. “Let’s do it. Let’s do it.” But Judd had said that it had to be done perfectly; they had to pick the right train; they had to make a test run.

Together they had come down to this station and chosen an afternoon train, so that there would not be too many passengers, and they had chosen a short-line train, going only to Michigan City, so no one would be likely to use the telegraph-blank box. And they had tested the train, sitting together – Artie by the window and he pressing against Artie – to get a good look, to select a spot for the “delivery”. There were mostly women on the train, biddies on their way back to Gary or Michigan City after their downtown shopping. On that ordinary train, among the dull little women on their everyday errands, he and Artie had been picking the spot where a ransom should be tossed to them!

Or now, sitting here in the railway station, watching Artie, with his easy smile, stooping to the ticket window, and knowing why. And only the two of them knowing You could go through life carrying always your extraordinary deeds between you, sealed off from all the little people, and sealed together by your doing and your knowing!

And sitting with his eyes on Artie, Judd must have told himself that he felt no different than on all their previous trips to this station. Just as during the months of planning it had seemed as if the thing would never happen, so it seemed now as though it had not happened. The thought habit of those months was stronger than the occurrence of a single day. All yesterday was a void, an intrusion, for yesterday had been a part of the deed that they could not have rehearsed. And today was like a going back to before the thing was done, like another rehearsal.

The rehearsal with the dummy package, to see where it would land when thrown from the moving train… A few weeks ago, together on the train, watching the package land in an alley near that factory… And Artie crying happily, “Let’s do it, Jocko! Monday!” And he had told Artie, Wait. What about picking up the package? How could they be sure the alley would be clear?

“Christ, people are always throwing crap out of trains.”

Still, Artie had agreed to another delay, for another test. They would separate, one on the train, the other on the ground. How heavy would ten thousand dollars be? A whole evening they had spent, laughing conspiratorially as they prepared an exact dummy package. Judd had calculated the weight in ones, fives, tens, twenties, calculated the best combination to fill a cigar box, for a box would sail good and solid. He had taken one of the old man’s perfecto boxes, and a magazine of the right weight to stuff inside. That awful Literary Digest. The next day, Artie had taken the package and boarded the train.

Judd had posted himself in the alley, behind the factory with the windowless back wall. To test everything precisely, he had left his car only two hundred feet away with the motor running. And there came the moment when he saw the train, and Artie emerging to him on the rear platform, Artie first throwing away a cigarette, and then tossing the box. It rolled down the embankment almost to his feet. In a few minutes he was in the car, and at the next station meeting Artie. Still, he had temporized, “Maybe it’s not the best place. Someone could have seen me from the street.”

And Artie had stormed, “It’s nearly summer, you sonofabitch. We’ll never do it if you keep on crapping around!”

Judd wondered, now. Had he really meant that it should never happen? That one thing or another should delay them until the day he would be going away on his trip to Europe? And Judd was a little ashamed of his own past hesitations. For everything was working fine. Here now was Artie coming from the ticket window, wearing the easy smile whose meaning was known only to the two of them. As always, Judd felt illuminated by Artie’s smile. The real collegiate carelessness about Artie, the jauntiness of him in that jacket with the half-belt in back, the quality of ease that Judd himself could never acquire.

Artie scooted past him as if they didn’t know each other. (Railway stations are full of detectives; best not be too conspicuous.) Judd arose, walked over to the magazine stand, and brushed against Artie, feeling as always the contact pulse through his entire body. But in that moment he had slipped Artie the letter, and now he watched Artie going through the wicket, having his ticket punched.

Judd sat down again. Now the machinery was in motion. The minute Artie, having planted the letter, slipped off the train, they would phone Kessler. Michigan 2505. Judd couldn’t quite picture the man. A skinny twerp, Artie had said. Until yesterday he had been Mr. A, for Adversary. Now he had a name. That too had been wonderful, sitting and drinking the old man’s liquor while playing over names of possible victims. Anyone you had a hate on for a day, you could put down as the victim.

Evening after evening, playing the game, picking out victims discussing the size, the maximum weight of a victim practical to handle… Nobody too large – a struggle would be abhorrent. And then the long arguments – almost fights – he had had with Artie, trying to convince him that it should be a girl. The image of it swept back on Judd: making it a girl, and raping the girl, would have been part of it. From the beginning he had seen it that way, the image of the rape always sweeping through him like a dizziness.

But Artie had eliminated the idea of a girl. He had no really valid reasons. He was simply against it. A boy, then. A small one.

After that, they had spent evenings debating the amount of the ransom. If you asked for a hundred thousand, Artie said, every cop in town would be on the job. How much would a man risk, and keep away from the police, just to get his son back?

“How much would your own old man give?”

“Hah! That depends on which son!” And, eyes snapping, Artie had begun to stutter as he did only when he was extremely excited. “Billy now! Billy, the baby, the cutie! They’d pay a hundred thousand, a million for him! Hey! Why not really kidnap Billy?”

For a moment he had been serious, Judd was sure. But then they had dismissed it as impractical. Artie would be surrounded by police all over the house. It would be too difficult to collect the ransom.

For a whole evening their game had followed that vein. Suppose they staged a kidnapping, one with the other? “My old man would give a hundred thousand simoleons and say, ‘Keep the punk!’” Artie had kidded. And he had pictured where he would send his old man to pick up messages. His dignified pater. A message in a ladies’ toilet! That had convulsed him.

Judd had in turn pictured how his own father would react. Oh, he’d pay; he was proud of his prodigy! The boy ornithologist! Judah Steiner, Sr., had to have his prodigy’s achievements to brag about at the club.

Then Artie had produced an even better idea: kidnapping their own old men, in person! They had fallen over each other with laughter. Artie, imitating his father – dignity outraged! Judd could just see Randolph Straus, the richest Jew in Chicago: “Boys! What is the meaning of this!”

Even now, sitting waiting for Artie, Judd had to smile at the thought. As if the whole thing were still to be done. And then he saw it as his own father, the old man’s bewilderment as they tied him up and took off their masks. “What are you doing to me?” the old man would demand in his ponderous way. Ah, there would be a crime for posterity!

But the thing was already done, Judd reminded himself. Though if they got away with this, Artie might want him to – No. For when he returned from Europe and went to Harvard, he would be different; maybe he wouldn’t feel this way about Artie any more…

Judd drew in his breath, and looked fearfully toward the wicket, as if by this disloyal thought alone he might lose Artie.

In a moment Artie would be coming out. Judd rehearsed the Kessler phone number, the address of the drugstore, and told himself he must now be sure not to tell the Adversary to go into the Help Keep the City Clean box. That was eliminated, and there jumped into his mind the other thing about the box, the final, macabre idea Artie had proposed, a skeleton popping up as the lid was opened, or maybe – his eyes darkening – even better than a skeleton, a severed hand

“You’ll give the guy heart failure; we’ll never collect!” Judd had said. “Besides, where would you get it?”

And Artie had given him that look, as if, despite all they had done together, Judd really wasn’t in on the real, the inside things. “Oh, I could get it all right.” Laughing, he added, “From a medical student. From Willie.”

And Judd had felt a fear, a sadness, that gripped him again even now as the scene came back to him; Artie’s merely naming Willie Weiss had brought the convulsed feeling around his heart that there were things Artie did with others, maybe with Willie, activities, secrets, from which he was excluded. He had even tried to turn it, to make Willie the victim.

“Willie!” he had exclaimed, but with a fear in watching Artie’s reaction. “Hey, he’d be a good one. How about him?” For a moment Artie had joined in the idea. Had it been to tease him? Picturing Willie, the astounded look on his face, Willie trying to talk his way out of it and his cleverness failing him, Willie with the gag in his mouth, then dead between them. But finally Artie had said no, because Willie’s old man was a notorious tightwad. He’d never pay…

There was Artie, coming from the train, smiling, as if he were just stepping out to buy a magazine. Now was the time to make the phone call. Judd pictured Mr. A by a phone, waiting. It was again a man like his own father. Still, it was better, purer, that nothing personal had guided them in their final choice. To have left blank the address on the ransom envelope, even as they prowled the street for the victim – that had been a superb affirmation. It proved destiny was accidental. Wouldn’t that settle forever the silly argument about any meaning in life? Concatenation of circumstances – admitted – but meaningless, meaningless…

Judd arose to the gladness of Artie coming toward him. Yesterday had been an intrusion. Now, the game was continuing.

He had already changed a nickel for a telephone slug, as each public phone had its own token. With the slug ready in his hand, Judd waited for Artie to crowd in beside him in the booth. They heard the busy signal together. Artie yanked the receiver from Judd’s hand, and slammed it back onto the hook. “Sonsabitches! They’re violating our instructions!” His eyes were yellow. Judd knew these sudden rages Artie could have. But after all…“Maybe somebody called them, by accident,” he said.

“Let’s get out of here!”

They hurried from the station. Artie, with his long stride, was already starting the car when Judd caught up with him. “Let’s call again from a drugstore,” Judd said. The note was on the train, the train would soon be on its way.

Pulling up at the nearest drugstore, on Wabash, Artie was out of the car before it had completely stopped. He snapped his fingers at the clerk for a couple of slugs. The clerk was busy with some blobby-faced woman over shades of rouge.

But Artie turned on his charm. “Excuse me,” he said to the lady, “I don’t want to keep my girl waiting by the phone.” She broke into a fat coy smile, while the clerk changed Artie’s dime.

Hurrying into the booth, Artie took the phone; Judd seized it from him. Kessler might know Artie’s voice. “I was only going to get the number,” Artie snapped.

The ringing began.

Charles Kessler seized the phone almost thankfully. “Yes, this is Charles Kessler personally. My boy is all right?” The kidnappers were keeping their word; they were calling. Surely that newspaper reporter was crazy. Paulie was safe.

“Do you have the money ready, according to our instructions?”

“Yes, yes. Is Paulie all right?”

“Your boy is safe. A cab will shortly call at your door. Proceed in the cab to the drugstore at 1360 East 63rd Street. Wait for a call in the first phone booth from the door. Is that clear?”

Kessler tried again, about the boy. Could he talk to Paulie?

“Remember, the address is 1360 East 63rd Street. You will receive further instructions at that time.” Their receiver clicked down.

“Wait! Wait-”

Judge Wagner seized the phone. “Operator! Operator-” But it was too late to trace the call.

“He told me a drugstore, on 63rd Street…” Then, despairingly, Kessler clapped his hand to his head. He couldn’t remember the address of the store.

From the phone next to Judd’s, Artie had meanwhile sent off the cab. Judd felt anew the pleasure in the whole thing, a kind of duet with Artie, the smoothness of their working together.

The woman had selected her rouge, and now she turned to them with a naughty-boy gleam. “Well, whose girl is it?” she asked coyly.

“Oh, it’s a double date,” Artie said, giving her his smile.

Judd looked at his watch. “Come on, we can just make it.” This time he took the wheel. Artie’s wild driving might get them into a smash-up. Especially if he had an idea he was racing a train.

I WAS WAITING on the sidewalk when the Pierce-Arrow drove up to the mortuary. “He’s in here, Mr. Kessler.” Jonas Kessler, taking off his derby hat, followed me into the rear of the shop.

“That’s Paulie!” he cried instantly. And from him came a harsh, gasping wail of grief piercing through, as from archaic times.

Two policemen had come. They stood with Swaboda, their faces fixed in respect. “Oh, this is dastardly,” the uncle kept saying, and I noted that people in a crisis seem to use words they have read somewhere. “Dastardly! They murdered him, and now they are trying to collect a ransom. My brother is waiting with the money in his hand for them to call.” He approached the body, raised his arm to touch it, but let his arm drop. “I have to telephone. No time must be lost.”

We led him to the desk, but for a moment he did not have the heart to pick up the phone. “I have children of my own. Paulie was like one of my own,” he remarked. I offered to make the call. “No time must be lost,” Jonas Kessler repeated, and still sat motionless. “They said the boy is safe. How can they… Oh, this is dastardly.”

At the Kessler house, the doorbell rang. A Yellow Cab driver stood there. Kessler picked up the cigar box full of money and started toward the door. But the address, the address! A drugstore on 63rd Street?

“Did they tell you the address?” he asked the driver.

The cabby was bewildered. “Didn’t you call, mister?”

“The address to go to, on 63rd Street -?”

And at that moment, the telephone rang again. Kessler hurried back into the house. Perhaps it was the kidnapper calling once more, a miracle from God.

Judge Wagner handed him the phone. “It’s your brother.”

“Charles, this is Jonas. I have to tell you. Charles, they were right. It is Paulie.”

Kessler’s face remained rigid. Automatically, tonelessly, he asked if his boy had suffered.

It always seemed to me a telling part of this tragedy that the victims were somehow external to it. The boy himself, since we came to know him only in death, never existed for us. The father we saw a good deal of, as he gave himself entirely to the case, and yet he was an utterly enclosed man. The mother we only glimpsed, once or twice. We never learned much about her, except that she was some fifteen years younger than her husband and that she suffered a nervous collapse.

In a sense, this impersonality of the victims seemed fitting; in the world as I was to come to know it, the victims mattered very little. The Kessler murder was the first to show us how the victim can be chosen at random.

Judd made it to 63rd and Stony Island with seven minutes to spare, before the train arrived. He drove a block farther, to a Walgreen’s; he had Walgreen phone slugs ready in his pocket. Everything was working beautifully. Artie clapped him on the back as they entered the store.

Judd called the number they had noted – the booth in Hartmann’s Drugstore – where Kessler should by then be waiting. Artie was jittery, watching out of the window, watching the I.C. tracks.

The phone was ringing. There had been ample time for the cab to bring Kessler there. Since ordering the cab, Judd himself had driven all the way from Twelfth Street, over twice as far.

Artie opened the booth door. “You sure you got the right number?”

At that moment someone answered the phone. “Hello?”

“Is that the Hartmann Drugstore?”

A Negro voice said, “Yah, who do you want, mister?”

“Will you see if a Mr. Kessler is in the store? He should be waiting for this call.” If Kessler was there, why hadn’t he answered, himself?

“Mr. Who?” the Negro asked.

“Isn’t there a man waiting for a call? A Mr. Kessler?”

“What number do you want?”

Judd kept his voice under control. “Just ask if a Mr. Kessler, a customer-”

“Don’t see any customer in the store right now.”

“Are you sure?”

“Nobody here, mister.” And the receiver clicked.

Artie had gone pale. He rushed out of the store, half ducking as if expecting cops to be waiting outside.

Curiously, Judd found in himself nothing of the despair he had felt when that detail had gone wrong at the Help Keep the City Clean box. Instead, he experienced a new, sharp excitement. Joining Artie outside the store, he said, “Let’s drive past Hartmann’s.”

“Too risky.” Artie flung away a just-lighted cigarette.

“We could phone and check if the Yellow went out.”

Artie’s restless eyes fell on a news stand, on a Globe headline: UNKNOWN BOY FOUND DEAD IN SWAMP.

“The jig is up,” Artie said, with his nervous way of lapsing into detective-story talk. “Come on, let’s get the hell out of here!”

But in Judd the sense of ascendancy grew stronger. Artie was getting jittery, but his was a cool, cool mind. Buying the paper, he stood against the window of a men’s-wear shop, reading the story. “So they found the body,” he said. “They still have no clue to its identity.”

“Christ, don’t be a fish! Since the paper got this story, that’s hours ago. The cops can put that much together – a body, and a kidnapped kid. They’re not that dumb.”

“Don’t get scared so easy,” Judd said. “One must go to the end of an experience.”

Artie stared down into his eyes. Judd felt strong, the stronger. “You stupe, this is the end!” Artie hissed. “We’d better get rid of this goddam car and split up!”

Folding the newspaper, Judd started back into Walgreen’s. Artie caught his sleeve. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to try another call. We’ve still got a minute before the train. Maybe the cab was late, or anything. Why should we give up just because he might be stuck in the traffic?”

“You and your damned bird-chasing!” Artie burst out. “You knew just the right place. Birdland! Nobody ever went near there. Nobody would even find the body!”

That was unfair. And something in Judd still kept denying the finding. Something in him insisted it was still the right place, the only place, the place where the body had to be put. And there could be no identification! Had they not poured the acid, to obliterate identity? But beyond that, deeper, was some kind of knowledge, some kind of insistence that the body would be impossible to identify because… because who was it? Deep in himself something was saying nobody could ever know.

It was a confusing, unclear thought. Judd didn’t like it, because it was unclear. He wrenched free of Artie to go and telephone.

“Jesus, not from here. They might have traced the last call!”

They hurried to the next corner, a candy store.

As Artie stood watching the street, fearful every moment of sirens, of cops closing the block off, he saw a train pulling in on the I.C. viaduct. That was surely their train. Even if Judd connected with Charles Kessler now, it would be too late for the man to run and catch the train. The train would pull out, and no longer would there be the moment when the package would come sailing to them through the air.

There arose in Artie then a frantic sense of deprival, a denial. No! No! It can’t have gone wrong; I want it, I want it to be! It was Judd who had screwed it up, Judd, Judd! There came an impulse to scream, to rage, to stamp his feet in a tantrum. And then he swallowed his anger; he had to be keen, cunning, the master.

In other things before, without Judd, nothing had ever gone wrong, nobody had ever found out. And Artie was engulfed by a wave of negation, a commanding need to wipe out all that had gone wrong, to wipe out Judd. As though he could will the dissolution of Judd, will him not to exist, by a pointing finger. You’re dead! You’re gone! That’s what you get for lousing everything up! And Artie turned, half anticipating that Judd would have vanished out of existence by his punishing wish. But through the glass of the phone-booth door, he could see the back of his partner’s sleek, small head, dark, tilted.

As Judd phoned, a different voice answered. “ Jackson 2502.”

Judd felt triumphant. “Mr. Kessler?” he asked.

“Who? This is Hartmann’s Pharmacy.”

He got the druggist to call out, “Anybody named Kessler been asking for a message?” But: “No, nobody of that name.”

“Thank you,” Judd said. Then it was clear. Kessler had not taken the cab. In the last half-hour, the body must have been identified.

The way Artie looked at him as he emerged was murderous. “Granted that we lost out on the ransom part of it,” Judd said, still feeling his mind working concisely, clearly, in the crisis – “the fact that they may have identified the body still does not mean they can identify us.”

Artie cursed and turned to the I.C. tracks. Judd, too, looked at the train, still standing there, as though waiting for Kessler to get aboard. Then the train pulled away. They turned back to their rented car. “Let’s just ditch it,” Artie said.

That would be the worst thing to do, Judd pointed out. The rental man would be bound to start a hunt, and by some freak, even though they had used fake names, a trail might be found leading to them. No, they had best return it at once and check out.

Now that the dead boy was known to be a millionaire’s son police cars swarmed the street in front of Swaboda’s, and cab doors slammed as reporters arrived. Some looked at me with the hostility and respect owed a man for a clean beat; others disregarded me – I was just a kid who had broken this big story by some fluke. And now that the real newspapermen were here, I began to feel inadequate.

There was Mike Prager from the Hearst afternoon paper, our direct rival. He was the inside-contact type, who would immediately take aside the most important official present and indulge in whispers. And then the Tribune’s star crime reporter arrived, a middle-aged man, or so he appeared to me then, though I suppose he was only in his thirties. Richard Lyman, like all Tribune men, seemed to take charge, not so much asking questions as demanding explanations. For a few details he had to come to me, and I gave him what I had, the spelling of the names of the men who found the body, things like that.

It was then, as the plain-clothes men and reporters and police piled into the back room, that the pervert talk was heard. It seemed to arise of itself, as the natural, obvious explanation, and indeed I pretended that I too had thought of it at first glance. The men would look at the corpse saying, “Some goddam sonofabitch pervert,” and look again, as though a mark were there, for those who knew.

I felt it was shamefully naïve of me not to know. And yet I wonder now how much the others really knew? All were ready to use the horror-word as a stamp to explain everything, and in the rage and disgust and fear that followed and pervaded the city for months to come, and indeed attached itself permanently to the Steiner-Straus case, there was a blanketing of homosexuality with every form of depravity, and despite all the “expertizing” that was to come into the case, there was little attempt to learn from it, to understand.

For myself the subject was vaguely covered by the word degenerate, which we used often enough in the paper. I had even been sent out one Saturday to interview a woman on the west side whose little four-year-old girl had been attacked. For such matters, the word degenerate was used, and that explained everything. Chicago still reverberated with the horrors of the Fitzgerald case – the sex fiend who had been dragged half conscious to the gallows for attacking and killing a little girl.

But with a boy, I was in my own mind perplexed. For in that time, among those of us who carried around the purple-morocco-bound volumes of Oscar Wilde, there was more knowingness than knowing. Love between men or love of boys scarcely seemed to suggest a physical act. I associated such love rather with purity, love of beauty, and high-mindedness. Lines from Keats, fantasies of an elderly philosopher, a Socrates, walking with his hand on the shoulder of a stripling youth, images of an elegant Oscar Wilde exchanging epigrams with an elegant young lord, seemed to make such love simply an avoidance of the clumsy, sometimes disgusting physical part of the act that took place with women.

For at eighteen, and already a newspaper reporter in Chicago, the wicked city, I was innocent. At the frat house, I had taken part in the smut sessions, and in the gym I had taken part in the horseplay, and I could use the sex swear words as freely as the rest-so freely precisely because the words had for me no meaning in experience.

Perhaps half, perhaps more, of my classmates, I think, were as innocent as I. At the frat there were those who bragged about their prowess at the cat houses, and those who loudly acclaimed that every girl they took out “went the whole way”. There were those who solemnly warned you against catching a disease, and those, like Artie Straus, who bragged about the “dose” caught at the earliest opportunity.

The fear of disease, and an idealistic notion of “being fair” to the girl you would one day marry, perhaps a kind of magical sense that by keeping yourself pure you would insure her purity, had kept many of us innocent. And we did not even have, then, the common words that today denote the homosexual; pansy and fairy and nance were unknown because the whole subject was somehow legendary.

So I stood in the circle of police and reporters, and we stared at the boy’s body as if it could reveal unspeakable last events and thereby show us the assailant. But there were to be seen only the few scratches that might have come from the concrete culvert, and the two small marks on the head. The face, around the mouth, had a yellowish discoloration; we did not yet know this was the only result of an attempt at obliteration with acid, and we speculated that this might have come from some chemical in the water where the body had lain all night.

But if it were a deed of perversion, what did the kidnapping and the ransom have to do with it? And we speculated even upon the mystery of the actual cause of death, for the blows were not enough to have killed the boy, and he did not seem to have drowned.

Then the coroner’s physician arrived, a paunchy man with dark eye pouches that gave him a constant look of irritation. In a shrill, authoritative voice, he cried, “One side, one side!” Even while Dr. Kruger was taking off his coat, Mike Prager’s huge, sequestering hulk was around him, Mike was enveloping him in whispers, and all the others were demanding, “Was it a pervert, Doc?”

In vest and shirt sleeves, the physician leaned over the body. Death had taken place some time in the evening, he said. It didn’t appear to be from drowning. Probably suffocation. Look at the throat muscles, swollen.

“Was he mistreated?” the Tribune man insisted.

The coroner’s physician turned over the body. A cop kept saying, “Imagine the kind of sonofabitch fiend.”

“It certainly looks like it to me,” the physician said.

A growl, almost of satisfaction, went through the room. Richard Lyman asked if it could be positively stated that there had been an act of degeneracy, and Dr. Kruger shrugged – hell, they could see as well as he, but as for proof, it would take an autopsy, and then maybe nothing would show up. The body had been in the water all night; anything would have been washed out.

I looked, with the others, feeling as though everything were being dirtied – the dead boy too – feeling I was truly in the midst of it now, the real bottom muck of the city, of humanity.

The Tribune man pre-empted the phone, and we all hurried out to look for nearby booths. I had only the words of Dr. Kruger to phone in, but seeing Jonas Kessler leaving, I walked quickly after him, asking if I could ride along. He gave a little nod, as if to acknowledge my feat in identifying the boy. A few of the reporters stared after me as I got into the car, and again there came the little sense of triumph.

The uncle said, “We have to tell them he didn’t suffer, you understand? Death was instantaneous. The papers too ought to say it.”

I promised my paper would handle it that way.

For a few blocks we were silent, though I felt burningly that I was losing an opportunity.

Again it was Kessler who spoke. Why, why should it come on Paulie?

I tried, “Did his father have any enemies?”

He shook his head. Who would do a thing like that, even to his worst enemy? And his brother was a respectable businessman, a real-estate man, practically retired. He had no enemies.

He shook his head. His brother was a respectable real-estate man.

The car swept across the Midway, past the university. “Paulie was going to go there in a few years,” the uncle said.

“I go there; I’m just graduating,” I remarked, and I thought of the sensation I would make about this, with my campus crowd, with Ruth. We crossed Hyde Park Boulevard. The area of red-brick apartment houses ended, and there began the enclave of tree-shaded streets, with mansions set far back on their lawns.

It was odd that I had never penetrated this section, though it was only fifteen minutes’ walk from the university and a few minutes from where Ruth lived. Indeed, this was where some of my rich fraternity brothers came from. And it struck me, only just then, that none of them had asked me to visit their homes here. I recalled that he Straus mansion was supposed to be a palace.

It might even be that this was a hostility that entered into the case and caused me to become so persistent, so obsessed, when suspicion began to fall on Artie Straus and Judd Steiner. It may be that I was driven by envy, and the sense of not really belonging that I had experienced at the frat. For soon after being pledged and finding myself among the rich boys from Hyde Park and the North Shore, I had concluded that I had been let in simply because I was a sort of freak all-A prodigy, expected to bring glory to Alpha Beta.

The last year, I had moved out of the house on the pretext that my newspaper work demanded another kind of setup, my own phone and all. But whenever I appeared they would slap me on the back and demand how the hot-shot reporter was doing, so they could say an Alpha Bete was a big newspaperman.

The Pierce-Arrow halted in front of an imitation English brick-and-beam mansion. An officer stood inside the portico. He deferred to the Pierce-Arrow, but gave me a questioning look. I said, “Globe,” and the uncle said, “He’s all right, officer. He’s with me.”

We entered a large room, with heavy dark furniture. It was filled with men, more reporters and photographers, and important-looking plain-clothes men. Tom Daly was in the midst of them all, his note-taking yellow copy paper in his hand, and the sight of him was both a disappointment and a relief to me.

At the same time I saw the father of the boy, getting up from his high-backed, carved chair and coming toward his brother. The two men walked to an alcove. The father’s face was like the brother’s, contained, clueless; it seemed to me to grow a shade darker as they stood there talking.

Tom came over to me, putting his hand on my shoulder. “We got a clean beat!” He looked at his watch. “Know any more?”

“His brother says he’s got no enemies.” We looked at the two men. In a peculiar way they were now our adversaries; if they wanted to keep anything of their lives private and secret, we would nevertheless have to pry and prod and find out. Impeding me was still my sense of awe before a bereaved person, and my sense of awe before a millionaire.

But even the bereaved may be suspect. Tom said, “Sure, nobody has enemies.” And we wondered what secrets of the past they might be combing. If a man is struck by misfortune, surely he must have committed some sin. And thus the victim immediately becomes the accused.

“Show me a pawnbroker that hasn’t got an enemy in the world,” Tom I went on.

I was startled. “His brother said he was a real-estate man.”

“Years ago he ran a fancy hock shop,” Tom informed me.

I looked around the room. Here was this imposing house, with its beamed ceilings, in this solid millionaires’ neighbourhood; thirty years of respectable business dealings had accumulated to cover the early days, but the sting of the pawnbroker stigma was still strong enough for the brother to have kept silent, to me, about the shop.

Vengeance, money, degeneracy, the rubber-stamp motives took their turns in the forefronts of our minds. Tom came back to the last; it was first again. “You saw the kid. Could you tell -?”

I said, “It can’t be proved. But Doc Kruger thought so.”

“Sonofabitch pervert,” Tom muttered like the others, and he turned to a theory that it was one of the teachers. Indeed, the entire room seemed to hum with it now. Those private-school teachers were all a bunch of perverts. Besides, look at that ransom letter. It was clearly the letter of an educated man.

We went over to the table, where one of the photographers was copying the letter, carefully laid out on the desk. The postmark was the Hyde Park station’s, only a few blocks away. The address, printed in ink. Mailed last night. That meant after the boy was dead.

And there was the use of the word we. Then more than one criminal was involved.

The letter was typed, but not professionally. Here and there, a mistake had been typed over. About the way I typed, I reflected. That, too, fitted the teacher idea. Suppose it were some teacher who had been misusing the boy. And who needed money. Those teachers were paid very little, anyway. Suppose he got the idea of satisfying the two desires at one stroke – sequestering the boy, and at the same time collecting ransom. Since the boy could later expose him, he had to kill the boy. Indeed, the crime might even have started with Paulie Kessler’s threatening to tell on some teacher who had been making advances.

Tom drew me aside. “Sid, why don’t you take a look around the school?”

Just as I was leaving, there was a stir at the door as the chief of detectives appeared. Captain Nolan strode in, a huge man who looked as if he had been picked for size. Captain Nolan expressed his sympathy to Kessler briefly, and then, with an air of getting down to business, went over all the facts we had already shredded to bits.

Charles Kessler had mastered himself so well that one could not have recognized, offhand, that he was the father of the slain boy. All his energy was available; grief had not drained him. Throughout the case this impressed me. It was not that I felt he lacked emotion; it was simply that his remarkable control seemed in some obscure way linked to a pattern that lay beneath the entire crime, a pattern of feelings pushed down so that nothing could show.

“I am racking my brain,” the father kept saying to Nolan. “It had to be someone who knew Paulie, or Paulie would never have gone with him. Paulie was not a boy to go with a stranger. If they tried to take him in a car he would have put up a struggle. It had to be someone he knew.”

Tom motioned me to be on my way.

I walked down the block where Paulie had walked perhaps at this same hour just the day before. The body I had seen on that zinc table had walked under these trees, past these hedges, past these fine brick walls, and somewhere along here he had been snatched from life.

I pictured the kid, idling home from his after-school ball game. A man approaches – but it must have been in a car. A boy of thirteen doesn’t respond to an offer of candy. An ice-cream soda, maybe – an offer from a teacher, driving home?

And once in the car? Perhaps a suggestion to go to the teacher’s house? No, that would risk being seen. Just to take a ride, then. Out through the park, and toward Hegewisch.

Somewhere, the perversion had taken place. I tried to imagine in my own body the impulse to do such a thing. I suppose this is a test that everyone makes. I tried to call up in myself such a sick lust, and to watch my own reaction. Could I comprehend such a perverted impulse? Only kid things in back alleys came to me. In today’s popularized Freudian knowledge, I suppose I should say that I stopped myself from homosexual imaginings because of some fear. But at that time, walking on Ellis Avenue, I felt, rather sanctimoniously, that it wasn’t in me.

As I turned the corner, there was the Mark Twain Academy, a square brick structure annexed to a former mansion. And there was the baseball lot where Paulie had played. The lot was deserted.

Indeed, the street was deserted. This was ordinarily an hour when children loitered outdoors, but though the murder itself was not yet known, the disappearance of Paulie had by now filled the exclusive neighbourhood with rumours. The moment school was over, mothers had appeared in cabs, or chauffeurs had appeared, or governesses had come to walk the children home.

And then the quiet was broken by a newsboy shouting, “Extra!” He came at a half run, a large boy, and he kept on yelling while I was buying my paper. “Extra, all about the kidnapping, murder!” I gulped the banner, MILLIONAIRE BOY SLAIN. And in large type the lead read, “Identified by a Daily Globe reporter today as Paulie Kessler, son of-”

I wanted to tell that newsboy it was I – I, the Daily Globe reporter. But he rushed on.

I read Tom Daly’s story, Tom’s and mine, then folded the paper and approached the school. If the fiend who signed himself “Harold Williams” was indeed one of the teachers, he would have been careful to attend to all his normal duties today, slipping out only to make the ransom phone call mentioned in Tom’s story.

There was still a small group of teachers in the entrance hallway, discussing what was to them, until that moment, only the mysterious disappearance of Paulie Kessler. They didn’t look like the teachers I had had as a kid. More of them were men than in a public school, and these wore tweedy jackets and pullovers.

“Reporters, already?” said one of the young lady teachers, with an air half annoyed, half intrigued, as I introduced myself. “Really, we don’t know a thing. We’ve no idea where he can be.”

“He’s been found. He’s dead,” I said dramatically, and handed them the paper. I was watching their reactions, looking them over with the question in my mind, Is this one a pervert? A murderer?

When the exclamations had died down, I asked if any of them had had Paulie in class, and two men spoke up. The tall, athletic young man in the belted sports jacket had taught Paulie American history. He had that inordinately clean, scrubbed look that certain people achieve; I half imagined a British accent when he spoke. Could this be a degenerate?

Today, an intonation, a movement of a hand in a night club is enough to bring a laughing roar of recognition. But I looked for I don’t know what – some indication of nervousness, I suppose.

No teacher had been absent from school that day, they told me, the first young woman taking the lead in answering, a slight asperity in her tone. As for Paulie, the usual things were said, several joining in. He was alert, a likable boy. Not at the head of his class, but a real boy, intelligent and quite popular.

Paulie’s other teacher now dropped a remark of the kind newspapermen seize upon for feature touches. Why, only day before yesterday, Paulie had won a debate on capital punishment. Paulie had been on the negative side.

This teacher’s name was Steger. He had soft, red cheeks, and he spoke in a somewhat breathless voice. He went on talking, it seemed to me almost defensively, mentioning how he had noticed the kids after school yesterday at their ball game as he was going home.

Indeed, several of the teachers seemed to be dropping alibis into their remarks, telling, as though accidentally, what they had done last night, whom they had been with. And they seemed to be breaking away from one another, under the uneasy, spreading suspicion. How could anyone know what was inside the mind and heart of his nearest colleague? Beneath all human communication there was a dark ocean, lava-like – the real human action lay there, the force we could not measure, nor check, nor even detect from the surface.

Steger mentioned a book he had been reading last night, talking so insistently that it seemed, when the police car pulled up, that he had by some compulsion drawn the whole thing upon himself. We all saw the car halting directly in front of the door. A silence fell. Two of the plain-clothes men I had seen at the Kessler house now entered the school.

The sprightly young woman spoke to them. “But, officers, police were here this morning. We’ve all been questioned, we’ve told all we know.”

One of the detectives looked at his notebook. “There a teacher named Wakeman here?” Wakeman had gone home. The detective went on, “Anybody named Steger?”

“That’s me,” said Steger softly. “Paulie was in my English class. But I’ve already-”

“We’ve got instructions to take you along, Mr. Steger.”

There was a gasp again, in the group, and a half gesture from one or two of them, as to intervene, to explain. And then the falling back, the not looking at Steger.

What Steger would have to go through, in the coming weeks, I suppose can be called an inevitable by-product.

The teachers were suddenly quiet. I started back to the Kessler house.

Leaving Artie waiting in the Stutz, which they had picked up on their way downtown, Judd drove the rented Willys into the garage of the Driv-Ur-Self. He got out of the car and stood leaning against its door while the manager walked around the vehicle, glancing at the fenders.

Judd looked away from the car; he would not let himself think of the spots on the rear floorboard. The manager would never inspect the rear. If he did, Judd was prepared to make the remark about the spilled wine, to hint about laying a broad back there – boys will be boys, what’s a car for, ha ha.

But the nausea invaded him again. It pulsed up in him like a pulsing flow of blood. Blood on the ground, blood when his fingers touched his forehead, and he was shrieking… wrestling on the lawn with his big brother Max, his forehead cut on a stone, and Max at first concerned and then getting sore… “Stop crying. Stop bawling. That’s enough! Boys don’t cry. What the hell are you, a girl? A girl?” And his own shrieking – “I’m not a girl! I’m not a girl” – while Max taunted, Max laughed… Max laughing at him, Max making fun of him, his big brother Max, he couldn’t stand it; it was worse than the pain, the bleeding. Then he had known he had to hide everything inside himself, hide from Max. Keep Max outside himself, keep everybody outside himself – they could hurt too much. A man didn’t let anything hurt. And he was no girl. He was no girl to cry at blood. And his mother had come out of the house and folded his face in her skirts. A girl. A girl.

Judd shut it off. To fill the mental void came the image from yesterday. He had not counted on the blood. In all the months of planning, he had seen the thing as perfectly clean. They had even talked of it as neat, clean, talked of using the ether. And he had taken along the ether, yesterday morning, as if for his bird collecting, taken two whole cans, enough for a thousand birds. And put the two small cans into the side pocket of this car… Judd’s mind leaped back to the immediate scene – the cans! Had he forgotten them there, since they hadn’t been used? No, he knew for certain he had taken them out and placed them back on the shelf in his room. Late last night. Yet it was all Judd could do now to restrain himself from opening the door and checking.

At least, he noted, this sudden scare had ended his nausea… And why hadn’t they used the ether? To put the boy cleanly to sleep, and in his sleep to do as planned – in his deep sleep to slip the rope around his throat, Artie and he each holding an end of it – to pull, with equal force, equal participation, forever linked in that way, he and Artie. Instead, it had all happened so quickly once the kid was in the car. It had happened while Judd had still been feeling that perhaps the whole final deed would not take place at all… Could Artie have sensed this last hesitation in him, and jumped the deed the way you ought sometimes to jump a girl before she can gather her resistance?

The rental man was putting his head inside to check the mileage. So outside nothing showed. They had washed it well enough. But it was a damn stupid thing. That damn stupid Emil had to come along offering the Gold Dust. It was a damn stupid thing to have taken the car into the driveway to wash. For that, Judd blamed himself. Last night’s washing should have been enough without the second going-over in the morning. Modern version of Lady Macbeth… out, out, damned spot!

What was the use of taking all the trouble to establish a fake identity, with hotel registrations and all that stuff, so as to rent a car and not use your own car, and then the next thing you do is let some dumb Swede chauffeur see you with it and tie you up with the strange car?

The only safety was, the question must never arise. For right now this car was being returned to anonymity; tomorrow it would be out in someone else’s hands.

“Fifty-three miles, Mr. Singer,” the rental man said. “Want to check it?”

Judd smiled, feeling refreshed. How natural the name sounded! This part-the carefully established false identity, the car – it was all his idea and it had worked perfectly. Artie would have to give him credit for that much. “What about the gas I bought?” Judd said. “I filled up the tank.” And he wished Artie had come in with him to savour this moment, to observe his complete self-possession. It was all there, the evidence of their deed was registered in the atoms of the vehicle, this inanimate object had experienced what they had experienced – the man had it standing before him as Judd stood; yet he could tell nothing, from either.

“Did you get a slip for the gas?”

“No, I didn’t bother, but you can see it’s practically full.” He had filled it at home from the pump in the driveway just before they had started out to find the victim; at least Emil hadn’t walked in on that.

With an air of creating good will in a customer, the man agreed to allow for a couple of gallons. “Call on us again,” he said, his upper lip folding back over his toothbrush moustache in a smile.

“I will,” said Judd, wishing Artie could hear that one.

“What took you so long?” Artie demanded before Judd could climb into the roadster.

“I made him give me an allowance for the gas.”

Instead of laughing, Artie snapped, “The longer you gab the better he knows you, you sucker.” Judd was getting in from the driver’s side, making Artie push over. And in that instant, in Artie’s anger, Judd suddenly felt the failure of the entire venture. It came over him blackly, fully – a grief, an anguish that nearly brought tears.

It was all closed now. They had turned in the car. The whole thing was a failure. The killing itself had been wasted. Even if the killing had been a necessary waste, an experiment, there remained the death of the thing itself. The whole thing had represented a plan, an entity, perhaps a poetic unity, a flower of evil, a union between Artie and himself. And it was dead.

What had killed it? What was it really that had gone wrong?

Judd pulled away from the curb, but Artie, in the midst of lighting a cigarette, made a motion for him to stop, and jumped out to a news-stand – a new headline had caught his eye: MILLIONAIRE BOY SLAIN. Artie stood there on the pavement, reading. Judd honked. Still reading, Artie got into the car.

“How did they find out who he was?” Judd asked.

“Some stupid sonofabitch reporter went out there-”

Judd parked part way up the block and leaned over to read with Artie. His eye skipped down the column, and together they saw the line about the glasses: “Desperately awaiting word from the kidnappers, the Kessler family at first refused to believe that the boy found dead in the culvert was Paulie, because the police reported that the dead boy wore glasses. Then it was learned that the glasses had been picked up in the weeds, and placed on the boy by his finders. The glasses, police now believe, were dropped by the murderer, and should prove a valuable clue.

Artie turned his face full on Judd. His cheek was twitching, high up under his eye. “You bastard sonofabitch, you had to go and spoil it.”

Automatically, Judd’s hand had gone to his breast pocket, though he already knew that it was so: this was the flaw. And a curious thrill went all through him, the first complete thrill of the entire experience. It was not the dark thrill he had imagined he might feel at the height of the deed itself, as at a black mass, nor was it the elative thrill he might have felt had the package been tossed from the train. It was a thrill as from some other being within himself; it was a gloating.

He told himself that it was a thrill to the challenge that now existed, the challenge to outwit pursuers, even when they possessed a clue.

But why had the glasses been in his coat pocket at all? He speculated on causation. He had scarcely used the glasses during the past few months, not even for studying. It must have been weeks ago that he had stuck them in this coat pocket, and, hardly wearing this suit, he had forgotten they were there. Then what had made him choose this suit yesterday?

And when could the spectacles have dropped out? Had it happened when he was bending over, in the back of the car, the glasses dropping into the lap robe half wrapped around the boy? Judd saw again the boy entering the car, the quick blows, the suffocation – that part of it already done, so hastily, so irretrievably done before you could decide finally whether or not to do it. Then driving through the Midway, past the university, through the park, south to the edge of the city, then stopping at a hot-dog stand, leaving him in back there while they ate the franks, then cruising, then parking on the little side road back of a cemetery, waiting for darkness. And both climbing into the back seat, and Artie’s high-pitched, “Let’s see.”

Like kids in a dark closet, to do the most awful imaginable forbidden things. Huddling down. Had the glasses fallen out then, on to the robe? Artie beginning to undress the body, pulling off the knee pants. And Judd in himself wondering at himself, now that the opportunity had come to test the farthest human experience, dispassionately, as in a laboratory. Remembering the untried experiences from the list in Aretino’s Dialogues. Artie’s saying, almost petulantly, “He’s dead all right. Getting stiff.” Then all at once, tumultuously, himself losing interest… Now Judd shut off the dark image. The glasses, only the glasses – were they glinting there, fallen on the robe?

Pulling out of that cemetery lane, dark enough then, and driving down Avenue F… the turn, the ruts onto the wasteland, the spot where he always parked and left the car, going birding. Lucky, lucky no love birds parked there this night; then the two of them removing the long bundle wrapped in the lap robe, lugging it all the way across the weed-grown wasteland… Artie stubbing his toe, stumbling and swearing and letting down his end, the bundle dragging on the ground. Stopping to rest, Artie complaining, “Why the hell so far? Why not an easier place?” But no, this had to be the place – and stooping to pick up the bundle again, was that the moment when the glasses had fallen out? No, they were found too near the culvert. That weird and exhilarated march, the sky rim reddish from the Gary chimneys, the clumsy burdened feeling of endlessness, weighed down awkwardly with the bundle on one side, and under the other arm the boots he was carrying, and the container of hydrochloric in his pocket bumping his hip… Why labour so? Only for something that had to be done, had to be done!

And all the time trying to quiet Artie, to shut up Artie in his high mood making his jokes, waving his flask- “We come not to bury Paulie but to baptize-”

“Shut up! There’s some bastard railway switchman got a shack up the track. He’ll hear you.”

“Invite him! Let’s give him a drink of that old acid! You sure you got the ass-it?”

“I’ve got it, right in my pocket.”

Then coming to the edge of the pond, putting down the long bundle. And there it must have happened… Judd saw himself there, sitting for a moment on the slope of the low railway embankment, bending to take off his shoes and pull on the boots – his brother Max’s fishing boots, taken from Max’s closet. You’re in it with me, Max, you sonofabitch, big man Max. Who’s a sissy now! And before him, the dark flat water, going into the dark hole, the culvert. Then, heated from the long exertion, and knowing he had yet to lift the body and carry it into the water, Judd rose to remove his coat. He placed the coat carefully folded upon the grass, beside his shoes.

The remainder of the scene flashed through his mind now, accelerated, for he still found it distasteful to review. First, Artie unrolling the lap robe. The lower part of the body, bare except for the knee-length stockings, appearing grotesque under the low-held beam of Artie’s flashlight, looking like those manikins you sometimes see half undressed in store windows… No! the glasses would have glinted then, under Artie’s light. No! Now Judd felt sure; he could sense the glasses lying there still folded in the breast pocket of his folded coat.

“Cold stiff,” Artie said. “Help me with his goddam clothes.”

“Rigor mortis,” Judd repeated, kneeling. They both worked to finish the undressing.

