Now that I had my bearings, it didn’t take much to pick up on what was going on. Bathtub gin, bootleg beer, and homemade corn whiskey kept the bar busy. In addition to the wagers on poker games and darts, the clerk at the market’s register took bets on horse races and baseball. Fancy girls circulated through the bar late in the evening and left with the most unlikely partners, which told me cash had changed hands. Abe Minker was running his own underground empire, putting Capone to shame. The guy had balls; I’d give him that.
Perhaps my looming presence kept troublemakers in line. West always told me that I was goddamn intimidating. I thought he just didn’t like anyone taller than he was.
Whatever the cause, troublemakers went elsewhere, and the regulars were on good behavior. Since I knew more now than I had the first night, I also picked up on little things I’d missed before. Several patrons had the wolfsangel lightning bolt tattoo. I spotted a few of the black sun sonnenrad marks as well. None of the skull and crossbones, at least not where anyone could see, but that symbol might raise talk. The other designs seemed artistic and could easily be passed off as just an interesting pattern.
I thought maybe Hans or Jakob might be among the speakeasy’s customers, but they didn’t show up during my shift. Frederick poured me a beer since Minker didn’t come out of his office and I clearly wasn’t even tipsy.
“Nice job, moving Karl the other night,” Frederick said, with a glance over his shoulder. The men at the bar were deep in conversation, unlikely to overhear. “There was a bit of a stir yesterday morning when some hausfrau went out to the outhouse and found someone already there!” He slapped me on the shoulder in good-natured camaraderie. “Pays to be able to think on your feet.”
As I studied the crowd, I realized that none of them had the look of miners. Factory workers, perhaps railroad men, and common laborers, yes. But not miners.
I had worked among men from the mines too long to not know their type. Always a little hunched, to fit in small spaces. Strong arms from swinging a pickaxe, but not usually big men. Men my size wouldn’t fit comfortably in tight tunnels or have room to maneuver. Short, wiry fellows and half-grown boys did better in those places.
And then there was the coal dust. No matter how much a man scrubbed, dark grains always remained beneath fingernails, in the creases of the neck, in hair. The shadow of the mines never left a man, and the dust that didn’t mark him on the outside laid its claim in his lungs and the unmistakable drag and rattle of a miner’s cough.
“Doesn’t look like you get many miners through here,” I noted.
Frederick shrugged. “We’re not close to the active mines. The ones under the city closed up a long time ago.”
I glanced toward the back, where I’d seen Minker down a hallway. “The boss doesn’t hang around much out here.”
“Doesn’t need to. That’s what he has me for—and I have you,” the bartender replied with a grin.
“Do the hexes worry him?” I said it off-handed like it would worry anyone.
“The boss is a smart man,” Frederick said, dropping his voice. “He knows how to take precautions. Old magic. Strong stuff.”
A guy like Minker could pay off the cops and the politicians and even the Mob. But if he intended to stay safe with the Free Society nosing around, I hoped he had a powerful witch on his side.
“I heard some guys got roughed up a couple of blocks over.” That’s what I’d gathered from the gossip I overheard on my walk. Two men had been arguing over whether the ones who got hurt deserved it, or whether it was a warning to those who “didn’t belong.”
Frederick grimaced and turned away as if I’d hit a nerve. “That sort of thing has gotten worse lately. There are always people who make it their business to decide who belongs and who doesn’t.” His disgusted tone made his position clear. “The Boss can take care of himself. Watch yourself, Joe. You’re not from around here. We had some guys in here tonight who might be trouble.”
“The wrist tattoos?” I asked, going with a hunch.
Frederick nodded, worried. “Yeah. Usually means they run with a bad crowd. The Boss makes it a point to serve everyone. I heard those guys talking. Didn’t like what they said. I’m worried that they might start taking it on themselves to run off the customers who aren’t ‘German enough’ to suit them.”
I snorted, like I found the idea preposterous when in reality, I’d suspected as much. West had warned me about the wehrwolves—ruffians who made it their business to “protect” their fortress by running off outsiders, like in that stupid book. Hans and Jakob had proven that the threat was real. “I’m happy to show that sort to the door—the hard way. Just give the word.”
