final Blue Rose murder, was that of Heinz Stenmitz, a butcher who
lived on Muffin Street with his wife and a succession of foster
children, all boys. Four days after the attack on the doctor, Stenmitz
was killed outside his shop, next door to his house. I have no
difficulty remembering Mr. Stenmitz. He was an unsettling man, and when
I saw his name in the Ledger's subhead (the headline was BLUE ROSE
KILLER CLAIMS FOURTH VICTIM ), I experienced an ungenerous
satisfaction
that would have shocked my parents.
I knew, as my parents did not—as they refused to believe, despite a
considerable scandal the year before—that there were two Mr.
Stenmitzes. One was the humorless, Teutonic, but efficient butcher who
sold them their chops and sausages. Tall, blond, bearded, blue-eyed, he
carried himself with an aggressive rectitude deeply admired by both my
parents. His attitude was military, in the sense that the character
played over and over by C. Aubrey Smith in Hollywood films of the
thirties and forties was military.
The other Mr. Stenmitz was the one I saw when my parents put two
dollars in my hand and sent me to the butcher shop for hamburger. My
parents did not believe in the existence of this other man within Mr.
Stenmitz. If I had insisted on his presence, their disbelief would have
turned into anger.
The Mr. Stenmitz I saw when I was alone always came out from behind
the counter. He would stoop down and rub my head, my arms, my chest.
His huge blond bearded head was far too close. The smells of raw meat
and blood, always prominent in the shop, seemed to intensify, as if
they were what the butcher ate and drank. "You came to see your friend
Heinz?" A pat on the cheek. "You can't stay away from your friend
Heinz, can you?" A sharp, almost painful pat on the buttocks. His thick
red fingers found my pockets and began to insinuate themselves. His
eyes were the lightest, palest blue eyes I've ever seen, the eyes of a
Finnish sled dog. "You have two dollars? What are these two dollars
for? So your friend Heinz will show you a nice surprise, maybe?"
"Hamburger," I would say.
The fingers were pinching and roaming through my pocket. "Any love
letters in here? Any pictures of pretty girls?"
Sometimes I saw the miserable child who had been sent to his house,
a child for whom Mr. and Mrs. Stenmitz were paid to care, and the sight
of that hopeless Billy or Joey made me want to run away. Something had happened to these children: they
had been squeezed dry and ironed flat They were slightly dirty, and
their clothes always looked too big or too small, but what was scary
about them was that they had no humanity, no light—it had been drained
right out of them.
When I saw Mr. Stenmitz's name under the terrible headline I felt
amazed and fascinated, but mainly I felt relief. I would not have to go
into his shop alone anymore; and I would not have to endure the awful
anxiety of going there with my parents and seeing what they saw, C.
Aubrey Smith in a butcher's apron, while also seeing the other,
terrible Heinz Stenmitz winking and capering beneath the mask.
I was glad he was dead. He couldn't have been dead enough, to suit
me.
8
Then there were no more of the murders. The last place someone wrote BLUE ROSE on a wall was outside Stenmitz's Quality Meats
and Home-Made
Sausages. The man who wrote those mysterious words near his victims'
bodies had called it quits. His plan, whatever it was, had been
fulfilled, or his rage had satisfied itself. Millhaven waited for
something to happen; Millhaven wanted the second shoe to drop.
After another month, in a great fire of publicity, the second shoe
did drop. One of my clearest memories of the beginning of my year of
convalescence is of the Ledger's revelations about the secret history
of the murders. The Ledger found a hidden coherence in the Blue Rose murders and was delighted,
with the sort of delight that masquerades as shock, by the twist at the
story's end. I read a tremendous amount during
lived on Muffin Street with his wife and a succession of foster
children, all boys. Four days after the attack on the doctor, Stenmitz
was killed outside his shop, next door to his house. I have no
difficulty remembering Mr. Stenmitz. He was an unsettling man, and when
I saw his name in the Ledger's subhead (the headline was BLUE ROSE
KILLER CLAIMS FOURTH VICTIM ), I experienced an ungenerous
satisfaction
that would have shocked my parents.
I knew, as my parents did not—as they refused to believe, despite a
considerable scandal the year before—that there were two Mr.
Stenmitzes. One was the humorless, Teutonic, but efficient butcher who
sold them their chops and sausages. Tall, blond, bearded, blue-eyed, he
carried himself with an aggressive rectitude deeply admired by both my
parents. His attitude was military, in the sense that the character
played over and over by C. Aubrey Smith in Hollywood films of the
thirties and forties was military.
The other Mr. Stenmitz was the one I saw when my parents put two
dollars in my hand and sent me to the butcher shop for hamburger. My
parents did not believe in the existence of this other man within Mr.
Stenmitz. If I had insisted on his presence, their disbelief would have
turned into anger.
The Mr. Stenmitz I saw when I was alone always came out from behind
the counter. He would stoop down and rub my head, my arms, my chest.
His huge blond bearded head was far too close. The smells of raw meat
and blood, always prominent in the shop, seemed to intensify, as if
they were what the butcher ate and drank. "You came to see your friend
Heinz?" A pat on the cheek. "You can't stay away from your friend
Heinz, can you?" A sharp, almost painful pat on the buttocks. His thick
red fingers found my pockets and began to insinuate themselves. His
eyes were the lightest, palest blue eyes I've ever seen, the eyes of a
Finnish sled dog. "You have two dollars? What are these two dollars
for? So your friend Heinz will show you a nice surprise, maybe?"
"Hamburger," I would say.
The fingers were pinching and roaming through my pocket. "Any love
letters in here? Any pictures of pretty girls?"
Sometimes I saw the miserable child who had been sent to his house,
a child for whom Mr. and Mrs. Stenmitz were paid to care, and the sight
of that hopeless Billy or Joey made me want to run away. Something had happened to these children: they
had been squeezed dry and ironed flat They were slightly dirty, and
their clothes always looked too big or too small, but what was scary
about them was that they had no humanity, no light—it had been drained
right out of them.
When I saw Mr. Stenmitz's name under the terrible headline I felt
amazed and fascinated, but mainly I felt relief. I would not have to go
into his shop alone anymore; and I would not have to endure the awful
anxiety of going there with my parents and seeing what they saw, C.
Aubrey Smith in a butcher's apron, while also seeing the other,
terrible Heinz Stenmitz winking and capering beneath the mask.
I was glad he was dead. He couldn't have been dead enough, to suit
me.
8
Then there were no more of the murders. The last place someone wrote BLUE ROSE on a wall was outside Stenmitz's Quality Meats
and Home-Made
Sausages. The man who wrote those mysterious words near his victims'
bodies had called it quits. His plan, whatever it was, had been
fulfilled, or his rage had satisfied itself. Millhaven waited for
something to happen; Millhaven wanted the second shoe to drop.
After another month, in a great fire of publicity, the second shoe
did drop. One of my clearest memories of the beginning of my year of
convalescence is of the Ledger's revelations about the secret history
of the murders. The Ledger found a hidden coherence in the Blue Rose murders and was delighted,
with the sort of delight that masquerades as shock, by the twist at the
story's end. I read a tremendous amount during
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