Artie joked – the punk was like some broad that goes rigid and won’t let you get her clothes off. He kept up the stream of jokes the way he had in the car, handling the body so casually, the way he had in the back of the Willys. Then the nude body lay there, a pale streak on the lap robe, and Judd knew his part had come. He rose and got the can of hydrochloric. Was it then? Not then; he had not disturbed the folded jacket.

And Artie had moved the body off the robe, to the water’s edge, and Judd stood over it, raising the can of hydrochloric, so well forethought – acid to dissolve all evidence of mortality. Then he was pouring the stream from the can – “I hereby baptize and consecrate nothing to nothing” – and with his high giggle, watching the stream, silvery, upon the face. To obliterate, all, all! A thought, an urge, a dark wing beating far back in his mind, so they never might recognize, never might identify, but it was more than that, it was all, all faces, and no face. It was as though he himself were being obliterated so he could never be caught. And then there was a sure impulse, a thing to do so no one could ever ever know who, what it was. And he turned the stream downward, giggling, giggling – he was a kid again playing in the sand, holding a can of water over a body of sand, the sand dissolving away to nothing – so now the stream upon the penis… dissolve, dissolve and be no more! And Artie laughed with him, and it was right, right! There was a great lifting within him, Judd thought, because now the deed was done, the whole terrible superhuman god-devil deed was done. They had achieved! But it was a feeling that continued, even stronger, more obscure, a lifting feeling within him, as though something utterly wrong had been corrected, put back right.

Then wading in Max’s boots into the water, seizing the body, feeling it cold as the touch of the water. And the whole thing had become easy. Shoving the object into the culvert, the non-being, face and sex soon dissolving, how neatly it fitted, as he had estimated it would, fitting perfectly in the perfect place. And then retreating to get cleanly out of there.

Had he then picked up the coat?

And the precise image of that moment came before Judd. Artie’s form, looming out of the dark, Artie breathlessly offering him his coat and shoes, the coat snatched up in a tangle any old way, the disorderly way Artie handled things, upside down.

That was how it had happened. That had been the moment. Judd could virtually sense the glasses sliding from the upside-down pocket, among the weeds.

“I’m sorry to have to contradict you,” he said now to Artie, “but I believe the slip-up was yours. It was you who picked up my jacket and brought it to me. That’s when the glasses must have dropped out. But I accept my share of the error in failing to notice-”

“Me!” Artie turned on him, raging. “Trying to shove it off on me! You and your buggering sure-shot hiding place! You and your damned eyeglasses-”

“Take it easy,” Judd said. He felt cool, controlled, exhilarated.

If the whole thing had gone off without a slip-up, it would have been perfection of a kind: a deed conceived and planned and carried out, like some intricate construction – a matchstick palace with even the last piece fitting perfectly into place.

But the glasses were an error, an error tearing down Artie and himself from their superhuman state as beings who could achieve an act of perfection. And in some centre of his self, Judd rejoiced that they were united in this error, united in their imperfect action; he rejoiced that Artie had committed his part of the flaw.

Now their action permitted a different kind of triumph, for they must try to retrieve their error and still emerge superior. And in their error they were united even more firmly than by a perfect deed. For had the adventure succeeded, they would have divided the ransom and been done. He would have gone on, in two weeks, to Europe.

Perhaps now he would never go. Even in this dread anticipation of being caught, Judd felt a subterranean satisfaction; he and Artie were entwined in what was still to come.

“By the law of probabilities,” he said to Artie, “there is one chance in a million that they can trace the glasses.”

“To hell with all that,” said Artie.

But something perverse in Judd made him see the spectacles already traced. They had to be traced – he had to be confronted with them – for the next part of the action to occur, the infinite ordeal through which he would redeem his error, prove himself a truly superior being. The ordeal in which, by facing down all accusation, he would save Artie, too.

To Artie he said, “They’re just the most ordinary reading glasses. The chance that their ownership can be identified is infinitesimal. But even if it should be, that still doesn’t prove anything. I could have dropped my glasses any day I was out there birding. I was even out there with my class in the same spot last week. In fact, I can use my bird class as witnesses!” There was a Machiavellian touch that Artie should appreciate.

Judd saw himself standing before some powerful man – a heavy moustache, an authority – but he remained unflustered, controlled, saying, “A mere coincidence,” as he accepted the spectacles back into his hand and placed them back in this same coat pocket. For no matter who they were, the authorities would know they had to accept the word of Judah Steiner, Jr.

In fact, they would conduct their questioning with the utmost deference, and probably apologize to his old man for even calling him in. And the old man would say to him quietly, “You don’t have to answer them if you don’t want to. What kind of nonsense is this?” But Judd would say, “It’s routine. I’m perfectly willing to answer any questions they ask.” And all that time it would be a howl over the old man and his slow-minded righteousness! For he would be fooling the old man as well as all the inquisitors.

“I ought to kill you for making such a boner,” Artie said, hurling the newspaper to the floor.

Judd put the car in gear. Starting homeward, he said, “I agree – if it were entirely my error, I would deserve death.” Indeed, in a superior society, no one capable of such a stupid oversight should have a right to live. Nietzsche would certainly have condemned him, for in the end it was his own fault for having the glasses in his pocket. Thus, the pendulum in him swung to the other extreme, and Judd saw Artie enthroned, with golden wristbands, golden breastplate and greaves, judging him as he knelt abjectly. And the sentence – Artie’s outstretched gold-banded arm, decreeing death. And suppose he went out now with Artie to some dark field and insisted that Artie carry through the sentence – Artie shooting him, his body crumpling – it would be his sacrifice for Artie. They would find his body; he would leave a note acknowledging the glasses as his, the crime as his. That would be part of the sentence, and Artie would be forever safe.

But aloud, Judd proposed a bold idea. To go directly to the police and claim the spectacles. “I read the story in the papers, and realized that on my last birding expedition-”

“You’ll bugger it up,” Artie said. “You’ll bugger it up, sure as Christ.” He whistled at a couple of chicks on Michigan, reaching over to pound the horn, and elbowing Judd to pipe the broads.

The girls went into a building. “Crows, anyway,” Artie said, but his spirits had lifted. “Suppose you go and say they’re your glasses. All right. They give you the third degree. You think you can take the third degree?” he challenged.

“I’d be glad to help you in any way I can, officer,” stated Judd, looking him unflinchingly in the eye.

“Watch where you’re driving, you sucker. All right, Mr. Steiner, where were you last Wednesday?” Artie’s restless glance lit on another chick – this part of Michigan was red light.

“The hell, you want another dose?” Judd remonstrated, then resumed, “Last Wednesday, yes, I recall distinctly, I spent the entire afternoon and evening with Artie Straus, a friend of mine.”

“All right, so then they pick me up and check your story. I ought to kill you first, you crapper.”

They rehearsed once more the story they had agreed upon, should they ever be questioned. Artie became suddenly attentive. “All right, we had lunch at the Windermere. That’s a fact. Willie was there with us.”

They laughed again. Judd felt pleased. They would be using Willie Weiss, and Willie wouldn’t even know how he and Artie together were having a laugh at him. “Then after lunch” – Judd picked it up – “we spent several hours in Lincoln Park, at the lagoon, mostly sitting parked in my car, as I was watching for a species of warbler that arrives in this area late in May-”

“Hey, give them the scientific name,” Artie said.

“Dendroica Aestiva, of the Compsothlypidae family,” said Judd.

Then Artie took over the story. “I went along with Judd Steiner and sat in the car while he did his bird scouting. I thought it would make a good effect on my mother to tell her I spent the afternoon with Judd and his bird science, so she would get the idea I was doing something real studious. But I’m afraid, sir, we had a pint of gin in the car and by suppertime I had too much gin on my breath, so I didn’t think that would impress my mother very well. We stayed out for supper, had supper at the – let’s see-”

“Coconut Grove,” said Judd.

“Then we drove around a while, trying to pick up a couple of girls.”

“You mean, girls you didn’t know?”

“Yes, sir, you know, just a couple of janes.”

“Do you frequently engage in this practice?”

“Well, officer” – winking – “you know how it is-”

“How did you make out?”

“Well, we picked up a couple, around 63rd and State. And we drove back to Jackson Park-”

Judd interrupted. “I thought we were going to say Lincoln Park.”

“The first time, the birds, is Lincoln. The second time, the twats, is Jackson. Over by the lake… Only you see, officer, these girls wouldn’t come across, so about ten o’clock we told them to get out and walk.”

“Can you give us their names, Mr. Straus?”

“Well, mine said her name was Edna, but you know – we didn’t give them our right names, either. She was a blonde, well built-” He made curves with his hands, and just then spotted a girl in a Paige, passing them. “Hey! Follow her!”

“Listen” – Judd chased the Paige – “how about if we change the story? If we say they did come across, then it’s even less likely the girls would ever come forward and identify themselves.”

“All right. Wait a minute. If they came across, then we’d have taken them home. So where do they live?” Judd passed the Paige, but the girl ignored Artie’s waving.

“We could say they told us to let them off at the corner where we picked them up,” Judd suggested. “That sounds genuine.”

“Hey!” Artie eyed him cleverly. “How about giving them the story you were out with a nice girl?”

“You mean, we had a double date with nice girls?”

“No, just you.” After all, no glasses of Artie’s had been found.

Judd felt a quiver of grief, more than anger. A feeling of loneliness, as if Artie had actually deserted him and left him with some jane he didn’t even want. But then he finessed the game on Artie. “I could say I was driving, and you had Myra in the back seat. She’d back it up for you. As you say, she’ll do anything for you.”

“Damn right,” said Artie, still eyeing him in that cunning way.

Desperately, Judd tried to recapture the mood. “How about we both take her out tonight and rape her?”

“You’d be scared to try.”

“Yah? Anything you’ll do I’ll do.”

“Yah?” Judd knew what it was now in Artie’s look. It was the accusation over what had happened yesterday, at the crucial moment – when they had the kid in the car, and the sudden blows and the blood, and Judd had heard himself crying out, “Oh my God, this is terrible!”

“You were scared cold,” Artie said with finality. “That’s why you dropped your goddam glasses.”

In his tone, Judd felt everything possible. Maybe Artie would do it to him. Like things Artie must have done. Maybe Artie coming up behind him, the slug on the skull with the taped chisel, and the quick push off the end of the Jackson Park pier, his body plopping into the dark water, and his own look, upturned to Artie, accepting.

“I’ll stick to the alibi for a week,” Artie said. “After that, it’s each man for himself.”

“If a week goes by, we ought to be safe on the glasses,” said Judd.

He turned on Hyde Park Boulevard. At the Kessler house, police cars lined the curb. Photographers and newspapermen were all over the lawn. Artie was about to hop out. “Stay away from there!” Judd cried.

Artie chuckled. “It’s only natural I’d be interested. I live practically across the street. Why, poor little Paulie used to play on our tennis court all the time. Why, he’s a chum and classmate of my little brother Billy!”

“You’ll spill the beans, the way you gab. Keep off of there!”

“The hell! You going to tell me what to do?” But he remaine in the car.

Silent, Judd pulled up to Artie’s door. But as Artie started into the house, Judd asked, “What’re you doing later?”

“I don’t know. I’ll give you a buzz.”

Judd drove on.

I must have just come back to give Tom the details of the teacher’s arrest when Artie and Judd drove by, for I remember seeing Artie go into his house.

With the rest of the press, Tom was now outside on the Kessler lawn. It was understandable: they couldn’t have all of us camping in the house, and they couldn’t play favourites.

Everything was up a tree, Tom said. Anyway, our last replate was gone; if something happened now, we’d read about it in the morning papers. Was there any place around here a man could get a drink?

I knew a place on 55th Street, where they had spiked beer. As we stood up to the bar, Mike Prager and a couple of other afternoon-paper reporters found the place. We began to trade theories of the crime. I felt I was a full member of the profession. I was drinking with the boys.

When Judd dropped him at the house, Artie ran in with the Globe extra, to make a sensation. His mother wasn’t there. She would be at some meeting, doing good. By the time she got home, she’d know. He felt cheated. Something always cheated him, with her. Mumsie, you know what happened to the Kessler kid! She’d have gone white. It could have been Billy! Why, Mumsie, Billy was right there playing with Paulie on the baseball lot. I saw them myself! No. Maybe better not go that far.

Artie leaped up the stairs. Billy’s room was empty. There, for an instant, Artie’s mind stood blank, with some weird confusion. As if the room were of course empty because it had been Billy they – Then he told himself, Hell, the kid was over in that crowd at the Kesslers’, soaking up all the excitement; he’d give a full report before his big brother could get in a word – a bright, cute Billy-boy report.

They should really have snatched him, the brat, as they had once planned. Only Judd had taken it as a joke. Artie saw it now as if they had done it, grabbing Billy, feeling the kid in his arms in a squirming struggle, like sometimes when they playfully wrestled. And if it had been Billy, Artie wondered, would he himself have wanted to weep?

Then his imagining switched suddenly to a jail. He was behind bars, and people passed, grimacing at the monster killer; and he grimaced and made faces back at them, stuck out his tongue, made funny faces, pranced like an ape. Some fun!

On Billy-boy’s bed was an open box of chocolates. Artie grabbed a handful and ate them. The images of the jail went on. They were giving him the third degree.

He heard a gasp. The maid was in the doorway. “Oh, it’s you, Artie! I didn’t hear anyone come in.” She looked scared stiff. “We’ve all got the heebie-jeebies today. You know what happened to poor little-”

“Yah, it’s in the papers. Where’s Billy?” he asked with concern.

“Oh, he’s safe! Your mother went with the car the minute we heard something was wrong, and took him out of school. She wouldn’t leave him there another minute. Your mother took Billy along with her to her meeting. It’s in the papers, is it?”

“Sure.” He showed her the headline.

“It must have been a fiend that did it,” Clarice said. “He could be someone in that school!”

“That’s right, and they come back to the scene of their crime,” Artie said. She was excited, moistening her lips with her tongue. She was always asking for it, brushing against him. But once he made the push he’d have to go through with it, and maybe the disgust over her would hold him down so he couldn’t do anything. Then he’d always have that funny feeling, having her around, knowing. The hell with her.

“I hope they catch him,” she said. “No one will feel safe until they catch him. That poor little Paulie, I hope he didn’t suffer.”

The delivery bell rang, and she had to go. Artie picked up Billy’s bow and arrow, thrown on the floor. No Miss Nuisance to make Billikins pick up things. Mumsie herself took care of her precious little boy.

The image returned. He was in the jail. They had him. Two huge dicks with rubber truncheons. He bent over, and they delivered the blows. He took all the blows, on his shoulders, on his ass. But he kept silent. They could never prove anything on him. He was the master criminal and they knew they had him, but they could never prove it on him! What a guy! At last they had to let him go. They followed him, the stupes, as though he would lead them to his gang. He gave them the slip. He got to his headquarters, in the basement hideout, and now he would take care of that rat, Judd. A couple of his strong-arm men brought in Judd and hurled him on the floor. Leaving his goddam glasses!

With Judd lying prostrate at his feet, in the hidden cellar headquarters, Artie arose to give judgment. He stretched out his arm. The surge of power was in him. He pointed his finger downward at the quivering traitor. It is my will that you cease to exist. And the power passed like unseen lightning through the form of Judd, and life was gone from him.

Or else, take him with the pistol in his back to the pier, maybe late tonight. You see, Judd, this makes everything perfect. You have to agree, this is the perfect solution and therefore I am obliged to carry it out. That would be slick, using Judd’s own crappo philosophy on him. Judd would agree – they had found his glasses, they would find his body floating in the lake, a suicide. Q.E.D.

Suddenly Artie felt the fear. The fear, the heebie-jeebies, the unbearable shrieking thing coming up in him – he’d snap! Someone – to be with someone, to keep him from – Not Judd. He tried to call Willie Weiss, but Willie wasn’t home. Piling out of the house, Artie strode across the street, passed right against the Kessler place. The lawn was clear; all the reporters were gone. But police cars were still there.

Artie forced himself away, circled back to his own house. His brother Lewis’s Franklin was in the driveway. Go screw yourself, Lewis! Behind the wheel, Artie felt somewhat easier. He swung the car down Hyde Park Boulevard. Not to Myra ’s house – screw Myra… string bean with her long stringy fingers, she gave you the jitters. Halfway across the Ingleside intersection, he swung the car violently into a left turn, barely missing a flivver and causing a couple of old ladies who were crossing the street to squawk and scramble exactly like hens. Artie laughed out loud, feeling better as he braked in front of Ruth’s house.

She was exactly the one, with her round face, milky and smooth. Have Ruthie sitting here beside him as he coasted out by the lake. Tell her a big story. She swallowed everything. Like the bootlegger act. The time he shot a hole in a shirt and wore it, showing her the hole, telling how he went bootlegging for the kick of it, and had to shoot it out with some hijackers. As if to prove she never believed the story, she would always ask how his bootlegging was getting along. But she was one of those who swallowed it. He’d tell her now that it was he who had kidnapped the Kessler kid! “Oh, yes, uh-huh,” she would say, with her serious eyes fixed on his, while keeping a you-can’t-fool-me-again note in her voice.

Looking in, through the window of her father’s drugstore, Artie could see that Ruth wasn’t downstairs. Their flat was on the second floor. He sounded the horn. Three, four times. Then Ruth appeared. Artie blew again.

She pulled up the window. “Artie, is that nice?” she said, not too reproachfully. “Are you too lazy to get out and ring the bell?”

“Hey, come on down,” he said. “I’ve got something to tell you.”

“Well, you may come up if you wish.”

“Come on down.”

Ruth closed the window, and a moment later came out of the hallway.

She looked good enough to eat. Her round, soft face had a glow, and her reddish hair glowed, drawn back from her forehead under a green velvet band, and fluffed out behind.

“Hey, come on for a ride,” Artie said.

“Artie, you’re cuckoo. I can’t go now.”

“Sure. Come on.” He gave her the boyish grin. “I feel lonesome.”

“What’s happened to all your girls?”

“Oh, I got sick of the whole bunch of them. I thought of you.”

“Well, that’s not very complimentary. The bottom of the list.”

He blew the horn. “Come on.”

“I can’t. I’m helping Mother. Maybe tomorrow.”

“Sure you can. Come on. I’ll buy you a beer.”

“No, really I can’t just now,” she said in that way girls have, when you know damn well they can. He let his face fall, moody, serious. It worked. She asked, “Is anything wrong, Artie?”

It was the shock of that thing in his block, he said, that horrible thing. Right across from his house. It could have been his own kid brother!

“I know,” Ruth sympathized. “It’s ghastly. Such an incredible, fiendish thing.” For a moment, he had her. But then she shook her head and said, “I really do have to go upstairs. But another day, if you like, Artie.”

Hell with her. She was a wet rag. He slammed the car into gear and drove away, glad of the surprised, almost dismayed look on her face as he left her there on the sidewalk.

Artie pulled up at the frat, ran in, told the big news, talking a mile a minute about the crime, his brother, the ransom, then suddenly, in that way he had, shifting his attention to a bridge game.

Leaving Tom Daly, I decided to stop at the frat for supper before I went over to see Ruth; I suppose I wanted to display myself and collect glory for my scoop. A bridge game was in progress in the lounge, and Artie was pulling his usual act of jumping from one side to another, handing out advice.

I tossed the paper on to the bridge table. “Hear about the big story? Kid got murdered.” And to Artie: “Say, he lived right near your house.”

“They’ve got my whole street blocked off!” Artie cried. “You never saw so many cops! I was just telling everybody-”

“Blocked off? I was just there,” I said, irked by his habit of exaggeration. “Didn’t run into any street blocks.”

The fellows were exclaiming over the news. “You on this story, Sid?” Milt Lewis asked with awe.

“… identified by a Globe reporter,” Raphael Goetz read out loud.

I admitted I was the reporter who had identified the boy.

“Say! Some scoop!” Artie stared at me, mouth agape. Then he flung his arm around me, patting my back. “Sonnyboy Silver, the hot-shot reporter! Fellows! We have a star reporter in our midst! The Alpha Beta is really getting there!” He seized the paper, glanced at it, waved it. “Hey! If not for Sid’s identifying him, it says they were just going to pay the ransom! Boy!”

He gazed at me so intently, his expression so strange that I clearly remembered the moment. “I just happened to get sent out-”

Artie was avid with questions. How had the poor kid looked? Any marks on him? Any clues? Sometimes the cops made the papers hold back certain information, to trap the criminals.

His excitement over the case seemed perfectly natural. Artie was a notorious detective-story addict. It was a common wonder around the house that he, who was supposed to be so brilliant, read practically nothing but pulp magazines and all that trash.

Actually, though he now developed a sudden friendship for me Artie and I had never been more than nodding fraternity brothers. He had been on campus only during the last year, having spent the two previous years at the University of Michigan.

Moreover, I had an obscure hostility toward Artie. I suppose it was because everyone tended to bracket us. We were the prodigies, both graduating at eighteen. Indeed, Artie was ahead of me – he already had his bachelor’s – and was loafing along taking a few extra courses.

I resented being paired with him because Artie was, to me, a waster, a playboy. He took snap courses, borrowed everybody’s term-papers. He bragged about his all-A’s at Michigan, but I had heard differently – mostly B’s and C’s. I felt he was just a rich kid who had the carpet laid out for him; he was spoiling what could have been a good mind. And I suppose I was jealous that he had rubbed off the glamour of my being the youngest graduate.

Now Artie pulled me aside, conspiratorially. “Say, Sid, I’ll give you a scoop! I can tell you all about that Kessler kid!” And he rattled on, about Paulie Kessler using his private tennis court, about his being in the same class with his own little brother, at the same school he, Artie, had gone to. That’s where I ought to look for clues – the Twain School!

I told him I had just come from there. I mentioned the arrest of the teacher, a piece of news that was not yet in the papers. Artie became even more excited. So they had pinched that ass-pincher, Steger! He would lay ten to one they had the right guy! Did I want some inside dope about Steger? He could tell me a few things, all right! His own kid brother, Billy, had been approached by that pervert. Sure. A kid doesn’t know what it’s all about, but Billy had come home one day and said there was something funny about Mr. Steger, he was always putting his arm around you. Billy had even asked if it was all right to go in Mr. Steger’s car. God! What a narrow escape that must have been!

There was no doubt, Artie declared – the cops were on the right trail. Steger must have been monkeying around with Paulie, and killed the boy to keep his mouth shut.

“What about the ransom?” Some of the fellows had gathered around.

“All right, what about the ransom?” Artie said. “Why not? That’s exactly what he’d do. Those poor suckers, those teachers, you know how much they get, maybe twenty-five bucks a week; they see all the kids coming to school with limousines – Christ, what a temptation!”

“After killing the kid?”

“I’ll admit that was terrible. But you can see, those teachers need money; it’s an obvious temptation.”

One of the fellows pointed out a flaw: how could the teacher have collected the ransom money if he wasn’t absent from school?

“He must have an accomplice!” Artie said. “Probably another pervert!” That school was full of them. He had gone there himself, and he knew.

“Yah, by experience!” Milt Lewis razzed.

“Nothing like Stratmore Academy,” Artie retorted, referring to Milt’s fashionable military prep school. “There, it’s an order!” Turning back to me, he wanted to know what the cops would do to Steger. Had I ever seen the third degree? Would they get it out of him?

“They’re not supposed to use it,” said Harry Bass, another of our law students. “If they use the third degree, he can repudiate the confession.”

“Crap,” said Artie. “They’ve got a way that leaves no marks.”

“Yah, in cheap detective stories!” Harry laughed.

Artie appealed to me as an expert, about the rubber truncheons that left no marks. Besides, he said, the cops got them in the balls.

Sure, the police had ways, I said knowingly. Could I go talk to his little brother about Steger?

His mother had the kid in hiding, Artie told me. All the mothers were scared out of their pants. But he would fix up an interview for me.

Too keyed up to sit at the dinner table, I decided to go over to Ruth’s. Artie followed me to the door, telling me to be sure to meet him tomorrow. “I’ll give you the benefit of my expert knowledge,” he half jested. And in the same breath he snagged Milt Lewis, who was passing. “Hey, Milt, you want a sure lay? I’ve got a terrific number.”

Ruth was my girl at that time. Or rather, I should say Ruth was my sweetheart, for there is no period that encompasses my feeling; whenever I think of her, and now as I write of her, the aura of that young love comes back, and I realize that what we then felt was indeed love. We were in love and afraid to know it, and nobody told us it was the true thing.

She was eighteen, a few months younger than I, and a sophomore. We had met on campus, and dated, and petted; in the long moony evenings we spent together we would stroke and excite each other and decide that this alone couldn’t be love. She was bright, all A’s, and we would discuss the new poetry of Amy Lowell, and we discovered Walt Whitman together, and read his poems of the body aloud to each other sometimes as we lay close side by side on the grass in Jackson Park. We read them wholesomely, without any suspicion in those days that he could be singing of another kind of love. And innocently reading Whitman, we used to discuss whether Ruth should give herself to me – that was how we put it – or whether we should wait.

Ruth’s folks were better off than my family, but still something of the same kind. Her mother, like mine, was always plying you with food, putting a plate in front of you even if you said you had just eaten.

Pushing the bell, I took the stairs two at a time; Ruth appeared in the doorway. “You’re a nice one!” she said reproachfully. And only then I remembered we had had a date for the afternoon.

“My God, look at you. Did you even shave today?” her mother demanded, from behind Ruth. “I’ll bet you haven’t eaten all day either.”

“I haven’t stopped going since morning!” I said, bursting to tell my big news, but Mrs. Goldenberg disappeared into the kitchen, immediately fetching a bowl of noodle soup, calling, “Well, you’re lucky Ruth isn’t gone.”

“Yes,” said Ruth archly. “You might have found me missing.”

“Who with?”

“Oh, a swell machine, a Franklin, stopped at the door,” said her mother.

“He honked enough for the whole street to hear,” said Ruth.

“Millionaire’s manners.” Mrs. Goldenberg went back for meat and potatoes.

“In fact, it was a frat brother of yours,” Ruth teased. “The sheikh of the campus, no less, suddenly remembered I was alive.”

“Artie? I just saw him at the house,” I said. “I didn’t know you go out with him.”

Oh, Ruth told me, not really. So it was odd, the way he had appeared all of a sudden today, saying he was lonesome. He had seemed quite upset.

“It must have been the murder, so close to his house,” I said, and pulled the paper from my pocket, spreading it on the table.

“Oh, I know,” Ruth said. “I read the extra. Isn’t it terrible!”

It really was, I agreed – after all, I had really seen it. “You mean this was you? The reporter that identified the body! Oh, Sid!” Ruth’s voice hovered between pride and shock.

“Horrible, a horrible crime!” her mother said, and urged me to eat. Chicago was becoming so terrible, you couldn’t even let a child go out in the street. And it was I who had reported all this, on the frong page?

“You saw the body? Poor kid.” Ruth was gazing at me, as though she could virtually see the child, through me.

I told her how the teacher had been arrested, and how Artie’s little brother was in the same class.

“I know. Artie told me. That’s why he was so upset. He tries to act blasé, but I think Artie is really softhearted,” Ruth said.

“Oh, yeah,” I said. “You’d better watch your step with him. That’s how he gets all the girls, with that winsome boyish line.”

“Do you think he’ll seduce me?”

“No, but he’ll say he did.”

Her mother disappeared. Mrs. Goldenberg always said she was broadminded and if her girl was going to do anything like petting, it was better for her to do it in her own home. So we sat on the overstuffed sofa in the sun parlour, and I kissed Ruth and put my hand over her breast. That was our limit.

“It’s so horrible about that little boy,” she said.

I remarked that it seemed pretty certain the crime had been done by a pervert.

We were silent for a moment, and then she said in a classroom-questioning voice, “What exactly is a pervert, Sid? I guess I’m supposed to know, but I don’t.”

I explained, trying not to reveal that my own knowledge was limited.

“But then,” Ruth said, “aren’t they suffering from a sickness?”

It was the first time in the whole day that I had remained still long enough for this thought to come through. And while I might ordinarily have expected myself to concur in this broader view, I found now that the thought made me almost angry.

“We can’t forgive crime by calling it a sickness,” I snapped. “It was murder, after all. It was a cold-blooded attempt to collect money from a kidnapping. And the perversion was just an added act of viciousness; maybe it was even a cunning way to disguise the rest of the crime.”

Ruth had drawn her hand out of mine. I went on, “It’s simply like a savage – murdering, and then mutilating his victim out of sheer savagery.”

“But, Sid,” she said, “why are you so angry? I was only asking, not arguing.”

She looked at me so earnestly, her eyes puzzled, and I melted with love of her, and took hold of her and kissed her. In the kiss, our loving was seasoned with bitterness over the world I had seen that day. We sometimes said we had Weltschmerz, but it was more like a presentiment that everything would be vile in our time. On that day it was as though the crime had split open a small crack in the surface of the world, and we could see through into the evil that was yet to emerge.

From the other room, Ruth’s mother spoke. “Children, why don’t you dance? Put on the Victrola.” Mrs. Goldenberg snapped on the light behind us. “You know, Ruthie,” she said, “I’m thinking of bobbing my hair.”

Even though there were only the three of them at the table, Judd’s father, neatly carving the roast, gave the meal almost a formal air. This was the way of the Pater. In everything always so certain of how he measured things out. So he must have been in the early days, with Grandfather in the woollen business – measuring with his yardstick, the solemn, upright young Judah Steiner. And so with his honest yardstick he had measured the growth of the woollen house as it was drawn along with the growth of Chicago ’s garment industry, and with his yardstick he had measured what family to marry into, and purchased woollen mills, and measured his real estate, and his honourable place in the world.

Yet tonight Judah Steiner was trying to speak in a lighter mood to his sons. There was Max’s engagement party; next week his fiancée would arrive from New York. Aunt Bertha must see to it, the house should be filled with flowers.

Max was sitting there quite proud of himself for the fine piece of merchandise that had been selected for him by brother Joseph in New York, a Mannheimer, no less.

Could it be, actually, that neither of them had heard of the sensational crime? Judd considered bringing it up – the topic would be normal enough: the kid had been snatched from Twain, almost across the street. But now the old man was turning to him. Was Judd ready for his exam tomorrow? “A Harvard law entrance should be taken seriously, even by a genius.” He chuckled, wiping his moustache.

“Huh, he’ll probably spend the night chasing tramps with Artie,” Max remarked. “That’s how a genius prepares. Me, I had to bone.”

“Even a genius can trip up some time; look at the tortoise and the hare,” said the Pater. “And how would a genius like to spend the summer preparing for Harvard instead of touring Europe?”

“Try and stop me. I’ve got the ticket!” Judd said, and all at once like a hand coming down on him was the thought that he really might be stopped in the two weeks before sailing. Should he try to get an earlier boat, leave immediately after tomorrow’s exam…? He’d go up and glance at his notes. He had them typed up, a complete set, from the session a few weeks ago with Milt Lewis and the fellows. What if a cop stepped in right now to make the arrest? Are these your glasses? What if the old man were told his Junior had achieved the greatest crime in the world? Could he ever understand such a conception? Could he comprehend that there was as much greatness on one side as on the other? Indeed, more. For the crime had to be created against the grain, à rebours, and law was with the grain.

His father was passing the pickles, remarking that he had stopped at the delicatessen for them himself. The staff forgot such things since Mama Dear had passed away. “Now Italy -” the old man was saying. “It might be advisable to avoid Italy in these unsettled times.” Judd let him talk.

“Oh, Italy isn’t so bad since that fellow Mussolini took charge,” his brother declared. “The country is under control.”

“You never can trust the Italians,” said his father. “Even here in Chicago, all the bootleggers are Italians. With their law amongst themselves, their killings, they give the city a bad reputation.”

“Sure, only the Jews are perfect,” Judd found himself snapping.

“At least we Jews are law-abiding, and engaged in respectable businesses and professions,” his father said.

“All the Italians gave us is Dante and Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo and Raphael,” said Judd, “Cellini and Aretino.”

“Maybe they were a fine people once, but today they are only gangsters.”

Max cut in. “I hear this Mussolini is a real leader, bringing back the glory that was Rome – a kind of superman.” Max wore a smile, to show he was for once trying to use his kid brother’s intellectual language.

In Judd’s mind, the word superman was echoing. The sullen, angry, god-furious figure of Artie, getting out of the car. If Artie were through with him now, because of the glasses… If Artie turned to Willie… The fear came over Judd – Artie leaving him alone. Like last time, before New Year’s Eve. The trouble hadn’t been his fault then either. Artie had been ready to blame him, and go off with Willie and some girls for New Year’s Eve, the one night, the most important night. Only Judd’s letter had kept him. A letter saying everything, analysing everything, explaining. Now, too, Judd would write a letter. In his mind, Judd began to form the words, showing clearly why the spectacles had to be counted as a shared mistake. Just as the entire experience was shared. If Artie started chumming with Willie… Christ, he couldn’t! They were bound together now, like when kids take an oath in blood…

Instantly, the blood image welled up, the pulsing spurt, sickening. It was himself, a child. He’d be sick…

Just then the phone rang. The maid came to say it was for Junior. Judd’s heart bounded. It was Artie, he was sure. He hurried out of the dining-room.

When Artie got home from the frat, he noticed quite an assembly still in the dining-room, and remembered that Mumsie had wanted to show him off to one of her chums visiting from the East.

“Arthur!” There was the usual loving reproach in his mother’s voice, but relief, too, that he had appeared at last. She was looking wan tonight, a bit over-ethereal in her greenish dress. The New York woman had bangs and horse-teeth; she was from far back, from that Catholic school of Mumsie ’s. The brothers were present, too – James, and even Lewis, complete with his recent bride. Full show.

“Arthur, dear, I was beginning to get frightened,” his mother said.

“Now who would kidnap me?” He laughed.

His father said, “It isn’t exactly anything to joke about.”

Artie dropped his lip to look contrite. “I know,” he said solemnly, and even felt a touch of sorrow. “Poor Paulie. Just the other day I took him on for a game, on the court. You know, for a kid his age he was real good – real strong arm muscles, had quite a smash. He must have put up a real fight with those fiends. I even asked him about buying a racket like his for Billy. Where’s Billy? Upstairs? How’s he taking it?”

“I tried to keep him distracted,” his mother said, drawing in her breath sharply. “But it was such an upsetting day I gave him his dinner upstairs. I’m taking Billy to Charlevoix first thing in the morning. I’m getting him away from here; there’s no telling what kind of madman is loose!”

At her words, Artie felt alive, glittery. On the table, they had their dessert: fresh strawberries. Mumsie hadn’t touched hers. “Hanging is too good for a fiend like that!” she was saying, her eyes fiery with indignation. “I don’t believe in capital punishment, but in a case like this, if they catch him, I think he ought to be tarred and feathered and then strung from a lamp-post! Oh!” She shuddered at her own words. Artie reached for her dish and helped himself. “Artie!” But her little sigh admitted her adoration for her incorrigible Artie, admitted that she had ordered the early strawberries especially for him. “At least sit down! Did you have any dinner?”

“I ate at the house. I’m sorry,” he apologized to Horse-teeth. “I guess I was upset and excited about this case.” He told all about his frat brother, the reporter who had identified the body.

“Poor Mrs. Kessler, she’s prostrate, I read,” Lewis’ bride put in.

Horse-teeth remarked that it was the war, the destruction that had taken place in the war. Life meant nothing any more.

“Sure, after all that mass killing, human life becomes only an abstraction,” Artie pronounced, feeling Jocko would have enjoyed this, and diving into a second dish that Clarice had set before him.

“What do you know about mass killing?” Lewis, the war veteran, demanded of Artie. “You were just a kid.” Big hero.

“That’s exactly when the effect is strongest,” Artie replied, glittering at the guest. Bet she’d wet her pants before he was through. “What did we play?” he demanded rhetorically. “Kill the Huns! Mow them down! We even had a scoreboard at school, how many Huns were killed! Hey! I forgot to tell you – I’ve got the inside news! They arrested a teacher! Steger! It isn’t in the papers yet. Sid Silver told me.” He gazed around, reaping their reactions. “You better watch out for Billy, Mums. That school is full of perverts.”

“Kiddo! Watch it,” his older brother Lewis sniffed, while his father looked pained. James, however, gave him a funny, keen look.

His father reminded Artie that it was unfair to come to hasty conclusions merely because a teacher was being questioned. It could have been any stupid brute.

“Oh, no! Take the ransom letter in the paper,” Artie exclaimed. “That’s no illiterate crook! That’s the letter of an educated man, also of someone who can type. Say, they ought to check every typewriter in that school!”

And in that instant, Artie saw the goddam portable still sitting in Judd’s room. Gobbling a last spoonful of strawberries, he leaped up.

“Date?” his mother asked.

“Yah. Just remembered.”

“Mary?” his mother asked. “Or would it be violating the etiquette of our flaming youth for a mother to ask?”

“It’s a new frail; you don’t know her,” he said. And on the spur of the moment added, “Ruth Goldenberg.” That way she couldn’t check up. “Brilliant babe – all A’s, and a good dancer. Folks are nobodies.”

He rushed to the phone.

Only to hear Artie’s voice, breathless, talking in their private code, gave back to Judd a sense of life; even if there were danger, it relieved the caged feeling he had had at the table – the sense of being defenceless there, alone, open to be caught. “I saw a bargain in portable typewriters,” Artie was saying. “Thought you might want to pick one up with me, two blocks south of Twelfth Street.” That meant two hours before twelve, Artie would be over. And portable typewriters? Judd gasped. Another error! His! And Artie had spotted it. The portable on which he’d typed the ransom letter, Artie leaning over him, suggesting phrases to make it sound real businesslike. The typewriter could give them away! If the glasses were traced to him, and the house searched, the portable found… They’d have to get rid of it tonight.

“Thanks,” he said. “I was thinking of getting rid of my old portable at that. Two south of Twelfth. I’ll go along with you.”

As Judd came back into the dining-room, preoccupied, Max remarked, “Your chum again?” Max never let up about him and Artie. “I never could figure out what two guys have got to call each other up about all the time. Weren’t you with him all day today? And yesterday?” Max said it jovially, but there was that smutty look back of his eyes. Ever since a certain story had got out about Judd and Artie, a couple of summers before, at the Straus’s summer place in Charlevoix, Max had never let up. “What were you guys doing all day long?”

“We went birding.”

“I’ll bet. Chickens,” he said with his fat chuckle, but with an air of letting it go. Max put a big cigar in his mouth, like the old man, and the two of them resumed talking business.

Judd looked at them, feeling acutely the “who are you?” that he sometimes wanted to blurt out. When his mother had been alive, there had at least been someone for him, at the table, when the “men” got off on their business dealings.

Sure, that same old story about himself and Artie was why the old man had been so easy about the trip to Europe. What a joke it would have been on them if the ransom had been collected and Artie had joined him abroad! Not that Artie still couldn’t do if it he wanted to – Artie certainly had the money.

“Too bad Artie isn’t going with you,” Max’s voice banged in; it was frightening how that stupe seemed to sense his thoughts. “You two could have gone birding all over the place.”

Judd didn’t answer; but as Max, chortling, went back to the business talk, the whole scene of yesterday flooded Judd’s mind. Birding, yes, birding for a rare specimen. Parking the rented car under the tree shade where the branches hung low to give a natural cover, so that from the school entrance the kids could hardly see anyone sitting in the car. And sitting motionless, hushed, just as when birding, until you are part of the landscape itself. Sitting quietly in the car you became part of the street, and you waited for the flock to pour out of the school doors like a flock whirring up suddenly out of a thicket, when quickly you snagged your specimen.

Waiting. “All set?” Artie’s eyes flicking, checking the pockets of the car. All the equipment on hand?

In the pocket on Judd’s side, handy, the ether cans. The length of clothes line. Artie had wanted a silken cord, but at the last moment they couldn’t find one. In the other pocket, on Artie’s side, the chisel and the hydrochloric.

What made this the day?

Again Judd saw the last test of the train. “Perfect! Let’s set the day!” And even then he had thought of something. What about the car? If someone spotted his car? Anybody’d know the Stutz, Judd objected. Then Artie wanted to make it a stolen car, but Judd said no, that would only increase the danger of apprehension. To make it a perfect crime, the car had to be unidentifiable.

There it hung. Artie became sullen. But driving down Michigan, passing the Drive-Ur-Self place, Judd suddenly had the idea. A rented car. This proved he still wanted to do it, and Artie came partly back. A shitty idea, he argued; if they trace the car, they trace who rented it. You can’t just use a fake name; they check references. Okay, Judd had said, we establish a fictitious identity – with references!

That brought Artie back entirely. Shifting closer on the seat, Artie plotted an identity. A fake name. You could open up a bank account. And register in a hotel. Then the personal reference. That was easy. “You give them a number where I’ll be waiting, and I’ll answer. Why, I’ve known Jonesey for ten years. He’s a fine, upright citizen!”

Great! Judd slapped Artie’s knee. Another thing, Judd said. Better take the car out at least once before, so there would be no suspicion.

Artie gave him a glance. Was this more stalling?

It was a whole chain of things, then. It stretched from one week into the next; could it even have stretched till the day never came, till he sailed with the thing undone? Had he really meant to do it?

There was the going down to the Morrison Hotel, Artie throwing a suitcase into the Stutz, the one he claimed he always had ready for registering with a girl. The suitcase felt too light, and Artie threw a couple of books into it, a history from the university library, and H. G. Wells – that made it heavy enough. And what about a name? J. Poindexter Fish, Artie offered, and how about P. Aretino, Judd proposed, and that led to a great game, each outdoing the other. Or how about making it someone they knew, like Morty Kornhauser, the prig, for causing all that trouble at Charlevoix? Or Milt Lewis, the ponderass? But then, settling down to it, they chose a name from a store window – Singer Sewing Machines. Artie signed James Singer in the register, and they went up, and laughed and laughed in the room, and had a drink and fooled around, and then Artie said, “Come on, how about renting the car?”

Leaving the suitcase, they drove up Michigan, and Judd said, “Wait, don’t forget the bank account for Mr. Singer.” Artie put in three hundred, signing James Singer, Morrison Hotel at the Corn Exchange Bank. And then, how about some mail at the hotel for Mr. Singer? They wrote a couple of letters, crazy stuff: How about a jazz, Jimmy dear? My husband is out of town. Your devoted Cuddles. It was getting better and better!

Then, the reference. A name: Walter Brewster. Then, stopping at a lunch counter on the corner of 21st, Judd taking down the number in the phone booth, leaving Artie sitting at the counter, waiting.

Selecting a Willys at the Drive-Ur-Self. “What business, Mr. Singer?”… “Salesman.”… “Any references in town, Mr. Singer? You know, we are required to have at least one business reference.”… “Oh, that’s all right, you can call – Mr. Walter Brewster.” And giving him the number. Then waiting while the dope called. “We have a Mr. James Singer here, to rent a car… Yes? Yes, thank you, Mr. Brewster. Any time we may be of service to you, sir.”… And driving out with it, picking up Artie at the lunch counter – smooth as silk.

“O.K., let’s set the day.” Not too soon after the first car rental. So the rental guy wouldn’t remember you too clearly. A week must pass, at least. That would be past the middle of May.

And the day his steamer ticket came, Judd had to show it to Artie. Artie’s eyes, wise to him, until Judd had to say, “How about writing the note tonight?” That made it so close, it had to happen. The ransom letter ready – Dear Sir – and the blank envelope waiting for a name to be written on it. The specimen to be selected. That was it. Life and death, pure chance. The day itself a random choice, until Artie said, “Friday?”

And Judd said, “No, I’ve got the lousy Harvard Law exam.” And if it waited past the exam, and past the weekend, it would already reach the week before his sailing. Then, Max’s engagement party…

“All right,” Artie gave him that cunning look, and pinned him, moving the date forward instead of farther away. “Wednesday.”

And Judd could say nothing except, “Hey, we were supposed to have lunch with Willie.”

“The nuts!” Artie said. Willie would be an alibi, ready-made. Wednesday, then. Yesterday.

After his ten-o’clock, driving down Michigan with Artie. “I had one of your cars out, once before. James Singer. Just got back into town.” And then the two cars driving back south, Artie ahead of him in the Willys, pushing the speed, and himself racing the Bearcat, nose to tail. Then, picking up the last things. The hydrochloric, though he wasn’t entirely sure – maybe sulphuric would work faster. But hydrochloric should do it. Two drugstores, without any luck. At the third, Artie going in, otherwise too many druggists might remember the same short, dark young man with the unusual request. Artie, bringing it. And finally the chisel. A hardware store on Cottage Grove. Artie knowing the kind that was best, the kind with the steel going all the way up through the wooden head.

And then stopping to get Max’s boots. And remembering – a silken cord. Artie tramping through the bedrooms. “Hey, how about this?” The cord from the old man’s dressing gown. Great!

“No, he might miss it.” Then, Artie: “All right, the hell, any piece of rope. Buy some clothes line. Wait, don’t forget to pick up the goddam adhesive tape.” In the medicine chest.

And then just time enough before lunch to stop in Jackson Park, Artie showing him how to wind the tape around the chisel, thick around the blade – tape makes a perfect grip.