Frederick rubbed his temples as if staving off a headache. “Hard to know what to do. If we get rough with them, they might try to bust the place up or burn it down.”
I met his gaze. “Not if I’m rough enough. It’s never bothered me to take out the trash.”
Frederick’s eyes narrowed, understanding. “Hope it doesn’t come to that, but thanks. Glad you’re here.”
“I’m glad for the job. You need me to move more barrels?”
Frederick had mentioned old tunnels when we moved the barrels last night. I intended to pay close attention when I went down there the next time to see what might lurk in the abandoned stretches.
“Not tonight, but come back in the morning, and there’ll be produce to unload,” he told me. I collected my pay for the night and headed back to the rooming house since it was already past midnight.
Tomorrow night I had the gathering on Neversink Mountain, and on Saturday, I’d be playing driver for West and Sarah. My dance card was full, a rarity for me. I wondered how long the meeting would take, and whether exploring in the tunnels afterward might be a good idea. Being undercover made me edgy because it didn’t take much for lies to unravel. The sooner we got what we came for and left, the more likely we’d be to survive.
After breakfast, I got an early start on investigating. Since I couldn’t ask the living the questions I needed to answer, I figured I would take my chances with the dead. With the “heaven letter” safely in my pocket, I ambled down to the potter’s field in Penn’s Commons, trying to look like I was just out for a stroll.
I didn’t quite know how the document’s magic worked, exactly, and I didn’t want to walk around talking to myself. Could ghosts read minds? I thought my question and hoped it was “loud” enough to reach the dead.
Were you miners? Did you see monsters in the deep places? Were the mines verhext?
I had been warm in the sun, but now a chill swept over me. The breeze suddenly picked up, cold and damp. When I looked back over the lawn of unmarked graves, three ghosts had answered my call.
Glancing around, I realized that we were alone on this end of the park. Most people were at work, and perhaps the ghosts had their own ways of making sure we were not disturbed.
The spirits were dressed for the hard work of the mines, but their outdated clothing suggested they had been dead a long time.
I saw them just before I died. The speaker was a child’s ghost, probably no more than eight or nine years old. Such young workers were common back in the day. I got sent down to the lower levels in the Eckert mine, to carry a message. Got turned around, went the wrong way. Something grabbed me, pulled me into the old tunnels. The monsters got me.
What did they look like? I questioned silently.
Not like people, one of the other ghosts replied. He might have been a teenager, still far too young for the backbreaking work of mining. They were as long as a man, but gray and stretched-looking, and they can walk like us, but they can cling to the walls and ceiling too, like a lizard. And they’re fast.
Damned if that image didn’t make my skin crawl. Did they…eat you? The three ghosts hadn’t appeared with their death wounds, for which I was grateful.
Not with teeth. The third miner’s ghost seemed to be the oldest of the three, and he looked ready to de
fend the younger boys if need be, although the dead were beyond the reach of all but the darkest magic.
How? I asked, and found myself holding my breath.
They touched my skin, and the life drained out of me, the youngest said, and the second ghost nodded in agreement.
Did the…creatures…do any work in the mine? Did they help the overseers? I couldn’t imagine what benefit anyone might see in monsters that could suck the life from a person with their touch.
They could make tunnels without digging. Sometimes, we’d break through a wall with our picks and find tunnels already there. But the walls were smooth, not like ours, the third ghost said.
Sometimes they’d move a whole cart from one place to another, the middle spirit added. It would just be somewhere else in the morning, but no one had done it.
Did the creatures ever leave the mine? I felt my stomach tighten with the thought of those beings loose in the world.
The last day…we smuggled a braucher in with us, the third ghost said. We feared the creatures, and we’d heard the overseers talking about how if they could be tamed, just a few could do the work of a hundred men. They didn’t care that the monsters killed our friends. We had to stop them.
“How?” I forgot myself and spoke the question aloud.
The witch read from a book that could seal the spirits of the earth. Then we set off dynamite in the lowest tunnels. Broke the lift and caved in the oldest part of the mine. Some of us died there, the third ghost added.
