There had been a murder of a minister and a...
There had been a murder of a minister and a choirmaster in the late twenties, down in Middlesex County, in a lane just outside New Brunswick, and in the Morris village of Brookside there had been a murder by an inmate who had walked off the grounds of the Greystone mental asylum, visited his uncle in Brookside, and split the man's head open with an ax--and these stories, too, are dug up and rehashedAnd, of course, the Lindbergh kidnapping down in Hopewell, New Jersey, the abduction and murder of the infant son of Charles ALindbergh, the famous transatlantic aviator--that, too, the papers luridly recall, reprinting details over thirty years old about the ransom, the baby's battered corpse, the Flemington trial, reprinting newspaper excerpts from April 1936 about the electrocution of the convicted kidnapper-murderer, an immigrant carpenter named Bruno HauptmannDay after day, Merry Levov is mentioned in the context of the region's slender history of atrocities--her name several times appearing right alongside Hauptmann's--and I yet nothing of what's written wounds him as savagely as the story about her "stubborn streak" in the local weeklyThere is something concealed there--yet implicit--a degree of provincial smugness, of simplemindedness, of sheer stupidity, that is so enraging to him that he could not have borne to white chanel purse see it hanging up for everybody to read and to shake their heads over at the Community Club bulletin boardWhatever Merry may or may not have done, he could not have allowed her life to be on display like that just outside the school SUSPECTED BOMBER IS DESCRIBED AS BRIGHT, GIFTED BUT WITH "STUBBORN STREAK" To her teachers at Old Rimrock Community School, Meredith "Merry" Levov, who allegedly bombed Hamlin's General Store and killed Old Rimrock's DrFred Conlon, was known as a multi-talented child, an excellent student and somebody who never challenged authorityPeople looking to her childhood for some clue about her alleged violent act remained stymied when they remembered her as a cooperative girl full of energy "We are in disbelief," ORCS Principal Eileen Morrow said about the suspected bomber"It is hard to understand why this happened As a student at the six-room elementary school, Principal Morrow said, Merry Levov was "very helpful and never in trouble "She's not the kind of person who would do that," Mrs"At least not when we knew her here At ORCS, Merry Levov had a straight A average and was involved in school activities, MrsMorrow said, and was well liked by both students and faculty "She was hard-working and enthusiastic and set very high standards for herself," Mrs"Her teachers respected her as a gold gucci watches quality student and her peers admired her At ORCS Merry Levov was a talented art student and a leader in team sports, particularly kickball"She was just a normal kid growing up," Mrs"This is something we would never have dreamt could happen," the principal said"Unfortunately, nobody can see the futureMorrow said that Meredith associated with "model students" at the school, though she did show a "stubborn streak," for example, sometimes refusing to do school assignments which she thought unnecessary Others remembered the alleged bomber's stubborn streak, when she went on to become a student at Morris-town High SchoolSally Curren, a 16-year-old classmate, described Meredith as someone with an attitude she described as "arrogant and superior to everybody else But 16-year-old Barbara Turner said Meredith "seemed nice enough, though she had her beliefs Though Morristown High students asked about Merry had many different impressions, all the students who knew her agreed that she "talked a lot about the Vietnam war Some students remembered her "lashing out in anger" if somebody else opposed her way of thinking about the presence of American troops in Vietnam According to her homeroom teacher, MrWilliam Pax-man, Meredith had been "working hard and doing well, A's or B's" and had expressed a strong interest in attending chloe dior his alma mater, Penn State "If you mention her family, people say, "What a nice family,'" Mr"We just can't believe this has happened The only ominous note about her activities came from one of the alleged bomber's teachers who has been interviewed by agents from the FBI"They told me, 'We have received a great deal of information about Miss Levov' For a year there is "where the store used to be Then construction begins on a new store, and month after month he watches it going upOne day a big red, white, and blue banner appears--"Greatly Expanded! New! New! New! McPherson's Store!"--announcing the grand opening on the Fourth of JulyHe has to sit Dawn down and tell her they are going to shop at the new store like everyone else and, though for a while it will not be easy for them, eventuallyHe cannot go into the new store without remembering the old store, even though the Russ Hamlins have retired and the new store is owned by a young couple from Easton who care nothing about the past and who, in addition to an expanded general store, have put in a bakery that turns out delicious cakes and pies as well as bread and rolls baked fresh every dayAt the back of the store, alongside the post office window, there is now a little counter where you can buy a cup of coffee and a fresh bun and sit and chat with your neighbor bag chloe paddington or read your paper if you want toMcPherson's is a tremendous improvement over Hamlin's, and soon everybody around seems to have forgotten their blown-up old-fashioned country store, except for the local Hamlins and for the LevovsDawn cannot go near the new place, simply refuses to go in there, while the Swede makes it his business, on Saturday mornings, to sit at the counter with his paper and a cup of coffee, despite what anybody who sees him there may be thinkingHe buys his Sunday paper there tooHe buys his stamps thereHe could bring stamps home from his office, could do all the family mailing in Newark, but he prefers to patronize the post office window at McPherson's and to linger there musing over the weather with young Beth McPherson the way he used to enjoy the same moment with Mary Hamlin, Russ's wife That is the outer lifeTo the best of his ability, it is conducted just as it used to beBut now it is accompanied by an inner life, a gruesome inner life of tyrannical obsessions, stifled inclinations, superstitious expectations, horrible imaginings, fantasy conversations, unanswerable questionsSleeplessness and self-castigation night after nightUnflagging remorse, even for that kiss when she was eleven and he was thirty-six and the two of them, in their wet bathing suits, were driving home together from the Deal omega speedmaster day-date bNo comments:
No trackbacks:
You will need to enable javascript to generate a trackback link
