The story, which is told in epistolary style, resumes with a letter from John Kenton to his fiancee, RUTH TANAKA, who is working on her PhD in California.
January 30, 1981
Dear Ruth,
Yes, it was good to talk to you last night, too. Even when you're on the other side of the country, I don't know what I'd do without you. I think this has been just about the worst month of my life, and without you to talk to and your warm support, I don't know how I could have gotten through it. The initial terror and revulsion of those pictures was bad, but I've discovered I can deal with terror-and Roger may be locked in his impersonation of some crusty editor in a Damon Runyon story (or maybe it's that Ben Hecht play I'm thinking of), but the funny thing is, he really does have a heart of gold. When all that shit came down, he was like a rock-his support never wavered.
Terror is bad, but the feeling that you've been a horse's ass is a lot worse, I've found. When you're afraid, you can fall back on your bravery. When you're humiliated, I guess you just have to call up your fiancee long distance and bawl on her shoulder. All I'm saying, I guess, is thanks-thanks for being there and thanks for not laughing... or calling me a hysterical old woman jumping at shadows. I had one final phone-call last night after I'd talked to you-from Chief Barton Iverson of the Central Falls P. D. He was also remarkably forgiving, but before I give you the final gist of it, let me try to clarify the whole sequence of events following my reception of the Detweiller manuscript last Wednesday. Your confusion was justifiable-I think I can be a little clearer now that I've had a night's sleep (and without Ma Bell in my ear, chipping off the dollars from my malnourished paycheck!).
As I think I told you, Roger's reaction to the “Sacrifice Photos” was even stronger and more immediate than mine. He came down to my office as if he had rockets in his heels, leaving two distributors waiting in his outer office (and, as I believe Flannery O'Connor once pointed out, a good distributor is hard to find), and when I showed him the pictures, he turned pale, put his hand over his mouth, and made some extremely unlovely gagging sounds so I guess you'd have to say I was more right than wrong about the quality of the photos (considering the subject matter, “quality” is a strange word to use, but it's the only one that seems to fit).
He took a minute or two to think, then told me I'd better call the police in Central Falls-but not to say anything to anybody else. “They could still be fakes,” he said, “but it's best not to take any chances. Put 'em in an envelope and don't touch them anymore. There could be fingerprints.”
“They don't look like fakes,” I said. “Do they?”
“No.”
He went back to the distributors and I called the cops in Central Falls-my first conversation with Iverson. He listened to the whole story and then took my telephone number. He said he'd call me back in five minutes, but he didn't tell me why.
He was actually back in about three minutes. He told me to take the photographs to the 31st Precinct at 140 Park Avenue South, and that the New York Police would wire the “Sacrifice Photos” to Central Falls.
“We should have them by three this afternoon,” he said. “Maybe even sooner.”
I asked him what he intended to do until then.
“Not much,” he said. “I'm going to send a plainsclothesman around to this House of Flowers and try to ascertain whether or not Detweiller is still working there. I hope to do that without arousing any suspicions. Until I see the pictures, Mr. Kenton, that's really all I can do.”
I had to bite my tongue to keep from telling him that I thought there was a lot more he could do. I didn't want to be dismissed as a typical pushy New Yorker, and I didn't want to have this fellow exasperated with me from the jump. And I reminded myself that Iverson hadn't seen the pictures. Under the circumstances I guess he was going as fast as he could on the basis of a call from a stranger-a stranger who might be a crank.
I got him to promise he'd call me back as soon as he got the photographs, and then I took them down to the 31st Precinct myself. They were expecting me; a Sergeant Tyndale met me in the reception area and took the envelope of photographs. He also made me promise I'd stay at the office until I'd heard from them.
“The Central Falls Chief of Police—”
“Not him,” Tyndale said, as if I was talking about a trained monkey. “Us.”
All the movies and novels are right, babe-it doesn't take long before you start feeling like a criminal yourself. You expect somebody to turn a bright light in your face, hook one leg over a beat-up old desk, lean down, blow cigarette smoke in your face, and say “Okay, Carmody, where did you put the bodies?” I can laugh about it now, but I sure wasn't laughing then.
I wanted Tyndale to take a look at the photos and tell me what he thought of them-whether or not they were authentic-but he just shooed me out with another reminder to “stick close,” as he put it. It had started to rain and I couldn't get a cab and by the time I'd walked the seven blocks back to Zenith House I was soaked. I had also eaten half a roll of Tums.
Roger was in my office. I asked him if the distributors were gone, and he flapped a hand in their direction. “Sent one back to Queens and one back to Brooklyn,” he said. “Inspired. They'll sell another fifty copies of Ants from Hell between them. Schmucks.” He lit a cigarette. “What did the cops say?”
I told him what Tyndale had told me.
“Ominous,” he said. “Very fooking ominous.”
“They looked real to you, didn't they?”
He considered, then nodded. “Real as rain.”
“Good.”
“What do you mean, good? There's nothing good about any of this.”
“I only meant—”
“Yeah, I know what you meant.” He got up, shook the legs of his pants the way he always does, and told me to call if I heard from anybody. “And don't say anything to anyone else.”
“Herb's looked in here a couple of times,” I said. “I think he thinks you're going to fire me.”
“The idea has some merit. If he asks you right out—”
“Lie.”
“Right.”
“Always a pleasure to lie to Herb Porter.”
He stopped again at the door, started to say something, and then Riddley, the mailroom kid, came by pushing a basket of rejected manuscripts.
“You been in there most de mawnin, Mist' Adler,” he said. “Is you gwine t'fire Mist' Kenton?”
“Get out of here, Riddley,” Roger said, “and if you don't stop insulting your entire race with that disgusting Rastus accent I'll fire you.”
“Yassuh, Mist' Adler!” Riddley said, and got his mail basket rolling again. “I'se goan! I'se goan!”
Roger looked at me and rolled his eyes despairingly. “As soon as you hear,” he repeated, and went out.
I heard from Chief Iverson early that afternoon. Their man had ascertained that Detweiller was at the House of Flowers, business as usual. He said that the House of Flowers is a neat long frame building on a street that's “going downhill” (Iverson's phrase). His man went in, got two red roses, and walked out again. Mrs. Tina Barfield, the proprietor of record according to the papers on file at City Hall, waited on him. The fellow who actually got the flowers, cut them, and wrapped them, was wearing a name tag with the word CARLOS on it. Iverson's man described him as about twenty-five, dark, not bad looking, but portly. The man said he seemed very intense; didn't smile much.
There's an exceptionally long greenhouse behind the shop. Iverson's man commented on it and Mrs. Barfield told him it was as deep as the block; she said they called it “the little jungle.”