Thus, all set. The lunch at the Windermere, and Willie, Willie the Horrible Hebe with his oily dark face, trying to act real clever, quoting from Havelock Ellis, flashing his medical-student sex-anatomy knowledge, trying to play up to Artie, and never knowing, never having the faintest idea what was going on between his luncheon partners.

Coming out, they ducked Willie, so he wouldn’t see the car they were using. Then, on the way to the Twain School, Judd went into his house once more. From the bottom drawer in Max’s room, he took the revolver. Artie already had his own, in his pocket.

Even when they were ready on the spot, waiting, so close to the school, it still did not seem that the thing was happening. The school doors opened, and a flock emerged – first a few, then the thick mass of them, spreading over the street. Judd saw himself as he had been among them only a few years ago, the spindly-legged crazy bird, smaller, younger than anybody. “Hey! Genius!” a redheaded comedian would call – “Hey, Genius, I saw a funny bird, right on Ellis Avenue.” And, falling for it, “What was it like?” “A Crazy Bird!” and the comedian would be pointing at him, and the whole gang howling. The punks, the snots! Why, even at that time he could name and identify over two hundred species!

And maybe picking up one of these punks today would be a kind of revenge for his miserable years in this miserable school. Today’s flock, or the flock around him four years ago – all crowds were the same, raucous humanity, stupes…

But coolly, Judd checked himself. What he was doing today was not for revenge. He must have no feelings about those days. Even then, as a kid, he had known that he must not feel anything. That way, nothing could hurt.

Therefore, no revenge. No emotional connection. This was an exercise in itself, a deed like a theorem.

“Hey, ixnay.” Artie gestured for him to drive on. Too many of these kids were coming toward the car. Some might know them. Artie slid down in his seat, while the car rolled around the block. By then the flock was already broken up. A few kids walked with maids who always called for them, and some lingered in small groups, girls especially. Then Artie nudged, pointing his chin. “Richard Weiss.”

A good one. A cousin of their pal Willie, and a grandson of Nathan Weiss, the biggest investment banker in Chicago, the financier behind all their family fortunes, the Strauses, the Hellers, the Seligmans. Little Richard Weiss was turning into 49th Street. It took a moment to make the U-turn, and by the time they came to 49th Street, the kid was not in sight.

In that momentary interval, the whole thing went down again in Judd. Perhaps losing the kid was an omen that it wouldn’t really be done. “The hell with him,” Artie said. “Let’s go back to the school.”

If by now the school street was clear, then today’s chance would have been lost, and tomorrow Judd could say he really had to get ready for his exam.

“Hey!” Judd followed Artie’s glance. Across from the school, on the play lot – a whole flock of them. “Watch me!” Boldly, Artie walked across to the lot. Judd sat staring, feeling a kind of awe. This was the way of a man entirely above normal fears and rules. So bold an impulse would never have occurred in himself, Judd knew.

Artie walked casually on to the lot. Judd saw him stop and put his arm around his kid brother, Billy. Would he really bring Billy!

He was leaving the lot alone. Judd pulled the car ahead a short distance to get out of sight of the kids. Catching up, jumping into the car, Artie said excitedly, “There’s a whole bunch of good ones. Mickey Bass.” His old man owned the South Shore Line. “And the Becker kid – but he’s pretty husky.”

“How about Billy Straus?” Judd suggested. “His old man is the richest Jew in town.”

Artie grinned. Then he shook his head. “How would we collect? Cops would be all over the house; I couldn’t make a move.” He looked back toward the lot. “I’ll tell you. Let’s make it the first good one that leaves the ball game.”

They waited. Artie became restless. Motioning Judd to follow, he dodged around behind the play lot; from the alley they could watch the kids – birds with their random movements, stirring on the vacant lot. Artie was getting dangerously close. And yet not near enough to recognize one kid from another, especially those at the distant end of the field. They seemed to go on endlessly with their ball game. “Damn it,” Judd said, “you need field glasses.”

“Hey! You’re a genius!” Artie squeezed his arm. “Let’s go!”

“What?”

“Let’s get your goddam glasses!”

Fleetingly, Judd wondered, was even Artie at that moment giving the whole plan a chance to collapse? Allowing a chance for all the kids to disappear while they went back for the field glasses?

The house was quiet. Up in Judd’s room, Artie went straight for the Bausch and Lomb, grabbing the case. “Take it easy!” Judd cried. “They’re delicate!”

Standing by the window, Artie focused. “This is the nuts! Christ, you could reach out your mitt and grab one of them!”

Judd stood close to Artie. It was one of those moments, perhaps because of being safe together in the room, and yet in the midst of their wild game – one of those moments when he could almost groan with excitation.

Artie turned to let him use the binoculars. And from the look in Artie’s eyes, that almost mocking look, Judd knew that Artie knew. “Come on!” Artie laughed, bounding for the stairs. “We’ll miss them!”

Into the car again, and back beneath the tree. They took turns with the field glasses. It was so strange, watching a kid as he bent to tie his shoe lace, then stood up, waiting. Like a bird, preening, lifting his head, listening.

Artie said, “One’s coming!” Judd started the motor. Then Artie shook his head. “No. I dunno.” They waited, the motor running. Judd felt Artie’s hand on his thigh, warm, tense, ready. Anything, anything to have times like this with Artie.

A squeeze would be the signal.

On the field, the boys had formed in a knot; it was an argument. Perhaps the game was breaking up.

“The ump,” Artie muttered. “I think the ump quit.” Then, elatedly: “He’s coming! It’s the little Kessler punk. Hey! He’s just right!”

“Who is he? You know him?” Judd’s voice went suddenly high. “They got dough?”

“They own half the Loop. Old man used to be a pawnbroker.”

Somehow, with that, the boy seemed exactly the right one.

The squeeze came, on his thigh. Let out the clutch, slow, easy, crawling. Let the boy walk ahead a bit, lead your bird.

Artie climbed over to the back seat. They had four blocks to work in, he said; the kid’s house was near his own. “Street’s clear,” he observed.

Now they were almost even with the boy. Judd waited for a truck to pass, then coasted along the curb. “Let me handle this. He knows me,” Artie whispered. “Don’t honk.” And as they drew abreast: “Hey, Paulie.”

The kid turned. Judd slid the car still nearer to the curb.

Judd’s father’s voice cut in, “Thinking about your exam?” The memory images braked, halting sharply. Judd looked up. “I guess I’ll do Harvard the honour of glancing at my notes,” he said, rising.

Upstairs, he even took out the typed notes. His hand fell on the Bausch and Lomb, brought upstairs last night; Artie had neglected to put it back in its case. Even in Artie, sloppiness irritated Judd. As he arose to set the glasses away, he thought of the boy they had watched through these sights. Was the image still on the lens? Like the story about the last image on the retina of a murdered man…

Judd tried to bone again, and then the sexual excitement came. Always, always when he sat trying to study. He was oversexed, he was sure. Images intruded: a slave, a slave rewarded by his master.

With a little gasp, almost a groan, Judd gave himself over to the fastasy. His master was extended on a stone couch, drinking from a silver cup. His splendid muscular torso was bare, the skin golden, glistening, not oily but luminous.

The slave was no common slave, but had been purchased because of his learning. He was crouched, reading to his master, and the master laughed at the tale, a witty account of an ass, making love to a woman.

As Judd read, he looked up to his master, and saw the half smile, the beginning of excitation. The master’s arm lay free, and a short whip dangled from Artie’s hand. Artie caught his slavish eyes, and laughingly commanded him, “All right, you bastard, you sucker,” and flicked the whip. The slave put aside his parchment and…

Then a tumult. An attacker plunged into the room, more, three, five, a dozen assassins. Judd leaped up, defending his master, with his bare hands wresting the sword from one of the villains, charging them, forcing them backward, plunging the sword.

Excited beyond endurance, Judd arose, circled the room, trying to keep away from the bed. It would be an hour before Artie came. Then, making sure the door was closed, he lay down.

He let himself slide completely into it, without fixing on any one image, letting the images come one upon the other: a street in Florence, and a young man, blond – Artie – rushing into a shadowed alleyway, a grinning backward, inviting glance, and then it was yesterday and the little girls scattering in twos and threes on the street, and why had Artie always been against making it a girl? Maybe that would finally have rid him of the need, but now he still had something left over that he must do. The girl… and there came the image of the Hun and the girl, the war poster in the hallway when he was at Twain – the young Frenchwoman with the dress half torn crouching against a wall, her arm up in defence, and the Hun with the slavering mouth coming toward her, then grabbing her by the hair and doing it to her…

With an effort, Judd pulled himself up from the bed. The typewriter. It was standing against the wall, beneath the glass cases of his mounted birds. For this second terrible mistake, Artie would be through with him. Artie would erase all their times together, as though they had never met.

It had been one of the last occasions when Mother Dear had been well enough to go out. Indeed, she had probably overstrained herself, Judd imagined, in arranging the visit for his sake. He had known it was a little plot, of the kind Mother Dear and Aunt Bertha loved to arrange.

For a long time he had been aware of their whispery worryings about him. Poor Judd, he ought to have more friends. He’s alone with his books too much.

Poor Judd, they meant, the kids all hate him. The kids all think he’s conceited. But poor Judd, they said, all the boys in his class are three years older than he is, and at that age three years makes a great difference. And he’s really not interested in baseball and such things. If we could only find someone…

And then they had cooked up the meeting with Artie. Of course Judd knew about Artie, the paragon who had skipped through Twain a year ahead of him, and was even a few months younger. He would have got to know Artie at Twain, most likely, if Artie hadn’t transferred to University High in his last year, to go right into the university at fourteen.

But when people talked about Artie Straus, the brilliant prodigy, Judd always remarked that entering a university at fourteen was not necessarily a criterion of intelligence. Any parrot with a large enough medulla oblongata could absorb the kind of knowledge that was required in a classroom. Judd could easily have done it at fourteen instead of fifteen, if he had not been out of school with his terrible skin rashes and boils, for weeks at a time. And besides, Artie Straus, as everyone knew, had had special tutoring from his governess.

Yet Judd admitted to himself a certain curiosity about Artie Straus. He therefore accepted the pretence that it was just a casual afternoon bridge party at the Strauses, to which he was escorting his mother and aunt. And if there had been hushed telephone calls between the ladies, to arrange this meeting for the two brilliant boys who really ought to be great friends, he pretended not to have noticed. Judd disregarded too the thought that although his own family was worth several million dollars, his mother and aunt would consider it advantageous for him to become the close associate of one of the Strauses, with their ten million and their palatial new mansion with the private tennis court. Only the best, as his father always said.

There was another uneasiness about meeting Artie. While Artie was brilliant like himself, Artie was more. He was an athlete, a fellow who had fun with the crowd. Tall, a lively figure on the tennis court – instead of a bookworm.

Still, Judd was aware that on his side he was supposed to exert a steadying influence on Artie, because the moment he had got into the university, young Straus had started running wild, with collegians who were several years older than himself. And recently Artie had had a bad smash-up in a car.

It was a warm, sweet day in May, and as they left the house Mother Dear paused to sniff the air. Judd offered her his arm, and she gave him the smile he had identified far back in childhood when his Irish nurse had taken him into a church with stained-glass windows. “Is this Heaven?” he had whispered, and of the glowing Lady in the window: “Is she God’s wife?” Then the nursemaid had told him who the Madonna was. The Mother of God. And though as soon as he began to grow up he knew himself an atheist, the Madonna image persisted as someone in whom he believed, and as his mother.

That day of the bridge party, as Judd helped his mother down the cement steps to the walk, his aunt gushed about the fine-appearing pair they made. Mother Dear was in something grey, grey silk – he wished he could recall precisely – and he, nearly fifteen, was still in knickerbockers, although they were tailored wide, to look more like golf plus-fours.

“You will meet Artie Straus,” Aunt Bertha insisted again. “I asked Mrs. Straus if Artie would be home. You know, Judd, dear, Artie can give you lots of pointers about the university, what teachers to take.”

“Professors,” he corrected her.

Aunt Bertha had come in her electric, and now gave him a chance to drive it the few blocks to the Straus mansion. Driving the Edison always gave Judd a kick, though he already could drive a regular car.

“I hear Artie is a nice fun-loving boy, and I hope you will become friends,” his aunt kept on, not realizing how a remark like that could push a fellow in the other direction. Especially if they were working on Artie the same way.

But Artie came running out of the house as the electric drove up. With a politeness that might have had some mockery behind it, he opened doors.

At first sight, Judd felt disappointment. It was an instant feeling that Artie wasn’t for him, Artie wasn’t the one. His long narrow face was like tallow. And everything about him was too long – his arms, his neck, his fingers. Even before emerging from the car, Judd knew he would scarcely reach to Artie’s shoulders. A shrimp in any crowd, beside Artie he would look like a midget… Artie would never be anything to him. Judd even felt a kind of triumph that he had come along as Mother Dear and Aunt Bertha wished, but had proven immune to their plotting. He would remain his solitary and superior self.

It was a small bridge party of ladies, several of whom Judd had seen at his own house – Mrs. Seligman, Mrs. Kohn with a K, and Artie’s mother, a thin, energetic-looking woman, with great, clear blue eyes. Judd remembered that she was not Jewish and was always held up as an example, when Hyde Park talk turned on mixed marriages, of a Catholic who fitted very graciously into the South Side Jewish circle – indeed, took the leadership.

There were three tables. Mrs. Straus warned everybody that Artie was a whiz, a shark. Oh, yes, since the two brilliant boys were going to be partners, the ladies had better watch out!

“Why don’t you take Judd up to your room? We’ll call when we’re ready,” Mrs. Straus suggested to Artie, who motioned – “C’mon!” – and took the stairs two at a time.

The room was as a collegian’s room was supposed to look, with pennants and sports stuff on the walls – tennis rackets and even crossed fencing foils. Immediately, Artie lighted a cigarette, and offered his Caporals to Judd. “Smoke?” Judd accepted one, remarking that his own preference was for the Turkish brands.

It was too bad he was going to register at the U. of C., Artie told him at once. That was no good because you had to live at home and you couldn’t fool around too much – they had their eye on you. He himself was going to switch to Michigan, to Ann Arbour, in the fall. Another thing, the girls of the U. of C. wouldn’t put out. “You interested in girls?” And in the same moment, Artie opened a heavy atlas that was on his desk. “I keep them in here so the spies won’t get wise.” And he handed Judd a packet of postcards.

They were French cards. Judd had never seen any before, but he made it his rule always to be inwardly prepared for anything. He didn’t flicker. The cards were certainly unaesthetic, particularly the females – the way their half-removed clothing dangled and dripped. Handing back the postcards, he said, “Not bad,” and Artie said he could get Judd into Alpha Beta, only they were a bunch of sissies, the whole gang – he’d bet a ten-spot half of them were still cherry. “You cherry?”

Judd grinned ambiguously. He was saved from the need to answer further by Mrs. Straus calling from downstairs, “Boys, we’re beginning.”

“Hey, I got an idea,” Artie said. “You want to have some fun with these hens? Let’s have some signals.”

That was the first spark between them; the idea of defrauding hese clucking women was pleasant to Judd. Artie proposed finger signals, but Judd feared even those dumb females might catch on. His own idea was word signals. Let the first letter of the first word you spoke represent the suit, say, for clubs, any word beginning with a C. Then the number of words in the remark would be the number of cards of that suit. His mind leaped ahead, even to word signals for the high cards, but Artie said he had a better system. He would tap Judd’s toe under the table – that’s what long legs were good for. Once for spades, twice for hearts, and so on. Then you tap the number held in each suit.

“What if they catch you?”

“They never catch me.” Artie laughed.

As the foot reached, pressing on his toes, Judd felt an odd combination of mischievousness and tense excitement. He lost count of the taps. He messed up the bidding. But Artie played with bravado and brilliance, and fished them out of the mess. Afterward they got a little better at it. Then they got so good, the women ooed and aahed, and Judd found himself giggling with the secret fun. Then Artie’s mother made a remark about how nervous he was, his legs rattling all the time, and Judd got scared and drew back his feet, holding them under the chair. He gave Artie a meaningful look.

They came out winners, nearly five dollars apiece, and during the coffee and French pastries, Artie took him upstairs again and produced a hidden flask of gin. Then Artie wanted to try Judd’s aunt’s electric to see if it could get up any more speed than his own aunt’s Edison.

In the driveway, the two electric cars were lined up. Aunt Bertha’s still had the key in it. And Artie suddenly had a thought. He tried the key in the second car. It fitted. All those Edisons must have the same key!

And so it started. Artie came over for bridge one evening, Judd and Artie trimming Aunt Bertha and Mother Dear, using Judd’s word system this time. Then Artie borrowed Aunt Bertha’s electric, and, while he was out, had a duplicate key made. Artie was car crazy, but since his accident, his family very strictly wouldn’t let him drive.

One afternoon he said, “Hey, how about some fun?” And he and Judd walked into a garage on Harper and tried the key in an Edison, driving the buggy right out. The garageman’s face fell open half a yard as they passed him – what a riot! But after a few blocks he was chasing them in his repair truck. You couldn’t get any speed on an electric, Artie cursed, so he slewed it against the curb and they both leaped out, lamming down an alley and dodging across a vacant lot, Artie pulling Judd quickly behind a shed. Artie held up the key he had saved, and they laughed.

It was there in the sun, laughing, pushed up close together against the wall, that Judd first saw Artie differently. His face was no longer pasty but alive, his eyes shone, and his body had suddenly a lanky grace. And that night in his imagining, when Judd waited for the king to come into his fantasy, it was Artie.

Every afternoon they were together. They swiped another electric and whizzed down Cottage Grove. Then, while they were in an ice-cream parlour, a cop looked in and asked if anybody belonged to that electric. Judd almost piped up, but Artie kicked his foot. They kept their faces in their sodas until the cop departed.

Electrics were too risky, too slow, Judd said. Anyway for graduation he would have his own car, a red Stutz Bearcat. Artie was almost more eager than Judd for that day.

There it was, sitting in the driveway when he came home from Twain’s silly, juvenile graduation exercises. Red as a fire engine, and with a rumble. Artie must have been waiting around the corner, for he appeared at once, tested the horn, sprang open the rumble. “Just right for picking up gash!” he said. “Ideal for two couples.”

Immediately after dinner, Artie was back at Judd’s house. It was a moonless night. Max haw-hawed, and even Mother Dear joked about the two young men going out to do the town. Judd could imagine their remarks after he had left. “It’s a good thing for him to have some fun; he’s much too serious.” Or: “Let him sow a wild oat or two.”

The first thing Artie did was to stop at a drugstore on Stony Island where he said he could get the real stuff. “Your share is three bucks,” he told Judd when he came out with the pint. Judd knew that Max never paid more than three dollars a pint, so this was the entire price he was paying; but he gave Artie the money, telling himself this way he would have something on Artie, even while Artie thought he was being fooled.

Then Artie wanted to take the wheel, but Judd decided to establish firmly from the first that it was his car, and he would be the driver. Artie shrugged.

In the park they had a few swigs, then Judd said how about a fond farewell to the institution? They drove down to Twain, gazing upon the brick castle, dark and solid as a prison. “Why is it the tradition that one is supposed to look back upon one’s Alma Mater with affection?” said Judd. “All I experience is relief at no longer having to have daily contact with those imbeciles.”

Artie climbed out of the car. A pile of bricks was lying there, where a wall was being repaired. He picked up a few, handing one to Judd. There was a corner window, where old Mr. Forman always stood.

“Here’s to Old Foreskin!” Artie saluted. They heaved, and glass rained down. Climbing into the car, they roared off. Judd was actually laughing out loud. “Too bad he wasn’t standing behind the window as usual!” He nearly doubled over the wheel, finding the image so funny.

Artie still had a brick in his hand. Judd drove to Lake Park. It was a crummy street, with few lights. A good street for gash, Artie remarked, though mostly professionals, and he didn’t want to get himself another dose just yet. Then Artie spied a perfect store window and heaved his brick; the Stutz had wonderful pickup, roaring away from the clattering, collapsing glass.

They circled, stopped a block off, and sauntered over. Two men were struggling to block up the window – it was a shoe-repair shop – and a dozen rubbernecks had already assembled.

The owner kept telling how he ran down from upstairs. “Who do this to me? Why anybody do this to me? I work hard-”

“Maybe it was the Black Hand,” Artie suggested. Turning to Judd, he said, “Looks like a typical Black Hand job to me. This is just a warning.”

“That’s right,” Judd said. “The next time they give him the works.”

Police arrived and scattered the crowd. Back in the car, Artie and Judd laughed themselves silly, Artie mimicking the terrified cobbler: “Black Hand! I don’t know no Black Hand!” And the most wonderful part of it, sensed for the first time there, was that they two together were a kind of secret power, like their own Black Hand – they could stand right there in the midst of the crowd, and nobody could even suspect them.

For Judd, this was a kind of proof. As a kid, parents tried to make you fear an all-watching God, and ever after that you felt a kind of fear that if you did something, people might somehow see it on you. But there was nothing! Nothing showed! You did whatever you damn pleased. And that was Artie’s philosophy.

They drove downtown, came back up Michigan, and passing 22nd Street, Artie said, “Hey, how about going to Mamie’s? Come on, I bet you never even had a piece. Tonight’s the night.”

Judd felt the blood flooding his brain. He wanted to get it over with, and yet something in him was repulsed. “I don’t like to pay for it,” he said. “I’d rather pick something up.”

“Yah, you’ll pick something up all right.” Artie laughed, but they tried a few streets. Garfield Boulevard he said was good for gash hunting. They drove up and down the length of it, a few times spotting pairs of strolling girls, and once coasting slowly while Artie went through a long conversation with two stupid gigglers. The whole time, Judd’s head was pounding with scenes from Fanny Hill, which Artie had lent him to read. Despite his excitement, he wanted to roar away from the two females, with their smeared mouths. Why should a man have to demean himself to make vapid remarks to such brainless creatures, merely for biological release!

For it was biological. And that was what dragged a man down. From deep in childhood, Judd had the feeling that the entire female mechanism was nauseating. Somehow he knew about the blood, from far back with that fleshy fat governess, Trudy. Occasionally at night the almost suffocating sense of her came over him. More often it was the girl in the war atrocity. In different ways – dragged out of her bed, or huddling in a barn. And dark female blood. Over her, the stiff-necked officer in uniform. Sometimes it was like the military-school uniform Max wore, buttoned to the chin, when he came home for the holidays. And lately Artie, he and Artie running from the cops, the cops firing after them, and Artie pulling him behind the telegraph post in the alley, laughing. And there in the alley, the girl from the war poster… Judd would surrender himself to his excitement, at the same time cursing the terrible need that nature had forced upon an intelligent being, the tormenting, relentless sex need…

That first evening in the car they didn’t have any luck. But one night just before Artie and his folks were going up to Charlevoix for the summer, they connected.

After the girls got into the car you could see they were a little older; they had creases in their necks. Judd’s girl put her hand on his knee right away, and from behind Artie called, “She wants to know if we carry a blanket!” All four exploded with merriment. Still laughing, Judd’s girl lifted his right hand from the wheel and placed it on her thigh.

He drove straight out on 63rd, beyond the new airfield there, and on the way the girl said she hoped he wouldn’t get the wrong idea about her, though she and her friend loved to be taken places, and of course every girl loved to receive presents, but she hoped he wouldn’t get the wrong idea.

When they parked, the girls got out on different sides of the car, as if by habit. They kept calling to each other with suppressed but shrieky laughter. It was a sultry night and there were mosquitoes on the field; Judd kept getting bitten. He felt angry at the need in himself to do this. Just as he embraced her, the girl looked into his face in a serious way and said, “You all right? I never had anything, honest; I swear.” It took him an instant to realize that she meant the disease. “Sure, I’m okay,” he gasped, but he was completely invaded by fear, wanting to quit, for probably she did have it, and he thought of Artie on the other side of the car – Artie not caring if he gave the girl a dose, and sure, that was the way to be – the hell with all females – and even as the girl guided him, Judd’s mind was filled with images of Artie giving it, with godlike anger and vengeance, to the twat.

Judd’s climax came instantly. The girl emitted a low, surprised “Hey?” and then an odd little laugh. He didn’t want her to look at him. He had read about the feeling of after-disgust. But he was sure that what he felt was more, much more. Utter nausea. He had done it quickly, to have the least possible contact with her, yet she was trying to hold him to her, to be playful. He couldn’t find a word to say to her. Instead, all the while, he was trying to hear, to see, Artie. And then they heard Artie’s partner. “You had too much gin, sonny.” And then that girl had jumped up, shaking straight her dress, and Judd’s girl stood up as at a signal.

Suddenly the girls began jabbering gaily again, and suggesting places to dine and dance, calling them “sports”. It was as if the intercourse itself had been some minor preliminary. But he didn’t want to go anywhere with them; he didn’t even want to be in the car with them driving them back to where they had been picked up.

Then the girl called from behind, “How about going to the show at the Tivoli? Pola Negri’s playing.” Artie quickly made up a big story in his bootlegger rôle about having to meet a certain connection in a certain spot in Little Italy. No dames.

Judd pulled up at the corner, and just as the girls were beginning to look angry, Artie slipped his a ten-spot, saying that would take them to the show and maybe the Stutz would be waiting when they came out, if he finished his deal.

Judd’s girl, smiling, offered her mouth, repeating, “I hope you won’t think we’re that kind.” He couldn’t stand to kiss her; he zoomed the car away before Artie was half settled beside him.

Artie shook his head, laughing. What a pair of bags. With a bag like that he never could get really excited.

Only then Judd understood that Artie hadn’t done it. And suddenly his own nausea was gone. Artie kept on talking. It was no kick with a cheap slut, a semipro. And Judd said females were disgusting anyway; all of them were disgusting. It was a foul trick of nature to make a man need to consort with the creatures. They took a swig to get the taste out, and then Artie had an idea for some fun. Back on 63rd were some sheds.

They drove west again and Artie picked out a shed at the end of a vacant lot, just an old shed – couldn’t hurt anybody. He got out of the car and found some old newspapers and cardboard. He lighted a little bonfire against the wall of the shack. They waited till it caught on, then circled the block, coming back to see the whole shed ablaze.

Artie put his arm on Judd’s shoulder, watching. Judd felt cleansed. He wished he had thought of this himself. How Artie’s eyes glittered! He felt the wine of full friendship in them at last.

Soon they heard the fire engines coming.

Lying on his bed, one ear cocked for footsteps, Judd restrained himself. He wouldn’t give himself to the final exciting imaginings, for at any moment Max or his father might come. At last he heard them on the stairs, talking; Max was going to drive downtown to a show, and would leave the old man for a card game at the club.

Good! They wouldn’t be here when Artie came.

And the image was upon him, of the first time with Artie. On the train going up to Charlevoix to be Artie’s summer guest. It was an overnight ride, and Artie had taken a compartment, and once they were in it Artie had unloaded a bottle and a deck of cards – this would be one big night.

Judd had taken along the Perfumed Garden in French, and he translated a few of the best parts to Artie while they played a couple of hands of casino, a nickel a point, Judd winning. And all the time they were drinking, and Artie was getting looser, the way he had of clowning so you couldn’t tell exactly whether he was tight or only pretending to be tight. Artie talked of all the girls they would have in Charlevoix – he had them lined up; he knew some terrific lays on the farms around there; it would be a great summer – and all the while Judd kept feeling freer and bolder, and the pounding was in him.

He hardly knew how – perhaps he was half drunk himself, maudlin – they were patting each other. “Old pal.” Maybe singing. Then they started to go to bed. Artie lost the toss for the lower, but refused to abide by the decision. He dived into Judd’s bunk, and Judd started to push Artie out; and then horsing around like that, wrestling, they lay extended together to catch their breath, and when it began Artie made no sign, pretending to be half-drunkenly half asleep. Then Artie laughingly muttered a few dirty names, and let it happen as if he were too drunk to know or care.

In the morning they said nothing about it. The Straus car was at the station for them, and they drove up to the terrific showplace the Strauses had on the bluff over the lake, a reproduction of a castle on the Rhine.

They had adjoining bedrooms.

“Junior,” Max called from the hallway, and Judd leaped up from the bed and went to the door, to be told about their going downtown. Then he forced himself to sit at his desk again and look at his law notes.

As he hung up the receiver after calling Judd, Artie experienced one of those dark surges of feeling, as if he could have sent a wave of death through the telephone and seen Judd stricken by it, paralysed, turned to stone. Electrocution by telephone. Himself, the master criminal. He’d call up his enemies, and then they would be found dead, telephone in hand.

He saw Judd, sitting like that. And picturing it, Artie felt a flash of comprehension: Judd wanted to be caught and executed. For if you left things around like that, the glasses, the typewriter, you wanted to get caught. Like the kind of girl that leaves hairpins all over the back seat.

So Judd was a terrible danger to him. Rage and grief shuddered through Artie. Why did that punk bastard have to go and spoil the whole thing! All the other things he had done by himself, were done without a trace. The last one in winter, the ice-cold night, the upturned coat collar covering the face, the tape-wound chisel in his pocket, hard against his hand, then the body falling off the pier into the lake. Had he done it, or only pictured it to himself?

That was the sad part of doing things all by yourself, on your own. You lost them. You really needed someone else to be in a thing with you so that the deed stayed alive between you.

Then all the little things he and Judd had done together, the fires and the thing at the frat house in Ann Arbour – all those things rose up in Artie and pleaded for Judd. Pleaded for dog-eyes Jocko. But Artie wasn’t sure. He would decide about Judd after they had got rid of the typewriter. Perhaps, if the feeling came over him… He put his automatic into his pocket.

Artie did not fail to call out good-bye to the family, flashing a charming smile at Mumsie’s guest. Then, though it was the wrong direction for Judd’s, he walked past the Kessler house.

In that house, were they getting any clues leading to him? Ah, let them follow him now! Instead of leading them to his accomplice, he would throw them off the track! And Artie turned up Hyde Park Boulevard, toward Myra’s. Let Judd sit waiting, worrying.

In the gilded lobby of the Flamingo there sat the usual two groups of little ladies in retirement, and Artie could sense the buzz among them as he passed toward the elevators: there goes the brilliant Straus boy, youngest university graduate, they were saying, and surely plotting about catching him for their nieces and granddaughters.

Myra’s mother herself opened the door, welcoming him, but with an air of confusion. “Why, Artie! Hello, Artie. It’s so nice to see you, but you know Myra’s just going out.”

Myra bubbled out from her room; she had not quite finished dressing, and was holding a sash for her beaded green frock. He and she always laughed as soon as they saw each other, a kind of guilty conspiratorial laugh, like the times as kids when they were almost caught playing doctor. Yet despite the laughter, Myra’s eyes were always melancholy, befitting a poetess, and she talked in breathless rushes of words, curiously like Artie.

Her date was a goof, she said, a football player. She had been roped in, but “When he is silent, I can imagine he is a Greek god. Oh, I want to have lots of lovers, like Edna St. Vincent Millay.”

While Myra rushed back to her room to find a poem she had just written, Mrs. Seligman managed to inquire conventionally about his family. How was his mother? How was his father’s blood pressure?

Fine, Artie said, everyone was fine, but Mumsie was rushing to Charlevoix tomorrow morning with little Billy, because of that terrible crime – wasn’t it a monstrous thing? And spying a huge box of candy, Artie poked his finger into one of the chocolates. “Aha! Liqueur!” he cried, sucking the finger, and then poking it down the entire row of candies while Mrs. Seligman giggled in horror – “Really, Artie!”

“He’s wacky!” Myra called. He walked into her room.

Myra thrust herself up against him and kissed him briefly, moving the tip of her tongue, and gyrating her abdomen to show she knew how to be wicked. She broke off and pulled back, looking at him intently with her huge brown eyes. “Is anything wrong, Artie?”

The girl made him impatient sometimes with her understanding looks. He said, “Nah, I just got the willies,” and she said he had to hear her new sonnet. “My Unfaithful Lover” was the title; Artie picked it up and read out loud. “I share my lover with the wingspread sail-”

She shared her lover with the sleet, the gale. He said it was swell.

They were, of course, not lovers. And yet she was in love with Artie; she had loved him since she was a little girl. They were remote relatives, fifty-eleventh cousins they called themselves, Myra always explaining, with a bubble of laughter, that anyone whose family owned Straus stocks was a cousin. Her father had been one of the founders.

She called Artie “lover”, as a kind of promise within herself that it would one day be he. She was sure she knew the Artie others didn’t know; she knew an Artie who was not always shining and being smart, but who was torn. This she cherished as a love secret. Artie was much deeper than he let on.

So now he said there was nothing wrong, he just was sick of the world, had a touch of the blues, and that reminded Myra of a terrific place she had heard about, downtown, where they had a wonderful blues singer. It was in a cellar on Wabash. Why not go there tomorrow?

He agreed; maybe they would make it a double date.

Myra groaned. Not Judd.

Well, he had sort of agreed to help Judd celebrate his Harvard exams tomorrow. Why did she always have to pick on Judd?

“Maybe I’m jealous.” Myra laughed without meaning anything. But she simply couldn’t see why he let that dreary drip hang around.

It was not a new argument. Especially if you went in a crowd, she said, Judd was so unlikable, with his conceited ideas, and his eyes that never blinked.

Aw, Artie told her, Judd was a brilliant little sonofabitch, and the reason he was so unpopular was that people knew they were inferior to him.

“I don’t care how brilliant he is, he gives me the creeps,” she said.

Well, Artie admitted, maybe he let Judd hang around so much partly out of pity because the guy had no friends.

The bell rang; it was her date. Artie grabbed the sash from Myra, and holding it around his waist, shimmied into the other room. Her mother had just opened the door, and Artie swayed toward the young man there, announcing, “I’m your date. Myra has just been kidnapped.”

“Don’t mind him. He’s my wacky cousin, just dropped in from Elgin,” Myra said, taking the sash, and then Artie solemnly declared that he was sorry he couldn’t join them on their date – he had an appointment to hijack a shipment from Canada. He gave her a passionate kiss in front of the young man and her mother. “Don’t drink any wood alcohol,” he admonished, whisking out of the apartment, laughing.

Why did he let Judd hang on to him? Her question resounded as he walked. Ever since the beginning, every piece of trouble had been on account of Judd, and now Dog Eyes had brought him to the edge of real danger.

Walking on Stony Island, purposely past the police station, Artie was now conducting the trial of Judd Steiner. All-powerful, in his hands was the life-or-death decision.

Take the second summer Judd came up to Charlevoix. They hadn’t seen each other much that year, because that was the year Artie had transferred to Ann Arbour. Morty Kornhauser, from the Ann Arbour chapter of Alpha Beta, was visiting him just then, too.

Sunday morning, Judd had to walk into Artie’s room through the connecting bathroom, to wake him up. They were going canoeing to an island where Artie knew a couple of girls – fishermen’s daughters. As Judd started pulling him out of bed, Artie made a playful grab, and then they were wrestling and fooling around.

And Morty had to walk in. Morty had a sneaky way of slipping around. Who the hell knew how much he had watched, before Judd finally noticed him standing there with his mouth open like at some goddam stag show?

Artie made the best of it and said, “Want to join the fun?” But that prig Morty said, “No, I don’t indulge, excuse me” – and walked out.

For a while they lay silent, except for that silly giggle Judd had. There was nothing to laugh about; Morty was the biggest tattler at the frat. Then, when they were putting on their trunks, Judd remarked, “Hey, didn’t that sonofabitch say he can’t swim? It might be dangerous for him in a canoe.”

Their eyes caught, and Judd let out his giggle. With three boys in a canoe, anything could happen.

They hurried down to breakfast, so as not to give Morty a chance to talk to anyone. Then, rather sullenly, he walked down with them to the boathouse.

When they were a good way out on the lake, Artie stood up, complaining, “For crissake, Judd, you don’t know your paddle from your asshole,” and Judd insulted him back and started a scuffle. Before Morty knew what was happening, they were all in the water.

They saw the bastard come up thrashing. He glared at them, and with his mouth full, sputtered, “…on purpose!” and then went under, thrashing. They swam away. But Judd looked back, treading water. Morty was flailing, but keeping his head up.

Artie saw it, too. The whole damn thing was Judd’s fault, he swore. He’d heard the bastard wrong. “I don’t swim” didn’t mean “I can’t swim”.

Morty came ashore some distance from them, and they hurried over to him solicitously. Panting, he gasped out. “You did it on purpose. I know, you filthy degenerates!” His eyes were narrow, meaningful.

When they told the story of the accidental overturning of the canoe, he was silent. And that night he discovered he had to cut his visit short and return to Lansing.

Then the bastard wrote his letters.

He sent them to their brothers. One to Max Steiner, and one to James Straus. They were neatly typed, sanctimonious letters – “unpleasant as the subject may be, I feel it is my duty” and “by chance came upon an exhibition of unmentionable character” and “not my place to give advice but perhaps you are unaware of-”

Brother James brought it up on the tennis court, just before starting to play. “Say, Artie, what was your friend so sore about when he left here, that Kornhauser kid?”

“Why? Has Morty been telling any stories?”

“Well, he wrote me a letter.”

“That stinking little crapper. Sure he was sore. We took about forty bucks away from him, shooting craps, up in my room, Saturday night, so he got mad and the little bastard even tried to suggest the dice were loaded-”

James had on his knowing smile.

“Is that what he wrote about?” Artie demanded.

“Oh, it was some junk about you and Judd.” In the look James gave him, everything was included. All the things James had covered up for him – the swiped things, the dose. But he wouldn’t spill this either; James had to imagine himself a real guy, protecting his kid brother. “It’s all a dirty lie!” Artie exclaimed. “Morty’s just a dirty trouble maker!”

James said, “Listen, Artie, this is for your own good. That Judd’s a freak. You know, funny. Maybe you fellows had better not be seen so much together. People make up all kinds of stories-”

“Why, that dirty-minded lousy – Why, for crissake I know what it is he made a story out of. Why, we were just horsing around.”

“You try to let Morty drown?” James asked coolly.

“Why, he fell out of the canoe. Why, that-” Their eyes met. Artie grinned.

It was lucky the letter hadn’t been sent to Lewis, because Lewis would have insisted it was a matter for Momsie and Popsie. But James didn’t like trouble. He liked a good time himself. And he couldn’t have already told anyone, or he wouldn’t be bringing it up like this. Christ, if the family knew about this one, it would be worse than that time with the car accident.

Artie took it easy with James, giving him the boyish wink, and letting him win the set.

But that was a mark against Judd, Artie told himself, turning down 49th Street toward Judd’s house and casting quick glances right and left.

Judd’s fault, that time with Morty. First, being such a damn fool as to start playing around, with the door unlocked. Hell, he himself didn’t get any special kick out of it, but he let Judd play around just for the hell of it. Judd was the one who started all that stuff. And then, once Morty had seen them and once they had got him out in the canoe, and when they saw he had tricked them about not being able to swim, they ought to have held the tattler’s head under water. If Judd hadn’t been so scared Morty would have been taken care of right there.

Instead, they had let him leave. So he not only had the story to tell of catching them fooling around, but, even worse, about their trying to drown him. Morty told everybody he saw that summer. Then, instead of coming back to the frat in the fall, he had to spend a year in Denver, with TB – the reason he didn’t exert himself swimming.

Even with Morty Kornhauser away from the frat, Judd should never have insisted on coming to Ann Arbour. That was another mistake to charge up against Judah Steiner, Jr. First he had to go and make a whole issue of it with his brother Max, who had received the same kind of dirty letter as James. Instead of simply gabbing his way out of it, Judd had to make an issue, declaring that just for that, the family had to show they trusted him by letting him go to Ann Arbour even though Artie was there.

And then another mistake. Mr. Judd Steiner had to insist he wanted to get into the frat! Morty heard about it and wrote one of his letters from Denver: to Al Goetz, president of the chapter. “Do you want to have a real pair of perverts, right in the house?”

The president took Artie aside for a man-to-man talk. Hell, it was so bad, Artie even had to get James to come up, casually, like for a football game, but to remind Al Goetz of a thing or two. And hell, Al finally admitted everybody knew Artie was okay – why, Artie helled around in the Detroit cat houses with the rest of the boys; they knew he was regular. As James said, he’d even caught a dose at fifteen. But after James was gone, Al told Artie, Why not face the facts? The thing wasn’t only because of Morty’s tales. Judd simply was not well liked, so why make an issue of getting him in?

At least – a point for the defence – Judd didn’t push it. He suddenly was against fraternities. He even made a Hebe question out of it. A principle.

The fact was, the Delts had taken him for a ride. For a couple of days he had the idea he was going to show up Alpha Beta by getting into a real gentile fraternity. Some Delt had made the mistake of inviting Judd over because of his being a genius prodigy and a millionaire too. But then they dropped him cold, and Judd suddenly made a principle out of it. He was against the idea of Jewish frats and non-Jewish frats. Being a Jew was simply an accident of birth. So now he was anti-fraternity. He would never join a Hebe frat either, on principle. Moreover, frat men were all a bunch of rubber stamps, Judd declared. They would come out a bunch of Babbitts. He would drop over to the house and spout this stuff, and some of the fellows would laugh, but a lot of them didn’t like it. They started telling Artie to keep his friend away from the place. On account of Judd he’d almost become unpopular.

Artie walked a little faster. He thought of an idea that suddenly made him feel bubbly, even gay. He would go in through the basement and up the back stairs. He would give Dog Eyes the scare of his life.

Judd was sitting erect, unable to study. He detested being at the mercy of a physical need. It seemed never to leave him. Others didn’t have it so bad. Artie didn’t have it so bad. Those two years at Ann Arbour, near Artie, had nearly driven him crazy.

None of the coeds would put it out. The cat houses weren’t enough. He had to have it all the time – oversexed, he guessed.

And that was the time when the image of Artie began to get in the way. Even when he was with a girl. Inside himself he would be saying to a drunken, laughing Artie, “You goddam whore! You goddam whore!” Whoever she was, he would make her into Artie, and he would be tearing in a rage at his own bondage, at having to have it, at the flesh being stronger than the intellect.

The times he had waited, in agony like tonight, always waiting for that capricious bastard – “See you at nine” – and you’d wait, getting more and more excited, imagining what you would do to him as soon as he came in.

Then, like some damn girl, Artie would behave as if the two of you had never done it at all, as if an idea like that never entered his thoughts.

The house was safe now. If only Artie would show up, they could be alone to themselves in the house, in this room. For two hours, even longer, without the worry of someone walking in.

Artie was already late. You could never be sure with Artie. But under Judd’s fretful impatience there was an almost gratified feeling. Artie, superior, should acknowledge no convention of punctuality.

Judd touched the typewriter. He felt a dreadful reluctance to part with it, to destroy it. It was the one thing he had kept from all they had done together; it was like a token of their pact. Perhaps instead of getting rid of it, they could hide it somewhere?

Judd had an impulse, tender and tragic, to write a farewell note on the machine, a lone confession, taking all the blame. He could mail the note and then disappear. They would recognize the typing. If one could vanish, truly vanish, dissolving into nothingness as though never even born! Would Artie feel regret, appreciate what he had done?

For, caught or not, Judd had a heavy presentiment that it was over now between Artie and himself. And parting with this machine would be like closing the circle.

The night they had got the typewriter was the night they had made their pact. Only last fall. Both of them were back living in Chicago. A bunch of Artie’s frat brothers from his old Ann Arbour chapter had come down for the football game. And Artie had got into their pool on the Big Ten. Then after getting back to Ann Arbour they had ruled him out. He claimed he was the winner. Was he burned! He’d show those bastards! And suddenly the inspiration struck him. “Hey, Jock, we’ll drive up there and clean out the whole frigging house!”

They could do it the following Saturday. Leave at midnight, three hours of travel, twenty minutes for the job, home by daylight. If anybody wondered where they had been, they’d had a big Saturday night and wound up on 22nd Street, and boys will be boys!

In Artie’s room, they had plotted it. A lazy November late afternoon, with Judd stretched out on Artie’s bed – one of those afternoons when he felt his energy ebbed, when he didn’t want to go anywhere, do anything. And Artie, relaxed in his Morris chair, his face in a desk-light glow, the petulant lips full-blown in his anger at the frat – in that moment Artie was Dorian Gray.

And as though recognizing a new closeness, in his anger at the lousy bunch up there in Ann Arbour, Artie suddenly offered, “Hey, you want to see something?” Artie went to his closet. There, under a jumble of junk, which he swept aside, was a treasure trunk that Artie had from when he was a kid. Opening it, he dug beneath a cowboy suit and broken toy guns. Underneath was his loot.

Not merely from the Five and Ten. That dime-store game of Artie’s wasn’t much of a secret. You walked through a crowded store with Artie, and he lifted items off the counters. Or at a party Artie would whisper, “Watch this!” and lift a wallet from the pocket of some half-crocked idiot.

But here in the closet as they knelt down close together, Artie let Judd finger the wallets, emptied now, and some women’s purses, too. Dozens. The trunk bottom was covered with loot.

To no one else, Judd felt, had Artie ever revealed this secret.

That was when Artie made the plan for cleaning out the frat house in Ann Arbour.

