The Death Beat

by Fiona Veitch Smith

  “Amelia believes in sterilization for the poor and weaker members of society – particularly for negroes, but poor whites get the treatment too. As you know, many women’s advocates also believe in birth control – but perhaps for different reasons.”

  “Like Mary Stopes,” offered Poppy. “Isn’t there some controversy about her?”

  “Yes, there is. Abortions are the real hot potato. But that aside, she wants to give women options, not just purify the population like the eugenicists. Amelia, I think, supports it for both reasons. She and my mother are good friends.”

  Poppy frowned. “Your mother?”

  “Yes. That’s how I first met Mrs Spencer – they travel in the same social circles, although Amelia is a good fifteen years younger than the mater. Both of them were founding members of the New York Eugenics Society, which” he cocked a thumb at the photograph, “von Hassler seemed to have been financing.”

  Poppy nearly choked on her own coffee. “Your mother believes in eugenics! B-b-but how can she? With your – your –”

  “With me being a dwarf?” finished Rollo. He inhaled and exhaled slowly, clearly trying to keep his temper under control. “It’s because I’m a dwarf that she got involved. She never forgave me for not being the perfect son. She said she didn’t want other people to repeat the… mistake she’d made.”

  Rollo looked out of the window at the lunchtime passersby. It was starting to rain and umbrellas jostled for space on the sidewalk. Poppy didn’t know what to say. If it was anyone else she would have taken their hand and squeezed it and said she was so very sorry. But it was Rollo, and he didn’t do well with public displays of sympathy.

  Instead she said very quietly: “That’s dreadful. Just dreadful.”

  He nodded. “It is. But, I can’t complain too much. I’m white and wealthy and well educated. And despite what the old girl thought, my father and brother loved me just the same.” He grinned, trying to whip up the old Cheshire cat. “I’m not the only fella in the world with a mother who didn’t care for him, Miz Denby.”

  Poppy smiled at him, playing along with his attempt to bring levity to the conversation. “So, von Hassler was a eugenicist too.”

  Rollo shrugged. “Nothing illegal about it. So was half of New York society at the time – half of them probably still are. What else does it say about him?”

  Poppy turned the page and read on. “Aha!” she said, pointing to the second paragraph down. “Seems like he was also a business partner of Theo Spencer. Some kind of textile business.”

  Rollo nodded. “Yes. Theo’s got his fingers in lots of pies. Doesn’t surprise me. He and my old man were partners in a couple of ventures too. Nice fella, Theo, for an industrialist.”

  Poppy agreed that he was – despite his wife’s dubious beliefs.

  Rollo hailed the waitress for the bill. As he was counting out the coins he said: “Look, Poppy, I know you think it’s too much of a coincidence that the fella you thought was Alfie Dorchester is posing as someone from Liechtenstein – and then this old geezer up and dies – but really, European aristocrats are more common than you might think in these parts. So perhaps we should start looking into other…”

  But Poppy wasn’t listening to him. She was completely engrossed in reading the third paragraph down:

  Prince von Hassler never married. His sole heir is the son of his now deceased sister. Name: Count Otto von Riesling, resident of the Principality of Monte Carlo.

  Poppy looked up, her face pale, her hands shaking.

  “What is it, Poppy?”

  “Oh my, Rollo, oh my. I think we’ve just struck gold.”

  CHAPTER 18

  The good thing about being a nobody on The New York Times was that no one expected Poppy to work beyond her contracted hours. At home in London she worked as many hours as she needed – day or night – to get the job done. But here in the salt mines of New York – when all the work she was officially allocated could be done in the office – she was a simple nine-to-five girl. So after having lunch with Rollo she went back to the office and put in the required time until knock-off at five.

  She was relieved to see that Paul Saunders had not returned to the office during her lunch hour and a quick question to one of the other journalists revealed that he was out following a story. No one knew when he would be back.

