The Busybody
Alice Wyckoff was often jokingly referred to by the people on her street as the Gladys Kravitz of Puritan Falls because, like the old busybody from Bewitched, she was forever looking out her window or peeking through the crack in her living room drapes to spy on her neighbors. A person could not walk his dog down Winter Street without feeling her eyes following his every step. The more charitable residents of her neighborhood attributed her odd behavior to the fact that Alice was a widow, a lonely woman whose children moved out west and never came home to visit. It was only natural, they believed, that she should take a good deal of interest in the lives of those around her.
Most people on the block, however, resented the old woman's snooping, especially adolescents and teenagers; for not only did Alice spy on people, but she also acted on what she saw. For instance, when she caught Mr. Rosen watering his lawn during a time when the town imposed drought-prompted water restrictions, she phoned the town hall and reported him. When she glimpsed Luanne Ferber smoking a cigarette on the way home from school, the old busybody was immediately on the telephone with the girl's mother. Consequently, many youngsters, except those who lived in the immediate vicinity of Alice's house, avoided walking down the section of Winter Street that was within her view. Kip Bachman, the rebellious seventeen-year-old boy who lived across the street from Alice's Cape Cod home, routinely gave her the finger when he drove past her house since he knew the old biddy would be shamelessly watching his every move.
It wasn't only the pedestrians and drivers travelling on Winter Street that were subjected to Alice's constant surveillance. The people living in neighboring houses might just as well have been actors on a stage every time they raked their leaves, entertained on their patios and decks, held garage sales or sunbathed in lawn chairs in their back yards. During the spring, summer and early autumn—prime people-watching seasons—Alice would place her wing chair in front of her picture window and watch backyard barbecues, pool parties, badminton games and family reunions.
Even people inside their homes were not safe from Alice's relentless gawking. Like F. Scott Fitzgerald's eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckelburg, the old busybody appeared to see everything. What she could not see with her bare eyes, she examined through her late husband's old Bushnell binoculars. Behaving like a brazen voyeur, she would frequently spy on her neighbors through their own windows and observe them in various degrees of undress and in their most intimate situations.
In all fairness to the old woman, Alice saw no wrong in her conduct. She considered herself simply an observer of life. Her telephone calls to the town hall and police department she chalked up to doing her civic duty, and her reports to parents were nothing more than the actions of a concerned, well-meaning neighbor. There was no ill will or malice in her meddling.
Of course, Alice wasn't always at her window. Where snooping might be a full-time occupation in a busy city like Boston or New York, in Puritan Falls there were fewer people to watch. Sometimes Alice had to wait more than an hour to glimpse a woman hanging her laundry out on a backyard line, a child riding his bicycle along the sidewalk or a man walking to the corner bus stop. Occasionally, the weather kept people off the street for hours on end. A good blizzard or thunder storm could ruin the old woman's entire day, for in the absence of any live entertainment, she was forced to watch television to pass the time.
It was during a late-season snowstorm at the beginning of March that Alice sat at her post in front of the window one afternoon. It had been snowing since the previous night, and there was already an accumulation of more than eight inches with a forecast of another four.
"When is this damned snow going to stop?" she complained to the empty room.
Due to the inclement weather, her neighbors were letting their dogs out into their back yards rather than walking them on leashes. And since it was Sunday, only one brave person had ventured out of his house: Willard Pringle, who worked as an x-ray technician at Puritan Falls Hospital had put the chains on his Jeep and took to the icy, snow-covered roads. Everyone else was apparently waiting out the storm in their warm, dry homes.
"No one has even come out to start shoveling yet," Alice grumbled.
It was ironic that a woman who enjoyed the free show provided outside her window rarely ventured out of the house herself. While there is little doubt she was a sad, lonely creature—pitied by some, despised by others—she was at least an extremely wealthy, sad, lonely creature. She could thus afford to pay someone to shovel her snow, cut her grass, rake her leaves and deliver her groceries. She even paid someone to pay her bills, do her taxes and generally oversee her finances.
Rolph Oppenheimer, an elderly widower who lived only three houses away from Alice, was a quiet, timid, church-going man who kept to himself in much the same way as the old busybody kept to herself, except he did not spy on his neighbors. Rolph was an accountant who took over management of Alice's affairs after her husband passed away. There was much speculation amongst the residents of Winter Street that the widow and widower would eventually gravitate toward each other and put an end to their mutual loneliness, but such a relationship failed to develop between the two.
On the aforementioned snowy March afternoon, Alice finally abandoned her post at the window since there was nothing for her to see. She made herself a cup of coffee, picked up the television remote control and began searching through the channels. There was little of interest to her. She passed by the Red Sox spring training exhibition game and rejected several movies, all of which had already started. There were a number of old sitcoms that should have been allowed to rest in peace instead of being resurrected in syndication. Reality shows, cooking shows, home improvement shows—Alice skipped over them all. Only one program was remotely interesting: Criminal at Large.