That day, Judd felt their intimacy sealed as never before. What his Dorian was revealing to him might be interpreted by the superficial as a mild kleptomania. But these trophies were, instead, tokens of a laughing superiority to the little rules of little men. An adroit theft was like a daring insult. It would be their retort to the whole frigging frat, for everything!

And to do it was to do something real. This Saturday would be the real thing, Artie said. With real guns. Judd could take Max’s. Artie knew where it was kept, in Max’s desk. And Artie let Judd handle his own, an automatic.

Saturday would be a cinch, because the big game was in Ann Arbour. Win or lose, the brothers would be stewed and dead to the world. Even if they heard anybody moving around the house, they’d think some guys had gone to a cat house and were pulling in late, or merely that someone was going to the can. And when they woke up in the morning -! Artie only wished he were still living in the house, so he could watch the hullabaloo and the guys accusing each other!

Whispering, kneeling in the closet, they made the plans.

On Saturday, Artie came over. While Artie stood in the hall, lighting a cigarette, Judd walked into Max’s room and put Max’s pistol into his pocket, feeling a little silly, and yet somewhat scared. Because he was sure Artie would go the limit if anybody tried to interfere. And Artie was right; if you were extending your sphere of experience into this kind of deed, then you did the deed in its own terms, all the way.

There came a quick vision of himself and Artie, pistols out, backing down a hallway as they held off a crowd of men, of himself holding them at bay while Artie ran to the car…

“Let’s go!” Artie snapped, and when they got into the Stutz, Artie fished in his pocket, pulled out two black silk handkerchiefs, and gave one to Judd.

On the way, they didn’t talk much of the adventure. Instead, Judd brought up the subject of New Year. Judd was anxious about New Year’s Eve. Willie Weiss had dropped a remark that he and Artie would be double-dating, Artie dragging Myra. Judd couldn’t believe it. That Artie would leave him out of New Year. Perhaps Willie Weiss had been needling him. So now Judd proposed his own idea, for Artie and himself, just the two of them. Instead of loading themselves down with girls, they could go out on the town, crash one party after another. Artie said sure, that’s what they would do. The two of them. No sense getting tied up with broads. New Year was the best time to pick up new gash.

It was then, on that ride in the November night, that Judd experienced the sense of the two of them in their unity apart from the world. A light snow began to fall, and traffic died away until theirs was the only car on a long stretch of road.

Then the thought came to Judd that at this moment no one in the whole world, only he, knew where Artie was. The night was between them alone. If something should happen right now, an auto accident, and they should be killed together, then their folks might wonder what were they doing way out here. If someone, even Myra, should want Artie right now, she wouldn’t have the ghost of an idea where to look.

He glanced at Artie, who was unusually silent, and saw that Artie had passed out, in the way he sometimes did, his mouth hanging a bit open. And a thrill of happiness went through Judd, to be riding like this as though he were carrying Artie with him into infinity.

Their adventure would be a continuation of their separation from the world. For in the theft tonight, in the masked silence of it, they would be even more as they were now, united in space and time, enclosed in an action that no one else might know of, no one else might ever share.

It was as though for this length of time they indeed escaped the world and inhabited their private universe together.

A thought intruded. Judd found himself wondering whether this was what happened between men and women when they were in love. Was this the secret feeling of a honeymoon? Would he ever repeat some feeling of this kind with a girl? He could not imagine it with any girl he had met.

As they drove into the outskirts of Ann Arbour, Artie woke. The timing so far was perfect. It was exactly three o’clock, and the streets were still; only an occasional car passed silently on the snow. Judd parked in an alleyway close to the Alpha Beta house.

“Come on, tie it!” Artie turned his head for Judd to knot the black handkerchief. All alive now, alert. “If we get into trouble, give it to them!” The revolvers were against their hands, in their pockets.

They walked up the front stairs. Artie still had his key, but the door was open. Judd followed, across the living room and up to the second floor. They could hear snores. His eyes were adjusted now; he could make out the walls, the door spaces, Artie’s form, his beckoning arm.

Now Artie used his trick fountain-pen flashlight, the beam pointed to the floor. They entered Morty Kornhauser’s room first. The snitching sonofabitch was back from Denver. He and his room mate lay on their beds, dead to the world.

Judd’s fright was almost paralysing, but greater than his fright was a pride. He was mastering his fear.

Artie picked up Morty’s pants and went through the pockets. Judd went for the other fellow’s clothes, found the wallet, a watch. Artie seized them from his hands, indicating Judd was only to act as guard.

After his first shock of resentment, Judd put down the clothes. Just then, he saw the portable typewriter, in its case by Morty’s bed. Artie was already moving out of the room. Judd picked up the typewriter. Teach that snitch to write letters.

In the hall, Artie muttered, “For crissake. Loading us down with junk!” Judd set the typewriter near the stairs, to be picked up later.

They went through several rooms. In one, the guys were away. Home week-enders, Artie said. He prowled through their drawers at ease, finding a pair of gold cuff links, a fancy fountain-pen set, even stopping to read a love letter.

“C’mon!” Judd whispered urgently, but Artie lingered over the letter. Somewhere a door opened. Artie stepped quickly into a closet. They heard a guy shuffling to the bathroom, heard the plumbing, Judd all the while feeling murderously angry at Artie.

The guy was back in bed. “Let’s get the hell out of here!” Judd said. At last they were in the corridor. What if the guy had seen the typewriter, even stumbled over it! “You frigging boob!” Artie snapped. But Judd picked up the machine.

As they got into the car, Artie let out a big laugh. They pounded each other. Success! Artie began to flip open the wallets. “Wait! Jesus, not here!” Judd pulled out and down the block. The plan had been to do another house, too, and for his turn Judd had picked the Delts.

It was nearly four o’clock – some furnace tender might begin to stir. But Artie was lit up, excited. Judd didn’t want to seem a coward. Besides, he owed it to the snotty Delts. Jews and dogs not allowed!

The door was unlocked there, too. Yet it seemed somehow more dangerous; robbing from gentiles was real.

Even while they were on the stairs, they heard a light switch snap on in one of the bedrooms. Judd turned and hurried back downstairs. He tangled with something, a lamp cord; he managed to catch the lamp before it fell, but it made a noise.

“I’ll kill you!” Artie snapped. They stood stock still in the hall. On the table lay some books, a camera. Artie picked up the camera. Things had become quiet upstairs. Artie started for the stairs again, but Judd held still. “You nuts?” he hissed. Towering over him black-masked in the dim hallway, his partner gave Judd a fleeting, shuddery, delicious thrill of suffocation, of death. “Somebody’s up,” Judd muttered. Artie growled, “You stink, you punk,” and pushed him out of the door. “Christ, that’s the last time I take you anywhere!”

“There was someone awake. We’d have been caught, sure,” Judd objected.

Artie grabbed the wheel, and the car leaped away. “Take it easy,” Judd begged. What a time for a smash-up, with all the stuff on them.

Suddenly Artie let out a wonderful laugh as he toyed with his pistol. “Morty! The way he was laying there, you could have stuck a rod up his ass, he’d never wake up!”

Judd had to laugh at the picture. He reached for his flask, opened it. Artie grabbed it from his hand, took the first swig, and in that moment Judd felt young, young, crazily happy; he felt the way a guy should feel!

Artie pulled into a side road to examine the haul. One of the wallets had a twenty-dollar bill in it. “The lying sonofabitch!” Artie complained. “He brags he always carries a fifty.” Altogether, there was nearly a hundred dollars. Saturday night. They should have figured the guys would have been out spending. As for the rest of the haul, several pretty hot-looking stickpins, cuff links, a couple of good watches, along with several cheap turnips. And the typewriter, Judd reminded Artie.

“That stupid piece of junk!” Artie burst out. “If you try to sell it, that’s just the kind of swag they can trace by the numbers on it.”

“Why should I sell it?” Judd said. He could use it.

Keep it? That made Artie decide he had a share in it, too. Judd flared. “You never even wanted to take it!” They screamed at each other. Artie drove a hard bargain. He’d keep the best of the gold watches.

“Keep them all!” Judd cried bitterly. “If that’s all it means to you.”

Artie called him a stinking punk amateur. If not for his backing out, they’d have cleaned the second place, too! Hell, Judd had no right to any of the swag; the Delt house was for him and he had screwed it up. Screeching, grabbing for the stuff, they scuffled, and then suddenly Artie started laughing and Judd too.

The atmosphere remained that way between them, swaying from playfulness to brawling. Artie was finishing the flask. Judd cried, “Save me some, you sonofabitch!”

Artie started the car, pulled onto the road. “You bastard,” he said, “if we’d have cleaned out the Delts, we’d be in clover.” Suddenly Judd had fallen into silence, moody. He hadn’t wanted Artie to start the car just then. And he hated to have Artie drive his car. Artie began a kind of act. “Listen, Mac, next time we go out, you do the way Charley says, or I get me another partner.”

Judd took it up. “For crissake, Charley, if not for me, you’d have got us both pinched. I saved you from getting caught.”

“Yeah? Mac, I pulled plenty of stuff and I never got caught. You’re just so goddam green you’re scared of your own shadow.”

Judd seized the flask. There was still some left.

“You didn’t even get a kick out of it!” – Artie was getting querulous again – “that’s why you wanted to stop.”

“Well, not the same kind of kick you get,” Judd said. “To me, it’s more of a stimulant than a gratification.”

Artie might not have heard. “I think I’ll get me a goddam date for New Year’s Eve,” he said. “You’re just a wet blanket.”

Judd drew in his breath. He must remain in full control of himself now; everything depended on it. Artie was teasing, that was all. Teasing. “New Year would be a hell of a night for a haul,” he observed.

Artie gave him a sidewise glance. Maybe he’d let Mac in on some more jobs; maybe they could pull some real stuff together instead of chickenshit. Only Mac had to know who was boss.

“Well,” Judd said quietly, “Mac, if I do what you want, you’ve got to do what I want. That’s equitable.”

Artie turned his face to him, this time, and there was the Dorian smile. “You want to make that a deal?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, we could make it a kind of a deal.”

Their eyes held together, in the bargaining. Judd felt himself almost unbearably quickening.

And then, in that same instant, a blur crossed the corner of his vision, something on the road in front of them; they were going through a small town, a figure was crossing the street. Judd cried out, and jerked the wheel from Artie. The car slid around the bundled figure – some goddam drunk; the car skidded, wavered. Artie gave Judd a terrible shove with his elbow, and somehow managed to put the car under control. “You goddam stupid sonofabitch, what did you do that for?”

“You didn’t see him! You’d have run him down!”

“I saw him.”

Artie was dead serious, sober, cool.

“You could have killed him.”

“So what? Who’d have known?”

Judd was silent. His mind worked around Artie’s words. Artie could do things, say things, flashing in an instantaneous reaction understanding, that he, Judd, had to attain in several steps of thinking. It was true again – by everything his intellect accepted, Artie was right. And yet he felt as though he had made some great, shivery effort, dragging himself up to a peak, an icy peak, alongside his friend.

“How about it, Mac? You want to make the deal?” Artie said, and the teasing note was there, just an edge of it.

“If we’re agreed on the terms,” Judd managed, quietly.

“Yah. But Charley’s the boss. What he says, you do. Life or death.”

Judd nodded. Yes. In any action, one had to be the master. And the slave, a slave.

Artie accelerated. The car swayed but held on the slippery road.

But not a slave to grovel. A slave of sure reward, the golden slave, his sword protecting his master, his beloved master, of long ivory limbs.

“Only, not for kid stuff,” Judd stipulated. “I don’t have to obey if it’s crap.”

Artie laughed at his apprehensiveness. “No, this is for real stuff.”

“Any crap, Mac has a right to refuse.”

“Wait a minute, Mac. If you start refusing every time I get a hot idea, what the hell.”

They defined it. Only things that might make Judd look ridiculous could be challenged. But if once he refused to go through with a serious thing, then they’d be finished. Artie would get someone else.

“But Mac has a right to question an order,” Judd insisted.

“Okay. But Charley has the last word. If Charley says so, it’s so.”

It hung between them for a moment. “Hey, Jocko, let’s make that the signal,” Artie said. “When I say ‘Charley says so’, that means no more questioning. ‘Charley says so’, you’ve got to do it, no comeback.”

It was like handing over his life. A fluttering elation went through Judd. “Okay, Dorian,” he said. They squeezed some last drops from the flask. Judd heard something like a giggle coming out of himself, the high girlish giggle he used to have when a kid. And just then the car skidded. It whirled completely around and landed in a ditch.

Judd sat rigid for a moment, but Artie lay back, laughing. Then Judd got out and walked around the car. They had been lucky; the ditch was quite shallow. He could pull out, he felt sure.

He came around to Artie’s side. The laughter had stopped. Artie’s head was against the back of the seat; his eyes were closed.

“Move over. I’ll drive.”

Artie swayed over, limp and warm-feeling in his racoon coat. Judd slipped in and closed the door.

It was one of those times when you couldn’t tell if Artie had really passed out or was only letting things happen. The deal.

In Michigan City, a diner was open. Artie, in high spirits, gabbed of the stunts they could pull off, now and then letting a word like “hi-jack” escape loud enough for the waitress to hear. There was Ned White’s house in Riverside. His folks had a cellar full of the best stuff straight from Canada. A couple of cases would be worth a couple of centuries. Maybe they could let Ned in on the job. No, Judd objected, Ned was a pet hate of his – a bore. Okay, Artie had a better idea: let Ned in on the job and then plug him. He was a snot anyway.

Then they started on pet hates, who shouldn’t be allowed to exist. They took turns naming candidates, beginning with Morty Kornhauser. And the blackballing president of the chapter, Al Goetz – Artie said they ought to shoot his balls off. And they named a prof or two, and William Jennings Bryan. And how about including females, Judd said, the old bitch who had spoiled his all-A average with her B in Medieval History. Sure, Artie said, and his own bitch of a governess, Miss Nuisance, he had always wanted to kidnap and torture her, “Cut her tits off!” Judd said. And it was like splashing, splashing, and he was tittering, and Artie said in a solemn voice, “Kidnapping, that’s the thing to do – pull off a snatch. That would be the real trick, a snatch for a big wad.”

“How about Myra?” Judd suggested, seeing the German soldiers, the French girl dragged by the hair. “And rape her for the hell of it.”

“Rape?” Artie laughed suggestively. “She’d beat you to it.” Then serious again: “A boy is better. A kid.”

And suddenly now in his room, as Judd sat waiting, his blood pounding with the exciting remembered images, the lights snapped on and a rough voice demanded, “Okay, Steiner, where’s that typewriter?”

He didn’t show, he knew he hadn’t shown, the leap in him. Yet it had been a dreadful leap of fear, before he told himself it was Artie.

Judd said, “What took you so long, you sonofabitch?”

Artie said that Myra had called just as he was leaving – she was alone, so he had to stop by and give her one. A man had to keep his girl serviced. He was in high humour. “Boy, you should have been at the house for dinner!” He told of his mother discussing the big murder. “The murderer ought to be tarred and feathered and then strung up, she said! I nearly stood up and announced, ‘Mater, I cannot tell a lie, it was me!’”

“Why didn’t you?” Judd said, his voice soft, Artie’s nearness almost uncontainable to him. “They wouldn’t believe you anyway.”

“Hey, how about if I try it? Confess to the cops!” Artie bet that was what Steger was doing right now! His words tumbled on. He’d met that punk reporter, Sid Silver. “Boy, did I fill him with crap about Steger.” And Sid had told him about the third degree, the tricks the cops used so as to leave no marks.

As Artie talked, he picked up the typewriter. “Let’s get rid of this goddam evidence.” He began to twist at the keys. “Hey, got a pliers or something?” Judd had a pair in his desk, but the keys were springy, his fingers got nipped, and he squealed. He never could stand physical pain. Artie laughed. “My God, you’re bawling!”

It was more than Judd could endure. After the way he had worked himself up with all that waiting, and now Artie was throwing the typewriter on the floor, jumping on it. “Cut it out! You want the goddam maid in here?”

It was odd how the machine seemed indestructible. “We better throw it in the lake,” Artie said. “This won’t come up and float.”

“Okay.” Judd put the cover on the machine. And in that instant he remembered the robe, the bloody robe, hastily thrown into the bushes last night, after burning the kid’s clothing in the furnace. How could they have been so stupid! And in that moment the first ghastly doubt of their cleverness spread through Judd. The spectacles could have been an accident. But the bloody robe lying in the open all day, with the neighbourhood filled with police! Then, if they weren’t really so clever, if they weren’t really superior – if they were just anybodies, where was their right to do what they had done?

It was a misty night, the sky almost milky, the air awesomely silent. They drove rapidly to Artie’s. Judd told himself that if the robe were still there it would be a sign that they’d get away with the whole thing.

The robe lay, a dark clod under the bush.

They drove into the park. Along the lake the cars stood, each with its mingled shape of lovers. Judd circled the old World’s Fair building. Behind the building was a little bridge over the lagoon. They parked the car, and walked out together, Judd carrying the typewriter. Not a soul around. No lovebirds, even.

They stood on the little bridge. He could feel Artie leaning beside him. In daylight you could see the bottom through the shallow water. “Hell, it’ll sink in the mud,” Artie said. He took the machine from Judd and was about to drop it.

“It’ll splash,” Judd warned. Suppose some damn cop happened to be attracted by the sound.

“Drowning kittens, sir,” Artie said. “This is where I always drown my kittens.” He let the machine fall. The plop was small.

They were almost free now of every thread to the thing. There was only the robe. It might float. Best to burn it somewhere, drive out where there’d be nobody around. Maybe the dunes.

Going south, they passed the marker where they should have caught the ransom only that afternoon. The building loomed vague in the mist. Artie slumped in his seat, subdued. Judd came to a turn: leftward led to the lake; right, to the Hegewisch swamp. And he felt Artie beside him blaming him, and he felt it was true, something in himself had betrayed them. Why had he insisted so on the swamp, when Artie would have chosen the lake? Why had it had to be that one place, the cistern under the tracks?

He drove on a side road the short distance to the lake. The mist has lifted a little; you could see a few stars, and the flame licks from the steel-mill furnaces.

There was a stretch of crummy beach here, littered with cinders and junk. They were in luck: the area was deserted. Artie lugged the robe, a huge dark wad under his arm. Judd gathered some pieces of wood and tried to build a fire.

“You’re a hell of a Boy Scout,” Artie said, and arranged the sticks in tepee form, so they would burn. Then they put the robe into the fire. Smudge and smoke arose; the flames were almost smothered “Hell, we should have brought some kerosene. This’ll take all night,” Artie said.

If the fire would only burn off the blood, they could leave the charred rag. Artie lay down on the cindery sand, limp, as though suddenly pooped of everything, the way he was sometimes, limp, passive. Momentarily Judd felt the stronger, felt better about everything.

Now at last everything was in the clear. The robe was burning, and even if found, who should ever imagine the boy’s body had been held in it? To all things material, he was superior. He was a mind. Why had he wept and been scared yesterday at the moment of the blow? Judd wanted now to say something to Artie, to say he hadn’t really been himself, to say he was recovered now, was beyond that kind of weakness.

“Hey, Mac,” Artie murmured. “All we need is some wieners, huh, and we could have a wienie roast.”

“Yah, Charley,” Judd said. He never was sure with Artie. Even after a couple of years. He lay down alongside, his face toward the fire.

Now and now was the culmination, the completion of their deed, the fulfilment of the compact. Now, now he felt released of fear. He would never be caught, for he was strength itself. The lake, the blackened sand, the stars, the long close body of his friend, the fire-tipped chimneys, and the power in himself – the dark power growing toward release, eruption, the bad stuff, the dark evil clot in him pushing like a ball of fire in the huge tall chimney, wildly flaming out.

I had two morning classes, and all through them I kept trying to think of some way to stay on the big story. But when I made my routine call, Reese said it himself. “See if Tom needs you over at the inquest.” A reward for my work of yesterday. From the morning papers I learned the inquest would be held at two o’clock, and I started for the frat house, to lunch there. It was raining, I was half running, soaked, and just as I reached the house Tom Daly called to me, coming up the street. He’d come looking for me, any place to get in out of the rain. The story was up against a stone wall. He had been to the Kesslers, to the police – hell, a man couldn’t even get a drink around here in the morning.

I said I could probably find him a drink in the house. We had not even shaken the rain from our hats before Artie Straus was up from a chair, holding an early Globe. “Anything new on the story?” he asked me. “Did you give them all that stuff about Steger? I gave you lots of stuff they haven’t got in here.”

I introduced him to Tom, and he became even more excited. Sure, he’d rustle up a drink. What about going out on the story with us? “Listen, I bet I can get you another scoop!” Artie said.

“Artie, the Boy Detective!” Milt Lewis kidded. “Now’s your chance.”

Hell, Artie said, just from the papers he could see there were lots of things that hadn’t been tried. There was the drugstore on 63rd Street, where the father was supposed to go with the ransom, only he forgot the address. How about tracking down that drugstore?

“You think the killer is still standing there waiting?” Milt jeered.

“The killers would never have been there!” Artie said excitedly. “That shows how much you know. The way they’d do it, it would be a relay. The father would get another call in the store, to relay him to the next spot-”

“Well then what use would it be to find the store?” Milt asked.

“For crissake, you never know; it could be a clue.”

“Jesus, it’s raining cats and dogs,” Tom complained.

“Come on. I’ve got a car. I bet we find it!” Artie said. “All we have to do is check drugstores on 63rd Street. Ask them if anybody phoned yesterday for Mr. Kessler.”

Tom and I followed him out to his car. Artie drove along 63rd, talking about the crime the whole time.

Tom asked, “You knew this kid pretty well?”

“Sure. Like my own kid brother.”

“What was he like?”

“A cocky little bastard,” Artie said. “Christ, if you were looking for a kid to kidnap, that’s just the kind of cocky little sonofabitch you’d pick.”

We were both struck dumb. Artie resumed. “I mean, why crap around, that’s the straight dope. It might help you to find the murderer.”

Tom pursued it. Who, for instance? Did his little brother have any ideas? Who could be sore enough at a kid to do a thing like that!

“I’ll ask Billy,” Artie promised.

As 63rd Street was miles long, it seemed a crazy chase, but Artie said he bet the criminal would have chosen a store in the busiest part of the street, somewhere east of Cottage. He parked in the middle of a block; there was a drugstore on each end. “Let’s divvy up,” he said.

Tom and I ran for one of the stores, and Artie toward the other. We told the druggist we were from the Globe on the kidnapping murder. He kept shaking his head. As we left the store, Artie came hurrying from the other end of the block. “Nothing doing,” he said. “Let’s try some more.”

That way we worked up the street. After a dozen stores, Tom said the hell with it – even if we found the store it would be meaningless. “Hell of a newspaperman you are!” Artie laughed. “Persistence is the only way in a case of this kind.”

“Fine,” Tom said, “that’s the spirit.” Artie and I could persist and he would wait in the car. We parked again, at Blackstone. There was only one store, and Artie and I made the dash. A Negro was behind the fountain. Artie headed for him while I approached the druggist. As soon as I uttered the name Kessler, the druggist’s face broke into a gasp. “Why, yes, yes, I never made the connection in my mind-”

At the same moment Artie was yelling triumphantly, “It’s here!”

Later on, we could ask ourselves whether it was a compulsion to bring down punishment on himself that drove Artie to reach closer and closer to the fire; for if Judd had been the one to leave a trail of clues during the crime, it was Artie who persisted in the days immediately afterward in taunting fate, pushing in among us, the reporters, and even among the police, like some perversely teasing, transgressing child, being bad and being bad until he brings the slap of anger down upon himself.

The fountain man and Mr. Hartmann told how they had answered the calls, about ten minutes apart, from a man asking for a Mr. Kessler. “He said look around and make sure,” the Negro recalled, “so I even yelled out in the store. Then I told him there was nobody of that name.”

“The nearest booth to the door,” the ransom letter instructed; now Artie went and stood in the booth, as though it might contain the presence of the criminal. “He must have come in here at some time, to copy down the number of this phone,” Mr. Hartmann said.

Artie even lifted the receiver and tried on a wild chance to trace yesterday’s calls. What was the man’s voice like? he demanded of Hartmann. “Any accent? Did he use good English?”

“You’d make a better reporter than I am!” I told him.

“Aren’t you going to call your paper?” he urged. “See! I told you I’d get you a scoop!”

I said Tom should make the call, and Artie ran ahead of me to Tom, waving his arms, yelling, “We found it!”

Our paper made much of the feat, crowing that the first tangible scent of the criminal had been picked up by the same Globe reporter who had identified the victim. It was a small thing to hail as a triumph, but there was no real news. The city seemed to stand transfixed by the murder. The case had seized the public imagination as a crime beyond other crimes. Perhaps it was because of the wealth of the boy’s family. But perhaps, I was to think as the story developed, because by some uncanny process people sensed from the beginning that this crime had meanings that would project far into our time.

We drove back to the campus. We ought to have him stick with us on the story, Artie insisted. He’d get us scoop after scoop!

On Woodlawn, spotting the red Stutz, he began to honk madly. “It’s Judd Steiner. You must know him,” he said to me. “Those clucks just had their Harvard Law entrance exam.” Artie pulled alongside. “Hey, Jock! I just got a scoop for the Globe! I found the kidnapper’s drugstore. How’d you come out?”

Judd quietly said he came out okay, it wasn’t a tough exam at all, and asked, “What was that? What drugstore?”

Artie explained how he was on the trail of the Kessler kidnappers, and in the same breath said, “Hey, Judd, you ought to celebrate. How about going out tonight?” He and a hot date were going to the Four Deuces, Artie said, and Judd should come along. Then turning to me: “Hey, drag a frail, we’ll make it a real party! Bring that babe of yours, Ruthie.”

Judd was trying to say something, but Artie called out, “I’m driving them to the inquest!” and zoomed off with us.

Paulie’s body had been moved to an undertaking parlour on Cottage Grove, a refined place with electric candelabra spaced along the walls. “This beats Balaban and Katz,” Artie whispered, yet with a proper note of commiseration under his remark. In a few moments he had crowded in among the police, among the reporters; he had gathered the arguments of the chief of detectives, who swore he would round up every known pervert in town, and he had caught the remarks of the chief of police, who maintained it was obviously a straight ransom job – there was no proof of perversion at all.

I was getting a little tired of Artie, his pitch of excitement was exhausting, and I felt relieved when his friend Judd suddenly appeared, pulling Artie aside. Presently Artie called to me, “See you tonight,” and they were gone.

The inquest itself only added to the uncertainty and hysteria. There were the identifications of the corpse by the uncle and the father, both of them controlled, unexpressive. There was the Polish workman who had found the body; he told nothing new. Then, importantly, his lips pursed over each statement, came Dr. Kruger to give the cause of death. Not the blows on the head, he declared, but suffocation. The tongue was swollen, and the throat. No marks of strangling. Suffocation. Perhaps from a gag. Death had occurred before nine o’clock. Previously, the victim had been subjected to an attack.

The word resounded. It was official now. A degenerate!

But immediately after Dr. Kruger, walking up hurriedly as if to correct a mistake, blurting his words before the questions could be asked, came a chemist, Dr. Haroutian, who had analysed the organs. There was no evidence of an attack, none at all, he declared.

Dr. Kruger leaped up, shouting. He had seen the body and if that wasn’t an attack -!

They began arguing about sphincters and muscle tension; it was too sad, too gruesome, and yet it seemed bitterly necessary to know just how, exactly how bestially some human had behaved. And as the argument grew, those who believed in the perversion became violently insistent, as though to exclude the evil of degeneracy would be virtually to condone the crime.

Both opinions had finally to be left in the record. Presently the inquest was over, and all of us, the reporters, were surging around the public officials, as though some extra word could settle what had happened to that poor boy on his way to his death.

With Harry Dawes of the Post, Tom and I traded details of our drugstore scoop in exchange for his story of a kid on Ellis Avenue who claimed he had seen Paulie get into a Winton car, a grey Winton.

But after we had phoned in and were sitting at a sandwich counter, Tom said it was clear that nobody knew a damn thing – we had done pretty well by ourselves so far; we would go off and work on our own. He kept speculating about the place itself, Hegewisch. All the kids who went to Twain had some time been out to that place. True, the science teachers who conducted the excursions had been cleared; they had airtight alibis. Still, by going out there we might get an idea.

It was a dreary nothing of an area, half swamp, half prairie, stretching from where the city left off, from streets of scattered frame cottages, out a few miles to where factory buildings began – steel mills and oil refineries. In walking over the ground, we first fully realized how far it was from where a car could park to where the body had been found. Had the boy walked? Willingly? Was it with someone he knew, who promised to show him something? Or had he been carried, already dead? Carried all this distance? And why, particularly, to be hidden in that culvert? We stood staring at the open cement pipe.

It seemed a haphazard choice, a wild, crazed choice, and yet there arose in me the tantalizing feeling of something unresolved that one experiences sometimes in the presence of the seemingly irrational. We speculated. Could the criminal be some poor local inhabitant who had picked up an acquaintance with the rich kids coming for their nature studies? Did people hang out here for anything? Fishing?

Strange how naked the area was only two days after the murder. Not even a policeman. But what would a cop be watching for, we kidded each other – the murderer’s return?

We decided to go back to the local police station. The captain himself, named Cleary, talked to us.

Well, he said, in summer kids went swimming there, and some guys went fishing, some of the Polacks, just for bluefish, and there was even a little rabbit hunting, but these Polacks around here were hard-working mill hands. Hell, in the first place none of them could even write a letter like that ransom letter.

Tom asked if there were any other teachers, besides those from the Twain School, who brought classes out there. Cleary said he didn’t know much about that; in fact, the prairie was officially outside his territory – it was state land, and the Forest Preserves had charge of it.

After we left, as it turned out, Captain Cleary telephoned a Forest Preserve guardian. He only wanted to protect himself. Captain Cleary asked the Forest Preserve man if he knew of any natural-history teachers, or specimen collectors, or anything like that, hanging around the Hegewisch wilds. And he got an answer. There was some bunch went out there on Sundays sometimes, Warden Gastony said; some lad brought them out there – he had his name down because the lad had a gun permit for shooting specimens. A millionaire’s kid by the name of Steiner – Judah Steiner, Jr., a real studious boy. Young Steiner would know what classes went out there.

Captain Cleary made a note of the name.

Coming home from the visit to Hegewisch, I saw Artie, driving along my street as though he had been lying in wait for me. He hailed me, waving a Globe, with our scoop about the drugstore. And he reminded me of out date.

I had really intended to forget about it; I always felt ill at ease when going out with rich guys, always felt they might suddenly drag the party to some place expensive. But now there was no getting out of it; Artie said he had run into Ruth on campus and told her.

Just when I was ready for the date, a call came from Tom. He was at the Bureau. A suicide had been found, at least a dead man, off the Oak Street Beach. And a typewritten letter had come to the police, confessing to the crime and saying, “When you get this I will be a dead man. I am very sorry I did this inhuman piece of work.” It was signed, “A Sorry Man.” Chief Nolan believed the note had been written on the ransom-note typewriter, and an expert was checking it. Tom was staying with the story at the Bureau, and if I wanted, I could go out to the suicide’s address; it was on West Madison. Sounded like a flophouse.

I called Artie, catching him at home. Perhaps he could pick up Ruth, and I would meet them later. Artie became intensely excited over the new clue. Sure, sure, he’d pick up Ruth; in fact, Judd didn’t have a date, so Judd could take care of Ruth for me. Why not let Judd pick up the girls, and he, Artie, would drive me over to West Madison Street on my story?

But I had had enough of Artie’s jittery intensity. I said he had better go fetch Ruth since she didn’t know Judd. Then I called her and joked about how this was what it would be like to be married to a newspaperman.

It was indeed a flophouse on West Madison. The manager, elderly and tired of everything, said, Nah, this John Doe had flopped there for a few days – nobody knew anything about him; there were no possessions. The cops had taken a couple of rags of shirts he had had there in a bag. As for his being the kidnapper, the murderer, “Hell, how could that bum have done it?” the manager said. “He was laying here all boozed up most of the time.”

I even ran out to the morgue at the county hospital and looked at the corpse, a runty, meagre body, a battered, boozy face. Had he written that note?

Certainly I knew, even as a young punk reporter, that every crime drew lunatic confessions, but downtown Chief Nolan was already declaring the crime had been solved. It was a degenerate vagrant who had murdered the boy and then tried to extort money, and finally, in fright, committed suicide.

Before it was over, the case was to reach into many such pitiful corners, like a random cyclone that leaves exposed the refuse of a city’s cellars.

I met Tom at the Bureau and gave him what I had. Between us we decided this was nothing at all, even though the morning papers were giving it their banner headlines. It was by then ten o’clock. I almost wanted to ask Tom to come along to the speakeasy, but we might seem like kids to him, I thought. So I said good night and went on to my date.

The place was a cellar night club. I ran down the stairs, slightly apprehensive about Ruth being with those smoothies, and I was curious, too, about Myra, whom I knew only from a poetry class. I felt full of importance, breathless with my impressions of the morgue and of a derelict’s death, while all they knew about was college life.

The room was a dim-lit box, with a few burly men around the doorway. Liquor was served openly there, I saw. The brassy music, slapped down by the low ceiling, made the whole box throb. This was a place already known among the knowing ones, the people like Myra and Artie who always knew ahead of the rest of the crowd.

The lighting was a subdued rose colour, on walls of a kind of yellowish stucco that was considered fancy at that time, and there was a small square dance floor. The Negro band sat on a strip of platform with their heads against the ceiling. I could not have known that in years to come jazz enthusiasts would look back reverently to this dim cellar as the birthplace of the Chicago style.

I made out first, from the stairs, Artie and Myra dancing, and even in that glimpse I caught something about Myra, the way she was entirely given over, her glossy head tilted, lost. I saw Ruth and Judd at a far table, their heads bent close together so as to hear each other under that noise. Ruth caught sight of me, raising her face, and there came over it the glow that was for me – but slowly, as though it had to be summoned, so absorbed had she been with Judd.

Artie broke off dancing and came rushing toward me. He wanted to know the news. Was the suicide really the murderer? I said it didn’t look like it. Breathlessly, Artie speculated, “Maybe it was a plant – the real murderer wrote the note and found this bum and gave him some knock-out drops and pushed him in!” We reached the table. “That would be a good move for him to get the police off the trail, wouldn’t it?”

Myra shook her head over his imaginings, and Judd said why didn’t he leave the case to the police? A chair had to be pulled up for me, and I sat at the corner of the table, feeling it was I who was the extra man since the party was a celebration for Judd.

I had seen Judd around campus, but now I had my first full impression of him, and I was made uneasy by the dark glow of his eyes in their disturbing intensity. And I felt at once that those eyes, that entire personality, fascinated Ruth.

My set-up came, and Judd poured some of his liquor into it. Artie ordered me to catch up fast. Myra said she had wanted to get to know me in the modern-poetry class – wasn’t this music like Vachel Lindsay’s “The Congo”? We recited it, Artie beating out the rhythm with spoons. Judd asked if he could dance with my girl. For a while I watched them; he seemed to keep on talking while they danced, and Ruth remained absorbed.

In the middle of the number, Artie excused himself and dragged Myra up. Then they were doing the Charleston in a spectacular way, but with great ease; presently half the floor was watching them. Ruth and Judd came back, and we clapped for Artie and Myra. The tenor saxman stood up. The drummer rattled and jerked his head to the flash of Myra’s knees.

Did I feel, already then, something heartbreakingly intense about Myra – a peak reached, yet an imprisonment, because no matter how fast, she couldn’t get free? Later, we discussed love like, oh, such emancipated people. Judd insisted that sex should be quite free and apart from love, and Myra said breathlessly that’s what it was like in Russia, where women at last were as free as men. But what about children? asked Ruth. Judd said the state should take care of all children, as was of course suggested in Plato’s Republic. Didn’t he believe in parental love? Ruth inquired, and Judd declared he didn’t believe in emotion; emotion was illogical and weak.

He was deadly serious, his eyes burning. Ruth drew him on, so understandingly, with her way of making a man feel she understood on his own level. Judd was beyond any shyness now. Ideas poured out of him.

Put down coldly, that sort of talk sounds sophomoric, and yet it sounded bright and even important at the time. Why were children supposed to have emotional feelings for their parents? demanded Judd. Did children have any opportunity to select their parents? Or even vice versa? It was pure chance – one spermatozoon out of trillions. He, for example, certainly had very little in common with his father.

Now Judd had become vehement. Myra said, suddenly, “Let’s dance,” and led me on to the floor. Artie took Ruth.

Myra moved her long bare-feeling body into contact with mine, and it seemed utterly pliant, boneless. Her head fell back a little. “Oh listen to that trumpet!” Then, with a peculiar, sudden assumption of intimacy, she asked if I were going to marry Ruth, and I said, oh, we hadn’t gone that far. “But you’re in love with her?” she repeated.

I said, “How is one supposed to know?”

“You know, I think Judd is getting a crush on her,” she remarked, and I glanced at Judd alone at the table. His eyes were following Ruth.

“What about you and Artie?” I asked, out of form.

She answered with a peculiar eagerness and sincerity. She was fond of him, Myra said, since they had been kids, but of course Artie had a million girls. “Artie’s just a baby,” she confided. “He’s so immature. Although sometimes I do get worried for him. He has black moods – you wouldn’t imagine it. He’s deeper than he lets on.” Then suddenly Myra thrust her belly in and belly-rubbed for an instant. As the dance broke and we started back to the table, she said, “You know I’m just a tease. I try to prove to myself I can get every man I meet away from his date.” She squeezed my hand. “Friends?”

“Sure,” I said.

Ruth was flushed and so beautiful as she sat down. I looked from one girl to the other.

Myra made me talk about being a newspaperman – was it the best way to become a writer? – and I described going to the scene of the murder. We were on the favourite subject again. Artie got all excited about our interview with Captain Cleary about who hung out at the swamp. Nature lovers. Did I know that Judd was a big natural scientist? He had discovered some very rare bird – a crane or stork.

Ruth became quite interested, drawing Judd out, and soon we were discussing Judd’s question. Did birds have intelligence? He was convinced they could think. Thinking was choosing, he said, between one set of acts and another.

“Bushwah, it’s all mechanical reaction,” Artie declared. Every action had a mechanical cause – and from there we were soon on the question of free will. “With humans, too, it’s all mechanical,” Artie shouted. The trumpet was screaming high, but Artie outyelled it, in some passion to prove his point. “Schopenhauer!” he cried. “He proved there is no free will. We are all a bunch of slaves to our instincts!”

“If that is so,” Ruth said, “then no one is responsible for anything. Even criminals and murderers are not to blame, if there is no free will. It’s all cause and effect.”

“Of course!” said Artie.

“If you talk like that,” I said, “then you might just as well believe in God.”

“What?” Artie cried, falling into my trap.

“A determinist does not believe in God,” Judd corrected me. “He believes in absolute cause and effect, and nothing – no God – can intervene and change anything.”

“That’s right.” Ruth recognized the distinction and smiled to him. “People who believe in God believe God can change things, can punish them for doing wrong. So they still believe in a certain amount of free will.”

“There can be free will,” Judd said, “but it has nothing to do with right or wrong. That’s just old-fashioned moralizing.”

Ruth knit her brows. “What do you mean?”

Judd suddenly began to talk like a whirlwind, with passion, explaining his ideas to Ruth. If you accepted a set of regulations about right and wrong, you might as well believe in cause and effect, for everything was exactly laid out for you, what to do and what not to do – you had no choice. But if you believed in free will, then you had to feel free to choose. You had to say there were no rules. Of course, you might for your own convenience decide to accept some of the minor rules, the minor conventions like wearing clothes. But to prove you were free, you had to know you could break the rules, too.

He went on and on. Sometimes his ideas seemed jumbled, even contradictory, but every time I tried to cut in and argue, Judd would screech me down, throwing in names, labels, Nietzsche, and the Will to Power, and the Greek Stoics, and Kant, in a crazy kind of mixture. About all I could make of it was that the multitudes weren’t strong enough to make use of their free will. Only the few. Thus Spake Zarathustra.

Myra was saying philosophy was her worst subject, she wanted to dance, and Ruth was summarizing like an intelligent student. “Well, according to Artie’s idea, there isn’t any right and wrong because of fate; everything is determined forever.”

“Sure,” Artie said, “you are my fate!”

Ruth laughed, and went on to summarize Judd’s point of view. “But you say there isn’t any right and wrong, but for the opposite reason, because people do have free will and should use it to do exactly as they please.”

“That’s anarchy,” I said.

Anarchy was merely a simple way of putting it, Judd declared, as though to push me out of the argument. Ruth had her eyes intently fixed on Judd’s. The two of them seemed to have forgotten I was there. She asked whether he was really interested in law, in going to Harvard. He was interested in everything, Judd said, in language, in science – his was a universal mind, like da Vinci’s, and it would be a waste to study law.

But wasn’t he interested in law too? Ruth asked. Surely it would be fascinating; there were great lawyers like Jonathan Wilk who gave their lives to justice.

He laughed his clever laugh. After all, being a lawyer meant being able to argue on either side of a case, so a lawyer really couldn’t have any convictions about justice.

That part of it at least fitted with his ideas about right and wrong, Ruth said, so he ought to be interested in law after all.

It was a neat response and I saw his face quicken, for it showed she had followed him. I was beginning really to feel annoyed, and yet was too proud to break up their tête-à-tête. Then Artie and Myra were back at the table, and we all drank and drank.

Some time late that evening, the idea about Ruth could have come to Judd. Ruth was dancing with Artie. I saw Ruth cutting loose; the quietest girl can turn into a flashy dancer when she’s with one. Judd’s eyes were upon them, unwavering.

I imagine there coming to him in that moment a sensation like a double beat of the heart, a knowledge, an intention, a recognition: she is the one to whom he will do it.

Every man and every woman has a testing image, like the photographer’s painted setting with an opening for the sitter’s head. How will she look every morning, across from me at the breakfast table? Orthe girl is pictured in some graceful attitude of undressing. Or in the midst of a kiss, her lips parted. Or mothering a baby.

With Judd, the test image was the fantasy scene of rape that so haunted him. Was this the one to do it to? How would she look afterward, lying overcome, her clothes in shreds? Would he feel touched? Would love spread through him? Would he turn to her tenderly to devote a lifetime to removing the horror of his act?

The image of violence was perhaps a final assertion of his darker self, wrestling him down to keep him from a love that might alter him. And yet the violent fantasy had in it something of that very love. For below the image was a throbbing sense that therein lay release – afterwards he would no longer need Artie. This would be an action entirely on his own, just as Artie had done things on his own.

It was a struggle of wish and counterwish – in the same action to make himself equal to Artie and therefore more than ever a partner, and yet to make himself free of Artie through a woman.

Hardly identified, these images swept through him as he raised his heavy lids and looked at Ruth dancing with Artie, and she sent him a smile.

When we reached Ruth’s house, I told the others I’d walk home from there, and Artie made the expected remarks.

It wasn’t extremely late, about two. We could have gone upstairs. But this hallway was fairly private; only one other family lived in the building, above the Goldenbergs.

We embraced, and she said, “You liked Myra, didn’t you?” I laughed and teased her about Judd. We kissed a real love kiss, tenderly, without opening our lips, and then Ruth had to talk about him. I could sense her frowning a little in the dim hall. That Judd, she said, he was really brilliant. She had never met anyone so brilliant – squeezing my hand – but there was also something disturbing about him, something sad. Then she added, a bit archly, that he had asked her to lunch tomorrow. But of course I needn’t worry about competition, as he was going to Europe in two weeks.

I told her she was free to marry any millionaire she could get, and we kissed the last kiss, which was always frankly passionate. Then she would say, “Oh, Sid, I wish we really were lovers,” and then we would break because it was too much to endure, and then she would hurry upstairs, though I might pull her back by her fingertips for one more such embrace. Then I would walk home, resisting the impulse to grab a cab and indulge in the traditional after-date release of a whorehouse.

THE BOYS DROPPED Myra at the hotel, and then they picked up a paper. Chief Nolan still maintained that the suicide solved the crime.

“You didn’t give that bum a push?” Judd said to Artie.

“Naw, not this time.” Artie grinned. “We should have thought of it, though.”

It would have been the perfect idea. Again, Judd had that fleeting, melancholy sense that they were not as perfect as they had thought themselves.

Judd felt a sudden sag of energy; he didn’t want anything, not even to stay with Artie. He wanted only some absolute oblivion, perhaps not exactly death, but something cleaner, deeper than sleep, something like a permanent hibernation, crawling away somewhere, some place close and warm, to have no thoughts.

And I see him, remaining quite late in bed, drowsing, and rubbing against the bedclothes, and indulging in fantasies. There comes the image of Ruth. Has he made his date with her in order to do it? But there is a strong counter-feeling about this girl. He feels her almost as not a girl. A person. He has a certain eager curiosity about how it will be with her at lunch.

Then as he tries to seize and analyse the sensation, the sex thoughts grow over it.