  Perfect. She could write the obituary for the prince without having to explain how she’d found the file. Then she could start doing some real work: tracking down Alfie Dorchester. At four o’clock she checked her watch and calculated that it would now be nine o’clock at night in London. Hmmm, should she send a telegram now and wait for it to be delivered tomorrow or just send it tomorrow? If she sent it tomorrow morning, it would be afternoon in England and precious hours would have been lost. No, she’d send it now.

  She wasn’t sure if she was allowed to use the telegram machine or not. It was operated by a young man in his early twenties who, whenever he was not sending or receiving telegrams on behalf of the newsroom staff, was usually propped up on one elbow catching forty winks. He sat bolt upright with a snort when Poppy spoke to him.

  “Frank, isn’t it?”

  Frank looked sheepish. “It is. I wasn’t sleeping, ma’am, I swear.”

  Poppy smiled. “I’m sure you weren’t. Can you send a telegram for me, please?”

  Frank looked around, trying to catch the eye of someone more senior. “Well, I’m not really sure if I can. Are you on my list?”

  “List?”

  “Of staff members who can send telegrams.” He reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a dog-eared list of names.

  “What’s the name, ma’am?”

  “Denby, Poppy Denby. But…” Poppy opened her blue eyes as wide as she could. “I’m probably not on the list yet, although Mr Quinn said I would be soon. So if you don’t mind…”

  The young man picked at some dirt under one of his fingernails. “Well, I don’t really know, ma’am. I really shouldn’t.”

  Poppy took a step closer and leaned on the desk. “Oh, I’m sure you won’t get into trouble. It’s not as if you’ve been napping on the job or anything…” She smiled with as much charm as she could muster.

  The young man’s eyes flitted to left and right and then down to the list. “You sure Mr Quinn said you’d be on it soon?”

  “Abso-posi-tootly,” said Poppy, using a word she’d overheard some New York flappers using at Chester’s.

  He nodded. “All right then. But just this once. Until Mr Quinn gets it sorted.”

  “Of course,” smiled Poppy. “Just this once.”

  Poppy gave the text of the telegram to the operator. It was addressed to Marjorie Reynolds of the Home Office, London. But as it would be arriving after office hours in England, Poppy had given Marjorie’s home address, rather than her office. Marjorie was a friend of Aunt Dot’s, one of the first female MPs and a minister at the Home Office. She also had ties to the Secret Service and she and Poppy had worked together on a case the previous autumn involving international espionage. If Marjorie couldn’t help her, Poppy thought, no one could.

  The telegram read: “Marjorie STOP Poppy here STOP Need to find Count Otto von Riesling last seen Monte Carlo STOP Where is he now STOP Ties to Dorchester STOP Urgent STOP Reply to Rollo NY address STOP”.

  After the young man tapped the final STOP Poppy thanked him and promised that she would sort it all out with Mr Quinn as soon as she could, then left him to resume his nap.

  It was now half past four. Thirty minutes to kill until home time – although Poppy had no intention of going home. Saunders still had not returned so she slipped the file on von Hassler back into his drawer. One of the other journalists saw her do it and raised an eyebrow.

  Poppy smiled and explained: “Something I borrowed.”

  The hack, approaching the end of a twelve-hour shift, shrugged, yawned, and turned his attention back to his typewriter.

  Poppy breathed a sigh of relief. So
not everyone in the office had been briefed to keep her in line. Or if they had, they didn’t care to. Good. And they probably wouldn’t mind if she used the telephone. If asked why, she would say it was to fill in some gaps on the obit she was working on – which was, of course, entirely true…

  She grasped the phone by the neck, picked up the handset, and spoke into the mouthpiece: “Bellevue Hospital please. Orthopaedic department. Dr Toby Spencer.”

  Following Rollo’s directions, Poppy got off the subway at 23rd Street then jumped on a trolley car heading to the East River, and Bellevue Hospital. Rollo in the meantime said he was going to drop in on an old pal in the New York Police Department to find out what he could about the von Hassler investigation. The two of them agreed to meet later that evening at the Waldorf Astoria to join a live audience for the radio broadcast Delilah was involved in. “Make sure Dr Love doesn’t waylay you,” advised Rollo with a wink.

