The Hour of the Cat (2 page)

“Yes.”

“Mind if I ask how?”

“I presume you already know or you wouldn't have sought me out,” Anderson said.

Without mentioning names, Anderson told Weber that he'd spoken with a number of doctors and researchers at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics. Anderson turned the last word over in his mind.
Eugenics:
A happy sound and a benevolent, if condescending, intent on the part of Francis Galton, Charles Darwin's cousin and the upper-class gentleman who coined the word—from the Greek for “wellborn”—and the concept. Encourage only the fit (the rich, the successful, the already blessed) to breed; discourage the unfit (the infirm, the poor, those devoid of pedigree.) A not-so-harmless concept in the hands of social engineers, racial theorists, and medical scientists, for whom eugenics was the key to ridding the world of the weak and securing the future for a master race.

“It's no secret,” Anderson concluded, “that racial hygiene is a basic goal of the National Socialist regime or that the foundation has been a long-standing supporter of the institute's work, particularly its eugenic research.”

“The foundation's interest is purely scientific, not political.”

“The two aren't as easy to separate as some wish to believe. Scientists aren't without political views. Research doesn't occur in a social vacuum. Someone must decide what is worth researching, which projects should be funded, and to what end.”

Weber turned and thrust his glass at a passing waiter. “Another,” he said. He faced Anderson again “That's my point, Ian. In the U.S., for instance, most people came to accept the fact that idiots and morons shouldn't be allowed to reproduce. A decade ago, when our highest court affirmed the practice of compulsory sterilization, it proceeded on the principle that ‘three generations of imbeciles is enough.' But under the present circumstances, with the bleeding hearts in the political driver's seat, the momentum is in the other direction. Hysteria replaces reason. Politics interferes with science. Radicals denounce anything to do with racial improvement as ‘fascist.'”

“Do you think the science that's practiced here in Germany is pure and unbiased?”

The waiter delivered Weber's drink. Two tall, well-built officers in black SS uniforms passed the table. They were accompanied by identical twin sisters, blonde, svelte, clear-complexioned, each in a tight sheath dress fitted to her athletic form. The whole room seemed to watch as they crossed to their table.

“Nice scenery, eh?” Weber said. “That's the future Germany is trying to build for itself, a race of healthy specimens. They believe it can't be left to chance. Science must show the way by encouraging the strong to breed.”

“And eliminating the weak and the sick?” Anderson said.

Weber wagged his finger, as if to scold Anderson for telling a fib. He recounted several visits he'd paid to Germany's eugenic courts, which had been instituted by the racial hygiene laws passed several years before. Each case, he said, was heard before a judge, a doctor and a social worker. No distinction was made among classes or religious creeds. The laws were equally applied to one purpose: using compulsory sterilization to reduce Germany's burden of hereditary diseases, mental as well as physical, and allow the fit to thrive. He stressed once more that any assistance by the foundation to the eugenics movement was based solely on the pursuit of “scientific truth.”

Anderson let Weber's brief sermon on scientific truth pass without comment. “My book is about individuals, not institutions,” he said.

Weber finished his drink and stood. “Thanks for being straight with me.” He placed two tickets on the table. “Here's a couple of press passes to the track and field competition. It should be quite a show, given the quality of the American and German athletes.”

The waiter came with a bill, which Weber plucked from the tray. “It's on me,” he said, “and I'll keep you in mind, Ian. I started as a reporter. It's a good way to stay poor. There's a lot more money in p.r., believe me. My firm is always looking for good writers, and we pay the highest rates in the business.”

“I won't give you any guarantee the foundation won't be the subject of further scrutiny. Though I never intended to look at the funding behind the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute, I won't discourage others from doing so.”

“You know that, and now I know it. But my client doesn't. Far as they know, I've helped them dodge a bullet. That's p.r., Ian. It's not just what you do for your clients, but what they
think
you do.”