Suppose only a short time is left to him, in freedom, even in life. Suppose he and Artie may soon be caught and locked up? (He never sees it farther than being locked up in a cell.) But then, if he is locked up for life, what of the things he has left undone, untried? Most insistent of all is the rape. Much stronger than the pressure had been for that deed with the boy. That deed had not been in him at all; he had told himself it stood for the rape; but in the act itself, no end had come. Had it been a wasted substitute for the deed that was still there in him, clamouring?

Should he tell Artie? Do this one with Artie?

No. Alone. At least, go on a way toward doing it alone.

Judd pictures himself driving to her house to pick her up. Take the pistol along, as Artie would? The lunch date is known; her mother would know. If he did only the rape, without the killing, a girl wouldn’t tell. The soldiers dragging the girls – the killing wasn’t always part of it. But an absolute part of it is the girl being a virgin. He has to find out for sure at lunch. After all, she goes out with this newspaper fellow; you can never know.

The maid knocked.

In an odd voice, constricted, the maid said there were two police officers downstairs who wished to speak with him.

Judd told himself he was delighted to observe there was no panic in him, none whatsoever. Undoubtedly they had traced the glasses. Now everything depended on his savoir-faire. Should he phone Artie, warn him? No, they might already be watching the telephone.

As he dressed, without undue haste, Judd could not help noticing a subtle fleeting sense of pleasure that they had come.

He had slept late; the old man had gone downtown, and Max was out golfing. Lucky they were out. Judd descended the stairs.

Two policemen stood there. On their faces there was nothing to go by; or did he detect a shade of deference for the neighbourhood, the house? The nearer one said Captain Cleary would like to ask him some questions. At the South Chicago station.

The easy way they talked, it couldn’t be that they had anything serious. “South Chicago?” Judd repeated as though completely mystified.

The cops exchanged glances, and now the second one said, respectfully, “He just told us to bring you in for some questions.”

“Is it for speeding or something?” He smiled. They smiled back but didn’t answer. Judd shrugged, and acted indulgent though a trifle worried as anyone should be when called for by the police. If only Artie had been watching!

Feeling the two of them bulking huge behind him, Judd led the way to the door. Would there be a police wagon? No, a Marmon.

One policeman got into the back seat with him. Judd glanced hurriedly around. The street was inordinately quiet; kids were still being kept indoors. Nobody had seen, he guessed.

Judd offered his Helmars. The cop’s fingers seemed almost too thick to grasp a cigarette. With a comforting snort he remarked, “It’s just something routine.”

But why the South Chicago station? From the way the papers had it, the case was being handled by the chiefs downtown.

Then Judd recalled, on our date the night before, my talking about interviewing the captain out there. About nature students. That was certainly it. Somehow they had got his name. Because of that punk reporter. That smart-alec reporter, Sid Silver, had to go nosing around. Rape his girl for him, would serve him right. And Judd imagined himself telling the whole thing to Artie, afterward, and Artie’s laughter.

But something could go wrong. And if they kept him under arrest, there would be no rape; in fact, Ruth would even be stood up on her lunch date.

Finally the car halted in front of the two-story brick station. It looked a lot like the Hyde Park station where he had been taken as a kid when some cops picked him up in Jackson Park with his.22, shooting birds. The old man had straightened that out quickly enough. Dragging a well-brought-up boy of good family into a police station! Indeed, Pater practically had the police apologizing, afraid of what he could do to them with his influence. “Why, this boy is already a recognized ornithologist!” And the old man had got him the only permit in the entire city, to use his gun in the parks. “You see?” His father had wanted him to be impressed. Judah Steiner, Sr., could handle anything, get anything he wanted in Chicago. Well, let the old man get him out of this one! And there arose in Judd that curious mixture of resentment and expectancy that came when he thought of his father. This whole thing was like a final challenge between them.

He walked with the cops into the vacant-looking room, with the railing and the desk and the pale bare floor and the stale smell. He still could not be sure but that this represented the remainder of his life.

A cop in shirt sleeves stood by a window, gazing out on a vacant lot, his gun important-looking in the hip holster. Turning, he said, “The captain wants you, inside,” motioning to a partition, with a door. Judd reached over the railing to undo the catch on the gate, and walked across to the private office.

The captain was writing at his desk. Giving Judd a glance, he motioned to a chair. He was middle-aged, fat, even easy-looking. “Judah Steiner, eh? Well, I’ll tell you, you been around out in Hegewisch quite a lot, the game warden tells me.”

“Yes, sir.” It would be nothing at all, he already felt sure. Judd spoke of his bird-watching classes, and told how he had conducted the last group out there only a week ago. With respectful curiosity, the captain inquired just what they were studying about birds, and Judd spoke of the mating habits of several species at this season. The captain became interested. Oh, and who was in the class?

Judd would be glad to supply a full list. In this particular group there were several young married women. The captain chuckled. The mating season, eh? Then, returning to business: “Ever been out there around the Pennsy tracks, there by that culvert?”

“You mean where the Kessler boy was found?” Judd said easily. “I know the precise spot quite well, as it happens.”

“How does that happen?”

“Only the last time I was out there, I recall climbing over the tracks, because I slipped, coming down, and got my feet wet. It’s quite swampy there.” Thus, Judd felt, he had paved the way for discovering he had lost his spectacles, in case they had already been traced to him. They might have fallen out of his pocket when he slipped.

“You ever know of this Kessler kid going out there?”

“He certainly wasn’t in any of my groups, but he might have gone out with a school group. It’s used quite a lot, as you know. It’s the nearest place to the city where you find so much wild life.”

The captain had picked up a file card of some kind, and he tapped it against his desk. He swivelled and faced Judd. “You use glasses?”

Perhaps this was the moment to say, “As a matter of fact, those glasses found out there were mine. I must have lost them last week, but I didn’t notice it until I read about the case, and then – I guess it’s quite natural – I was rather frightened of becoming involved.”

Instead, he heard himself saying, “You mean field glasses?”

“No, I mean regular eyeglasses.”

“Why, yes, I do – or did. For reading, at home. I had them prescribed for headaches last year, but the headaches stopped, and I haven’t used my reading glasses for several months.”

The captain nodded. “Any of those people with you, or anybody you know goes out there, wear eyeglasses?”

Judd gave himself time for reflection. “Well, as a matter of fact, a few of the women wear glasses, and I have an assistant, occasionally – Jerry Harris is his name. He wears glasses. He was with us last week. But I’m sure he would have mentioned it to me, if he had lost his glasses.”

The captain took down the name and address, writing slowly, in a schoolboy hand. He didn’t ask for the phone number, and it occurred to Judd to call up Jerry and warn him.

Then the captain just sat there as though trying to think of more questions. Judd didn’t want to appear anxious to leave. He was indeed beginning to enjoy the situation, beginning to form an account of it in his mind, for Artie. Still, the silence became somewhat tense, and he allowed himself to glance at his watch. “As a matter of fact,” he remarked, “I have a date to take a girl birding this afternoon, but I guess we won’t be going to Hegewisch.” The captain’s flesh wobbled with his chortle. “That’s a new name for it. Birding!”

Judd took a full breath.

“Okay,” the captain said, pushing a sheet of paper toward him. “Tell you what, son. You write me out a little statement, all you just said, the facts you just stated, for the record.”

As he opened his fountain-pen, Judd felt in himself, perhaps a little more faintly but still quite recognizably, that shiver of elation he had experienced when he had first read in the papers of the glasses being found. For he had after all come under suspicion. This had been a mild third degree. He had acquitted himself. He had gone through the sieve.

“I’ll have the boys drive you home, so you won’t be late for your date – birding.” The captain chortled again.

Judd watched himself, so as not to write too much. A paragraph. He wrote fast in a careless hand; one thing was sure, this wouldn’t match his lettering on the envelope of the ransom letter. “This all right?” He passed the sheet to the captain.

The officer read it over slowly; he was a lip-reader, but concealed it by mouthing a cigar. He nodded.

“I’m afraid I haven’t been of much help,” Judd said, rising. A clear, mathematical conviction of superiority had come back to him. Against such people, it was a certainty he and Artie had to succeed.

“Well” – the captain leaned back – “it’s a downtown job now. But we’ve all got to give them all the help we can.”

Judd went to the door, opened it, even enjoying a fluttery feeling that a peremptory voice could still halt him. His two escorts were sitting, idle. They arose as though they had expected him, and led him out to the car.

He thought of asking them to drop him at Artie’s. That was how Artie would have done it – try to scare him by pulling up in a police car. But for himself, Judd reflected, he could enjoy the thought as much as the deed. Artie was excitable; if Artie saw a police car pull up without warning, he might even shoot, or do something equally wild, and give himself away. And anyway, there was just time to keep his date with Ruth.

The two cops dropped him at the house. The maid rushed forward as though she had been waiting at the door. Judd laughed at her. “I’ll bet you were scared I’d never come back.”

“Oh, no.”

“It was just some routine junk about my bird-watching classes.”

He went upstairs. There was an elation in him now over the way he had handled the interrogation. His victory was like a confirmation of his entire code of behaviour. He was right, right, right!

I SEE JUDD then, starting for his date with Ruth, picking up his field glasses to prove he really meant it about going bird-watching. And besides – a weapon? Does he definitely intend…? Let her fate hang on chance. If he spots a warbler. That will be a sign. Do it.

When the bell rings, Ruth goes to the door, while her mother looks out of the window and notices the red Stutz. “My, my! My daughter is getting popular these days,” she comments. “Who is this one?”

“He was out with us last night. Artie’s friend, Judd Steiner.”

“And you’ve got a date already? Fast work,” says her mother. “The Steiners. Is that the millionaire Steiners? Poor Sid, what kind of competition are you giving him?”

“Oh, don’t jump to conclusions, Mother,” Ruth protests. “We just like to talk. He’s very brilliant. He just passed his exam for Harvard Law School, besides being Phi Beta Kappa at seventeen.”

She picks up her scarf and her handbag. “Aren’t you going to ask him up to introduce him?” her mother demands.

“Another time.” And Ruth runs downstairs to where Judd waits in the hallway.

Coming down, she makes a kind of illumination – her reddish hair, her yellow pleated skirt, her bare forearms, the streak of her scarf, giving a passing gladness to the hall. Ruth feels friendly – curious, she would say – toward Judd. Despite his reputation among the co-eds. Some say Judd gives them the creeps.

Ruth hasn’t found him at all repellent. He is somehow a stray person, and her upbringing has been in a house of warmth toward strays. Her mother and father are the kind who, some years back, attended Emma Goldman meetings and collected Yiddish poets visiting from New York, or stray anarchists, or intense-looking men with long hair who were vaguely “studying”.

So what others find odd or even disturbing in Judd rather attracts Ruth. And physically, though Judd is quite short, he is not smaller than she; they danced quite well together. He is something of a change from her gangling reporter.

There is in her, that day, the unworried adventurous confidence of a girl who has a devoted steady and yet is uncommitted, who may tease herself that perhaps there is yet something unknown, something supreme, in romance to be encountered.

With his curious perfection of manners that contains a touch of condescending irony for the custom itself, Judd opens the door of his car for her. Then he walks around to his own side.

As she settles into the fancy car, her skirt rimming her knees, Ruth smiles to Judd. “I almost expected to see you with Artie,” she says. “You’re practically inseparable, aren’t you?”

“Oh, I have a life of my own, too,” he parries. As he drives away with her, he wonders at the unusual feeling of glee that wells up in him. Is this a feeling of happiness? More likely an enjoyment of the power in himself, of his secret imaginings. Can there really be something special about this girl, about having her sitting next to him, and feeling her interest in him? Wryly, Judd permits himself to appreciate the image of the pretty girl and himself, gay youth breezing through the town in his Bearcat!

She too must be feeling the image, for she leans back with a delighted sigh, saying how perfect the day is for a ride. Then Judd has a suggestion: “Instead of going to a restaurant for lunch, why not pick up some hot dogs on the road?”

And Ruth says, “Oh, that sounds scrumptious.”

He heads through the park and along the lake. A hackneyed refrain comes into his mind. “A pretty girl is like a melody.” He drops one hand from the wheel and catches her knowing smile. Ruth lets her hand lie in his, against her thigh, so warmly firm through the short pleated skirt.

She remarks that she has been wondering about his friendship with Artie, because they really are so different. Artie acts like a college sheikh, while he is so quiet and even shy. Of course, as everyone says, Artie is very brilliant, and she supposes there aren’t many people around who-”

“-can meet my lofty requirements?” Judd says. “There is no sense in false modesty.”

That’s true, she agrees. The average man at the university is interested only in football and his frat. “You’re not a frat man, are you?”

“No,” he says.

“Sid practically dropped out,” Ruth remarks.

“Is Sid your lover?” Judd asks.

“Oh” – she gives him a candid glance – “it’s not that I believe strictly in the conventions. But I don’t believe in rushing things either. I mean, if I were really certain I was in love and we wanted each other, and for some reason we couldn’t get married, then I should give myself.” There is something almost prim in the way she makes this announcement. It excites him.

“And you’re not sure you’re in love?”

“Oh,” she says thoughtfully, “I sometimes feel as if it’s already settled that I’m going to marry Sid. And then sometimes I feel as if some wonderful unknown thing still has to happen.”

“Does he intend to marry you.”

She laughs softly. “Even after he gets out of school – a reporter doesn’t earn enough to get married on. And Sid wants to write. And… I don’t know.”

“I see.” They are silent for a moment. “You don’t mind my being so inquisitive?”

“Don’t you have to find out if the coast is clear?” Again her soft laugh.

“Is it?” He reflects how cleverly this female has put him into the rôle of a possible serious suitor. Judd finds himself saying, “Perhaps Sid will win the reward on the murder case – he’s working so hard on it. And then you can get married.” Why has he mentioned the case? He is getting as bad as Artie.

But it seems a normal subject to her. “Oh, is there a big reward?”

“The papers said several thousand dollars, I think.”

“I don’t think anybody needs a reward to try to catch them,” she remarks. And after a musing silence: “I’m not really ready to get married. There are still things I want to do.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, go abroad.”

She recalls that he is to go in a few weeks, and she says she envies him, and Judd offers the expected persiflage about her coming along, and she says she would if she only had the money, and he finds himself saying, “Well, I’ve got an idea how to get the money for you! I’ll confess to the murder! I’ll get the reward – and that will pay for your trip!”

“There’s only one thing wrong with that” – she takes up the game – “you wouldn’t be able to come along!” And then: “Would you really do that for me?”

“Why not?” he says. “And it would be an experience to see if I could make them believe me.”

“I’m afraid I couldn’t accept such a sacrifice,” she says, but then her voice drops. “It’s cruel for us to be joking about such a thing.”

“Why?” he demands. “Why is it cruel to joke about death? After all, what is one creature more or less in the world?”

Her mouth opens. But then, as though catching on to his line, she says, “I think you say things just to shock people, to be different.”

A tiny spasm of irritation runs through him at her words. Unaccountably, Judd thinks of his mother, of the first time he brought down a bird, a robin, with a B-B gun they had given him, as a little kid. How Mother Dear softly explained to him that he really didn’t want to kill the bird for no purpose. People made guns that could kill, it was true, Mother Dear had said, but they used their guns always for a reason. To protect themselves from wild beasts, or to hunt for food. Or to study animals, like the mounted birds in the museum. As she talked, Judd had felt angry, cheated. And the same shadowy feeling of resentment has come over him now at Ruth’s sententious words.

With a secret pleasure, he heads for the stand where he stopped with Artie. “They’ve got wonderful hot dogs here,” he says.

Ruth leans back. “Oh, I’m so hungry I could eat an elephant.”

“With mustard and piccalilli?”

“Everything!”

She sits waiting as he goes to the stand. She looks so right, the pretty girl in the car. Judd tells himself she isn’t precisely beautiful; it is rather a supremely blooming quality that gives her such appeal. It is the sex urge that is causing him to endow his reactions with aesthetic value. Why can’t this be just a date; why can’t he simply take a nice girl out on the dunes?

He turns down the side road toward Miller’s Beach, stopping the car at the edge of the sand. Ruth gets out; she stands for a moment, breathing full, her blouse rising with her breath. Judd takes the binoculars from the side pocket.

“Is this where you come to watch the birds?”

He tells her it was here that he discovered the Kirtland Warbler.

“Discovered?”

The species hadn’t been seen for decades, he informs her, and was assumed to be extinct. “I don’t go by other people’s assumptions,” he says. It is this kind of remark that makes people dislike him, Ruth realizes. But can’t they see that he has to do it, from some need, some weakness?

Judd tells her how he searched all last spring. And then, one day, he recognized the warbler’s call.

“But you had never heard it before?”

“When I heard it, I knew it.”

“That must be such a wonderful feeling,” Ruth says, “to be the discoverer, to be the first.”

“I’d like to be the first with you,” he remarks, with the expected double meaning. Boys feel they have to say things like that, Ruth knows, and momentarily it even gives her a sunny sensation that Judd has made a silly remark, like an ordinary boy. She feels a surge of sureness – something good is happening – and she gives him her hand so he may pull her up a steep dune. Everyone likes being “different”, but with Judd it is such a terrible passion. Like the way he has to brag about the different courses he takes at school, how he is the only student in that course in Umbrian dialect. And here, his pleasure seems to have been not so much in what he discovered but in having been alone to prove others were mistaken.

He drops her hand and hurries ahead. There is a dip between dunes, an area of stunted bushes, forming clusters in the sand. She comes alongside him and stands still, as he is standing.

“Oh, it’s so wonderful here,” Ruth says. “The sand is untouched.” It looks as if no one in the whole world had ever been here before.

He moves a few steps, and she moves, but then Judd makes a halting gesture with his hand, and Ruth freezes, her arm arrested gracefully. Judd listens. There are a few calls. Not the warbler. “Hear anything?” he asks.

“I was afraid to breathe,” she says softly.

“You can breathe,” he says.

“Doesn’t it frighten them to hear people talk?”

“You can talk. Just naturally, so the voices fit in.”

“I think I never listened to nature before,” Ruth says. “I mean, just to the air. It’s as though the sky itself had a sound, not quite a sound, but-”

“I know,” Judd says. And he is startled, at a feeling as of anguish rising up in himself.

He leads her farther, over several dunes, until they are well away from where any beachgoers might wander. Then he slips down on the sand, nesting down behind some shrubs. She settles herself beside him, her legs neatly folded. “Is this where you found your bird!” she asks.

Judd draws out his wallet to show her the picture of the warbler perched on his hand, feeding. This is the same picture that his father has enlarged to keep on his desk at the office. Judd tells himself that he has not forgotten his purpose in coming, and the self-wager he made over the call of the bird.

Then they listen for calls. She sits alert, listening. “A mating call,” he remarks. He focuses the field glasses, and directs her to a low distant branch, the birds flickering around it, alighting, circling, alighting. A curl of her hair moves against his cheek.

“This is what you really love, isn’t it!” Ruth says.

Judd doesn’t reply. He feels a choking rush of conflicting emotions; he feels invaded by her, and he turns against this a scorn for her, for her female sentimentality. And yet the same sense of anguish has returned, as though her voice has touched upon some unbearably sensitive mechanism within him.

“I can always do this,” he says.

He puts the glasses to her eyes. After a moment Ruth remarks, “It makes you wonder if we ourselves might be watched, like this, by superior beings.”

This breaks the spell, he tells himself. And he tells her she might just as well ask if the birds are speculating about being watched by human gods.

“Why not?” she says. “Last night you were arguing that birds have intelligence and can think.”

“Then perhaps we exist only in the minds of the birds,” he says.

Ruth smiles. “Philosophy 3,” she says. “Berkeley.”

“Well, why not?” he persists, irritated. “What proof is there of anything else? If God exists, it is because we created him in our minds. And if man can conceive of God, then God is less than man – he is merely a conception in man’s consciousness. Isn’t that right?”

“I know it’s logical,” she says softly, “but it seems so conceited. According to that idea, everyone is his own God.”

“Why not?” he demands again. She is once more merely the female, refusing to recognize logic! Can’t she see that a person, a consciousness, can be sure only of itself alone? A flood of ideas rushes through his mind – the “God is dead” of Nictzsche – but it is no use explaining to her. Judd sees the archaic bearded gods, the Jehovah – all those gods that little men had invented to fill up their areas of fear. Even his father doesn’t have the nerve to swing out alone into the universe, to admit God is dead. No. He still sends cheques to the Sinai Temple.

Ruth seems somehow to have followed part of his thought. “I thought you were an atheist,” she says. “Are your folks atheists, too?”

It angers him that she has touched on his folks. What should that have to do with his beliefs? “My father still adheres to vestiges of Jewish superstition,” he declares. “He still belongs to a temple.”

“Do you have brothers and sisters, Judd?” she asks.

He feels even more resentful; she has diverted him from the main discussion. “I have two older brothers,” he mutters. “But they’re just Babbitts.”

Looking up at the sky, Ruth tells him, “My folks are agnostics. I think I am too.” Then, with almost an apologetic note: “Oh, Judd, sometimes the world seems so beautiful, like here, don’t you feel that things have to be good?”

“Good?”

Her warm throaty laugh acknowledges that sophisticated people don’t speak of such sentimental concepts. Oh, she remembers from last night. His philosophy. There is no such thing as good or evil. Things just are.

“What about the beauty in evil?” he challenges. “What about Baudelaire?”

Ruth says, “Of course, there is a deeper kind of experience, as in Dostoevski, an evil that has good in it too.”

“No! There is only experience itself!” Judd insists. And he feels he is almost ready now for his intention. He feels that somehow she has revealed herself, she is really from the other side, from the enemies of his own kind. He guides the conversation now to the Medici, to Aretino, to the rare book he wants to translate, listing all the forms of perversion.

“Are you trying to excite me?” Ruth asks.

“Why not? I’ve got you alone here.”

“Yes.” She is a trifle breathy. Then she tries to return to the lighter tone, impersonal. “You men! For all we intellectualize about it, the double standard is still in force. Men want women to be pure, don’t they?” And then, with a sudden burst, “Oh, darn, Judd, sometimes I think the whole question is silly, and what am I waiting for, and I just wish something would happen to me so I would get rid of the whole question.”

“It’s well known,” he says, “that every woman really wants to be raped.”

“Oh, don’t talk like a callow youth with a line,” Ruth answers.

“Well, you invited it,” he snaps, beginning to feel the necessary anger toward her.

“It’s not really like that,” she says. “I think what every woman dreams of is more like a dream I used to have as a little girl, that the great lover is going to climb through the window, and then something wonderful will happen.”

She continues, appealingly, and it is anguish for me to imagine her saying this to Judd, for this is a fantasy Ruth once confided, so intimately, to me. “When I was a little girl, we used to live in a downstairs flat where there were bars on the windows, and I used to imagine that was why the bars were there, but that somehow my Lochinvar would come in, even through the bars. It used to give me kind of nightmares, but I knew I wanted to have those nightmares.”

He moves so that the whole length of their bodies touch, as they lie side by side in the sand. She turns her face to him, like on a bed, Judd thinks. “Please don’t – you know – get excited,” Ruth says.

“I believe in doing everything I want to do.”

She looks directly into his eyes. “No. How can you, Judd? I mean, there are things people think of, impulses, not only sex-”

“If we imagine things, then those things exist in us. It’s only cowardly not to do what we want.”

Her voice becomes low, intimate, almost pleading. “I know, Judd. Ideas like that, Nietzsche and such ideas, they may seem very logical. We can even believe them with our minds. But we don’t have to do them.”

Is the fear coming up in her? he wonders. For that is what he would need to go through with it.

“But, Judd, suppose everyone believed like that,” she whispers. “Then everyone would be justified in doing anything. Even murder.” Her whisper is somehow schoolgirlish, and he has an impulse to laugh, yet to kiss her and tell her not to be scared.

He hears his own voice repeating his favourite ideas. There have to be people who are ready to explore all the possibilities of human experience.

“Oh,” she says, as though trying desperately to keep up with him, “oh, there have been plenty of people who have found out all about evil.”

But the higher the type of mind, Judd says, the more there is to be discovered.

And then she says it. Lightly. She hopes he doesn’t feel, because he has such a brilliant mind, that it is his duty to taste every crime like rape and murder.

“Oh, the murder now won’t be necessary,” Judd remarks, almost idly. And he catches himself. But she is too confused to notice meanings within meanings. Her brows are contracted, a shadow is over her face.

“I mean,” he says, “if I were to rape you now, I wouldn’t have to murder you because it would be unlikely that you would announce that you had been possessed. You would be more likely to keep it a secret and become my mistress.” She is breathing quickly. If she makes a move to get up and run away, he knows her movement will unleash him from the last restraint. His arm, his hand holding the heavy field glasses, will describe an arc…

But she does not move. Are tears coming into her eyes? There is such a questioning in them, such a dismay. And now the moment has come for him, for an act of will. Inwardly Judd feels tumultuously threatened; he doesn’t dare examine what doubts may be rising in him, but some horrible upheaval is there, as if all, all he were ever sure of were suddenly crossed out, wrong! And it is a partner-feeling, too, to the strange sense of almost – almost – Of almost being free, almost attaining. Yes, attaining! The same feeling that he experienced the other night, beside the cistern. To reach the sense of having done, done!

With an act of will, he rolls his body upon her. Ruth’s body is rigid. Her face is so utterly close to his that Judd can no longer see it, only the eyes, still puzzled and hurt.

“Please don’t,” she begs. “Judd, please don’t.”

He tries to insert his knee between her legs, and recalls some definition in a piece of sex literature that it is really impossible to rape a woman, that in the last moment, even against her conscious will, she physically consents.

With his free hand he tears at his clothing. She seems not so much to be resisting as to have become unliving, frozen. He feels his throbbing power. He will do this. He alone.

“Judd, Judd, I’m afraid for you!” Ruth calls, with awful anxiety, and he seems to hear the call over a distance of years in the voice of his mother as he tries to walk atop a fence. And all at once her arms are around him, holding him close, close, somehow protectively.

In that moment it isn’t predominantly a fear of what might happen to herself that pervades Ruth, but a dreadful anguish for the boy, for the sick, sick eyes, for the tyrannic needs in him – not only his sex lust but something far beyond, some horror. And her intuitive gesture is to draw the sick soul into herself, not the drawing in of sex that might come to a mature woman, but the girlish impulse, the drawing in to her heart.

And then, suddenly, he is spent.

Her head turns sideways, under him, and he rolls from her.

Now if death could come through a wish, he would will himself to cease existing. For it is not only the after-sorrow and the physical disgust of spilling; it is the whole sense of failure, incompetence to live, that invades him.

He lies motionless as she looks at him. He supposes, somehow, he will have to say he is sorry, and he tries to move his lips.

Ruth says, “Don’t. I understand. I want to understand.” And she makes a slight, tentative gesture, as to touch him, but withholds, knowing she must not touch him.

Presently the tension lessens. And then a thought begins to come up in Judd, like some distant memory. One way in which the experience has perhaps succeeded, or meant something. For through the entire attempt, even at the most urgent moment, the moment when it always came, there had not come the image of Artie.

Could he, then, only be like everyone else? Could it be possible that he may come really to be in love with a girl, perhaps this girl? Even marrying, raising a family? Would the whole idea of what that is all about, what ordinary life is all about, come to him, too?

But if he can be ordinary… He shudders in horror and fear, as of losing his very self, and at the same time he experiences a frightful sense of something wasted, the murder as a false and wasted act. If the newer self is the real one, he has in previous dark error forsworn it.

On the way back, they do not refer to the experience. They scarcely speak, and yet Judd does not find himself uncomfortable with her. When he leaves her at her house she asks, “Shall I see you again?”

“Do you want to?” Judd says.

“If you do.”

They make a date for Monday evening.

The crime had become our total obsession. I worked with Tom, running after the police and with the police and ahead of the police from one glimmer to another, and watching the other reporters, and eluding the other reporters, and conjecturing and imagining and listening, and gathering more and more the feeling in the city that some hitherto unknown terror was among us. The child’s fear of wolves prowling in the forest, wolves that will eat you up – this childhood fear seemed now to have leaped awake in every soul in Chicago, and the wolves were the primordial menace, more savage than any beast ever encountered by man. There was a growing presage that something new and terrible and uncontrollable, some new murder-germ, was here involved.

The threat seemed to be against the logic of life itself, for we must have sensed, beyond the touchable aspects of the mystery, that some killing factor, some element, purely murderous, had broken loose. Even before the boys were arrested, there was this dreadful foreknowledge of the escape of some always present, imperfectly contained violence, and if we did not capture it, if we did not hold it and examine it and master its containment, we were all unceasingly exposed, lost.

Tom and I were only a couple of reporters caught up in this hysteria. Yet we could see how, among the police chiefs, there was a growing bewilderment. Their statements daily became more contradictory. Every hour there would be a new crop of sensational clues; by nightfall everything would have been disproven; and on the next day the chiefs would again announce that the murderer would soon be caught.

On Saturday morning, Nolan still declared, in an interview in the Tribune: “There is no doubt in my mind that the man who wrote the suicide letter was the same man who wrote the kidnapping letter.” But by noon the poor suicide had been discounted, forgotten. And a number of other suspects – teachers, even relatives of teachers who owned Underwood portable typewriters – were suddenly being discharged. For though the first expert had stated that the ransom note had been typed on an Underwood, a new expert declared that the machine was a Corona.

The Kessler mail was flooded with tips, and with abuse. Chief of Police Schramm told us that nearly all of his men were working extra shifts, with leaves cancelled, for a veritable epidemic of kidnapping threats had broken out on the South Side, and along the North Shore’s Gold Coast, too. It was always like that after a big crime, he said, but this was the worst.

And actually, three youngsters, sixteen-year-olds, sent messages and made a rendezvous in an elaborate plot to have Kessler bring $25,000 or risk the abduction of his other children. The plotters were caught and arrested. But the imitative fever and the released flood of evil continued unabated. All the quiet-faced people of the city, all the open-faced youngsters – were they all cunning madmen? “You dirty, stingy -! If I had you here I would strangle you to death. We will go a little farther, so watch yourself. You couldn’t keep your dirty mouth closed. To hell with the police. You are crying. You made your money honest. Hah hah. But you will suffer minute by minute you low-down skunk. So low you could walk under a snake. And now every time you disobey us we will strike. Go ahead.” Anonymous.

From these hate letters, police turned again to the revenge theory. But not one out of a thousand of those letters could have come from people who ever had known Charles Kessler. What weird, filthy, primordial imaginings were revealed, carried around behind unidentifiable city faces, walking around in coats and pants of ordinary men, in dresses of ordinary women! The police passed around to us a number of their scrawls, the obscene symbols, the daggers and mystic suns and moons, and the religious quotations and admonitions! Surely so ghastly a punishment, they wrote, was a visitation for some ghastly sin.

Yet each day what was known for sure seemed to be diminishing. Even the suspected teacher, Steger, had not confessed, and doubtlessly the police had used everything on him. Mike Prager came out with a story that Steger had finally admitted to an unnatural liking for young boys. But no one could find out where the teacher was being held. We kept asking Captain Nolan. We kept trying the office of State’s Attorney Horn. Then suddenly, instead of merely shrugging, “I haven’t got him,” Horn changed his reply. “For all I know, he’s home.”

We rushed to the apartment building on Dorchester. Within seconds, a half-dozen cabs with other reporters pulled up. No one answered the bell, no one responded to our knocking. Through the teacher’s door, Mike Prager called offers for an exclusive story. “Name your own price.” We kept calling questions. “Are you going to sue for false arrest? Did you get the third degree?” And finally a tormented, imploring howl came through the closed door. “Let me alone, can’t you!” The questions, the offers increased. But the siege proved futile. After some time, a brother of the teacher arrived with a doctor. “Leave him alone, can’t you! Be human, can’t you!” they pleaded, and managed to slip inside. After more useless badgering, we finally gave up.

Even the idea we had had of the criminal as an educated man seemed to become uncertain. For this idea had been founded on the wording of the ransom letter. Now, from New York, came a story that the letter was virtually copied from a ransom letter in the previous month’s issue of Detective Magazine. The murderer could be anyone who could read and copy what he read.

Yes, the murderer would be caught soon, soon, everyone declared. As fright increased in the city, the Tribune’s front-page cartoon showed a cowering man, huddling in a dingy hotel room, clutching a newspaper, with other papers scattered over the floor. “Closing In” was the caption.

But Artie and Judd, following the editions, as yet felt no such dismay. Only once during those days was Artie irked. A late edition of the News appeared without the murder in the banner headline. Instead, the headline was about some exclusive interview obtained in Rome. The new boss of Italy had given an audience to a crack foreign correspondent. “Fascism is a spiritual movement,” Artie read. And he suggested to Judd, “Say, while you’re over there in Italy, how about buying a couple of those black shirts? They look pretty snazzy.”

Judd read the rest of the interview, becoming rather excited. “Listen, I must try to see him!” This Mussolini certainly understood the philosophy of Nietzsche. It was by the will to power, Mussolini declared, that Italy would rise again.

Artie laughed and pulled away the paper to turn to the pictures of the newest murder suspects. There were some good ones.

A picture of a young woman, a showgirl type, a gangster’s moll. Yes, she really was. She had been living with a confidence man and she herself had phoned the police. She suspected her friend was the murderer. He kept all kinds of poisons in their room, she said, and he possessed a portable typewriter.

And the police were also investigating a man who lived only a block away from Hartmann’s Drugstore and who had formerly taught science at the Twain School. The man’s neighbours had tipped off the police. They were suspicious of him because he owned a portable typewriter and he liked small boys.

Police were checking, too, on relatives of the school’s athletic coach. Several of them had been picked up for questioning. Meanwhile, Artie read, preparations were being made to provide absolute privacy for the funeral of Paulie Kessler.

That night, a floral bouquet arrived at the Kessler home, with condolences from “Harold Williams”. Police cars, cabs rushed to the florist shop, not ten blocks away. The shop was closed. Four of us located the owner in a nearby flat. Yes, he had sold the bouquet, but he had not noticed the name on the card. We told him – the same name as on the ransom letter. Slowly, his first fright-reaction was replaced by a sense of importance, for was he not the sole being who had actually seen the kidnapper-fiend in person? The florist concentrated on recalling the appearance of the customer. Only a few hours ago. Yes. A tall man, about thirty, wearing grey clothes. Wearing glasses? No, but he squinted slightly.

From this, a portrait of the killer was evolved; newspaper artists drew the picture, everyone was alerted to be on the lookout for a thinnish man – long face, high forehead, age about thirty – wearing a grey suit.

Moreover, he drove a Winton car! The florist was certain he had seen his customer drive away in a Winton. Thus he corroborated the story told by the little boy who had seen Paulie get into a grey Winton with a tall, thin man!

And on Sunday morning we were all pretty sure of his identity. He was a druggist named Clement Holmes, who had just tried to commit suicide. Holmes had been taken to the South Side Hospital. He was tall and thin. Police had questioned his wife and daughter, who told how strangely Holmes had been acting. He had been terribly worried about money matters, having recently lost his drugstore. Saturday, he had left the house… Was it at the time “Harold Williams” had appeared at the florist? It proved to be during the very same hour. Later, Holmes had returned in a terribly agitated state and had chased his wife and daughter out of the apartment. When they ventured back, they had found him on the bed, an empty phial of poison in his hand.

At the hospital, Holmes had been restored to consciousness, but to all questions he gave only babbling, meaningless replies. In the morning, the florist was rushed to the hospital to identify the suspect. But Holmes had vanished! SUSPECT FLEES HOSPITAL! Would the madman turn up at the funeral?

Somehow, the funeral was held with a degree of dignity. On the plea of the bereaved millionaire and of his friend Judge Wagner, all editors were prevailed upon to restrain their coverage. A police cordon kept photographers at a distance. We agreed among ourselves not to try to interview Paulie’s mother, watching respectfully from across the street as she walked, trancelike, almost carried by her husband and his brother, to the black limousine. Judge Wagner had given us the list of pall-bearers, Paulie’s classmates, the richest boys on the South Side. We watched from across the street as they came out, in their knickers and black stockings; each of them might have been the victim.

At the cemetery we all stood in a knot, whispering and conjecturing as to whether the murderer might appear. The family procession passed into the grounds, and we followed, remaining at a respectful distance. I heard the rabbi, speaking briefly – the crime was not mentioned; he spoke only of a young life taken in purity. Then the Kaddish, recited very softly by the father. And thus was Paulie Kessler buried a second time.

We came away hurriedly, for there was a police tip that Clement Holmes had been seen, in a Winton, on Skokie Road.

Monday, police were checking every registered Winton owner in Chicago. One had even turned up whose name was Harold Williams. But it seemed he had an absolutely airtight alibi.

In the afternoon there was a sudden wild alarm, and we followed police cars to an address on Harper Avenue. The pavement was filled with people asking one another what had happened. Police came rushing out of doorways; police were scouring the alleys. It seemed that a tall man in a grey suit, wearing a fedora hat, had come hurrying into a rooming house saying excitedly, “I want a room right away. I’ve got to get off the street!”

He had behaved so strangely that the landlady had whispered to a lodger to call the police. The stranger must have heard, for he had turned and run out of the house. There had been a wild chase through back yards. But the suspect had got away.

By then we were looking for a woman, too. The clue came from the glasses. A Lieutenant Cassidy had been detailed to try to trace the spectacles, and he had consulted an optician near the Bureau. The lenses were of a common prescription, as we all knew. But the frame, the optician said, was not a style that he handled. It was a tortoise-shell frame manufactured, he believed, outside of Chicago. Also, the frame was quite narrow. He judged that the glasses might have been worn by a woman. Someone with a thin nose bridge and a narrow forehead. Pictures were drawn of the female accomplice of the man in the grey suit, both of them sitting in a grey Winton car.

We began to hear stories of pressure. The almost mythical multimillionaire founder of the Weiss-Straus enterprises had appeared in the office of State’s Attorney Horn. He had come down with Judge Wagner. The magnate had asked pointedly about the progress of the investigation. For though the slain boy had been only remotely related to the Straus clan, there were among his classmates two of Weiss’s favourite grandsons. Were they safe? Were any children in Chicago safe as long as this monster remained uncaught, unknown? An editorial of the same tenor appeared in our own paper and in the Post.

Suddenly, police raids were taking place. Flophouses were combed, derelicts were picked up. Police Chief Schramm came back into the headlines by announcing that he had dropped the ransom theory and now favoured the pervert theory. ROUND UP ALL DEPRAVED, we headlined. Petty ex-convicts, floaters, queers were brought into the stations by the score, and we went and looked at them in the sour-smelling Canal Street lockup, the restless little men with puffy faces, the whisperers, the morons, as we called them. How many were kicked around, battered, abused? Who knew? Who cared?

Then Captain Nolan, chief of detectives, recaptured the headlines from the chief of police. “Dope will be found at the bottom of it all,” he announced in one of his exclusive interviews with the Tribune. And every dope addict in town was to be picked up and examined.

But as Nolan and Schramm failed to provide convincing suspects, our headlines were turned over more and more to State’s Attorney Horn and his eager staff of investigators. “The most important clue to appear so far,” we declared, had been provided by Horn, whose men had been questioning a railroad switchman oddly overlooked by the police. In Horn’s office we all listened to the switchman’s story. An elderly man with the scrubbed look of the intensely sober, he was quite convincing. On Wednesday night about midnight, he said, he had been driving home to Gary, and just past Hegewisch he had come upon a car stuck on a little side road. A dark sedan. It was a Nash or a Moon, not a Winton. He had given the car a push to get it back onto the road. Those people had been carrying a bundle of some kind, like something wrapped in a tent. He had even made a remark to the woman, “This is a hell of a time to go camping.” They had thanked him for the push. And one detail he remembered: their car had a broken front bumper.

And then Detective Chief Nolan issued an extraordinary statement: “I ask everybody in Chicago to look around and ask whether his neighbours, friends, or acquaintances showed signs of muddy clothes last Wednesday night, or were away from their usual haunts or callings last Wednesday afternoon or evening.”

“Hey, I saw mud on your shoes last Wednesday!” became the jest of the day, but Nolan’s invitation was followed by a new wave of telephone tips, letters, denunciations, arrests. Everyone was looking at his neighbour with strange eyes.

And at night, police pounced upon a group of people in a vacant lot at Cottage Grove and 44th – a few blocks from the Kessler home. There were two men and a woman. They had been acting strangely, burning something on the lot. And they carried a small bundle. It proved to be a shirt wrapped around something hard, which was nothing else than a broken typewriter! But it turned out to be an Oliver.

And near Aurora, police saw two cars stop. Their drivers got out, talked. A portable typewriter exchanged hands. The cars drove off in different directions. The police car chased one, and an officer commandeered a passing automobile to pursue the second fleeing vehicle. But the exchange proved to have taken place between a typewriter repairman and a respectable customer.

Neighbours of a mysterious redheaded woman reported that her room was filled with newspaper clippings about the murder. “I know all about the case,” they had heard her say. She was arrested as she was parking her old grey car. In the car was a shoemaker’s hammer, a weapon that might well have caused the death wounds on the boy’s head. She turned out to be a harmless eccentric.

Then we were haunting Steger’s block again. An anonymous telephone caller had informed the police that the dead boy’s clothing would be found “inside that block”. “We can’t afford to pass up anything,” Chief Schramm said, and the police combed the block. A woman was noticed acting suspiciously, running and peering under shrubs. But it was proved that she had merely lost her cat.

Meanwhile a truck filled with street labourers arrived, the block was closed off, and the men began breaking open the pavement. With the other reporters, I ran up and down the stairs that led to Steger’s apartment. Front and back doors were locked; blinds were drawn. It was rumoured he had been rearrested. One of the officers who was friendly to Tom, Lieutenant Cassidy, swore he didn’t know anything new about the school teacher. As for the digging operation, he only repeated our own guesses. “Maybe the sewer is stuffed up.” Maybe Paulie Kessler’s clothes would be found stuffed in the sewer.

The job continued into the darkness. Special lights were set up around the trench. In the crowd, the wisecracks flew, and the shocked, self-conscious giggles of flappers could be heard, as suggestions were made about what people might want to get rid of down the sewer. And in that same crowd, inevitably, Artie Straus had turned up with his satellite, Judd, hailing me, pausing to add a few horrors to the list, and swirling away among the watchers. I had a momentary impression of Artie’s voice laughing above some girlish shrieks, and then the sewer was finally opened. They found only a lot of muck.

In this muck, all the activity seemed to have come to a dead end. Of the hundreds of perverts and morons arrested and grilled, a score were still being held, among them an ex-policeman. We had taken to filling out our stories about them with the views of alienists, as we called them in those days. We quoted Dr. Arthur Ball, whose own grandson had been a playmate of Paulie Kessler and who declared that the killer would be found to be a degenerate of “the same mental type as Fitzgerald”, the sex maniac who had been hanged only two years before for mutilating a little girl.

After the alienists came the turn of the psychics. From Detroit, the police received a telegram signed by a Mme Charlotte High, who declared she had had a vision of the killing and could describe the killers.

Reese had me get her on long distance. A strange voice, breathless, masculine, poured out the detailed vision. “There are two men; one has a sort of grey streak in his hair. I see him hiding, in a big place, a hotel, in the south-west part of the city. The boy’s clothes are there. In my revelation I saw a car,” she continued. “It is not a Winton, as the police think, but a Buick. I traced the course of the car. A woman wrapped her skirt over the boy’s mouth to gag him, and he strangled. They went to a red frame house on Wabash Avenue at the end of the line where cars turn. In a day or two, someone will attempt to commit suicide. There will be a confession.”

And indeed on the next day someone did try to commit suicide. It was again the poor deranged druggist, Clement Holmes, who had escaped from the hospital. Now the news came from Louisville, where Holmes had been found in a rooming house, again nearly dead from poison. Police were waiting at his bedside for a confession. Only a thread of life remained. Would he live long enough to confess?

The report had come late in the day. Tom and I hurried back to the Bureau, hoping for the confession. If Holmes lived, Tom was to take the sleeper down to Louisville.

As we walked across the Loop, we felt that our job together on this story was drawing to an end. Somehow it was in the air – the murderer was about to be caught. We both felt, with our fagged-out nerves, that the thing was culminating.

We had worked together without rest all week. I had cut my classes, certain that in this assignment I was at last gaining my maturity. And with Tom I had experienced something I had never known before, a kind of partnership that I was to find rather rare even as I went on in my newspaper work. More and more as the week wore on, we had taken to keeping together, going out on the leads together instead of dividing them up. I knew only the barest facts about Tom Daly’s life, and he knew little more about mine. Yet we could curse each other out, call each other Hebe and Mick; each could tell when the other had reached a limit of fatigue, yet each would overcome his own fatigue to run down one more clue. And while Tom kidded me about my literary ambitions, I made in him the startling discovery that not all newspapermen intended to become writers; some thought of eventually becoming managing editors.

The Bureau was tense. The case was coming to a head. We couldn’t see Nolan; Cassidy was just going in. Tom caught Cassidy’s sleeve as he passed. “All set for Louisville?”

“Hell, what do we want with Louisville now!” Cassidy let out excitedly as he hurried to his chief.

What could he mean? We looked at each other. “You chase over to Horn’s,” Tom said. “I’ll see what I can get here.”