  Poppy had pooh-poohed the suggestion and waved goodbye to her grinning editor. But, Poppy suspected, Rollo was not entirely wrong. On the ship she definitely had the impression that Toby Spencer was romantically interested in her. All that might have changed since their encounter at Chester’s Speakeasy, when the young doctor had seemed less than convinced by her accusations about the fake count. So Poppy was not sure how she would be received when she got to the hospital.

  She needn’t have worried. As soon as she arrived at the reception desk she was met by a smiling nurse who announced that Dr Spencer was waiting for her, and ushered her into his office.

  He was seated behind a desk piled high with files, in front of a wall lined with what Poppy assumed were x-ray plates. She had seen something similar when she went to Marie Curie’s Radium Institute in Paris the previous year: shadowy white shapes on a black background. As she stepped through the door she passed a skeleton – suspended from a frame – jauntily sporting a trilby hat. As soon as he spotted her, Toby jumped up and strode across the floor. Gone was the dashing tuxedoed socialite from the speakeasy, and in his place was a professional young doctor in a white coat. But the auburn hair – slicked down with Brillantine – and the sea-blue eyes remained the same. So did the smile.

  “Miz Denby! You made it!”

  “Of course I did, Dr Spencer. It’s just a short journey on the subway.”

  He grinned, making him look younger than his thirty years. “Indeed it is, but it seems an eternity since I last saw you.”

  “You flatter me, Dr Spencer.”

  “Toby, please, after all we’ve been through together…”

  The nurse, who was still standing in the doorway, raised a quizzical eyebrow.

  Poppy flushed. “We have only met a few times, Dr Spencer, and…”

  Toby raised his hands in mock surrender. “Of course. Forgive me for giving the wrong impression to Nurse Forbes. I meant when you helped me with the emergency surgery on the ship. Nurse Forbes, this is the young woman who so ably assisted me with Seaman Jones, who, no doubt, is the reason you are here…”

  Seaman Jones, thought Poppy. Of course! The injured sailor had been brought to this very hospital. How convenient for her.

  “Indeed it is. I was wondering how he is?” she quickly offered.

  A slight smile played at the corner of Toby’s mouth. “I shall take you to him shortly.” Then he turned to the nurse. “Nurse Forbes, will you ready the patient for a visit?”

  The nurse said she would and retreated from the room.

  As the door closed Toby leaned his backside on his desk and folded his arms. Then he frowned. “I suspect, Miz Denby, from your reaction, you did not come to see Seaman Jones after all.”

  Poppy cleared her throat to speak, but before she could he grinned and said in an exaggerated Long Island drawl: “And that, I can tell you, pleases me no end, no end at all.”

  “It does?” asked Poppy, surprised.

  “Indeed it does. After the other night at Chester’s I thought you and I… well… I didn’t think it went very well. Do you?”

  Poppy shifted her satchel from one shoulder to another, alerting Toby to an ungentlemanly oversight. “By Jove, I’m sorry!” Then he jumped up and pulled out a chair. “Please, take a seat. May I take your bag? It looks heavy.”

  “Full of files,” said Poppy, and sat in the chair as Toby placed the satchel at her feet.

  Toby sat opposite her and crossed his legs, showing a pair of red and blue checked golfing socks under his smart work trousers.

  “Well, I –” they both started at the same time and laughed.

  “Ladies first,” said Toby and leaned forward to hear what she had to say.

  Poppy wasn’t sure how to proceed. She was here in an investigative capacity but she did not want to put him on edge, thinking he was being interrogated. Neither, though, was she comfortable playing along with the idea he seemed to have that she might be open to progressing their relationship along less formal lines.

  Seaman Jones was an option…

  But before she could decide which tack to take, Toby chipped in: “Look, Poppy, I’m sorry about the other night. You were very obviously upset when you thought von Riesling looked like that bounder who assaulted you. Cousin Miles filled me in on the whole story after the fact. Apparently it was all over the papers – even here. I must have missed it. I’m sorry.”

  He cleared his throat and re-crossed his legs in the other direction.