With her peripheral vision on the alert for any movement outside her window, Alice watched segments on a Detroit bank robber who had managed to elude the FBI for more than seventeen years, an automobile mechanic who abducted his three young children from his estranged wife's West Virginia home and a serial rapist who was terrorizing Miami's South Beach area.
It was the final segment of the true crime show that commanded Alice's attention, however. According to the program, Leonard Clawson, a middle-aged man from New Jersey, murdered his elderly mother, his wife and his three children and laid their bodies out in sleeping bags in the middle of the living room. He then left a letter for his pastor, explaining his actions, and promptly left town. After viewing photographs of the Clawson family home, the victims and the crime scene, Alice examined a twenty-five-year-old picture of Leonard Clawson, which appeared on the screen.
There's something familiar about that face, she thought.
In the hope that someone in the TV audience might recognize the fugitive, the program's producer hired a forensics sculptor to create a bust of how Leonard Clawson might have aged in twenty-five years. The host then rattled off Clawson's height, hair color, eye color and other descriptive details, but Alice paid scant attention to his words. Her eyes were fixed on the bust.
"That's got to be him!" she cried aloud, her voice echoing through the empty house.
When the show's host announced that Leonard Clawson had been employed as an accountant while he was living in New Jersey, Alice's suspicions were confirmed. The old woman ran to her kitchen, and with a shaking hand, dialed the number for the Criminal at Large tip line.
"I'm calling about Leonard Clawson," she told the young woman who answered the phone, "the man from New Jersey who murdered his entire family. I know him. He's living here in Puritan Falls, Massachusetts, under the name of Rolph Oppenheimer. He's an accountant and looks exactly like the bust on your television show."
The young woman took down all Alice's relevant comments and contact information and then politely thanked her for calling.
"Is that it?" the old lady demanded to know, feeling somewhat disappointed.
"We'll pass this information on to the proper authorities, Ma'am. A police investigator will check out this Mr. Oppenheimer, and if he is Leonard Clawson, he'll be arrested and returned to New Jersey to stand trial."
Alice smiled and congratulated herself, feeling happier than she had the time she caught an unknown teenager trying to egg Principal Frampton's car on Mischief Night.
* * *
Two days later the Puritan Falls Police Department received a phone call from one of the television program's associate producers. Since the episode aired, there had been hundreds of calls from people claiming to have seen Leonard Clawson from as far away from the scene of the crime as Seattle, Washington, and as near as Pequannock, New Jersey. All of them had been either cases of mistaken identity or downright hoaxes.
"It's probably another dead end," the woman told Stan Yablonski, the detective on duty, "but we have to report all leads."
"Do you have the name of the person who phoned in the tip?" Yablonski asked.
The producer referred to her notes.
"Let's see. Here it is: Mrs. Alice Wyckoff."
The detective rolled his eyes at the mention of the familiar name.
"Her address is ...."
"No need to tell me. I know where she lives."
"You know the woman?"
"Oh, yeah. I think she has the police station on her speed dial."
Had anyone else from Puritan Falls phoned in the tip, no doubt the police would have given it more credence, but Alice's reputation as a notorious busybody and tattle-tale made her claims less believable. Detective Yablonski laughed when he recalled the time Officer Shawn McMurtry was dispatched to investigate a breaking and entering at Mayor Dole's house, only to find the portly politician trying to squeeze his over-sized derrière through his kitchen window after he inadvertently locked himself out of his house.
Still, as the producer had said, all leads had to be checked out. So with a sigh of resignation, Detective Yablonski put on his winter jacket, hat and gloves and headed toward his unmarked car.
* * *
The detective smiled amiably when Rolph Oppenheimer opened his door.
There's no need to upset the poor old guy, he reasoned.
"Good day, Mr. Oppenheimer," Yablonski said, flashing his badge.
The color drained from Rolph's face. It was a natural reaction, one the detective saw on a regular basis.
"Is something wrong?" the meek-looking, elderly man asked with trepidation.
"No, no," Yablonski assured him. "Just a few routine questions, that's all."
"Questions? About what?"
"How well do you know Mrs. Alice Wyckoff?"
The detective had decided to let the man think the focus of his questions was on his meddlesome neighbor.
"Fairly well—on a professional basis, that is. I'm her accountant."
Yablonski shook his head. Alice had failed to tell the young woman from Criminal at Large that she was on familiar terms with her neighbor. Could she possibly have an ulterior motive for phoning the show's tip line and claiming her accountant was a vicious murderer?
"Why? Has something happened to Alice?" Rolph asked with a noticeable trace of relief in his voice.
"No. She's fine," Yablonski reassured him. "But tell me, Mr. Oppenheimer, are you having any problems with her? Was there an argument of some kind?"
The old man's eyes narrowed.
"No. Why do you ask?"