It's often been said that New York isn't a city in which to grow old. The truth of this bit of folk wisdom instantly impresses itself on the casual visitor. New York is a nervous place, a raw city, unpolished, unfinished, uncivil, more like Berlin in the days of the Weimar Republic than present-day Boston or Baltimore. The grandeur that was Rome and the hauteur that is Paris are utterly missing. If the visitor will linger here a while, however, he will discover that in its wanton disregard for rank or station, in its mongrel disdain for all that is ancient and outdated, in its restless lust for fun, fashion, and the future, New York is the man-made equivalent of the fountain of youth. New York might try your patience and test your wits. It might lift you to the heights of stardom or expel you to the provinces. But it will not let you grow old.

—IAN ANDERSON,
“New York, Home to the Next World's Fair,”
World Traveler Magazine

T
HE GREEN, LEAFY SEA of Central Park's treetops framed in the window behind her, Mrs. Prudence Addison Babcock stood with one hand on a baby grand piano. Her other hand raised a cigarette to her mouth. She had a pretty face, except when she sucked on the cigarette. Her cheeks became sunken pits, the sharp, bony points seemingly ready to poke through her skin. Her eyes narrowed into slits. The embittered eyes of a woman with a hubby who'd been fingered before. Fingered and forgiven. Not this time. “I want the son of a bitch caught in the act.
In the act
. I want pictures.”

She sat across from Fintan Dunne. A maid delivered scotch and sodas on a silver tray, set them down noiselessly on the taboret between their chairs, each glass with its own small, immaculate linen napkin. “He's a rat, Mr. Dunne, a lying, scheming rat. I want him destroyed.
Ruined
.”

Dunne rested his hand on hers for just a moment. She seemed neither to notice nor to be reassured. No six-week stay in Reno for Prudence Addison Babcock; no out-of-state settlement that set her husband free and rewarded his infidelity. She wanted him caught in flagrante delicto, with the corpus delectable. Pop open the door, photographer in tow, flash the Speed Graphic, send the photos to the
Mirror
and the
Standard
. He let her rant. Get the venom out. Like milking a cobra.

The next time Dunne met with her his retainer had been paid. Morning, pre-Scotch, the maid poured coffee from a silver pot, cream from a silver pitcher. He drew his chair in close for a heart-to-heart and tried to make her understand. In some cases the husband and wife arrange a “handshake shot.” Hubby rents a room and a woman. They strip to their underwear and get beneath the sheets. The wife's witness and a photographer enter through a conveniently unlocked door. Take half a roll of film to be sure there'll be some usable snaps. Incontrovertible proof of adultery, the only grounds for divorce in the State of New York. Case quietly adjudicated. A mutually agreed-upon parting of the ways.

“This isn't one of those cases, Mrs. Babcock. Not an easy thing to get two people to stand still to have their picture taken in that sort of circumstance. And unnecessary. A carefully detailed record of his infidelity is what will stand up in court. Times, dates, witnesses, affidavits. Besides, once the circus gets started, the press won't stop with your husband. Drag everybody in, kids, folks. They'll be parked outside your door.”

“Very well, Mr. Dunne. You're the expert in these matters.” She dabbed at her eyes with a delicate lace hankie embroidered with violets.

He lit a cigarette and handed it to her. “I'll deliver an airtight case to your lawyers, Mrs. Babcock. You'll get what you want, I promise.”

“Yes, you're right.” She puffed softly on the cigarette. Her eyes stayed wide, her cheeks soft. “I just want it over and done, that's all.”

Over and done. Turned out, she was a woman of her word.

Noontime, six weeks later, a cop gave Dunne the bad news. His face was glaringly familiar, a vice-squad detective for sure,
but his name?
They were buying cigarettes in the Liggetts on Broadway and Duane, and the detective punched him lightly on the shoulder. He had that tight, irrepressible grin a cop wears when he's got the pleasure of giving a private dick an item of information he should know, but doesn't.

“Hey, Dunne,” he said, “I just seen the Professor.”

His name rhymed with crimes:
Grimes? Symes? Pines?

The detective tore the cellophane off the cigarette pack with his teeth. “He's just back from the Commodore. Some society dame plugged her hubby, and the Professor's fresh from covering it. You know him, always first on the scene.” He spit the cellophane out of his mouth and it fluttered to the floor. “And you know what, Dunne?”

“What?”