I found the State’s Attorney’s suite strangely quiet. The large outer office was deserted. But at a desk near the door was an oldish fellow, a kind of ward heeler on a sinecure. “Everybody gone to Louisville?” I asked.

He smiled slyly. “They don’t have to go that far on this case.”

That was all he would tell me. Clearly, Horn and his staff were questioning some new suspect, in secrecy. Or did all the other reporters know? Where were they all?

“Dick Lyman been here?” I asked. “Mike Prager?” He waved his hand reassuringly. “I told them boys all to go home.”

I hurried back to the Bureau. I found our rivals were all on hand. In the same mysterious way that had worked with us, others too had felt impelled to look in on the Bureau. Someone had recalled it was to the tracing of the spectacles that Cassidy had been assigned.

Finally Nolan emerged with his arm around Cassidy, and he let Cassidy tell the story. It was the rims. The horn rims had a slightly unusual hinge. Cassidy’s optician across the street didn’t handle any such rims, but from a catalogue he had found the name of the firm that made them, in Brooklyn. Cassidy had written to the Seemore Company, and discovered that only one store in Chicago handled their product.

For the time being, Nolan said, he had to withhold the store’s name. We all shouted our guesses. When Almer Coe, the biggest optical shop on Michigan Avenue was mentioned, we could see from Cassidy’s face that we were right.

“That special frame, on that prescription of the glasses – it cuts the prospects down,” Cassidy said.

“How many?” we all wanted to know.

Chief Nolan shook his head, smiling. “Just a few, just a few.” Now would we please play square with him? He had played square with us. He could not divulge that little list, and it would be no use pestering Almer Coe. Mr. Horn was checking on each and every one of those people. Before the night was over, he promised, the owner of the glasses would be known.

On Monday, Ruth was sitting in the university library. She had drawn a large volume filled with pictures of birds, and she was reading in it when Judd sat down next to her.

It was somehow an impulse that took hold of students, when a new romance was coming upon them, either to linger around Sleepy Hollow or to go and sit in the main reading room, with its cathedral windows and the soft light lying across the tables.

Judd had caught her nicely. Had she really become interested in bird behaviour? he asked. Mostly, she replied, in what it might explain about people. And she didn’t want to seem such a nitwit if he talked to her again. In a low library voice he asked whether she was angry with him about Saturday. She looked at him, her eyes fully open. She shook her head. “I suppose you couldn’t help it.”

In those remaining few days, were they in love? Judd was living under heightening tension. A week, he and Artie had agreed, might be enough to let them feel in the clear. The week had not quite passed. The pressure was still within him to live as if each day were his last, as if the gripping hand might fall at any moment upon his shoulder; this was indeed what he had sought – the intensification of life. And he carried it, containing in himself all the pressure, with no outward change in his manner.

But inwardly Judd seethed with a sense of being on the verge of a whole new area of cognition. It was not only the murder that had so sharpened his awareness, he felt. It was what had happened to him with Ruth on Saturday. Would it not be unique for a person of really unusual intelligence to permit himself to enter into an ordinary experience of love, to see what would happen? He might transmute that love into something hitherto unknown, something unusual, for it had to be said that Ruth was quite intelligent, exceptionally so for a female. As to the idea of the rape, it had turned in another direction; the force of the idea had propelled him into what might prove to be a novel experiment. What if he began something of importance to himself with this girl and in the meantime were caught? Wouldn’t he then suffer more than if he allowed no feeling to develop about loving a girl? And Judd even found himself thinking, Would it be fair to the girl?

They had their date that evening, and spent their time analysing what they might feel for each other. Judd maintained that there was no such entity as love, that it could always be reduced to self-interest or physiological response. “In your presence,” he explained, “I experience a certain ocular stimulation that causes a heightened activity in my glands.”

Ruth sat smilingly before him. But why, she inquired, should this stimulation be higher in the presence of certain members of the opposite sex than in that of others? And even if you explained the entire physical mechanism, she said, weren’t you still left with the same question? If you felt a longing for one certain person, and just wanted to be with that person and not with anyone else, didn’t you have to admit it was more than physiological?

I find it somewhat painful even today to project myself into this love scene between Ruth and Judd, for as I summon her up, I respond to the glow of her as though I were sitting opposite, at the small, round table with the menu card against the flower glass. I hear the music, “The Japanese Sandman”, and see all the couples around us, and feel Ruth’s own wonder at what was happening in herself, in regard to this boy, and in regard to me. Was she going to discover that what she felt for me was only “girlish attraction” and that her fate was with this tangled and intense boy, sometimes a genius, sometimes so childish about the most obvious things?

Judd must have tried to analyse what, in particular, drew him. He had a few times before experienced sudden compelling drives to “make” some certain girl – you gave the girl a rush, but always with the feeling of hurrying back to tell Artie. Now, since that stupid spilling of Saturday, he hadn’t wanted to tell Artie anything about himself and Ruth. He felt an endless need of exploration with this girl.

Was there for Judd a possible going-over? Was the time nearing for his going-over? Another day, another day, and would the emotion grow deep enough in him to hold?

So I torment myself with their little scene, with the certainty that while sophisticated words poured out, their fingers touched, and they reacted like any two kids made goofy at the contact. I see them later in the car, sitting mooning by the lake, perhaps only their hands clasped on the seat between them.

And he is still talking, talking as he never before talked to a girl, or to anyone. The slight clacky accents of self-satisfaction, so often irritating when Judd speaks, fade down and vanish. He tells her, his tone just barely tinged with sorrow, that he has never had a true friendship with a woman and has never thought it possible, because every connection between men and women becomes falsified through sexual desire. (There wings through his mind the image of his father, his mother, but how could his father ever have understood the delicacy, the fastidious quality, the purity of Mother Dear? The times when they must have copulated, since children were born, Judd banishes as gross, gross moments that didn’t really count in her life.) And so he explains to Ruth that pure love, disinterested love, can be felt only between men, just as Socrates said, for only then is nature unable to intrude her ulterior motive and to make people imagine they are in love. Yet as he speaks, Judd reserves within himself the knowledge that he includes the component of physical love between men. This knowledge gives him a feeling of power over her, the power of deception, but tinged with a tender shade of protectiveness – she need not know this thing in him, and how he has always felt toward Artie.

As he talks, headlong, about pure love, abstract love, it is almost as though he were exorcising the moment when he will be caught by that same dreadful purpose, by the demands of real life, that make a bond between men and women. He is still free, and perhaps in the crime he has committed with Artie he has made himself free forever, for as the toils of natural love reach toward him, the toils, also, of the punishing law may be reaching to seize him.

And thus as Judd talks, his sense of inverse pleasure increases: it is as though a self-thrust knife were already in his flesh, to cut off this prospect of love, and as he twists and turns in his emotions the heightening tension of his muscles presses exquisitely against the ready blade.

This, too, in her innocence Ruth cannot know. And Judd hints only darkly; he says he does not believe happiness ever to be obtainable for himself. And when she spoofs, “Oh, Judd, you’re just having Weltschmerz,” he pretends perhaps she is right, but lets her feel there may indeed be something more, something dark and personal.

“But what is it, Judd?” Ruth begs. “Why do you have these fits of melancholy?”

“Oh, the whole world,” he says. “It disgusts me. The things people do.”

“I know,” she says. “Sometimes you wonder how human beings can be so ugly, when they are capable of beauty, too.”

He plays with the idea of a sudden Dostoevskian confession. To tell her everything, the crime, and even how he intended to rape her. What would she do? Could he possibly discover in Ruth a soul so deep that it could encompass the horror of his own? Or would she jump out of the car? He feels she might burst into prolonged tears. That would finish everything.

But perhaps the black knowledge would draw her in, seal her to him, like the time, the breathless night, when Artie had let him guess about the body pushed into the lake. From that night, he had felt sealed to Artie; and the whole need to take part with Artie in another such crime was perhaps a need to put himself beyond the reach of ever squealing on Artie.

Could Ruth be up to it? In the remaining days, if only days remained, to treat all of life like some Huysmansesque Black Mass! Could she join him in a carnival of the senses?

“A penny,” she says.

And with a short laugh Judd reminds himself that Ruth is nevertheless a nice girl, that this is a component part of his permitting himself to be drawn to her, as an experiment. Perhaps a girl like Myra could go into some mad final carnival, but not Ruth. So he responds to her conventional query with, “Oh, just the same old subject.”

“Dat old debbil sex,” she quotes knowingly, soothingly. The sophisticated note returns to his voice and Judd makes some remark about Paris, soon – Paris, where they know how to make the most of such pleasures – and she mock-slaps his wrist, and he says well, of course, he believes in the same freedom for women as for men.

Ruth begins to say, “Would you like it if I-” but cuts it short, and Judd says, with a show of self-surprise, “You know I do believe I would feel quite furious; I would feel possessive about you,” and she laughs softly. “You see, all our smart theories-” And there is a lapse, and she remarks that she heard his brother is getting engaged.

Oh, he had meant to invite her – the party is Wednesday, Judd says. But is he sure it isn’t meant to be strictly a family party? Ruth asks. Perhaps she would be… “Oh, no!” he insists. “It’s a big brawl. The whole South Side will be there, and anyway even if it were a family party” – he feels suddenly peculiarly not himself to be saying a thing like this, yet tells himself he means it – “you must come!”

And the girl, his brother’s girl, Ruth asks, what is she like? Has he met her? Max met her in New York, Judd tells her; it was one of those conventional things, a perfect match, a Mannheimer. The girl is said to be very nice, quite pretty. She will arrive day after tomorrow for a visit, to meet Max’s friends, and from then on Judd is sure the house will be unbearable…

Suddenly he remarks that he has often thought of simply going away, leaving home on his own, bumming around, something like Harry Kemp tramping on life. She restrains herself from observing that all boys have such an impulse. And he continues, saying with a self-conscious little laugh, “Or maybe even getting married.”

“Now,” Ruth says, “that is surprising.”

Yes, Judd says, he has thought how it would be to have a wife and a home, but with someone quite different from his own family.

Ruth says she understands how he may sometimes feel a stranger at home, because even in her own home – though her mother and father are angels, and her mother is very young in feeling, more like a girl friend – still, parents can’t really tell you everything; you have to find out for yourself.

Then Judd is speaking of his mother. An invalid for many years, she was ethereal, like a Botticelli madonna – and within himself he goes on to say that truly she was a madonna, a virgin, and she was like Ruth – from Ruth there is something of the same emanation of purity and goodness – and then he sees himself being held aloft by a virgin mother. Though he is an infant, he is a person fully developed, speaking and able to walk, and already complete in intelligence.

He hears himself telling Ruth deprecatingly how he was indeed a prodigy, speaking his first words at the age of four months. She laughs softly, saying it is difficult to imagine him as a baby, and he declares he never was a baby; he resents the idea of having been a helpless baby.

Ruth has become so tender toward him; now their talk drifts into silence, and they sit looking at the dark lake, and their faces turn with the same impulse, and there is a slow tender kiss, the lips touching without weight, simply as though they were of one being. A lovely melancholy fatedness rises in their hearts. And it seems to Judd that he has the power to make the whole deed with Artie turn non-existent. It seems to him that he must somehow have drawn back that deed, erased that entire night from the schedule of time.

In bed that night, Judd could not summon the image of Ruth. He could not summon the madonna image of his mother. He could not summon the image of Artie. Instead there was his brother in the dark blue uniform with the brass buttons, the uniform of the military academy. He remembered when Max came home the first time in that uniform, Max, so huge, so strong, and Judd just a shaver eyeing him from the hallways.

And he remembered, too, the morning he was still in bed and Max caught him doing it and said if he kept on, the thing would come off and he would be a girl. Then way, way back there was fat Trudy, his nursemaid, her huge mouth open, laughing, the irregular teeth, and suddenly her head swooping down, and his terror, her laughing sounds through it all, and her joking threat that he would be no more than a girl, and the torture, pleasure, torture, like tickling, and big Trudy making imitation devouring sounds… “I love my little boy, my little man!”

The following morning all this was absent; he awoke with only the strange tenderness in him. The sense of wanting to see Ruth persisted. And as he drove to school, a whole new drama was being enacted in his mind; the play continued during class. He might perform it tomorrow at Max’s engagement party. “I have an announcement to make!” Oh, that would be a good one on brother Max, the self-satisfied groom, the centre of attention, suddenly fading into the background while the startled gasping crowd listened to his kid brother. Judd had to stand on a chair for his head to rise above their shoulders, and he announced – was it his own engagement or the crime? As he sat through the lecture his fountain-pen was busy: again a hawk, the talons open, sharp, long, and ready to strike. Near it he made patterns of the sun, with streamers of energy flowing out. Now, spread-winged on a cross, a great bird, an albatross. But still he was following something the instructor was saying about compound crimes – sometimes in compound crimes the lesser crime took precedence! Suppose they traced the glasses. To him. Suppose they somehow traced the letter. His. And it was he who had rented the car. (The cleverness of Artie! Judd smiled inwardly in appreciation.) But if he were caught by these items, wasn’t he free to make his own deal? Premeditated murder was death. But if the kidnapping had been a prank, the death accidental, if he made a deal for a charge of manslaughter, there might be only a few years in jail. He saw himself a model prisoner, studying, reading. Ruth waiting, and coming to visit him, and waiting…

What could you get, then, for kidnapping alone? Judd was shading in the initials on the cross, class was ending, and he managed to walk out alongside the instructor.

It wasn’t difficult to steer the conversation to the Kessler crime, as a striking current example of a compound crime. Suppose the criminal were apprehended, Judd asked, in preparing a defence would it not be advantageous to let him stand for the kidnapping instead of the murder?

Well, in some states, yes, that would be a distinct advantage, the instructor said. But in Illinois, kidnapping had quite recently been made a capital offence – since that miserable case of the abducted little girl assaulted in the coal cellar, the Fitzgerald case. “And in this crime,” said the instructor, “if they ever catch the perpetrators, I’m afraid the best legal manipulation would be of no avail. There are times when law seems pointless – any verdict short of hanging would be corrected by a lynch mob, I imagine.” He flashed an academic smile that had in it a touch of their shared superiority to the mob.

After his next class he met Artie. They strolled across the Midway, Artie hooting about the latest stupidities of the cops – checking every Winton in town. They even had the car wrong! And the two tramps and the vagabond woman who had been caught with a busted typewriter – now that was something! And that reminded him. “How’d you make out last night, Jocko? Did you get in?”

“Oh,” said Judd, “it wasn’t that kind of a date.”

Artie horse-laughed. She’d been running around with a frat brother of his, and Sid was no chump – Sid was a newspaperman. Hell, when they had all been together on Friday, hadn’t Judd been able to see that the girl was Sid’s push? Did he think a newspaperman would be wasting time with a girl that didn’t come across? Artie was willing to bet a ten-spot he could lay Ruth on his first date.

Judd was silent.

When he reached home, Aunt Bertha was already there, busily directing Emil in hanging summer curtains and draperies. It should have been done long ago! No woman in the house! And suddenly Aunt Bertha fixed her eyes on Judd, coming up to him and touching his sleeve. “And how are things with you, Judd? You’re looking worried. What can a boy like you have to worry about? He passes his Harvard exam with flying colours. And in a week he’s running off to sow his wild oats in Europe, and he’s worried!”

He smiled. She contracted her brows. “Maybe you are in love?”

“Maybe I am,” he said, to give Aunt Bertha some excitement.

“You just hate to have Max do something you can’t do,” she remarked, pleased at her shrewdness. And with a sigh: “If only your mother had lived for this. You see, Judd, it’s the same way with sisters, too. They’re jealous of each other and still they love each other.”

He kept the smile fixed on his face. Jealous of Max the Mope! “I was jealous of your mother when she married first,” his aunt said. Then, with a streak of asperity she added, “You know something? I was almost jealous of her for passing away first and being done with it all?”

It was this, this cheerfully admitted pessimism, that made him every once in a while feel you could talk to Aunt Bertha. She might even understand the whole thing with Artie; if any of them could get a glimmer of it. Aunt Bertha would be the one. No she would put the blame on Artie, as his mother would have done. Just as they had blamed others every time he got a childhood disease.

Judd remembered suddenly the one year when he had gone to public school, and his mother had admonished him, “Don’t ever touch anything. You’ll get germs. Don’t sit on the toilets. You must absolutely wait until you get home, Judd dear, you understand? They’re just common children.” And it had indeed scared him, because being sick all the times with hives and boils and eruptions on his skin, he was in horror of more hurting and more ugliness of oozing and scabs. Judd recalled how he had felt all that time, with the kids jeering, but keeping their distance. And in the corridors of the school, he had always tried to walk so as not to touch or be touched, until it seemed there had always been a space around him, everyone leaving him alone. Until that one day…

“What is it? Something bothering you?” his aunt appealed.

“You know, I may not be going to Europe,” Judd remarked. For an instant he was going to add, “I might get caught.” But instead he let the story of his love affair come out, saying he was quite interested in a new girl and might not care to leave just now.

“A new girl! And you’d give up your trip for her! Well, that’s really serious! Tell me! Who is she?”

Someone she wouldn’t know, he said. Just a girl.

Not a shikseh! Even with her supposedly liberal philosophy, there was this automatic horror. But Aunt Bertha covered it at once, giving him her lecture about how of course if he were truly in love with a nice gentile girl of good family, it would be no tragedy – there had been some good intermarriages on the South Side. Look at Artie’s mother, a Catholic. But still it was always luckier if you happened to fall in love with someone from your own background – like Max going to New York and meeting a wonderful girl at his brother’s, a Mannheimer, too! But suddenly she halted, eyeing him with new apprehension. It wasn’t some little tramp like that one he nearly got into trouble with last year, a pickup?

Judd shook his head. “This is serious, I assure you.”

Then he told her about Ruth, a brilliant student. Her family were respectable little people; her father owned a drugstore.

“Russian Jews, I’ll bet,” she said with a sigh. Still, there could be worse tragedies. “But you’re so young, Judd, a brilliant boy. Your father would be disappointed if-”

Then his aunt observed that perhaps the trip would really be the best thing. If he found himself still interested in the girl when he returned, and if she would wait until he got through Harvard Law School -

Wait. The word instantly brought an image; he was coming out of prison, his hair white at the temples, and Ruth was waiting at the gate, her dear face softened with years of faithfulness. Then a gush of grief came up in Judd, almost breaking out as tears, and at the same time he chided himself in disgust for this cheap sentimentality.

With her eyes still on his face, his aunt had caught the passing emotion. “It’ll be all right, Judd. It’s youth, youth. We all have to go through it,” and she patted his hand.

At dinner everything centred on Max. All the arrangements were reviewed again, to the last detail, for the arrival of his girl and for the engagement party. Uncle Adolph permitted himself some smutty jokes about Max’s impatience, with advice about what to do during the engagement period – “put it in the icebox” – and even the old man laughed indulgently. Max carried it all off with a large air of tolerance.

There was talk of honeymoon plans. “Kid, we might even meet you in Italy.” And Judd was squirming more and more at this smugness, while at the same time a choking self-pity was in him. “Never for me, never anything so ordinary and simple as happiness.” Then he took an inward vow – if he weren’t caught, if he got away with the thing, it would be a sign, an omen for him to marry Ruth and be conventional all his life.

They were sitting down for a little family game after dinner, and he even felt a kind of dopey pleasure in the ritual, perhaps for the last time. Then Artie burst in, waving his long arms, “Jocko, you’ve got to see this! They’re tearing up the whole street where Steger lives! The sewer is stuffed up! They think he shoved the clothes down there.”

“Steger?” It took the family a moment to think back to poor Paulie Kessler. “But I understood they let that teacher go,” Max said.

“They arrested him again.” Artie could hardly keep the laughter out of his voice.

Judd hurried him from the house. “Like a couple of kids to a fire,” he heard his aunt say as they rushed out.

The street was blocked off, and lights had been brought up, flaring over the small area where the crew chopped away at the trench, now waist deep.

“We should have thought of this too,” Artie whispered. “Stuffing the clothes down there.” Getting out of the car, Artie remarked that this was a good place to pick up some gash – easy to start a conversation. “How about those two?” Then began the game of undressing the girls with their eyes.

Artie pushed up against a pair and in great innocence asked what was going on, requiring a full explanation of the Kessler case. “Hey, don’t you even read the newspapers?”

He gave them the bootlegger act. “We’ve been up to the border for a shipment.” Judd tugged, getting him away. “What’s wrong? They’d have put out,” Artie snapped at him.

“Their teeth were bad,” Judd said.

“Oh Christ, just for a lay, you examine a twat as if you’re going to marry her.” He started on another pair, cute ones, full blown, with knowing looks. By this time Judd felt almost uncontainably excited. The peculiar feeling of tension, of expectancy about seeing Ruth, with which he had awakened that morning, seemed to have been multiplying progressively all day until now it was a general uncontainable lust. The presence of Artie had excited him even more than always; from the moment Artie came into the house, the need had been unbearable. And now it was the pressure of the bodies, Artie’s among them, until all the bodies seemed Artie’s, and something even more, something special in the excitement of the crowd, a crowd lust, the smutty things they were talking about. And perhaps compressed with it all, with Max’s engagement and the marriage talk, there was the danger in being here within arm’s reach of dozens of policemen. A cop was right in front of the girls, and Artie, instead of drawing the girls aside, started a conversation with the officer.

Pressed against the girls and against Artie, and tormented by the tumultuous raging need, Judd could have torn the bastard apart. “Come on,” he urged Artie.

But there was no moving him. “They’re just getting there!” Artie exclaimed. And someone wisecracked that the diggers had found a dead skunk. No, Artie said, it was a five-month baby! With a shocked gasp, the girls walked off. Artie pressed after them, loudly telling tales about the dreadful things women did – women were much dirtier than men, but women couldn’t help it. After all, the way they were made, they had their own sewer pipe.

And in that moment Judd recalled a chart in a drugstore window, first seen in childhood, with square-angled pipes going through a cross-section of a human body, a woman’s. And was there a baby curled in one part, or had he seen that in a medical book? But the picture remained in his mind, ugly, horrible. A nausea came over him; he backed out of the crowd. That nursemaid, Trudy, and even his mother, and even Ruth, the way a baby was made in there – no, it was too disgusting, too filthy in there. Females! He leaned against the car, feeling weak and ill.

Just then Artie spotted me in the group of reporters talking to the captain. He waved and pushed his way to me. “Anything new on the case?”

“They’ve got us running around in circles,” I said. “They’re even listening to a medium!” I told him about that crazy phone call. “She predicted a confession on Friday.”

“That’s only the day after tomorrow,” Artie said. “Want to bet on it?”

I said I wouldn’t be sorry if it happened; I hadn’t had any sleep for a week.

“You’d better watch out. Judd is making time on you, he’s stealing your girl,” Artie said.

We all laughed, and as they pulled away Artie blew the horn.

Judd was annoyed by that last remark; it was a night when everything that Artie did or said rubbed him the wrong way. And yet this only heightened his need. He was sure Artie was teasing him.

They ended up in a cat house, Judd agreeing to go just to get the stuff out of his system. But when the moment came when he always imagined himself doing it to Artie, this time again it didn’t happen. The act itself lasted longer, and for a time he imagined a wedding scene – Ruth in white, a shining bride, coming toward him. He would not picture himself doing it to her. There came back the scene on the beach, and then a kind of blank grief was in him, and, at his climax, a dreadful trembling, a sense of tumbling, like giants crashing in a circus act.

Going home, Artie was half potted. Judd still felt querulous; the post-coital compound of disgust and remorse was on him, and with it some dreadful unidentifiable anticipation.

Artie started to tease him about Ruth, making cracks.

“Shut up,” Judd said.

“Wow,” said Artie. “This is getting serious.”

“Aaw, cut the crap!”

He looked at Artie, and all at once his friend’s face appeared to him the way he had seen it the very first time when his mother brought him over to Artie’s house: he saw it as long-jawed and pasty. A tumult of revulsions and fears raced through Judd; everything, everything in the whole past of creation was wrong. In that moment he knew Artie, knew him objectively, as a being apart from himself. In the thing that they had done, they had not been doing the same thing. Artie had been doing something else, something he had done before, like the one in the lake, and the ones Artie had made dark hints about – the campus fellow who had been found shot, the taxi driver found castrated. Artie was driven by some demonic force, and in himself it was not the same. Had everything, then, been a gargantuan mistake? When he had believed himself to be participating, joining with Artie, had they really been separate, doing their separate things? If that could be so, then what – what had he been doing there? The possibility was a gasping void. Judd closed it out of his mind, and yet found it continuing into another thought: when people imagined they could be immersed together performing the act of love together, it was also like that: each was doing a separate thing.

Judd was silent the rest of the way home. Artie once or twice took gulps from the flask, then brooded. He got off at his house, saying in no obvious connection, “All right for you, you -.”

The tumultuous sense of some impending change, something tremendously imminent, remained in Judd through half the night. He could not analyse it, though he attached it to Ruth. In the morning the feeling was still with him, and with it he felt a compulsion to talk. If he met Ruth, he would perhaps babble out everything.

Instead, he found himself talking about her, about being in love with her. On impulse he was visiting a young married member of his birding class, Mrs. Cyrilla Sloan – and his excuse for ringing her apartment bell on South Shore was the delivery of a book he had promised her.

It had come upon him, that morning, that he must leave no promise unfulfilled; it was as though he were propitiating the nonexistent gods of luck.

Just after his ten-o’clock class, he found her looking morning-fresh, neat; Ruth would be a young wife like that, a secret bird in her nice neat little package of an apartment.

Mrs. Sloan offered him coffee, drew him into conversation. And presently Judd was talking in a rush, more easily than to Aunt Bertha, saying he was considering changing his plans – perhaps he would get married, perhaps he would get a job as a teacher instead of going to law school. Of course, this might displease his father, but -

“Don’t tell me you’ve fallen in love, Judd!” She smiled warmly as though she now understood his sudden visit.

And as he described Ruth, Judd became convinced it was really love – he wanted only to be with Ruth; all the tumult in him was the result of some complete change-over.

She kept smiling, letting him talk, telling him that she was glad he had found someone to be interested in, that she had always felt he needed someone. But he mustn’t be too emotional, she said; he mustn’t let his emotions run away with him. For now he was talking about getting married secretly, about going away somewhere to live.

The tumult in him was subsiding a little. Judd had no idea why he had made up all these things about family opposition, going so far with the drama.

It seemed to him that she held his hand lingeringly, perhaps invitingly, as he was leaving. Only by telling her he was in love he had caused her to change toward him. It was as though he had inadvertently used a password for the closed little world of ordinary people.

As he came out of the apartment building Judd felt relieved, eased as never even by intercourse. He heard himself whistling.

He spied Ruth with a little group in Sleepy Hollow, and lay down beside her on the grass. The crowd would begin to talk of them as a pair. It was an idyllic scene.

Someone had left a newspaper lying on the grass, and after the first glimpse of the headlines, Judd made himself avoid looking at it. They were still churning, churning over the city. But he would be safe. He was changing; he had to be safe to find out what he was going to be like.

The house had a different atmosphere; there were plants all around, huge green potted palms and rubber plants, and there were vases filled with flowers. Against an entire wall of the so-called library were the catering tables. Cases of real stuff from Canada were stowed in readiness under the boards. Max, hustling everywhere, showed Judd all this while telling him what a good buy he had got on the liquor, and that Sandra would be down in a minute; she was resting.

Then, as though she had sensed the young brother’s arrival, Sandra appeared. She was a statuesque girl, and each speech seemed to have been thought out in advance so that every word was precise. “So this is the genius of the family,” she said, offering her hand and pressing his for a second, with proper sincerity. “I wonder if you know how proud your brothers are of your accomplishments! I understand you speak eleven languages.”

Max said that Sandra was interested in literature, especially the French, so they would have much in common. Judd tried her quickly, mentioning Huysmans, Verlaine, Anatole France. She had not read any of them – if she had even heard of them – but she declared she would make a mental note to look them up, and you could see her inscribing the titles on her mind.

Max was looking at them almost desperately, wanting everything to be right and fine, and Judd even felt a surge of warmth toward his brother on this day. “Looks like it’ll be some party!” he remarked stupidly, and suddenly wished nothing would go wrong. If they were going to catch him, let Max have his dumb engagement party first unspoiled.

The dinner was in grand style, the full table, all the aunts and uncles, and the old man at his best, even genial – a real feast of the high bourgeoisie, Judd told himself, and when he went to fetch Ruth he prepared her in that vein.

She looked as if she belonged perfectly in the crowd, he was surprised to find – her dress, shoes, all. He introduced her as he might an ordinary date. But Aunt Bertha gave Ruth her knowing scrutiny, then told him privately, “I don’t blame you – she’s charming. This time you can’t be blamed.” Then she added conspiratorially, “You haven’t told anybody? Nobody knows?”

“I haven’t told even her,” he said. He felt gay, suddenly crazily elated.

The whole South Side was there, all right, the Weisses and the Strauses in force, including Artie’s entire family. The moment Artie came in he began to make a noisy play for Ruth – “I saw her first!” Then Judd had a peculiar feeling, as if everything he had been building up in the last few days about himself and Ruth was an act; in Artie’s presence it all fell apart.

Artie was taunting Ruth about that reporter, Sid. Did Sid know Judd was giving her the big rush? “Oh, Sid’s so busy I can’t even see him to tell him.” She laughed, and then Artie was on the crime again, full of the latest reports, and – hey, here was an idea for her boy friend, the reporter. What about the other unsolved killings on the South Side during the last year? That university student who had been shot, and the young man who had disappeared, just a few blocks from here, in April, Perry Rosoff – maybe the same fiend was responsible for them all! She ought to tell Sid to investigate the connection.

Myra appeared, touched Artie’s arm, and they started dancing. Judd danced with Ruth, feeling he was dancing better than ever in his life.

Later they were all at the punchbowl. Ruth was flushed. Judd was becoming somewhat drunk. Again, everybody was around Artie, talking about the crime. Judd signalled, trying to shut Artie up. But it was as though his excitement flashed between Artie and Ruth in an alternating current. Perversely, he did not entirely want Artie to stop. Judd heard himself laughing loudly at a monkey-gland joke about the castrated taxi driver. He was losing control of himself. In sudden need of escape, he went upstairs.

A moment later he realized Ruth had followed him. So this was his room. “How strange,” she said. “It isn’t like a room to be lived in at all.” It was so like a museum, with all these birds in their display cases. The collection was the work of ten years, he told her.

“But, Judd,” she said, “weren’t you ever a boy?”

The word shocked him. What did she mean?

Of course it was a thing boys did, collecting insects and birds. But the way he had done it, so seriously. “I just meant, you never seem to have had a real childhood. Always so precocious.” Her words, peculiarly, misted his eyes. Judd didn’t let anything show; he offered her a Beardsley book to look at, with risqué illustrations. But scarcely glancing at them, Ruth said, “You know, Judd, I can see you must feel all alone in your family. They’re not at all like you – your father and brother.”

She understood him, she understood him truly, he told himself; she was the first one, the only one. Then he felt a sweep of panic. He must get out, get out with her, escape! No, he was becoming intoxicated; he had been drinking since afternoon, mixing whisky with champagne. But Artie was certainly going to give everything away – he should stay and watch Artie! No, it was hopeless; he should flee. “Let’s get away from this,” he said. “Let’s go somewhere.”

Ruth would perhaps have wanted to stay longer at the party, yet in another sense she was an outsider. It was really an affair of the big South Side millionaire families, and from some of the girls she had already sensed a slightly hostile gleam. If she were to become truly close to Judd, if anything really developed between them, then she would have to be brought into his circle in some other way.

In the car he put his arm around her and they laughed. Being outside, away from those gasping, grinning faces, Judd felt all right again. He tried to think of a place to go – perhaps this was even a night for consummation; he should have brought a suitcase just in case. The way Artie said he always did.

Judd turned west; out on the Cicero road there was a place with a dance floor and booths. Maybe even rooms upstairs.

They danced. Then they were sitting and talking intently, again about love. Judd began sardonically: “My brother and that self-satisfied girl of his – could people like that really be in love?”

Ruth brought him down neatly. Could someone as conceited as he be in love? He said “touché”, and she pressed his hand and smiled, and then she said the essence of love was completely knowing each other. She hoped if she ever loved someone, they would always tell each other everything, no matter what they did, even infidelities.

Her words were banal, Judd told himself – she was after all ordinary – and yet the tug of her was more powerful than ever. He told himself that the two of them really looked like an ordinary nice college couple. Was that what he wanted so much, wanted to tears?

Something far inside him was laughing. It was as though he were with Artie, laughing at the sight of Judd sitting here with this girl. Then a thought came, one of those awfully simple things you suddenly recognize, things that everyone else must always have known. To experience everything, to experience every possibility of life – why, that included not only the unusual, the bizarre, the depths of evil, but it should have included the other side too; the other range of experience should have come first. How could he, now? How could he ever experience the most everyday common feelings, love and truth, with a girl like this? How could he know whether after all this common thing might not be the most important of all? An overwhelming sense of deprivation came to him because of what he had missed. And he had gone too far away now ever to secure it. Why had he not at least tried that ordinary experience before he went this far?

In the dim pink lamplight, Judd knuckled his eyes, as if he had a headache. Ruth suspected there were tears. But why? Why?

“Is something very wrong?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Tell me.”

“I can’t.”

And Ruth began to feel that it was more than youthful melancholy, more than the dark self-dramatizing in men, when they assume a Hamlet moodiness and seek comforting. This was something serious and real. But what evil could she know? Seeing Judd so profoundly depressed, there came to her only the dread bogeys of childhood fantasies, used to explain any threat of great sorrow. They were the primal threats of girlish imaginings. What would I do if I loved a man and there was insanity in the family? There even appeared the spectre of the ghastly disease: perhaps he had caught syphilis in his running around with Artie. But she cleared all that away.

No, perhaps much more reasonably Judd was still disturbed about the occurrence on the beach. Being alone with her like this, that powerful male sexual desire that boys had to cope with, so much more powerful a desire than women’s, must be upon him again. It was a need that made men so miserable. He was perhaps afraid it would again force him to do something that would spoil things. But ugly as the moment had been, Ruth wanted to comfort Judd, to tell him she understood. This was the compelling thing of nature, and especially if you loved – if you began to have a feeling for a man – you only sympathized with him for it. True, that moment on the beach had had another kind of strangeness, disturbing, for an instant even terrifying, but Judd had mastered himself for her sake, and in a sense that made Ruth feel he did respect her. If he was “different”, even moodier than Sid, this was perhaps what attracted her; this was the challenge of him. Everyone knew he was brilliant, and it would take an extraordinary girl, an extraordinary woman, to be equal to a man like Judd. And he had never found one, he had been so lonesome. Now perhaps she could give him the first happy feeling of true friendship, and even love might develop.

“Judd,” she said, “if it’s something about me, you mustn’t worry. You’d never hurt me.”

He shook his head. “I know I’d hurt you. I’d make you miserable.”

She touched his hand, and moved her head forward with the tender smile of a woman who has no wish to belittle a man’s suffering but yet sees that other times will come. “Let’s dance,” she said.

Then later, I picture them sitting in a car in a small woods along the Desplaines River. The despondency has come over Judd again, even more darkly. Between kisses, Ruth chides him, “But, Judd, what’s so terrible? You’re young, bright, rich; you’ll get what you want out of life.”

“You don’t know,” he says. “I just feel-”

Gradually she begins to feel his hurt, to feel it powerfully, deeply, to know that there is some unknowable sorrow stemming perhaps even from the brilliance of his mind – his mind apprehending some fated evil that ordinary people cannot see, some inescapable world sorrow. And Ruth begins to believe that anything must be done to assuage such a hurt that comes only from very life itself. If sexual release may lift away even a little of this dreadful pain in man, then the whole structure of purity becomes meaningless.

She wants, by some magic womanly touch, to dispel his ache. Yet it is not her ignorance or even her own innocence, she feels sure, that impedes her. This trouble of his is something uncommon, as Judd is uncommon. This intensity of pain is not merely what other men feel.

She draws his head down to her bosom. “Tell me, tell me,” she whispers, desperate over her own inadequacy – a girl trying to play the rôle of a woman. He is silent, caught in some bleak indescribable horror.

Her dress has small buttons all down the front, and in a chaotic wish to help him, Ruth undoes the buttons and draws down the edge of her chemise. His cheek rests against her bare breast. As it touches her, Ruth feels a warm pulse through her entire body, and in her sex, and she wonders whether now, now she will become a woman. His lips touch, and she wishes that her body could draw from him all the hurt, all the grief of living. She places her hand on his head. She feels a slight shudder going through his body. Is he weeping?

Judd sees the boy. For the first time, he sees the face of the dead boy – a kid’s face gazing up at him from the night-time water. And staring at him with a child’s unblinking candour, the face becomes his own.

Ruth is white-faced. She sits utterly still. And she hears Judd say, “I wish I had never been born.”

The words stagger Ruth; there is a strangeness in the intonation. It is not the way people usually say this.

She can only press his head tightly, feeling in herself a great distress that she cannot help this man, a great tugging to relieve his suffering, and a frightened wonder – can this be love?

Judd puts his hand on the gearshift. With an effort of will, he starts the car. Once the machine is in movement it is easier. He even is able to tell himself he has done a noble thing. He could have had Ruth tonight, and he refrained. Perhaps it will count, in a kind of bargain exchange with his fate. Perhaps it will help him not to get caught.

On the next day – the day Lieutenant Cassidy secured the list of Seemore spectacle owners – Judd was telling Artie how he had made Ruth. Judd assured himself he was talking that way only to keep himself from really talking about her to Artie. So he told how he had lifted her out of the car. Artie’s face wore a loose, sceptical look; no one was taking him in. That meant he was believing it. “You bastard!” Artie cried. “Why didn’t you take me along? You know I always had my eye on her; I knew she was tail. Let’s the two of us get her tonight-”

Judd shrugged. He wasn’t interested in her any more, he said.

“Okay, you bullshitter. I don’t believe you ever laid her.”

That was when the maid came in to say some gentlemen wished to see Judd.

Artie and Judd were in the library playing casino, not even for money; the débris of the engagement party was still around them. Now Artie sank far down in his chair, holding his cards in front of his face.

Two large men entered. Obviously they were not entirely at ease in this imposing house. Their hands hung stiffly.

“Who is Judah Steiner, Jr.?”

Judd arose. Let Artie see he could handle it. After all, he had been through it once; Artie hadn’t.

“What can I do for you gentlemen?” Judd said.

“The state’s attorney wants to talk to you, Mr. Steiner. We’ll take you downtown.”

“Is this about the Kessler case?” he said blandly, watching their faces. One of them reacted as though he had been handed a confession.

The other looked suspicious. “Huh?” he said.

“Well, I’d be glad to tell the State’s Attorney all I know about it, although I already talked to Captain Cleary out in the South Chicago station last Saturday.”

“Captain Cleary?” They exchanged glances.

“Yes,” Judd said. “Out there where the poor kid was found. I go birding out there, and the captain asked me if I could help out, give him any ideas as to who might habitually visit the swamp out there.”

The impassive look came back over their faces.

Then this was more. This time it must be the spectacles. The second detective said, “We don’t know about all that. We’re just supposed to-”

“-bring me in,” Judd said easily, and they all chuckled. “Sure, let’s go.”

He glanced toward Artie. All kinds of things were on Artie’s face. It was almost the way Artie looked when playing drunk, pretending he didn’t quite know what was happening, and wasn’t really taking part. “Artie,” Judd said, “would you tell my folks, should they want to know my whereabouts?” Then he introduced the cops. “This is Artie Straus, a friend of mine, Mr.-”

“McNamara,” the first one introduced himself. The other said his name was Peterson.

A third dick was at the wheel of the car. Judd sat in the rear with McNamara. He offered cigarettes. No conversation started, so he tried the Carpentier fight as an opener. The cop thought the Frenchman would win. He hoped he could get there, but he might be busy.

“This case is keeping you on the go, I’ll bet.”

“You said it.”

“Perhaps it will be solved by then.”

The dick said nothing.

This was more serious than last Saturday, Judd felt sure. But assume they did have the glasses traced to him. Or suppose it was something that hadn’t been thought of at all? Fingerprints? Anything. The telltale atoms in the universe. Each atom left its trace.

But apparently they still had nothing on Artie. Artie should stay out unless caught. There was the wish for Attie to be with him, and a sly kind of counterwish, to be alone, to suffer punishment that would make him worthy of Ruth.

No, no sentiment. It was his mistake. The glasses in his pocket where they could fall out.

He was a stoic. He knew that all in the end was fated badly. A man should combat the putridity of life to the limit. Therefore he would go through everything without changing, without breaking. He would show himself consistent in his beliefs. Even to the execution.

But not Artie. Not Artie, dead. A wave of emotion returned as from some far distance, engulfing and washing out everything Judd might have felt for Ruth, his silly puppy love of the last few days, making him ashamed of the moment a few nights ago, after the whorehouse, when he had loathed Artie’s face. He saw Artie now, the laughing, easy college guy whom everyone loved – Artie standing at Judd Steiner’s execution, watching, talking with clever pity about the poor Judd he had known, a deranged genius. With the old quick pleasure, Judd saw himself on a scaffold, his hands tied behind him – on the scaffold as on a platform where slaves were sold in ancient times, sold or executed. Multitudes stood below, and great, immortal words of parting came from him, his legacy to mankind.

Ruth would weep.

Crap. He would not be defeated, not by such clods as were beside him. Now was the real test; now he would outwit everyone. Now was the chance to prove to himself that he was of another mental calibre, of another orbit entirely.

When the car stopped in front of the La Salle Hotel, Judd was surprised. The men escorted him through the lobby. “We’ve got a suite here,” Peterson offered. “The State’s Attorney don’t want to expose people, you know, if the papers get hold of it.”

It was a dead giveaway, then. They didn’t have anything for sure. The outcome depended on himself.

It was not only to protect innocent people from publicity that Horn had moved over to the hotel. There had been no such consideration for other suspects during the previous week. But after that frustrating, killing week, here was at last a hard clue. And Horn was simply at nerves’ end. His staff was exhausted. He didn’t want any distraction while he dealt with this one good lead. Because if this one petered out, the case seemed hopeless.

It would be conventional to suggest political importance. But I doubt if the State’s Attorney, any more than we reporters, thought predominantly of an effect on elections. All of us, including the police, were much more deeply embroiled. We were struggling with the first and lifelong problem of man – to find out how things happen.

Now, from the optician Horn had three names. Only three pairs of glasses of this prescription, encased in this new, expensive brand of frame, had been sold in Chicago.

Those three names could bring only bafflement and dismay to the prosecutor. One was a middle-aged lady piano teacher, who lived on the North Side. The other was a fairly prominent accountant. The third was the son of a millionaire, living in the Kessler neighbourhood.

The piano teacher was quickly eliminated. Her glasses were on her nose. The accountant had been out of town for the past three weeks. He had his glasses with him, he wired, and would be glad to show them to anyone designated by the authorities. That left Judah Steiner, Jr.

In the inner room of the suite, Horn gave his instructions. With his characteristic, choppy motion of the elbows, he emphasized that this had to be it. He wouldn’t have a trick remain untried even if the youth were the son of the mayor himself. Horn left the preliminaries to Joe Padua.

Padua had a liquid voice and liquid eyes, a touch of Rudy Valentino in the fluid way he moved. He was a tripper, because he could go along, polite and soft-toned, and then, in the conventional manner of a stage prosecutor, suddenly turn cold and murderous, a gun.

So Judd was brought up in the lift and into the suite. Joe Padua introduced himself, and his handshake was affable. His antagonist, Judd surmised, was in his thirties and probably a graduate of John Marshall or one of those downtown diploma mills. At once, Judd told of his interview with Captain Cleary. Padua, too, he saw, had known nothing of it. Glibly, Judd repeated how he frequently took his birding classes to that very area. He was sure he felt his opponent’s hostility shrinking.

Nevertheless, Padua tried. “We just wanted to ask you, Mr. Steiner, you do wear glasses?”

“Well, as I told Captain Cleary – in fact, I left a statement in writing with him – I did wear glasses for a while, when I was boning.” He put on a you-know-how-it-is smile. “I’m studying law, and this is quite interesting to me, my first practical contact; but as I was saying, the reading can get pretty heavy.”

“Don’t I know.” Padua gave him back the smile.

“I was getting headaches, so I had reading glasses prescribed, but the condition disappeared a few months ago.”

“You stopped boning?”

Judd chuckled. “Well, it’s curious, I still read just as much, but in any case the headaches ceased, so I don’t believe I’ve made use of the glasses in two or three months.”

“I see.” Padua picked up the glasses from the table and handed them to Judd. “Are these yours?”

Judd felt them against his hand, with that sense of natural contact given by a familiar possession. He put them on. “Well,” he said, “I would say they were mine, if I weren’t sure that mine are at home right now.” He laughed shortly. “That is, unless someone swiped them, though I can’t imagine why.”