  What exactly is he sorry for? wondered Poppy. That he hadn’t known or that he hadn’t believed her? It was her turn to clear her throat.

  “Well, thank you, Dr Spencer – Toby. But there’s no need to apologize. I don’t expect everyone to know everything. Particularly something that happened in another country. But – and you might not like what I’m going to say – your friend doesn’t just look like Alfie Dorchester –”

  Toby raised his hand and interjected. “Oh, he’s not my friend; merely an acquaintance.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. His uncle and my father have some shared business dealings. I only met von Riesling a few months ago.”

  Poppy twirled the strap of her satchel around her forefinger. “Does he live in New York?”

  “I think he intends to settle here, yes. He lived in Monte Carlo before this. Moved here because his uncle was becoming increasingly infirm. He’s an old fella – well into his eighties – and Otto is his only heir.”

  Toby was speaking in the present tense. So, he didn’t know the “old fella” was dead then.

  “Was – is – Otto staying with his uncle? In the same apartment?”

  Poppy tried to keep her voice nonchalant. She decided that as long as Toby was giving her the information she came for it would be counterproductive to antagonize him with further accusations that his so-called acquaintance was in fact her assailant, Alfie Dorchester.

  Toby picked a hair from his trousers and flicked it into a waste paper basket. “I’m not sure, to be honest. I never had dealings with him at home. We would just sometimes bump into one another when we were out – Chester’s, Club Deluxe, places like that. I first met him at a Christmas party at my parents’ place, out on Long Island.”

  “Ah, I see,” said Poppy. “I assume he was with his uncle then?”

  “No,” said Toby. “Old von Hassler is a bit of a recluse. No one has seen him outside his apartment in years. But Otto introduced himself to us. He said he’d come on his uncle’s behalf. The old duffer had been invited – as a business courtesy – but no one had really expected him to come.”

  “And no one was surprised that someone claiming to be his nephew arrived in his stead?”

  Toby cocked his head to the right, his Brilliantined hair staying primly in place. “No, why should we? We all knew he had a nephew. Just hadn’t met him, that’s all. Look, Poppy, I’m not sure what all this is about but –”

  There was a knock on the door. The nurse entered. “Seaman Jones is ready to see you now, doctor.”

  Toby looked at Poppy curi
ously. “Do you want to see Seaman Jones or is there something else you would like to know?” His tone was similar to what it had been that night at Chester’s.

  Be careful, Poppy…

  “Of course I’d like to see Seaman Jones.” She stood up and picked up her satchel.

  Toby stood too, looking relieved.

  “How is he, by the way?” she asked, allowing Toby to take the satchel from her.

  “Better than expected,” said Toby, as he led her to the door. He ushered her down the corridor and explained his patient’s medical condition as they walked.

  Seaman Jones had been taken straight into surgery when he arrived at the hospital so Toby’s team could “clean up” what he had done in the makeshift operating theatre on the Olympic. Then he had been placed in a private room – paid for by the Carter Shipping Company – and monitored day and night for signs of septicaemia setting in. So far it hadn’t, and yesterday, for the first time, Jones had regained consciousness and was starting to take small amounts of food and water.

  “He’s doing as well as we could hope, all things considered,” said Toby, as he pushed open the door to the private room, “but he’s not quite out of the woods yet.”

  Lying in a sea of white sheets was Seaman Jones. The bedding over his legs was draped over a frame, so it would not touch his tender stump and would give easy access to the medical staff. Poppy had seen similar contraptions at the military hospital she had worked at during the war.

  The man’s eyes were closed but they opened as Poppy and Toby approached.

  “How are you feeling today, Seaman Jones?” asked Toby as he cast an expert eye over the patient and took his wrist in hand to feel his pulse.

  With considerable effort the injured sailor composed himself to answer: “On the mend, I hope, doctor.”

  “I think you’re making good progress,” said Toby in a tone of voice that Poppy suspected he used when he was being noncommittal but wanting to provide encouragement. He’s a good doctor and a decent chap, Poppy decided, and wondered why she was so averse to any romantic overtures from him.