“The Professor says to me, ‘What a shame. The one who done the shootin' happens to be a client of Fintan Dunne's.'” The detective pulled off the tinfoil on top of the pack the same way as the cellophane, ripping it with his teeth and spitting it to the floor. “Who'd a thought in a million years I'd bump into you right after him? But that's the way life is, don't you know? Full of happy coincidences, even in a city as big and sloppy as New York.” He delivered another, harder, punch to the shoulder. His grin got bigger. “Chief Brannigan is lookin' for you,” he said. “Wouldn't make him wait too long I was you.” He went out the revolving door without looking back.

A puff of carbon-colored exhaust from a Broadway bus made Dunne's cigarette taste like a blend of tobacco and coal. The detective's name popped into his head.
Tommy Hines
. Nephew of Jimmy Hines, Tammany bigwig, freshly indicted for running the Harlem numbers racket, an activity Uncle Jimmy had been richly successful at since the days of Dutch Schultz. Uncle Jimmy was the only reason Tommy Hines got to carry a gold badge in the first place. If Tommy was nervous about his uncle's fate, he'd given no sign of it. As cocksure as ever. And as dumb. Never be clever enough to invent a story just to tease a former cop who'd gone out on his own. Unfortunately, the roster of society-types Dunne had to search had only one name on it: Mrs. Prudence Addison Babcock, wife (and now self-made widow) of Mr. Clement Babcock.

By the time he reached Police Headquarters, Centre Street was awash in blue with hungry cops on the prowl for lunch. He skirted the south side of the building and went around the corner into a ramshackle building on Centre Market. Inside was as cluttered and dingy as a sweatshop: crumpled paper on the floor, figures hunched over tables, typewriters' incessant metal chatter. The Professor was on the phone. He stood by the first desk on the right, a spot ceded by consent to the longest-serving tenant of the Shack, home of the hard-shells who crawled Manhattan's crime beat, scavenging for whatever morsels they could use to turn the latest rendition of Cain and Abel into a screaming headline and a two-day follow-up.

A few reporters looked up at the clock over the door. The low-hanging pall of gray-blue tobacco smoke grew more dense; the banging on the machines, keys, carriages, bells louder and more frenetic.

Dunne slumped into a rickety chair. The Professor put the receiver down with a slightly trembling hand.

“Babcock in the Commodore?” Dunne lit a cigarette and offered one to the Professor.

The Professor shook his head. “No to the cigarette. Yes, I'm afraid, to Mr. Babcock. Room 328. Five times in the epicardium, at such close range there were scorch marks on the silk pajamas. A sartorial as well as human tragedy.”

“Who did it?”

“The police arrived to find a distraught but defiant Mrs. Prudence Addison Babcock, wife and now widow of the deceased, cradling the smoking weapon, while Mr. Babcock's nubile bedmate was whimpering behind the locked door of the bathroom. The perpetratorix was instantly pinched. Be the lead story in this evening's
New York Standard
, a well-crafted piece by the city's most seasoned chronicler of murder and mayhem, yours truly, John Lockwood.”

“The woman in the bathroom, who was she?”

“A stenographer in the Babcock Publishing Company named Linda Sexton, a bosomy oread from the wilds of Washington Heights, not much older than eighteen.” He looked questioningly at Dunne. “May I infer from your question that trysts of this sort were a usual part of Mr. Babcock's routine?”

“Hey, quit yappin'. I'm tryin' to file a story.” The heavyset, crimson-faced man at the next desk clapped his hand over the receiver.

“Good God, Corrigan, had I suspected I was in any way cramping the literary efforts of the senior crime correspondent of Gotham's august morning journal,
The Daily Mirror
, I'd have stifled the urge to speak.”

“Shove it, Lockwood.”

“I return your gracious sentiments,
in perpetuum
.” The Professor removed his homburg from the desk and put it on his head, adjusting it in the small, grime-ridden mirror tacked to the wall beside his chair. He framed his droopy-eyed reflection in the gray glass, stretched his long, thin neck, and straightened his collar, the old-fashioned winged variety. “
Mais où sont les neiges d'an-tan?
” he said. “Know what that means?”