If it went that far he could suggest a whole flood of possibilities. He might have left his glasses at the university, or anywhere; the murderer could have picked them up. He was certainly safe if he played it right, because with this bit of evidence alone – and it was clear it was all they had – they wouldn’t dare go to court. Not against a son of Judah Steiner!

“You say your glasses are at home?”

“Why, yes. As I haven’t worn them for months.” He turned to McNamara, who was sitting by the door. “If you’d have mentioned it at my house, I’d have produced them for you.”

“Well” – Padua smiled – “it won’t take long to pick them up.”

McNamara arose from the chair.

Judd placed the glasses on the desk. “I believe mine are a very common prescription,” he said, and then checked himself. Could it be possible that they had called in everyone in town with glasses of that prescription? No, that would have meant thousands. There must have been some other factor leading to him. What could it be?

He smiled at his questioner, and made an abortive gesture to shake hands on leaving. But Padua didn’t stand up, didn’t reach out his hand. As he left with McNamara, Judd felt that he had not exactly won the first round.

He thought over the interview. It was a little disturbing that his antagonist had been so brief. Why hadn’t they asked for his alibi? Or perhaps that was on the good side. As for the glasses, perhaps Almer Coe had recognized them in some way as their product.

Would Artie still be in the house? Perhaps he had fled. Artie could run up to Charlevoix, take his boat, and hide out on one of those little islands, as he had so often dreamed of doing. Perhaps they should both have beat it up there, and they would be living there together now, hermits bound together for the rest of their lives.

Max had just come home; he was dressing to take his fiancée to the theatre. Judd explained curtly, annoyed with Max for being there, “These men are from the state’s attorney’s office. It seems the glasses found in the Kessler case are similar to mine. They’ve been checking all the people who have similar glasses.”

Max blinked once or twice, as though uncertain whether to take an insulted attitude toward the authorities or make a gag of it. “I’m just going to get my glasses and show them,” Judd said. “They’re in my room.”

But McNamara and Peterson followed him upstairs. On entering the room, the detective was startled. “What’s this, a museum?”

Judd explained that he was an ornithologist. But he felt instantly that the room had made a point against him. He was now someone queer. Trying to recover, he made an effort to impress the detective, telling him this was the most complete collection in the Midwest, and that he had a special permit to shoot specimens, even in the city parks. The man’s dumb-animal stare altered. A glint of respect had come into it.

Meanwhile Judd made a show of looking among his papers, on his desk. Then he opened a few drawers. “I haven’t used them for such a long time-” At the second drawer he said, “Oh, here!” He picked up the spectacle case, then held it in his hand with a puzzled look.

McNamara took the empty case from him.

“I can’t imagine-” Judd frowned. “They must be around here somewhere.” He poked aside a pile of books.

The maid had come to the door. “Have you seen my glasses anywhere?” he asked. “I haven’t used them for some time.”

“Why, no,” she said. “Did you look downstairs in the library?”

He never read in the library. The last one who read there had been his mother; not a book had been added since. Frowning, Judd started downstairs, to make a show of it. “There was a mob in here yesterday; we had an engagement party,” he remarked. “A lot of our friends got tight and turned the house upside down.”

McNamara nodded but did not at once follow him to the stairs. It swept through Judd’s mind that they would search his room. In that moment he tried to visualize everything that was in his desk, every scrap of paper. The ransom letter had been typed on stationery bought outside. The envelope was not from his stock, either. And yet he felt uneasy. If they started to search, should he demand a warrant? Or would that be bad, arousing suspicion? But McNamara turned away from the desk and came downstairs. The other one, Peterson, still stood there.

Judd made a big show of searching the library, the living room, irked as they followed him from room to room. Peterson had come down, finally; he remained aloof, but McNamara seemed to want to be helpful, picking up a magazine here and there as if expecting to find the glasses underneath. Or was he a cagey brute, using this means to rub it in? Judd said, “Well, I really can’t explain it. I must have lost them somewhere without realizing it.”

Max, all dressed up, ready to leave, appeared in the hallway. “Look, kid, what’s this all about?”

“Can’t you see!” Judd snapped. “I’m looking for my glasses.”

“Well, so you lost your glasses, so what?” And to the detectives Max said, “This is ridiculous.” But he checked himself. “Of course, I realize you have to go through with it and make a thorough checkup. But-”

“I’ll have to go downtown with them again,” Judd said, “and explain.”

“Say-” Max half laughed at the idea of even having to make such a statement, but he told the detectives, “anyone you want to vouch for the kid here – why, Judge Wagner is a friend of my father’s. I understand, I’ve read in the papers, the Judge has been very helpful to the Kessler family. Now, Judge Wagner’s known Judd since he was a kid. Why don’t you give him a ring?”

“Well, that would depend on them downtown,” McNamara said.

“Do you want me to come along, Judd?” Max offered.

“Why, no! What for?” Judd was smiling again, but his hostility to his brother was rising in him, stronger than ever.

“Well, give Judge Wagner a buzz if there’s any complication,” Max repeated.

Now on the drive downtown the silence was ominous. Whatever he thought of saying might be interpreted the wrong way. Judd remarked only that he hoped his carelessness wasn’t going to keep them working very late. It was all right, they said; they were used to it.

McNamara asked about the birds, and Judd started to talk enthusiastically. “A kind of hobby?” the policeman inquired.

“Well, it’s more than that.” And he gave them examples of puzzling things about migration and mating. Perhaps all this would show them he was unworried.

The hotel room looked messier. The men had had sandwiches and coffee sent up; plates and cups were scattered on desks and chairs. McNamara handed the empty spectacles case to Padua. “He couldn’t find the glasses,” he said.

Padua picked up the horn-rimmed spectacles from his desk, slipped them into the case. He made nothing special of the little action, but, gesturing with the same hand, introduced Judd to an older man.

“This is Mr. Horn, the State’s Attorney,” Padua said.

On first sight, Horn had a way of confusing people. He was not so much ugly as odd-looking; his face was exactly half-moon in shape, with a tiny, almost caved-in nose. His torso was bulky, his legs were very short, his movement was abrupt. And his voice had a shrill, rather feminine pitch.

Horn’s presence had intensity. There was never anything relaxed about him. He had an intensity, I suppose, beyond his capacity; otherwise he would have become a very important man. The drive was there.

“Do you want to admit now that these are your glasses?” he demanded in his shrill voice.

Judd retained his schoolboy smile. “I don’t want to admit any thing I’m not sure is so,” he said.

Horn went in again. “You know this looks serious, Mr. Steiner.”

“Indeed I do,” Judd said. “It’s quite embarrassing. They may even be my glasses. But after all, my family is quite well known. Judge Wagner is a friend of the Kesslers and he knows me quite well-”

“Do you want to talk to Judge Wagner?” Horn said.

“Well, he could tell you something about me.”

“All right.” Horn tilted his head to Padua. “Let’s get Judge Wagner on the line.”

They all subsided into a kind of neutrality while Padua tried the Judge’s home, and finally reached him at the Kesslers. Padua handed the phone to Judd.

“Judge Wagner,” he began, “this is Judah Steiner, Jr… Yes, fine, thank you. I’m calling you in rather unusual circumstances, from the State’s Attorney’s office, or rather his suite at the La Salle Hotel. They are investigating persons whose glasses resemble those found in the Kessler case, and mine happen to fit. Well, I thought, or my brother Max thought, you might want to say a word-” Smiling, he handed the phone to Horn. The least it could do, Judd told himself, was to keep them from pulling any rough stuff. If they didn’t lay hands on him, he was sure he could ride it through.

Charles Kessler leaned close in to Judge Wagner, listening. Their faces had the same expression, troubled, disappointed and yet persistent. Of all they had hoped for, when the glasses would be identified, only this had come.

Judge Wagner repeated that Judd was a brilliant boy, a Phi Beta Kappa at seventeen, a law student, and the son of one of the most respected men in Hyde Park. “Still, you have your investigation to make,” he said. “Let justice take its course.”

Sighing as he hung up, he said to Kessler, “No, this is really impossible. Some kind of accidental coincidence.”

Horn replaced the receiver, musing. Padua turned to Judd, as with a new thought. “Tell us this, Mr. Steiner – Judah-”

“My friends call me Judd.”

“Well, Judd, if I may – you say you’ve been out to Hegewisch?”

“I should say a couple of hundred times. As I told Captain Cleary, I was out there quite recently, the Sunday before this awful event. I even remembered running across the mouth of the culvert there. I was trying to get a shot at a species of crane, and I tripped.”

“You tripped?”

They were all staring at him. “Why yes, I recall it distinctly.” He waited for one of them to make the connection, and Padua obliged.

“You could have dropped your glasses then?”

“Well, it doesn’t seem probable. I don’t recall bringing them along. As I said, I hadn’t used them for a few months. Unless” – he reflected – “unless I had quite simply left them in the pocket of my jacket and entirely forgotten they were there.”

They all looked at each other. A chubby, silent one, in a corner, taking notes, he didn’t like.

“Well,” Padua said, with that impersonal air of having to go on until every detail was clarified, “when you saw all this in the papers about the glasses, and you knew you had been on the spot, and even had tripped there, didn’t it occur to you that these might be your glasses?”

The moment had come for a decision. “Well, no,” Judd said.

“No?”

Horn put in, “Didn’t you check up to see if you had your own glasses?”

“Well, even if it had occurred to me, I believe I would have avoided checking on it.”

“How’s that?” asked Padua.

“In a hysterical situation of this kind” – he laughed, a bit nervously – “one wouldn’t have wanted to risk having to get involved. I might even have had some silly notions about the third degree.”

They all chuckled. Then Horn said, “Now Judd, you, a law student, ought to know better than that.”

“There were stories about what was happening to that teacher.”

“What stories?”

“Well, I happen to be acquainted with a newspaperman on the case-”

They wanted to know what newspaperman. And what had the newspaperman said. Oh, he hadn’t said anything specific, but it was just one of those popular ideas.

“Well, all right. No one denies there is a lot of talk about the third degree.” In Padua ’s smile there was almost a hint of “you’ll see for yourself”. But he persisted, “So even as a law student, you didn’t think it your duty to check whether they were your glasses, so you could identify them and save the state a lot of trouble if they were. And you also must have realized that in the meantime we were running down false clues, and giving the real culprit more opportunity to get away.”

“There might have been a question in the back of my mind,” Judd said. “But in the situation-”

Horn said, “Then you admit now that these are your glasses?”

“Why, I can’t say for sure. It could be possible.”

A point had been reached. There was a prodigious relaxation in the room; the note-taker put down his book; men moved around; Horn whispered something to McNamara, who went out.

So they had pinned that on him. But what was it? Nothing. His explanation was perfectly logical. There were half a dozen witnesses to vouch that he had been out to Hegewisch that Sunday, birding.

Horn stood up, crossed the room in the most casual way – oh what a cheap show they were putting up; wait till he imitated Horn for Artie! Horn took the glasses from the case, and put them in his breast pocket. “You carried them in your pocket like this?”

“Why, yes, that was where I would habitually carry them. I could have left them in the pocket of my jacket. I hadn’t worn the suit for some weeks. But – I believe it is this suit I have on now.”

Suddenly Horn performed a curious little shuffle with his feet, and half flopped over, like a vaudeville dancer in a buck-and-wing, nearly losing his balance. Startled, Padua and the others lunged to catch their chief. But Horn steadied himself, grasping the back of a chair. He straightened up. Then he touched his hand to his breast pocket. The glasses were still there, intact. “Would you like to show me, Judd, how you might have fallen, and the glasses dropped out? Especially since you have on the same suit.”

“Why, it seems to me that when I did use them habitually, they were always falling out of my pockets when I bent over.” Horn was holding out the spectacles. Judd slipped them into his coat pocket, smiling.

“How did they fall? Will you show us?”

“Well, I’m not much of an actor,” he said, chuckling.

“Just let’s see if they fall out.”

“Well, the terrain isn’t exactly the same, you know. I tripped, I think it was down an incline, down the overpass of the railway tracks there.”

“You do know the site quite well,” Padua remarked.

“Still,” Horn said, “let’s give it a try.”

With a slight frown at being put in a situation where he had to make a fool of himself, Judd made a few steps toward the centre of the room, and then fell forward, landing on his palms. As he straightened himself, he had difficulty concealing an angry sense of humiliation. But he made himself chuckle. “Of course when you try it never happens.”

They smiled with him.

Padua now came forward and arranged a little pile of stuff in the middle of the floor; there were a couple of telephone books, with a few smaller books on top.

“Do you want me to break my leg?” Judd said.

“I’ll risk mine first.” Padua reached out his hand for the spectacles, but then corrected himself, putting them aside, “Anybody got another pair? We might be needing these some day in court, who knows.”

The secretarial fellow, now introduced as Czewicki, also an assistant State’s Attorney, handed over his shell-rims. “Be careful. You want to leave me blind?”

“Don’t worry,” Horn said humourlessly. “The state will buy you another pair.”

Padua slipped Czewicki’s glasses into his pocket, walked back a few steps, then allowed himself, with a certain elegance, to trip over the phone books. Nothing happened. He offered the substitute glasses to Judd. “Want to try?”

Judd thought of protesting at this point. Still, this nonsense could turn in his favour. “I suppose I might stand on my head,” he joked. “That ought to do it.” Then he let himself trip over the books, pitching forward. At least, he wished that the bastard’s glasses would be smashed.

It became too stupid. Five, six times, he must have tried it. Horn was sitting there like a school teacher. Frowning, he rose and said, “I’ve got an idea. Would you mind taking off your coat?”

“Why, no,” said Judd, “I’m getting hot from all this exercise anyway.”

The State’s Attorney took Judd’s jacket and placed it on the floor. Then, as one absorbedly performing some abstract demonstration, he picked up the jacket by its bottom. The glasses slipped soundlessly from the pocket and lay on the carpet.

All looked at Horn as though he had performed a great feat.

“That’s how it might have happened, isn’t it?” said Horn, helpfully.

“Why, obviously,” said Judd, “glasses can fall out that way. But I don’t recall having my coat off that day.” Instantly he wanted to kick himself. He tried to backtrack. “But of course I might have.”

Padua was shaking his head, thoughtfully. “You wouldn’t pick up your coat that way.”

“Why?”

“You’re pretty careful about your clothes, Padua said. “I noticed it, because I’m the same way. But perhaps – in the dark-”

Judd stared back at the fellow, unblinkingly. Certainly, he told himself, he was superior in intelligence to this wop. He must simply be careful not to be tripped by his own over confidence. He must not try to prove them wrong on each remark, as he had done so far.

Receiving no reply, Padua resumed, “Another point confuses me. When you spoke to Captain Cleary last Saturday, the question of the glasses did come up.” So during the last hour, they must have been in touch with Cleary. They must now have the report he had written.

“Yes. I told him I used to wear glasses.”

“Then, surely when you got home you checked up?”

“No,” Judd said. And as they stared at him: “Perhaps that was when it crossed my mind, and I decided not to. As I said, I would have hated to see my family get involved over an unhappy coincidence of that kind.”

Padua took a long breath, and said, quietly, “As a matter of fact, you knew they were your glasses the whole time. You lied both to Captain Cleary and to us.”

“I resent that!” Judd snapped.

Horn looked toward Padua. There might have been a hint of disapproval in his expression.

With elaborate casualness, Padua said, “You’ve seen this ransom letter in the papers. What did you make of it?”

“Well, I didn’t study it very carefully.”

“Here.” Judd was handed the letter. He made himself read it over, word for word, so as not to seem familiar with it.

“Judd, what sort of man wrote that letter, do you think?”

“Well, obviously he is not uneducated. I would say at least a high-school graduate. There don’t appear to be any errors in grammar or spelling. Unless – the word kidnaped. It is spelled here with two p’s.”

“Isn’t that correct?”

“I think it would be the British way,” he said. “I believe we would use one p. But either could be called correct.” How he had argued with Artie about it! But now, Judd felt that making this point separated him from the letter. He replaced the letter on the desk.

After a short silence, Horn said, rather formally, “Suppose you tell us where you were on the afternoon and evening of May 22.”

“May 22?” Now, this would be the last round. “Oh, the day of-”

“Yes.”

“Well, offhand, I suppose it was a day like any other day. I went to my classes…” Now he was approaching the barrier. The alibi. The week that he and Artie had agreed upon for using the alibi was technically over. Today was Thursday. “May 22 – that was a Wednesday, wasn’t it?”

“Yes. A week ago yesterday.”

“I don’t recall any special activity on Wednesday.”

“But surely, only one week ago – you’ve got a pretty good memory about almost tripping out there in Hegewisch a few days before that.”

“Well, I had my Harvard exam on Friday morning, so I was pretty busy studying.”

“Friday morning – you took an exam?”

“For Harvard Law,” he said modestly.

“How’d you make out? Was it tough?” asked Czewicki.

“Of course it was only an entrance exam, and I boned up pretty well.”

“A Phi Bete would have no trouble,” Padua said.

“That’s a great school,” Czewicki said. “You’ll probably come back here and beat the pants off us.”

Horn brought them back to the topic. “What time did you leave the university? On Wednesday.”

“About noon.”

And where had he lunched? At home?

“Well, I usually lunch with friends. Yes, Wednesday I believe I lunched at the Windermere with a few friends – Willie Weiss and Artie Straus.” They wrote down the names. For the first time, he had brought Artie into it. “I recall driving my aunt and uncle home, in the evening.”

“What time was that?”

“About ten. Perhaps a little after.”

“They had been visiting?”

“Yes. For dinner.” Let them assume he had been home for dinner.

“You were home for dinner?”

Too easily checked. “No. I was out. I came home to drive them.” Now he would have to use the alibi. He had to tell some kind of story. Why had he and Artie chosen to put a time limit on the alibi? They should have agreed to stick to it until he sailed. He tried desperately to think of some other plausible story, but his mind seemed frozen, blank. There was only this path.

“Were you out alone?”

“With a friend.”

“Girl friend?” Padua said.

“Well, yes, in a way.”

Respectfully: “Can you give us her name?”

Judd hesitated.

After all, Padua kidded, the girl’s honour was scarcely at stake, since he had come home by ten o’clock.

Perhaps he could still keep Artie out of it. He said he couldn’t tell the girl’s name because he didn’t really know her name. It was a pickup.

They exchanged looks again.

“I thought you were so busy studying,” said Horn.

“Well, you know how it is before an exam. You bone on the last day – at least I always do. I stay up all night before the exam, as I find that a sleepless night makes me extremely alert. So I did my intensive studying on Thursday.”

“And Wednesday you were out on the town.” Padua clucked his tongue.

Judd gave them the alibi, but without Artie. How he had gone birding most of the afternoon in Lincoln Park, then he hadn’t returned home for dinner because – well, his dad might then have expected him to stay in and study. So he had eaten in a restaurant and then he had picked up this girl on 63rd Street, and taken her to the wooded island in Jackson Park, and tried to make her, but she wouldn’t come across, so finally he had let her out to walk home. She had said her name was Edna.

And just where had he picked her up?

He gave the corner again.

Could he find her?

Well, possibly she hung around that neighbourhood. He was pretty sure he could recognize her.

“By the feel?” Padua cracked and they all laughed.

Padua resumed. And was there no one else to substantiate his whereabouts on that day? Judd smiled, as if to recognize that it sounded pretty fishy. But all the more reason for them to believe it.

“A lone wolf,” Padua said.

They went over the whole thing again, and again and again.

Horn, sitting on the edge of a table, remarked in a toneless voice, “Look, Judd, you see where that leaves us. Your family is one of the most respected in town. Now, we don’t want to prolong this. If there is anyone at all who can corroborate this account of yours, that would be a great help.”

For what happened at this point, Judd blamed himself. What made him bring Artie in, he never quite understood, unless it was a sense of fairness – he had been going through this ordeal for a couple of hours, and it was only fair for Artie to share part of it. Perhaps there was even a feeling that Artie would want to share the experience. And beyond this was a certain terror. Despite all their soft expressions, he had reached a stone wall.

“Well,” he said, “I wouldn’t want to involve anyone.”

They jumped on it. Surely it would simplify things if someone had seen him, been with him.

“Well, a friend of mine was along with me, but the fact is, his mother is a highly refined woman and it would be quite a shock to her to hear that her son participated in such-”

“-pastimes?”

He waited.

Padua asked, “You had another fellow with you when you picked up this girl?”

“Who was it?” Horn demanded.

He couldn’t back out of it now. “Artie Straus.”

Once more, the sigh of relaxation spread through the room. Judd hated baseball, but from way back in his Twain School days, when they had tried to get him into things by making him the baseball manager, he recognized the feeling among the men: the second out.

“Straus was with you when you picked up this girl?”

“Well, we picked up a couple. The fact is, we had some drinks, in the afternoon while we were watching for the birds.” Somehow that always tickled them. “And we thought we had a little too much on our breath to go home – it would show – so we went to the Coconut Grove for dinner, and then we drove around and picked up these girls.”

“Straus,” Horn repeated as he wrote down the name. “That the Straus Corporation?”

Judd nodded.

A low, appreciative whistle came from Czewicki.

“Can you give us his address?”

McNamara was already coming forward to take the slip of paper. “Say, that’s right across from the Kessler house,” he said. “Say, I know this Artie Straus – he gave us all that dope on the school teachers.”

“He’s been extremely interested in the crime,” Judd said. “His little brother was in Paulie’s class at Twain. And Artie is a kind of amateur detective.”

As McNamara left, Horn stood up, smiling. “How about some dinner?” he suggested, in the tone of a man who has done a good day’s work. “I’m starved.”

“I could eat,” Padua agreed.

To Judd’s surprise, Horn suggested they all go down to the dining room.

It was an amiable meal. Not once during that hour did they touch on the crime. Various law schools were discussed, and, as Judd had suspected, it turned out that Padua was a product of evening courses at a downtown school.

The University of Chicago’s law school was outstanding, Padua said – it would certainly have been good enough for him, without going off to Harvard.

“My father insists on Harvard because Harvard is the best,” Judd remarked. “That has always been his attitude. Buy the best.”

He said it inadvertently. He would not have wanted to antagonize them. And indeed, none of them seemed to take it as a bragging remark.

During that dinner, the feeling began to grow in Padua that he would soon understand this case. No such feeling had come to him with any of the other suspects. Now, with Judd Steiner, Padua had that unmistakable glimmering, the feeling that, even aside from the material facts of the case, the crime would become comprehensible.

Had the glint in his mind come from Judd’s remark about buying the best, always having the best? A pampered kid, a prodigy, a young man who had always had everything he wanted. How did that lead to the murder? And the ransom? To prove he could get something on his own?

Padua remained quiet while the conversation flowed into other channels. Judd was discoursing on ornithology now, explaining about the stuffed birds McNamara had seen in his room, throwing in Latin names of species, and mentioning some rare specimen he had discovered.

One of the squad, a sergeant named Fleury, said bird shooting was his favourite sport; he knew a fine lake in Wisconsin.

It wasn’t the shooting part, Judd broke in. He didn’t particularly enjoy killing birds, but when there was a scientific reason, the killing became incidental. He went on elaborating his point, his voice becoming somewhat clacky as his self-assurance mounted.

But once more, a word, a phrase, had glimmered for Padua. “… the killing became incidental.”

Toward the end of the meal, Judd wanted to go to the men’s room. He had been drinking a great deal of water – was his thirst a sign? As he arose, Fleury made an involuntary movement to follow the suspect, but Horn shook his head.

The moment Judd was away from the table, the discussion began.

“That was a pretty fishy story about those broads,” Sergeant Fleury offered, to make an impression on Horn.

Czewicki pursed his lips. “He’s a smart cooky. He had a whole week to fix up a better story, if he had anything to do with it.”

“I think he did it,” Padua said.

They all looked to Horn. “We’ll damn well find out,” he said, his voice rather shrill.

When the detectives picked up Judd, Artie felt excited to the point of elation. Of course Judd would get out of it, the bastard. Or were they swatting him? Judd couldn’t stand a scratch. He’d bawl. He’d confess.

Maybe the best idea would be to scram, right now. But if he beat it, the game would be up. What did the cops have so far? If they knew anything much, they’d have arrested him, too. Then, if it was only Judd, it could be the glasses. Or it might be only some more questioning about birding. That was it. The police were baffled. They were going over the same old ground. Judd had got through it once; he’d do it again.

Artie decided to go home and wait for Judd to call.

Suppose he beat it up to Charlevoix? That could be natural – merely running up there ahead of the Memorial Day crowd. And then, if he heard anything bad about Judd, he could jump into a boat, hide out among the islands. Go across to Canada, up to Alaska…

At home, Artie retreated to his room. Two hours had passed. Surely Judd was back from downtown. The little bastard was teasing him.

Artie phoned the Steiners. The maid answered. She told him in an anxious puzzled voice, Mr. Judd had come back with those men, but he had gone again.

“What?”

Yes, they had all come back, to look for Mr. Judd’s eyeglasses. Mr. Max had been home at the time.

“Did Max go with Judd and those detectives?”

No, Mr. Max had gone out to a social engagement, she believed.

Artie hung up. Still, it couldn’t be too bad, or Max would have gone along with Judd.

His mother was talking about the weekend at Charlevoix. Did he want to invite anyone special? Artie held back the news about Judd. He made all kinds of funny suggestions about Charlevoix. How about Fatty Arbuckle? There was a good man for a party!

“Arthur! Fun is fun, but do you have to be so vulgar?”

Putting on a record, Artie snapped his fingers to the music. He seized her and danced her around for a moment. Then, all through dinner, he was subdued. Mumsie even remarked on it. He was thinking of his future, Artie said, and everyone laughed. His father remarked, “Well, in fact it’s about time.” But Mumsie said he was still only a baby.

After dinner he watched from an upstairs window. And he saw the Marmon drive up. That goddam little bastard, could he have confessed! Artie rushed into his room, seized his automatic. Should he shoot it out?

His mother approached, calling from the stairs in a puzzled voice that there were some gentlemen to see him. Artie threw the pistol into the drawer. Carrying a gun might spoil things. Coming down with Mumsie, he recognized McNamara and the other guy. “Hi!” he said. And to his mother: “It’s some friends of mine from the detective force. I’ve been helping them on the Kessler case. There’s an important new clue.”

“Oh God, I hope they’ve found the culprit,” she said.

As he went out of the door with them, Artie said, “I’ve always wanted a ride in one of your Marmons.”

“You’ve got it,” said McNamara.

With a dozen other reporters, I was on watch in the State’s Attorney’s office. We had been there for hours. Somewhere, we knew, Horn was questioning the possible owners of the glasses.

All we could do was wait. A couple of squad men were on duty, and whenever one of them left the room, several reporters jumped up and followed, hoping to be led to Horn. Most often, it would be to the toilet, and we’d all guffaw. Whenever the phone rang, to be answered by Olin Swasey, an assistant on duty, we pleaded to talk to his chief, if that was Horn on the wire. But he only smiled, shaking his head.

It was then that Artie Strauss came in with McNamara. We all stirred. But Artie was not an unfamiliar figure, and it actually did not occur to us that he was brought in for questioning.

“Well for crissake! Are you on the force now?” I joked.

“The boy reporter!” he greeted me. “You seen Judd? Say, Sid, were those really his glasses?”

Before I could fully grasp the immensity of his remark, the whole crowd converged on him. Judd? Judd who? Startled, Artie turned silent. The pack wheeled on me, on McNamara. Meanwhile Swasey rushed Artie into a private office.

The morning-paper men beat angrily on the door. Why should the Globe get all the breaks? they complained.

Swasey said he would telephone for instructions. A moment later he emerged and said all right, the glasses belonged to Judah Steiner, Jr., a law student at the University of Chicago. Artie Straus was a friend of his. That was all.

Everyone knew the Straus family. And the Steiners? The word spread that they too were multimillionaires. Instantly, we were all on the phones, trying to contact the two families. At the Steiners, no one was home.

I saw Mike Prager hang up his phone and go out. He was probably rushing out there to see if he could find someone.

At the Straus mansion, a brother, James, made a statement. Artie had been trying to help from the beginning, he said, and would surely do all he could to aid the police now. As for Judd Steiner and his spectacles, he was confident some reasonable explanation would be forthcoming.

Meanwhile Olin Swasey had begun to question Artie. The interrogation was matter of fact, and had Artie then given the same story as Judd, about the two girls, suspicion might have been turned away from them for a time, perhaps altogether. But the week of their alibi compact was over, and so Artie utilized their agreement that after one week it was “each man for himself”. He was the master criminal making his own getaway.

Wednesday? he repeated. He’d hung around the frat, maybe played cards. No, he hadn’t been with Judd Steiner.

Swasey didn’t press his questions. Indeed, after going over the story a few times, he left Artie sitting with McNamara, and slipped out through a side door. But as it happened, an extra man from the Examiner, just arriving, recognized Swasey coming out of the building and followed him across to the hotel and up to the mysterious suite. Thus, the hiding place of the State’s Attorney was uncovered. Soon we were all there.

We couldn’t get to see Judd Steiner. But from Sergeant Fleury we learned that Steiner had definitely taken a bird-lore class out there to Hegewisch the Sunday before, when he must have dropped his glasses. That seemed the end of all the excitement. A false alarm again.

Tom and I went into a Raklios for coffee. I started to speculate on whether it was even remotely possible that Judd could have committed such a crime. Why, I had been out with him last Friday. Ruth had been going out with him since then. And suddenly my sense of a fated personal involvement, whose meaning had not yet been disclosed, came over me again, and I believed it was possible.

Tom brushed speculation aside. The hell with the psychology, he said; that comes later. “Isn’t Judd the fellow we saw Artie talking to, coming out of that law exam, the day Artie helped us locate the drugstore?” Tom recalled. “Maybe some of the boys in his law class would remember when he wore his glasses the last time.”

Then the whole drugstore incident stood in a new light. Artie’s weird insistence on our going out with him in the rain, to search for it. And another recollection struck me. How Artie had said, about Paulie, “If you were looking for a kid to kidnap, that’s just the kind of a cocky little sonofabitch you would pick…” There came again to me the whole perverted side of the story, and I found myself matching Judd to it. That night at the Four Deuces, his ceaseless sex talk, his lustrous eyes. I began to visualize him with the murdered boy. And then a shuddering anger took hold of me. All week, what he might have done, going out with Ruth!

She was downstairs in the drugstore, taking care of the soda fountain, as she usually did when her parents went out. Ruth was wearing one of those white waitress coats that I loved to see her in. A middle-aged man was eating a sandwich. I went to the other end of the counter.

Ruth drew coffee, and as she leaned to give it to me, I wanted to take her face in my two hands. She had put on a provocative smile, and was going to inquire about my big activities, but changed as she saw my own expression. “Is anything wrong, Sid?” Then: “You look so tired.”

I told her quietly, “Listen, Ruth, the glasses in the Kessler case, they’ve found out they belong to Judd Steiner.”

She kept staring at me, her pupils getting dark.

“He says he dropped them out there, the Sunday before, when he was birding.” I had meant to be roundabout; perhaps I had even intended to try to find things out about Judd from her. But under her gaze I had to say it all at once, so as not to seem to be personally accusing him.

Without taking her eyes from me, Ruth came around the counter. This was an old signal; we would go to the back of the store, to the prescription cubicle. We had used to go there, and swiftly kiss. Through a slot that showed the store proper, you could see if anyone was coming.

Ruth seized both my hands. “Sid. You want to prove he did it.”

“I want to find out,” I said.

Her mouth had remained slightly open. Now the tears came slowly, on her cheeks. I could not know, then, about the night before at his brother’s engagement party, and about the ride she had taken with Judd, and the misery in him she had felt, against her breast. I could not know about the strange time on the beach. Yet it was all conveyed, somehow. I knew something had happened in Ruth. And if I had not seen her in these last days, it had not been only because I was so busy; surely I had remained aside, with the instinct of a man who knows he must give a rival emotion a chance to prove itself, or to run itself out.

My heart hurt for her. It seems that I can still feel the ache of it, today. “You poor kid,” I said. I held her close, to comfort her.

“Sid.” She controlled herself enough to talk to me. “I don’t know what it is. But – things happened between us. I feel he is somebody, somebody who – you can’t explain.” I stroked her hair.

The man at the counter had finished; there was a pharmacist on duty, who came from behind the drug counter to take his money. Still holding Ruth, I watched them as though there were some importance in the transaction. I kept saying to myself with murderous irony, Now you can get a scoop, the girl angle, Judd Steiner’s girl, exclusive story. Or would I now become one of those people trying to keep a girl’s name out of the papers? My own girl, who happened to have had a few dates with Judd Steiner while I was busy on the story.

Was she still my girl? If Judd proved really to have done the crime, and got convicted and executed, would I not always feel that but for the crime, Ruth’s love for him would have developed?

“Ruth, can’t you tell me?” I begged. “Not for the paper. For us.”

“Oh, Sid. I don’t know what I feel. Only, last night, he was so terribly, terribly unhappy about something.” She gasped.

I thought that perhaps we were both being melodramatic. Judd might simply have been frightened, all this week, knowing that the glasses could be identified. His whole story could be true.

I tried to tell this to Ruth, sitting her on a stool by the prescription bench. She became calmer. But now we couldn’t meet each other’s eyes at all. We both knew the dreadful truth of her first intuitive reaction. It could be Judd. Knowing him closely now, she had admitted it was not impossible.

Presently I left. A bitterness and a grief for Ruth kept mounting in me. I grappled with the image of Judd Steiner, someone like myself, my own age, a prodigy like myself, graduating at eighteen, in the same school, reading the same books, and attracted to the same girl.

If we were in so many ways alike, surely I would come to understand him. And yet he had done that most incomprehensible, that most horrible murder. Yes, he had done it. Ruth had known it instantly, and now I knew it. And I would somehow find the means to prove it.

It was a fury that seized me then. A fury that there were so many things in Judd like those in myself. I would find what else there was in him, to prove that he was far, far different from myself.

I had walked to the Fairfax. I remembered that last Friday, Artie’s girl Myra had told me I must call her, at the Fairfax. And I marvelled ruefully at the symmetry, the reporter’s rote, that had led me from Judd’s girl – for so I must now think of Ruth – to Artie’s girl.

Myra was home. Her voice had that combination of surprise and knowingness that girls have for young men who they were sure would one day phone. I said I was downstairs; could I come up? Myra was heartbroken, but she was going out – why hadn’t I given her more warning? I told her I was there in my working capacity and she became quite intrigued. Her date hadn’t yet arrived, so would I please come up?

I entered the huge living room and Myra settled me beside her on a huge custom-built sofa. I told her the news.

Her thin cigarette-stained fingers clutched my sleeve. Could anything happen to Artie? Myra’s voice, in excitement, had a hoarse quality.

I said I was sure Artie was only being questioned as to whether he had been with Judd on Wednesday. Judd had to be checked in every detail, because of the glasses.

“That little worm. That devil. Oh, Sid!” Her eyes glowing darkly, she became solemn. “Do you think Judd could have done it?” Myra sucked in her lower lip. I didn’t answer.

“I always told Artie Judd would get him into real trouble. You know, Artie likes to have fun, and he’ll do wild things, but he’d never hurt anybody. But Judd-” Then she said no, this was beyond Judd. How could the police even imagine, even of someone like Judd..?

And yet she was imagining it, with me.

“Did Artie say he was with him?”

“I don’t think so.”

Oh, Artie had probably been out chasing girls that night. Didn’t I know Artie! But he had his serious side, too, she said. All his playboy act was a cover-up. He could be extremely sensitive. Whereas Judd really gave her the creeps. She had nearly broken up with Artie over his constant companion. And did I know that Judd had been taking out my little friend, that attractive, lovely girl, Ruth? Judd had taken her last night to his brother’s engagement party.

“Yes. I know. In fact-” I stopped.

Myra ’s huge burning-coal eyes examined me. She moved a trifle closer, and lowered her voice.

“You know, Judd’s never really had a girl,” she said. “I mean – if there is really something serious between you and Ruth – he’s probably just experimenting. He likes to experiment.”

I shrugged, to show I wasn’t worried about Ruth, and she hurried on, “I don’t mean there’s anything wrong with him; it’s just he’s such a conceited intellectual. He thinks women are inferior.” She was babbling as though to distract herself from the real, the dreadful question. “You know what he sometimes called Artie? Dorian.” Myra sucked in her lip again. We looked at each other.

Then I asked if she could remember about Judd’s glasses. Had she seen him wearing his glasses early last week?

She shook her head. “I’m almost ashamed to try,” she began. Then, again, intimately: “Sid, you don’t really think he could have-” Soon she went on: of course, this wouldn’t be for the paper, I must swear. But we were friends, weren’t we? Well, from what she had heard was done to that poor little boy, and Judd was obsessed with pornography, we had to be ready to face the ugliest truths in the world. Didn’t I remember the other night how he kept bringing perversions into the conversation? In fact he had translated some especially pornographic thing from Aretino, the thirty-two perversities. And he was always talking about the decadents, Oscar Wilde and Sade. “I used to think it was a pose.”

I said maybe it was. Nothing had as yet been proven.

Myra clutched my arm again. “Oh God, Sid!” And then, determinedly: “I’ll say I was with Artie on Wednesday.” But it was with a feeble laugh, at the pathetic preposterousness of anyone like herself taking part in an alibi.

Her mother came in, and Myra jumped up. “Sid is taking me downtown,” she told her mother. “Artie arranged to meet us at the Sherman.”

“Oh?” her mother said, and smiled. “You youngsters all went out together last week, didn’t you? That’s nice, I like it better when you go in a group. Have a good time, dear, and don’t stay out too late.”

All the way downtown, Myra talked incessantly, a flood of coquetry, of sophistication, shot through with sudden worried remarks about Artie, but simply as though he were in a scrape, and quite confidentially she told me now, Artie was always in scrapes – there was the time he had nearly killed someone, in Charlevoix, and nearly killed himself too in the accident, his car overturning, and the worst was, he had stolen out of the back window to drive to a dance. She giggled. But it was only things like that he did, madcap things; Artie would never hurt anybody deliberately. Then came gasping questions about law, as though at moments the possible reality struck her. Then she would tell me all about Artie’s girls – of course every flapper on campus was chasing him, but for all his flamboyance, for all his clowning, she said, Artie was really very unsure of himself.

We got out by the County Building, and I showed her the lighted windows on the eighth floor, where Artie was; and I walked her over to the College Inn. She begged me to go and see how things were, so I left her while I hurried over and talked to Tom. I had Artie’s girl at the Inn, I told him, but I didn’t want to use her name, and as for Judd, she couldn’t remember seeing him with his glasses.

Tom said nobody was bothering Artie much; he was just sitting in there. And Judd, at the La Salle Hotel, was still sticking to his alibi about their picking up the two girls. But Artie didn’t confirm Judd’s story.

Late into the night, the situation remained unchanged. Judd had no idea that Artie was failing to corroborate his tale. Cool, in perfect control of himself, he kept repeating the details of the story, how they had picked up the girls, Edna and Mae, how they had taken them to the Coconut Grove and then to Jackson Park. He even appealed to Horn to have the newspapers request the girls to come forward. And so detailed was Judd’s story, in contrast to Artie’s vagaries, that Padua himself finally went over to question Artie. It seemed impossible, Padua remarked, that he couldn’t recall what he had done nine days ago.

“Well, can you?” Artie challenged.

Padua tried, and after a while, managed. But Artie had had his laugh.

Then Padua asked, had Artie ever had dinner at the Coconut Grove?

“The Grove? Lots of times.” He had dragged all kinds of dates there.

Had he been in one of the parks, that Wednesday? Jackson Park? Lincoln Park?

Had he ever heard of a girl named Edna? Or Mae?

So Artie surely knew, then, that Judd was using the alibi; still he did not corroborate the story. He became a little more doubtful, saying he must have been blotto most of that day; he couldn’t remember anything for sure.

Padua left Artie and returned to Horn’s suite at the La Salle. Now the questioning of Judd became a little harder. They shoved an envelope in front of him, and had him print out Kessler’s name and address. Then over again. And again.

Several times I stepped out of the College Inn to see if the lights were still on, up on the eighth floor. “Do you think he is getting the third degree?” Myra would ask breathlessly when I returned. “Artie looks strong but he isn’t,” she said. “They could make him confess to anything!”

I reminded her that the State’s Attorney would be a little careful with a Straus. Myra shuddered. “Ply me with liquor,” she said, and I replenished her glass. Then we danced.

Dancing belly to belly, Myra whispered she wished she could get up the nerve to give herself to Artie. Virginity was just a rag; a girl should have the courage of her convictions. She didn’t want to be a fake – did I think she was a fake? But then, it wasn’t only sex attraction between her and Artie. She was his real friend. As far back as when he had that awful governess, Miss Nuisance – Newsome. Again, Myra sucked in her underlip. What a game it had been for years to fool Miss Nuisance, who practically never let Artie out of her sight, making a model boy out of him. The triumph was every Saturday afternoon, when Artie wanted to see the serial movies – you know, where the heroine was tied to the tracks, and the train was coming. Artie loved them, The Perils of Pauline, and of course Miss Nuisance would never allow him to see such things. So on Saturday afternoons he was supposed to go to the Children’s Symphony, with Myra, and her mother would leave them in the concert hall while she went shopping, and then Artie would slip out to a movie on South State Street, and Myra would cover up for him. Oh, the angelic face on Artie when he told Miss Nuisance about the symphony!

I thought of the college-boy face on Artie, upstairs now answering their questions, and I thought of the easy laugh of Artie at the frat, telling us how he had got by some gullible prof with a borrowed term paper, and then I thought of that ghastly remark about the “cocky little punk”. Something must have shown in my face, for suddenly Myra’s fingers dug into my shoulder, frantically. “Oh, Sid, I’m saying all the wrong things. Sid, you believe he could have done it! You don’t know him, you don’t know him!” she pleaded desperately. “He’s just a playful kid. Judd is trying to drag him into it. Judd could have done anything!”

In her hoarse, almost sepulchral voice, Myra kept begging me to say I didn’t believe Artie could have done a thing like that. Instead, something in me kept pressing forward those words of Artie’s; I kept wanting to tell her his remark: “the cocky little punk.” But I couldn’t let myself add to her fear. I began arguing it down in myself. A murderer would never have made a remark like that, a dead giveaway.

We left the Inn. Up there in the County Building, the lights had gone out. “Do you think he is still there?” Myra asked. I said probably he had been taken somewhere for the night.

Not to jail! Oh, why didn’t Artie just leave that devil Judd to his fate!

It was after three. Myra couldn’t bear to go home yet; she wanted to walk to the lake. As we walked, her spirits lifted. She quoted Edna St. Vincent Millay, about burning the candle at both ends, and about the ferryboat, and then I quoted Carl Sandburg about the lake and the fog coming in on little cat feet. Some day, she said, perhaps I would get to know the real Artie who was like us, who was only trying to escape the futility, the nothingness, of the world. It was nearly four when we got into a cab.

In the lobby of her hotel, there were only a few lights. Out of sight of the desk, she told me good night, and then turned her whole body to mine, her mouth to be kissed. It was partly the conventional goodnight kiss of a date, and yet it was voracious, with a ghastly emptiness.

Then in her husky voice, she begged that whatever I did, I wouldn’t put her name in the paper. I said of course not, as if it were sacred.

I had the driver take me back downtown to the La Salle. Tom was just coming through the lobby. “They took them someplace to sleep,” he said. “That’s all for tonight.”

We sat in an all-night Thompson’s. We went over everything again. I described both girls, feeling myself a betrayer, but telling myself it was not for the paper; it was truly to help solve the crime that I betrayed their emotions. I told about Ruth. “She really feels Judd could have done it; I can tell. Something happened between them in the last few days – I don’t know. But when I told her about the glasses-”

“That’s your girl, Ruth,” Tom said.

I said Myra too believed Judd could have done it. But not Artie.

Tom looked up with an odd smile. Nobody had really suggested it could have been Artie. He was only being held because of Judd’s phony alibi. So why had Artie’s girl felt she had to deny the possibility?

Then I recognized that Myra was as afraid as Ruth.

The families, Tom said, seemed not to be worried. They had called Horn, and he had assured them the boys would be sent home as soon as certain technicalities were clarified.

And that seemed all that was known. “Listen,” I said to Tom, “I promised we wouldn’t use the names of the girls.” He shrugged.

We went out and picked up the morning papers. The Tribune had dug up some campus talk about Judd: “a brilliant atheist.” His friend Artie Straus, it said, had not yet confirmed Judd’s alibi.

And there was one new item, exclusive. A chisel had been picked up on the night of the murder by a private night watchman who had seen it thrown from a car, on Ellis Avenue, not far from the Kessler house. The blade of the chisel was wrapped in adhesive tape. There was blood on the tape. The chisel was believed to be the murder weapon. And the car from which it had been thrown was a dark sports model. It could have been a Stutz, like the one owned by Judd Steiner.

The Examiner had more about the millionaire playboy suspects. Judd was a strange sinister genius who kept to himself. Artie, whom Judd was trying to involve in his alibi, was one of the most popular men on campus, especially with the girls. Myra ’s name was mentioned, as was Dorothea Lengel’s – “girls of good family” often seen with him.