"She seems to think you're not who you say you are. Apparently, she was watching that Criminal at Large program, and she got a notion into her head that you're some guy who murdered his family twenty-five years ago in New Jersey."
"That's ridiculous!" Rolph exclaimed.
"That's what I think, but I have to ask you a few questions nonetheless."
A half an hour later Detective Yablonski got into his unmarked car and drove back to the station house, confident that the old man was not living under a false identity. He had seen the Massachusetts birth certificate and the federally issued social security card in the name of Rolph Aloysius Oppenheimer. If the commonwealth and the U.S. government said the man was Rolph Oppenheimer, who was he to question the man's identity?
* * *
For three weeks after the episode of Criminal at Large aired, Alice kept a watchful eye on Rolph Oppenheimer's house and driveway. During that time she observed only one visitor to her accountant's house. Alice, who didn't recognize Stan Yablonski's Subaru Forester as an unmarked police car, didn't realize that the Puritan Falls detective had investigated her claims. When she failed to hear back from the producer, she grew impatient and phoned the TV show's tip line again.
"According to the local police investigator, Rolph Oppenheimer isn't Leonard Clawson," the young woman told her.
"Are you sure?" the busybody asked, clearly disappointed.
"Yes."
Alice hung up the phone and returned to her post at the crack in her drapes.
"I was positive it was the same man!" she said, watching Kip Bachman get behind the wheel of his Mustang and drive away, giving the nosy old woman the finger as he passed by her house.
* * *
When Alice saw Rolph Oppenheimer walking up her driveway with his black leather briefcase in hand, she felt only a mild sense of apprehension. There was no need to fear since the young woman from the Criminal at Large tip line had assured her that the accountant was not a murderer. Besides, it was tax season, and Rolph was sure to have questions or papers for her to sign.
"Good morning, Mrs. Wyckoff. How are you today?" he asked when she opened the door and let him inside.
"Cold," she replied. "The older I get, the more I feel the cold temperatures."
"Maybe you ought to think about relocating to someplace warm like Florida."
"No, thank you. Puritan Falls may be cold in the winter, but at least I won't have to worry about a hurricane knocking my house down."
"There's not much you can do here in the winter, though," the old man persisted. "About all you can do is sit and watch television. Do you watch much TV, Mrs. Wyckoff?"
"Not really. I usually only turn the set on when the weather is bad, like last month when we had that awful snowstorm."
"Any program in particular you enjoy watching?" he asked.
The question was an innocent one, but Alice was immediately on her guard.
"I like a good romantic comedy," she lied. "What about you? I'll bet you like to watch the History Channel."
Rolph chuckled.
"I haven't got much of an interest in history. No, Crime shows are more to my liking: CSI, Law & Order, NCIS, Cold Case. Every once in a while I even watch Criminal at Large. Did you ever see that show?"
For an old woman, Alice moved quickly, making a sudden, desperate dash for the first-floor bedroom where she would be able to lock the door behind her and phone the police. Unfortunately for her, Rolph was also fast for his age, and he easily caught up with her.
"What were you thinking when you reported me to the authorities?" the accountant cried angrily. "Did you honestly suppose the police would believe you of all people?"
Alice didn't bother denying his accusations.
"If they didn't believe me, then I'm no danger to you. So why are you here?"
"Because I know what a notorious snoop you are. If I let you live, you might search for proof of my real identity. I'd have to be looking over my shoulder every day for the rest of my life, and I don't want to have to live like that."
Hoping to avoid the bloody mess he had made when he shot his mother, wife and children to death, Leonard Clawson chose to strangle the old woman instead. Puritan Falls' Gladys Kravitz put up a fight, but given her frailty he was able to choke her with minimal effort.
* * *
No one noticed anything different on Winter Street. The lights in Alice Wyckoff's house came on at dusk and went off at ten each night. Rolph saw to it that the bills continued to be paid on time and the tax returns filed by April 15. Those who noticed that the elderly accountant made more frequent trips to the widow's house, smiled with satisfaction, believing they had been right in predicting the two lonely, old people would become intimate friends.
Alice's neighbors still felt the busybody's prying eyes peering through the crack in her living room drapes. Teenagers persisted in avoiding walking along her area of Winter Street, and Kip Bachman continued to flip her the bird when he drove past her house in his Mustang. But should one of the neighbors someday venture inside the widow's home, he or she would discover a decaying, lifeless corpse secured to the wing chair by heavy ropes. And just as was the case with the sign of Doctor T. J. Eckelburg in The Great Gatsby, Alice Wyckoff's dead, staring eyes saw nothing.
This story was loosely based on the case of John List who murdered his mother, wife and three children in Westfield, New Jersey. He was apprehended eighteen years later with the help of the America's Most Wanted television series, which featured an age-progressed clay bust sculpted by forensic artist Frank Bender.
Salem often peeks through the curtains at our neighbors, who flip him REAL birds.