We went up to the office. At daybreak, there wasn’t a soul in the Globe building. We went to Tom’s desk, and on a sheet of paper began to enumerate the points against Judd. The glasses. An unproven alibi. Now, the chisel.

Coldly enumerated, in the calm of that huge empty room, each point in itself seemed dubious, and the whole monstrous accusation seemed a nightmare. But for me, the strongest point of all, unwritten, was Ruth’s weeping. Yet this too seemed to have a thousand possible meanings. Perhaps she had wept in dismay that I could be trying to prove Judd a murderer, only because he had gone out with my girl.

Tom too, starting to put together our story, said we had better be careful. There was nothing really definite. Boys from families like that couldn’t be held much longer. Probably some big lawyer would appear the moment the courts opened, with a habeas corpus writ.

Instead, we heard that Horn was permitting an interview. Thus the families could be reassured that the boys were receiving no rough treatment. After the late-hour questioning, Judd had been sent to rest up, at the South Clark Street station, and Artie to Hyde Park.

I felt sure that when I saw Judd face to face, I would know. I would see him somehow as with Ruth’s eyes, with Ruth’s intuition.

And when I saw him my instant reaction was one of shame, for having last night been half convinced of his guilt. A large group of us, reporters and photographers, assembled in the South Clark Street station. We were led to the rear detention cells. Judd was in one of them. He greeted us with utter calm, chatting about his “adventure”, and answering, with politeness and gravity, even the silliest sob-sister questions.

Some food had just been brought in for him; there was coffee, but no spoon, and Judd eased the atmosphere at once by borrowing a pencil from Richard Lyman with which to stir his coffee. “I hope you have another one for your notes,” he said. And recognizing me, he said “Hello” with a smile that admitted social acquaintance, but made it clear that this would not give me an edge in the interview.

We joked a bit about his few hours in jail, and Judd declared that in Mr. Horn’s place he would do the same – it was the State’s Attorney’s duty to make an absolutely thorough investigation.

Lyman took the lead, and asked about the glasses.

“It’s queer,” Judd said. “All along when I read in the papers about the glasses, I had a feeling they might be mine.”

“Why didn’t you check on it?” Mike Prager cut in.

“Well, I suppose there are things we don’t really want to find out. Wouldn’t that be the psychology of it?”

The questioning got to his alibi. “I certainly hope those girls come forward,” Judd declared. “It may be a bit embarrassing, but it is more embarrassing for me if they don’t.”

We all laughed, and made the point about their honour being safe since they walked home. Peg Sweet said archly, “That is, if they did walk home?”

Judd smiled amiably. Somebody behind me asked, “What would you do with ten thousand dollars?”

Eagerly Judd replied, “Why on earth should anyone imagine I would kidnap someone for ransom? I get all the money I want from my father, and besides, I teach three classes in bird lore, and get paid for it.” He seemed to be speaking directly to me. And in that moment I was sure he was innocent. What indeed had I been blaming him for? An interest in sixteenth-century Italian pornography? Did that make him a pervert and a murderer? Confronting him, I found the whole idea impossible to believe, and from that moment, I suppose, there had to grow for me the mistrust of human confrontation that is so deep a mark upon our time. What could you truly know of anyone by looking into his face, his eyes?

Tom’s stock phrase – “What do you know for sure?” – reverberated in my mind as I walked from the police station. For besides Judd’s story, there was Artie’s. If you believed one, you couldn’t believe the other. Yet both were polite, smiling, and eager to help solve the dreadful crime.

Artie had been brought back to the State’s Attorney’s headquarters. Through the glass door to the corner office I could see him talking to Padua. Artie waved to me, and presently Padua came out.

“Listen, Sid, maybe you can help us.” Wasn’t I the one who had been with Artie that day, finding the drugstore? And wasn’t I a fraternity brother of Artie’s?

I nodded, but said that didn’t mean an awful lot.

Still, he said, maybe I could talk to Artie. The other fellow, Judd, had at least told some kind of a story. But Artie wouldn’t remember anything. “You know how it is. We don’t want to keep these fellows any longer than we have to. Ask him for God’s sake just to tell the truth. Maybe they were up to some kind of shenanigans-”

I didn’t believe Artie would tell me anything, but I couldn’t refuse to try.

“Just one thing,” he said. “Don’t tell him Judd’s story.”

I went in. “Hail the boy reporter!” Artie said. “Hey, have you got me in the papers?”

“You’re famous.”

“Am I a suspect? Hey, this is the nuts!”

I grinned. “Well, you know this is a hell of a case, Artie, and the glasses were all they had to go by.”

“Oh, I don’t blame them,” he said. “But my mother is kind of upset, otherwise this would be fun.” He threw away a half-smoked cigarette and almost instantly lighted another.

“Artie, look,” I said. “Why don’t you tell the truth, whatever it is, and get it over with? Whatever you and Judd may have been up to, it isn’t worth being suspected of the crime.”

“You think I was up to something with Judd?” he asked.

“Oh, hell, you’re always together,” I said.

“That what he said?” He smiled back at my smile. “Yah, you’ve been busy making time with my girl!” he kidded. “I’ve got my spies in operation. Hey, what does Myra think? She think Judd could have done a thing like that?”

“Well, those glasses were pretty embarrassing,” I said. “And the fact that you don’t remember anything specific about Wednesday makes it look worse for him.”

“It looks bad for him?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that exactly. But I guess the question has to be cleared up.”

“Listen, you don’t think they’re going to make him confess, or any crap like that?” he demanded. “If they start pushing him around…”

I said I didn’t think there was any pushing around. “But, Artie, if you know anything, if you can help him out of it – you know him better than anybody.”

“He says I was with him?”

“Well-”

“Aw, can it, Why would the cops pick me up if it wasn’t to check on his story? I didn’t lose any glasses anywhere.”

“Well, if you were with him, no matter what you were up to,” I repeated, “it can’t be as bad as this. Otherwise, they can’t let him go. There’s nothing to prove his story.”

Artie stared at me. Again he flung away his cigarette. “Okay, kid.” He walked around, then perched on the desk. He cracked, “If you see Myra, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” Then he said, “Stick around out there. I may give you another scoop.”

Padua looked inquiringly at me as I came out. I smiled but shrugged. He hurried back into that office. Now Artie began to remember a few details about Wednesday. He had been all ginned up all that day and evening, he said, but some of it was beginning to come clear.

I suppose Artie feared that with his story uncorroborated, Judd might break down. If Judd confessed, would he not in his bitterness involve his partner? Then the only hope for both of them now was for him to help Judd get released.

So Artie now recalled that there had been a couple of broads involved – he could even think of their names: his was Edna, kind of redheaded. They had picked up the girls on 63rd Street… And so, point by point, he told the same story.

Why had he waited so long to tell it? “My mother doesn’t like me to run with these cheap broads,” he said.

Yet, even his waiting could be interpreted favourably, For if it were simply an alibi that the boys had agreed upon, wouldn’t Artie have come out with it at once, the way Judd had?

And so, that morning, the suspicion was lifting. Judd Steiner, cheerful and candid. And Artie Straus finally corroborating the story of Mae and Edna.

Probably, because of their wealth, I thought, I had been resentfully ready to believe anything of them.

As I entered the newsroom, Reese tilted his chin, a signal for me to step to his desk. “I think they’re clean,” I said. “Artie Straus just told exactly the same story as Judd Steiner, about the two girls.”

He shoved the early edition of the American toward me, with part of their lead story circled in red pencil. It was a beat on us. A letter, a carbon found in Judd Steiner’s room. “Dear Artie,” it began. It seemed to deal with some bygone incident between Judd and Artie and Willie Weiss, and at first glance I could not see its importance. There was some quarrel about whether Judd had betrayed to Willie Weiss a secret that Artie had confided to Judd. This letter was Judd’s denial of betrayal. It had been written after a big scene between them. A passage, printed in bold type read: “When you came to my house this afternoon I expected either to break friendship with you or attempt to kill you unless you told me why you acted yesterday as you did.” This was Judd, to Artie.

The letter continued: “You did, however, tell me… Now, I apprehend, though here I am not quite sure, that you said that you did not think me treacherous in intent, nor ever have, but that you considered me in the wrong and expected such a statement from me. This statement I unconditionally refused to make until such time as I may become convinced of its truth…”

It was a strange letter, but what did it have to do with the case? I glanced back at the date – months ago, last November. I went on reading: “The only question, then, is with you. You demand me to perform an act, namely, state that I acted wrongly. This I refuse. Now it is up to you to inflict the penalty for this refusal – at your discretion, to break friendship, inflict physical punishment, or anything else you like, or on the other hand continue as before. The decision, therefore, must rest with you. This is all of my opinion on the right and wrong of the matter.”

I looked up, puzzled. Reese was watching me. I shook my head to show my mystification, and resumed reading: “Now a word of advice. I do not wish to influence your decision either way, but I do want to warn you that in case you deem it advisable to discontinue our friendship, that in both our interests extreme care must be had. The motif of ‘a falling out of -’ would be sure to be popular, which is patently undesirable and forms an irksome but unavoidable bond between us…”

Feeling Reese’s eyes still on me, I had drifted down the aisle, and was standing near Tom. At the moment it didn’t even strike me as important that the paper indicated some words omitted after “falling out”. Perhaps they had been undecipherable. There was more to the letter. Judd begged Artie for his decision, yes or no, and he suggested that in any case they keep up an appearance of friendship such as “salutation on the street” and on all occasions when they might be thrown together in public.

But what did it mean? Aside from showing the intensity and violence of their relationship, what bearing could it have on the murder of Paulie-Kessler?

Tom was typing rapidly, to catch us up on the story. He had a scrawled copy of the letter on his desk. That bastard Mike Prager had gone out with the squad last night when the cops had ransacked Judd Steiner’s room. Mike had pocketed this letter. Only just now, after his paper was on the stands, had Mike turned the letter over to Chief Nolan.

Tom handed me up his notes, containing the left-out words. “The motif of ‘a falling out of a pair of c -’ would be sure to be popular…”

I saw again the naked body of the boy, I heard again the gruesome argument at the inquest, I saw the candid smile of Judd Steiner, whom I had just left, I saw the boyish smile of Artie Straus, whom I had just left, and I felt a sick bewilderment, an inadequacy. I was too innocent; I was unable to recognize the ugly and the bestial that lay underneath the smiling world.

They had seemed so bland. I had made a fool of myself just now, telling Reese, “They’re clean.” These diseased creatures, these perverts, they had been going out with me and with my girl. Judd had done something to Ruth, disturbed her deeply in some way. Perhaps something of this was what she had known. Through Judd’s ways, she knew they had done it. They had done it to Paulie Kessler.

Then I held myself back. I tried to tell myself the word could have been used in jest, the way we commonly used it around the frat house. I tried to tell myself, even if they were perverts with each other, that still didn’t prove they had done anything to Paulie. I tried to tell myself not to let my anger run away with me.

“What do you think of your pals now?” Tom said.

“God, this looks like they really might have done it.”

“You can’t prove it from this,” he said.

“And Horn looked about ready to let them go.” I told him of Judd, so easy in his interview; I told how Artie had finally confirmed Judd’s alibi about picking up a couple of girls.

“Picking up a boy, he means,” Tom said. While he typed, he handed me a few more pages, copied from Judd’s letters.

First there was a document that had been attached to what was to become known as the “c – letter”. It was a legal-sounding document, and its purpose was explained in the letter itself: “I wanted you this afternoon, and still want you, to feel that we are on an equal footing legally, and therefore, I purposely committed the same tort of which you were guilty, the only difference being that in your case the facts would be harder to prove than in mine, should I deny them. The enclosed document should secure you against my changing my mind in admitting the facts, if the matter should ever come up, as it would prove to any court that they were true.”

Then came the document: “I, Judah Steiner, Jr., being under no duress or compulsion, do hereby affirm and declare that on this, the 20th day of November, 1923, I for reasons of my own locked the door of the room in which I was with one Arthur Straus, with the intent of blocking his only feasible mode of egress, and that I further indicated my intention of applying physical force upon the person of said Arthur Straus if necessary to carry out my design, to wit, to block his only feasible mode of egress.”

I stared at Tom. As he sent up his story, we tried to reconstruct what had gone on between the two boys. Judd was handing Artie “evidence” that he had locked Artie in a room, saying, meanwhile, “I purposely committed the same tort of which you were guilty.” So, apparently, in a bitter wrangle they had been locking each other up! First Artie locking up Judd, because he claimed Judd had betrayed a confidence, had been “treacherous”. And then Judd locking up Artie.

It had a weird overwrought echo of childhood games, locking someone in a closet – “I won’t let you out until you tell me the secret.” But these were university graduates, prodigies of eighteen. Where on earth did Judd imagine, before what “court”, would Artie presumably ever produce Judd’s legal-sounding admission of a “tort”?

And there was the curious, even touching intensity of his plea for Artie to decide the whole issue. “Now, Artie, I am going to make a request to which I have perhaps no right, and yet which I dare to make also for Auld Lang Syne. Will you, if not too inconvenient, let me know your answer (before I leave tomorrow)? This, to which I have no right, would greatly help my peace of mind in the next few days when it is most necessary to me. You can if you will merely call up my home before 12 noon and leave a message saying, ‘Artie says yes’, if you wish our relations to continue as before, and ‘Artie says no’, if not…”

I felt almost guilty, peering into so intimate a confession. Judd, at one moment pleading with Artie to judge him, to “inflict physical punishment, or anything else you like”, if he had been “treacherous”, and at the next moment arrogantly vowing that he had been ready to kill Artie. For the first time, I began to understand the strange bondage, to glimpse a love relationship entirely outside my knowledge.

And what could Artie think Judd had betrayed that was important enough to have brought the boys to imprisoning each other and to threatening death?

“Something Judd knew about Artie,” Tom reasoned. Again, we studied the dense wording. At bottom it was a sort of “you said he said I said” affair. It had the ring of tempestuous accusations among children and – yes – among girls.

And I tried to set this image against the two young men I had seen only an hour ago, sophisticated, self-possessed, superior to their little predicament.

Tom handed me another sheet. This was a copy of a letter Judd had written two days later, from a train; he had been making a trip to New York. It was clear that Artie had in the meantime chosen to “continue their relationship” by taking back his accusation of “treachery”. And Judd was “forgiving” him.

The point in the whole controversy, Judd said in the forgiveness letter, was to determine which of them was guilty of a mistake, for a mistake was the greatest crime a person of their sort could commit! “But I am going to add a little more in an effort to explain my system of the Nietzschean philosophy in regard to you. It may not have occurred to you why a mere mistake in judgment on your part should be treated as a crime when on the part of another it should not be so considered. Here are the reasons. In formulating a superman, he is, on account of certain superior qualities inherent in him, exempted from the ordinary laws which govern ordinary men. He is not liable for anything he may do, whereas others would be, except for the one crime that it is possible for him to commit – to make a mistake.

“Now obviously any code which conferred upon an individual or upon a group extraordinary privileges without also putting on him extraordinary responsibility, would be unfair and bad. Therefore, the superman is held to have committed a crime every time he errs in judgment…”

Tom repeated a phrase from the beginning, “… exempted from the ordinary laws which govern ordinary men…” I read that part over: “In formulating a superman, he is, according to the superior qualities inherent in him, exempted…”

“These dirty perverts think they can do any damn thing they want,” Tom said.

I was trying to recall things from Nietzsche, but then I realized that it really didn’t matter what Nietzsche had said or meant. What mattered was the meaning expressed here by Judd himself – he and Artie were playing some kind of game, a superman game, and these were their rules. If Judd and Artie were “exempted from the ordinary laws which govern ordinary men”, then what would stop them from murder?

It was as though two dense curtains had shrouded the possibility of seeing these rich, clever boys as perpetrators of the crime. The outer curtain was the negative one, the one that excluded them from the action, a curtain of “why they would not”. For all the fears of punishment, all the laws of man provided a “why not”. And this curtain seemed now to be lifting. If they really believed in this idea of being superior to ordinary law, then there was no “why not” for them. The inner curtain was the “why?” and was still impenetrable, though the sexual motive provided a rent in it.

Yet their superman idea was hard to grasp because I had seen them in everyday life. It was hard to believe that within their very appearance of living under the same rules as the rest of us, they had their own contrary rules. It was hard to take their own words and believe them, just as it was to be hard, only a decade later in our lives, to believe that an entire nation could seriously subscribe to this superman code.

What I had sensed emotionally, intuitively, the night before, from Ruth, I was now trying to justify by fact and by reasoning, and the effort seemed heavy, like trying to provide a mathematical formulation for an answer you had already glimpsed.

In Horn’s office, too, they were puzzling over the letters. Horn was no reader of Nietzsche. He tended to brush aside the superman letter as show-off kid stuff; you never could hang anybody with that.

Perhaps he was right. We were to see the philosophy for a time as an explanation – it was even offered as a kind of excuse. But could it ever have been a cause?

The first letter, Horn said, was only a lot of wild talk about some silly quarrel. Except for the perversion business. But even that had to be taken up carefully. In a roundabout way, Padua might try to find out if these fellows had anything to do with young boys. One thing was sure after these letters: you couldn’t let these two fellows go so soon.

Padua and Czewicki had a short discussion of their own. Padua had always meant to read Nietzsche, but never found the time; perhaps Nietzsche could have helped him trip these wiseacres. Czewicki wasn’t so sure. He had read Ecce Homo in a Haldeman-Julius Little Blue Book. It didn’t tell you you could go out and murder anybody.

But the strange letters, published in the papers, even with the key words omitted, had raised an active apprehension in one other person who was to enter the case. Edgar Feldscher was a cousin of Randolph Straus, Artie’s father. A lawyer, engaged with his brother Ferdinand Feldscher in corporation work for various members of the family, Edgar Feldscher had interests outside the law. He was something of an aesthete, a bachelor in his early forties who went often to Europe. He read a great deal, and was fond of Havelock Ellis and D. H. Lawrence. He was also acquainted with the works of Freud, and when people made jokes about suppressed desires or the inferiority complex, Edgar Feldscher was apt to start lecturing on the serious meaning of the terms.

Edgar Feldscher telephoned Artie’s father. He was a little disturbed, he said. Of course he knew the boys had been close to each other for several years. But if stuff like this was going to be dragged through the papers, it might prove harmful to them and to the families. Besides, who could tell what might turn up? It might be time, he suggested, to get Artie, at least, out of the hands of the State’s Attorney.

“The harm’s already been done,” Randolph Straus said wearily. Every reporter in town knew what the unprinted word was in that letter. In a way, he almost wished the police would give Artie a good pushing around, to teach him not to play detective and get himself into this kind of a mess. After all, what did Artie know about the Kessler murder? To go in now and demand his release might only make things worse, give the papers a story about the family trying to use influence.

“Yes, there’s something to that,” Edgar Feldscher agreed. The feeling of apprehension was deepening in him, but he couldn’t find it in himself to utter the real question. No, it was impossible that the boys had done it…

At the university, I tried to find Willie Weiss. For it was he who had been involved in Judd’s wild letter to Artie. And wasn’t it Weiss who had lunched with Judd and Artie on the day of the kidnapping? Perhaps he would tell me what kind of a secret it was, of Artie’s, that Judd was supposed to have betrayed. And also, Willie Weiss might remember whether Judd was wearing his glasses during lunch that Wednesday.

It was hard to find anyone that afternoon – people were going away for Memorial Day. The frat was almost empty. I thought of two fellows I had seen coming out of that law exam with Judd Steiner – Harry Bass and Milt Lewis. Bass had already gone home to the North Shore, but Milt Lewis, one of the brothers said, might still be on the tennis court.

Starting for the court, I ran into our chapter president, Raphael Goetz. God, he said, he was glad about only one thing in this mess – that Judd Steiner had never been let into the frat. It was bad enough with Artie, but if Judd had ever got into the Alpha Beta! The papers would make out we were all a bunch of perverts. Oh, he’d been getting funny questions all morning, from police, from reporters.

Well, I said, he knew he could trust me to handle anything he told me, in a way that would protect the frat as much as possible. But whatever was known about the fellows would have to come out.

Raphael was a huge fellow, a halfback on varsity, a good student, and one of those men who endow any meeting with an atmosphere of earnest good will. So now, putting his arm around my shoulders, he said, “Have they really got something on them?”

I showed hit the story containing Judd’s letter. He already knew the omitted word. “That all happened when they were up in Michigan,” he said. And Goetz told me about the Morty Kornhauser incident. “He caught them at it, and they tried to take him out in a canoe and drown him.” We stopped. We stood facing each other, feeling gravely that the fate of others might be in our hands. “Morty even tried to get Artie thrown out of the frat.” But all the fellows thought it was Judd who was to blame. “Hell, you know Artie – he’ll try anything just for the hell of it. He’s happy-go-lucky, but Judd, there’s something that gives you the shivers about him.”

We talked more. About Artie’s being such a drinker, about his betting high stakes at cards, all that stuff, but you still couldn’t say he was capable of murder. He was just a loose character. Being such a prodigy, he’d been pampered since he was a kid, and with all that dough in the family, naturally the guy was spoiled. But you couldn’t say he was a pervert – why, hell, Artie was playing half the girls on campus.

I said I knew.

“I’d believe anything of Judd Steiner, but if Artie is in trouble, I’ll bet that little bastard dragged him into it.”

And suddenly I saw why Artie had held back from admitting he had been with Judd on Wednesday. For if they had been together, they could have been together committing the crime! Judd was capable of anything. Why not even of murder? Artie’s hesitation in placing himself with Judd actually tended to confirm the crime. The story about the picked-up girls was a fake they had agreed upon in advance, but then Artie had held back from telling it, trying to save himself from implication with Judd should the alibi collapse. Artie’s hesitation was actually the proof!

And just then, as if the thought of their guilt in itself caused me to find the conclusive evidence, I noticed Milt Lewis. He was in his tennis clothes, hurrying into the house. I caught up with him. “Listen, Milt,” I said, “the early part of last week, do you remember if Judd Steiner was wearing his glasses?”

“I refuse to answer on the grounds of possible self-incrimination,” Milt cracked. “And who the hell could remember on what day some guy was wearing or not wearing his glasses? All I know is I read in the papers that Judd Steiner lost his glasses in a very inconvenient place.”

We were climbing up to his room. “That’s it,” I said. “He claims he lost them on Sunday. But if he was seen wearing them, between Sunday and Wednesday-”

“Listen,” Milt said, “if you’re trying to hang that conceited bastard, I’m with you.”

“He claims the last time he actually used them was in March.”

“Hell no, I’d say more recently than that. Wait a minute.” Milt Lewis seemed to pick an image out of the air. “At his house, about three weeks ago. A gang of us went there to make some notes on equity. Judd put his glasses on when he opened that portable and started typing. I can just see him sitting there under all those birds, because I kidded him that he looked like one of those owls, with his horn-rimmed glasses.”

A few weeks ago? That still wouldn’t prove anything. But – “You say he was typing on a portable?”

“Yah, we had two machines going. Harry Bass was using a big machine Judd had there, and Judd opened his portable.”

“Did you notice, was it a Corona?”

“How should I know?” He stared at me. “Hey listen, Hawkshaw-” Then he grinned. “All right, I’ve got carbons of that typing, right here, from both machines.”

He began pulling out papers, folded in among his notebooks. There were indeed two kinds of typing. In itself there was nothing startling in the fact that there should be two typewriters in a millionaire’s house. The second machine might have belonged to his brother. Or he might have bought a portable when he went to Ann Arbour.

I stared at the typing, feeling somehow silly to be going so far, and yet headily sure. “Anybody got a Corona in the house?”

Milt was excited now. We ran through a couple of rooms, located a Corona. The style of lettering seemed the same as on one set of notes. But still, there were millions of Coronas.

For real comparison, I needed a copy of the ransom letter. It had been reproduced in the papers, only a few days ago, but while the house was usually littered with old newspapers, we could now find nothing.

I ran along the street, found a cab. The ad-taking counter at the office was just inside the main door. There was a file of papers kept for the public. I found the page, exactly a week ago, with the reproduced ransom letter. Our story, alongside, quoted typewriter experts, pointing out that there was a faulty p, and that the tail printed faintly on the y. The same faults were on Judd’s law notes! I tore the page from the file.

Running the few blocks to the County Building, I felt I was watched by Judd’s eyes, morose, lustrous, unblinking. I stepped into the cigar store, and phoned Tom in the press room. He came down. We huddled in a corner, while I showed him the two samples.

“Kid, if that bird hangs, you did it!” he said, staring at the evidence.

Could we hold this till tomorrow, for our paper? We decided it was too important. We had to inform Horn.

But upstairs, the offices were empty. They had all gone out to dinner, taking the suspects with them. Nobody knew just where.

This was the famous dinner at the Red Star Inn, near Lincoln Park, an old-style eating place, renowned for its huge schnitzels, apfelkuchen, and other German specialities. If there was a moment when Artie and Judd savoured their adventure, I suppose it was at the time of this dinner. For the sense that they had sought to achieve, the sense of power and superiority in knowing what others did not know, was theirs, here, and together, in the presence of baffled authority itself.

This was the thrill, vibrating in the tension of their still undecided fate. They were so far the masters, and yet, like acrobats who might slip before getting off the wire, they were under a delicious suspense.

Until the cars drew up they could not know they would be together. It was a thought of Horn’s, to confront them in this way, and perhaps catch something in an unguarded moment of surprise and pleasure.

Horn’s own car, with Judd, pulled up first, and Judd in a worldly manner expertized about the restaurant, remarking that his family always had a German cook at home. Just then the second car drove up, and Swasey emerged with Artie. Seeing each other, the boys aluted with hand waves, Artie calling, “Hey! When did they let you out?”

“I’m joining the staff!” Judd retorted.

For the large party, two tables were put together at the end of the main room. The boys were only a few seats apart, with Padua and Horn between them. There was beer to be had at the Red Star, and a good deal of jesting took place about protection and payoff, as the State’s Attorney and his men permitted themselves to indulge.

It might, indeed, have been construed as a farewell party, a send off with no hard feelings. The boys had endured twenty-four hours of examination. Since Artie had confessed his drunken afternoon and the pickup ride, and since their stories jibed, what could they be held for?

But Horn, Padua, Czewicki, Swasey, and the squad of detectives might also have been exulting inwardly. For newspapers had been kept from the boys. They did not know that Judd’s intimate letter had become public. They did not know that they were being looked at with the peculiar contemptuous mirthfulness of bull-showy men for a pair of perverts. No one actually had said, “Watch the fun,” but holding that knowledge key was like having a special pair of glasses through which you could see the punks, nude.

Only you couldn’t see anything. These rich kids had smooth manners that carried them through. Judd was perhaps a bit jumpy, hardly taking his eyes off Artie, but if you didn’t know about that letter, you could put it down to apprehensiveness rather than passion.

Judd was giving his order to the waiter in German, with minute instructions about the seasoning, and all listened, admiringly. Czewicki asked how many languages was it that Judd knew, and Judd replied fourteen, although a few were really only dialects.

“You must be a superman,” Padua remarked, and Judd quietly responded, that wouldn’t exactly be the qualification, according to Nietzsche.

Padua had got in a few hours at the library, reading up on Nietzsche. After all, he said, wasn’t the superman definable as someone with extraordinary abilities? No, Judd said, a superman had to be extraordinary in every way.

Well, how was a superman recognized? Did Judd know any supermen? Was Napoleon a superman?

No, Judd replied. Napoleon had been defeated, and that in itself automatically eliminated him, because a superman could never be defeated.

“You mean, he never makes mistakes?” Padua said.

Judd was apparently too eager to expound his views to catch the echoing word. A superman was really an ideal, he said – what Nietzsche meant was a man who was more than man. In fact you couldn’t precisely translate the word Übermensch – you had to read Nietzsche in the original to understand the concept.

But, Padua persisted, couldn’t a person strive to be a superman, to act like one?

The rest of the men had fallen silent, watching the duel. Yes, Judd conceded, people could strive to exceed themselves, to live by a greater measure of life, the measure of the Übermensch.

Well, for such people, Padua probed, what happened to the laws? If the law said you could drive fifty miles an hour but you wanted to be an Übermensch and drive a hundred miles an hour, who was to decide? Did the ordinary laws of ordinary people apply to the superman or were supermen exempt?

Smilingly, Artie backed up Judd’s explanation. Naturally, a superman would have to live by his own laws – all the great men of the world had made their own laws. Alexander the Great, and Caligula, and Napoleon too had made new laws.

Judd had suddenly grown quiet; he was studying Padua.

But those people were all rulers, Padua argued. They were trying to make new sets of laws for all men to follow. But a superman who was not a ruler, just a citizen – he would still have a law unto himself that would permit him to do anything he wanted, even things that were crimes for other people. Wasn’t that the idea?

“Sure,” Artie began. But Judd cut in; the trap had become too obvious. The Nietzschean idea was only an abstraction, Judd said. You couldn’t apply it in practice because what Nietzsche meant was really for all men to strive to free their spirits, to become greater than they were. First, there had to come naturally gifted individuals, and they might stimulate ordinary men, but eventually there would have to be a society of supermen, a whole nation to try to live by that idea.

“I guess we haven’t got there yet,” Horn said.

The food came then, on huge thick platters. Padua and Judd were staring at each other, smiling as at the end of a round with no one hurt.

After a while, Padua made another try. He remarked about Judd and Artie having gone to the University of Michigan together. They’d really been pretty close friends for several years, then?

Sure, Artie said. He had superintended Judd’s loss of virginity; and he went on to tell about whorehouse escapades in Detroit. Czewicki suddenly made a remark about Oscar Wilde. “You know he was married and had two children. I never realized you could have it both ways.”

Judd coolly informed him that among the Greeks it was quite the custom for married men to maintain their favourite boys.

Horn declared he had learned all he wanted to know about perverts going through the dragnet in this investigation. Artie brightly recalled – hadn’t a member of the police force been caught up in the net, a respectable married man?

Anyway, said Swasey, it was pretty soft for a couple of college boys to have their own car, to run around chasing gash.

There was clinical talk about pick-up techniques. And then: “Now, about those girls the other night, you mean they really didn’t come across?” And Peterson offered advice on how to make them come across.

From McNamara came a throaty gurgle. “Anyway, if they don’t, you can always help each other out.”

Artie laughed with the rest of the crowd. Judd, after an instant, laughed as though he had just caught on.

There was a lull in the conversation. Someone asked for more beer.

It was said that if not for our typewriter evidence, the boys might, that evening, have been released. One other bit of evidence was to come that night, but it was tenuous, and I suppose, had the boys been released, the chauffeur would never even have offered his story.

But Emil had been troubled ever since he had read Judd’s alibi in the morning papers. Judd claimed to have been riding in his car all that afternoon and evening. Emil thought about the matter, driving home after taking Mr. Steiner down to his office. In the kitchen, Emil found the three servants, indignant over what was in the papers, and angry because the police had pawed through the house.

Emil didn’t say anything in front of them. But he carried the Examiner upstairs to his apartment over the garage, and he discussed the story with his wife. Of course Judd couldn’t have been connected with the crime, but correct is correct. Now, a week ago Wednesday -

She joined his thought at once. “That was my dentist day. Remember, I spoke to you downstairs. Judd was with you.”

They remembered well, because Emil had told her a thousand times never to interrupt when he was talking to one of the Steiners.

“But I needed the dentist money.”

Then Emil came out with what bothered him. Just then, young Steiner had been telling him the brakes of the Stutz needed adjustment. “He left his Stutz in the garage. He didn’t have it out at all that day.”

“Well, he went with that Artie Straus chasing girls. They must have had some other car.”

“Yes, but here he told the police he was in his Stutz. And at first Artie wouldn’t even admit he was with him.”

“It’s none of our business.”

Another thing: Artie and Judd, the next day – that was Thursday, about noon – had come around the driveway with a Willys. They had been washing it. He had offered to help clean the Willys – there were some dark spots in the rear, wine spots they said – and Artie had refused his help, saying they were all through anyway.

“Well, that would explain it,” she said. “They borrowed some other car.”

Yet Emil kept puzzling. By nightfall he felt it was his duty to mention the matter to the police.

“You want to make a fool of yourself?” his wife argued. “These people are good to us…”

By evening, after the boys had been held more than twenty-four hours, each family was assembled. At the Steiners, there were Judd’s aunt and uncle, his brother, his father. Max was for sending down a lawyer and getting the kid out, before any more dirty stuff, like that letter, was spilled.

Judd’s father was rather silent. He had a way of being present in a discussion without speaking, except to make summaries – not exactly decisions, but summaries that left only one possible decision.

But Aunt Bertha was indignant. The boy had spent the night in jail. What was he getting to eat? Had he had a chance even to change his clothes?

“We can see that he is well treated,” his father said. “But when the authorities are satisfied the boys don’t know anything, they will let them go.”

At the Straus mansion, Artie’s uncle Gerald was taking charge. He was older than Artie’s father, and was the most decisive character among the Straus brothers – a businessman who operated in spectacular flashes.

Arriving with Edgar Feldscher, he demanded action. “What’s Horn holding him for? Is he arrested? If not, let’s get him out.” Feldscher counselled going easy. After all, if Horn started to dig behind that letter… The men’s voices dropped, as though a shade were drawn between them and the women.

Finally, after phoning back and forth between the two families, the Steiner men came to the Strauses. The two brothers, Max and James, went aside. It was Max who said, “We’ve got to look at the thing realistically. We have to consider all the possibilities, even the worst.”

For an instant, their eyes admitted it to each other. They were of about the same age. To each, the brother was still “the kid”, some seven years younger. Max tried now to make a practical suggestion. Maybe the simplest thing would even be, since the boys couldn’t produce those two girls they had picked up – it shouldn’t be impossible to dig up a couple of girls.

James shook his head – too risky.

“I just thought we ought to be prepared for everything. Those cops will stop at nothing to get off the hook on this case.”

That was why somebody ought to go downtown, James said. Just to remind them who the boys were.

And so the two fathers and Uncle Gerald Straus went downtown. Emil drove them to the County Building.

The whole press gang was still waiting around for the boys to be brought back from dinner when the three older men walked into the office.

We crowded around them, these men of millions who had come, we felt sure, to take their sons home. I looked at the two fathers with a dazed sense of my own power, for I held the proof of guilt in my pocket. How had they known so little of their sons! What did my own father know of me?

Judah Steiner, Sr., looked somehow so fatherly, so decent. The other, Randolph Straus, was of a pair with his brother Gerald – both of them more polished-appearing than Steiner, and colder in their manner.

Gerald Straus was the spokesman. “Now, boys, we have no information; you fellows know more than we do. We only came to see Mr. Horn.”

Healy, a staff assistant, explained that Mr. Horn was out to dinner. Yes, he was expected back at the office.

And the boys? Were they in jail? Or where?

They were probably having dinner with Mr. Horn. It was just a matter of getting all the information they could provide…

The mention of dinner with Mr. Horn somewhat surprised and mollified the men. “Naturally,” said Gerald Straus, “we want them to give every assistance they can in this horrible thing. You say they are in Mr. Horn’s personal custody?”

“Yes, he personally is responsible.”

Straus spoke again, choosing his words carefully. “Both families want Mr. Horn to keep the boys until he is fully satisfied that they know nothing that may have a bearing on this crime.”

“The minute he is satisfied,” Healy repeated, “they will be sent home.”

Steiner added that if the boys were going to be held any longer, perhaps it would be best to send down a change of linen, pyjamas.

“Why don’t you give us a ring a little later?” Healy suggested.

The men spoke a moment among themselves, then thanked him, and withdrew. We all followed them to the lift. Gerald Straus was again the spokesman. “Give us a break, gentleman. We want to help, but we also are concerned for our boys and for the family reputations. Some of you fellows have run some pretty damaging stuff about a couple of innocent boys. Now I know what you’re up against, too. But, gentlemen, remember we are pretty responsible families in this town.”

And so they departed.

Fifteen minutes later, the cavalcade arrived from the restaurant. Everyone seemed animated, friendly, but Horn laughingly steered the boys straight through the press crowd. Judd went into Padua ’s office; Artie went along with Swasey.

Tom had tried to stop Horn on the wing; now he strode to the corner door, knocked, and walked in. I followed. “We’ve got something,” Tom said. I put the material on Horn’s desk.

Horn’s short, jabby arms fell on the papers. An instant later, he buzzed for Healy, told him to fetch the original ransom note, and to keep his mouth shut. Of us, he demanded whether we could get hold of the boys who had been with Judd when he typed the law stuff? I said two of them were waiting for my call at the frat.

He nodded. “Get them down here.” His hands were clenching, unclenching. As he looked up, his eyes were glazed. “That dirty pair of fairies,” he muttered. “They had half my staff believing them.”

Tom made our request. Could this break be kept quiet, for the Globe?

Horn stood up, sympathetic. “Fellows, you’re helping me and I appreciate it. I’m going to see your paper gets credit for this.”

Padua brought Judd into the room. We were waved out. As I walked past him, Judd gave me a wary, inquiring look. In my excited state of mind, I imagined it asked if I were trying to do something against him.

Only the typewritten legal notes were in sight on Horn’s desk. Horn asked if he remembered typing this stuff at his house in the presence of several of his classmates? Then Judd saw himself using the portable. So they had him.

But it did not seem possible. He and Artie had proven they were truly of another level; they were minds moving in a fourth dimension unreachable by these mundane police. He stared at his adversaries – Horn, who could say parlez-vous, and Padua, a slick Valentino.

And he began his last struggle, squirming and twisting to slip through their fingers. Yes, he recognized that this added bit of evidence made a link in a fantastic chain. But, he declared, it had not been his typewriter. One of the boys must have brought it along. Who? He couldn’t be sure. Probably Harry Marks. Where could he be reached? Well, he was the son of Gordon Marks of the Marks Stores.

“Call him,” Horn told Padua.

Harry Marks proved to be in Europe.

Horn’s eyes, held on Judd, shone with that unfocused metallic lustre. “You think you’re too clever for us,” he said. “Maybe you’re too clever for yourself.”

Then Judd was in a Marmon again, surrounded by squadmen, speeding once more toward his home, this time to search for the typewriter.

When they entered the house, Judd’s father came toward them with a relieved smile. But Judd spoke loudly. “Now it’s the ransom letter! They want to search the house to see if I’ve got the typewriter that typed the ransom letter!”

Judah Steiner, Sr., seemed not to comprehend. “Is everything all right?”

“Sure. This is quite an experience,” Judd called from the stairs.

Entering his room, he saw the ransacked desk and angrily began to sort his papers. McNamara seized more typewritten notes. Padua, in the doorway, asked, “Those the same batch?” They were. But no Corona was in sight.

The maid was hovering in the corridor. “Say, Miss” – Padua smiled at her – “have you seen Mr. Steiner’s portable typewriter recently?”

“The portable?” Elsa said helpfully. “Well, now, last time I saw it, it was just there, by the desk as usual.”

“And when was that?”

“She doesn’t know what machine she’s talking about,” Judd snapped. But her first words couldn’t be pulled back.

The men searched the room, the closet, other rooms. “No use. I guess he got rid of it,” Padua said. The group started downstairs.

“Did you find what you want, gentlemen?” Judd’s father asked.

“Well, yes and no.” Padua put on his glittering smile. “Does your son own a portable Corona typewriter?”

Hopefully, Judd realized that the old man might never have noticed the machine. “Why, a portable typewriter, no, I never bought him one that I recollect. He has a regular standard typewriter, I’m sure.” Steiner looked questioningly from one to the other. “Are you going to need my son much longer downtown?”

“That’s hard to say. We haven’t got everything cleared up yet.”

Judd showed his father an annoyed smile. The group departed.

Judah Steiner stood there for a moment. His head was moving almost imperceptibly from side to side. Then he went to the phone. He was beginning to feel outraged. But his sister-in-law counselled him to have patience a little longer. And better to send Judd down some fresh clothing.

More and more attackers were lunging at him, but he was fencing them off. If only Artie could see how he was holding them off! But once more they were separated. Once more Judd had been taken to the hotel suite, to be worked on. And there in the room stood Michael Fine, Harry Bass, Milt Lewis. They kept their eyes averted from his; but in quiet voices they formally identified the law notes, and said when and where and by whom they had been typed.

Judd confronted them. “But I typed on my own machine, on my desk. Don’t you remember? Harry Marks must have brought along the portable.”

Milt Lewis looked right into his eyes for the first time. “That was your machine. You had it right there. You bragged about having two typewriters, one for travelling.”

Horn thanked the boys, and they went out.

They stood with us in the other room.

We waited, as outside a hospital door, for the doctor to emerge. But still it did not happen, and after a time the three boys departed.

Across the street from the hotel, the Steiner chauffeur appeared in the State’s Attorney’s offices, carrying a suitcase of clothing. As he turned it over to Healy, reporters surrounded him for a feature story.

Emil fled. He drove all the way back to the house. Somehow, while on the family’s errand, he had not been able to bring up his own thing. But back in the garage, he could not get out of the automobile. His wife came down. “I won’t be able to sleep,” Emil said.

So he drove back downtown on his own errand.

It was just then that Horn and Padua, still unable to break Judd’s denials, decided to try a little stratagem.

During the evening’s frantic activity about Judd’s typewriter, little attention had been paid to Artie. Hour after hour, he had been sitting in the assistant’s office; Swasey didn’t even ask him any more questions.

Now Padua came in. Artie jumped up. He confronted Padua. “Hey, maybe you can give me a straight answer. Am I supposed to be under arrest, or what?”

Padua smiled.

“You’re holding me, aren’t you?”

“Well, you guessed it,” said Padua.

“What for?” demanded Artie, with a show of petulance. “You haven’t got anything on me. I’ve told you all I know.”

“You said you were with Judd Steiner all that day and evening.”

“Yah, sure.”

“Okay. Things don’t look too good for your friend. Besides the glasses, it turns out that his typewriter was the one the ransom letter was written on. Since you admit you were with him all the time, whatever we’ve got him for, we’ve got you for.”

Artie’s cheek was twitching. “Are you nuts!” he shouted. “I told you we just went to pick up some janes.”

“Yah, I know, that’s what you both said.”

It was then that the chauffeur walked in. He marched past everybody toward the glass-doored offices. It was so unexpected that no one moved to stop him. Opening the door Emil stood rigid, like some converted sinner intensifying his resolve to confess. “I want to talk to the State’s Attorney.”

Startled, Padua said, “The State’s Attorney is busy. What’s it about?”

“I’m the chauffeur for the Steiner family.”

“Yes, I know. I’ve seen you. Bring Judd’s toothbrush?”

“I have some information I must give,” Emil stated.

Padua’s manner changed. “I’m the attorney’s assistant. You can tell me.”

Artie everyone listened. “I saw in the papers that Junior said he was driving the Stutz all day, the day it happened. I have to say that is a mistake. The Stutz was in the garage; he left it for me to put oil on the brakes; they were squeaking.”

Artie seemed to sway. His gaze went from Emil to Padua. Then he moved back, and folded on to a chair. Not the glasses, not even the typewriter had had this effect on him. For both those points, there had been some degree of preparation. But Emil’s testimony fitted into that detective-story nightmare, the insignificant, forgotten detail.

Padua was leaning over him. “All right,” Artie gasped, and ran his tongue over his lips, his eyes still evading, evading. “All right. Can I have a glass of water?”

Padua hurried to the cooler, brought the water. Swasey pushed us away from the doorway, Emil among us, and closed the door.

Emil swallowed, staring at the closed glass door. He had the bewildered look of a man who only gave someone a shove, a tiny push. How could he know the fellow would crumple, collapse? Healy led him into another room before we could ask him any questions.

We waited. The men from the morning papers kept calling their offices, telling them to hold open for the big story.

Presently, Czewicki came hurrying through, from the hotel. He went into the corner office. After a brief interval, he emerged, his expression hovering between a smirk and fright, his wide cheeks seeming to wobble.

We besieged him. “Is he confessing? Did they do it?”

“It’s on the way,” Czewicki said, officiously, happily. “It’s going on right now.” And he rushed back to the hotel to give his details to Horn.

There, the chief came out into the hallway to meet him, and they walked up and down, Horn’s arms already making his choppy courtroom movements. Then the State’s Attorney returned to the room where Judd sat. “Your partner is confessing,” Horn said. Judd didn’t blink.

“All right,” Horn said. “What about the Driv-Ur-Self agency? What about registering at the Morrison Hotel?”

Judd gave him an almost abashed look. He arose, moving about in distress, murmuring, “He can’t be! He would stick till hell freezes over!”

“He says it was all your idea,” Horn continued in a quiet voice, not without sympathy. “And you’re the one that struck the fatal blow.”

If maturity can ever be traced to a single moment, perhaps this was the instant of transition for Judd Steiner. He began to shake his head, slowly. “Oh, the weakling,” he said. Then, with a spurt of anger: “So Mr. Straus imagines he can blame it all on me. You can go back and inform Mr. Straus that I shall tell the truth. The account I give shall be precisely accurate and complete.” Judd drew a full breath, then added, with a kind of satisfaction, as if after all the main results would be as desired, “I shall reveal the true purpose and meaning of the deed.”