“When?” I whispered, not used to hearing other voices in my head.
The year of our Lord 1828, the year the mine closed, the oldest of the ghosts replied.
Despite my extra abilities and the magic that the himmelsbrief conveyed, talking with the spirits left me drained and made my head throb. Whatever questions remained would have to wait for another day.
Thank you, I told them. I wish you peace.
The gray things are still in the deep places, the second ghost warned. Don’t let them out.
With that, the three ghosts wavered and vanished.
I made my way to a bench in the shade and sat down, rubbing my temples to ease the ache in my head. Whatever prowled deep beneath the city could not be allowed to get free. Why either the Völkisch groups or the robber barons thought that any benefit they might get from those gray monsters outweighed the risk otherwise escaped me.
When the headache throttled down to a dull roar, I walked to the speakeasy. Frederick had wagons of a different sort for me to unload, this time for the market. Instead of barrels of beer, I hefted cases of rutabagas, cabbages, and potatoes, but they paid me for my work, and Frederick told me he would need me late that night at the bar.
That gave me an excuse to leave the meeting on Neversink Mountain early, in case I needed an out.
To my relief, Hans and Jakob did not expect me to go to the meeting with them. I didn’t trust them and preferred to find my own way there and back. I debated whether or not to take my Colt, unsure whether I’d be patted down. My abilities from Krukis were formidable but required being up close and personal, where a gun offered the chance to dispatch enemies at a distance. In the end, I erred on the side of caution and stuck the Colt in my waistband, just in case.
I also made certain that the himmelsbrief stayed in a hidden inner pocket of my jacket. Ziegler believed it offered protection, and I’d seen its effect on ghosts. I wanted all the advantages I could get.
The meeting location was in an abandoned hotel, which didn’t bode well. Fifteen years ago, Neversink Mountain had been a tourist destination with big lodges and luxury hotels that catered to a well-to-do crowd. A series of questionable fires destroyed some of the most famous lodges, the Centennial Springs Hotel became a sanitarium, and the Highland Hotel, our gathering spot for tonight, sat empty since then. Even the gravity railroad that once ferried guests to the mountain top hotels and made a circuit of the summit struggled to remain in use.
I paid my fare and watched as the city gradually receded beneath the railroad car. The steep slant of the track meant that the car jutted out, providing a spectacular view. The lights made a pretty pattern, and I could spot some of the tall buildings downtown. Ahead of me, the darkness of the mountaintop loomed, far less reassuring.
No good reason existed to meet in the ruins, not for any regular organization. That just fed my concern that this was one of those Völkisch groups that did not want to draw attention to itself. Which was exactly what I came to Reading to investigate. But it also reminded me that I meant to betray any secrets entrusted to me by the group and its members, so I’d need to be very careful. I believed Krukis when he told me I would be immortal, but I didn’t want to put that promise to the test.
The platform at the top of the incline looked deserted and in disrepair. My heart raced, and I wondered if Hans and Jakob had lured me into a trap. Yet I had done nothing to give myself away, and I realized that scenario was unlikely. I went nowhere without a candle and matches in my pocket, just in case, and I was about to light the wick so that I could see when the headlamps of the incline car went away. A man opened the shutters of a railroad lantern and stepped from the shadows.
“I came for the meeting at the Highland House,” I said. “Jakob invited me.” I hoped that if I failed to pass muster, the man would just send me back down the mountain. I didn’t doubt that I would best him in a fight, but doing so might reveal abilities I would prefer to keep hidden.
He tilted his head and looked me over. I tried not to fidget. Immortal or not, I didn’t like the feeling of being judged.
“Alright,” he said, jerking his thumb toward the platform exit. “Follow the guides. Mind you stay on the path—it’s grown a bit wild up here.”
I wasn’t quite sure what he meant until I stepped down off the platform and found another man with a partly shuttered lantern at the base of the steps. “There are lanterns along the trail,” the man told me. “They’ll take you where you need to go.”
As my eyes adjusted, I could make out shapes in the moonlight. The dim lights of the lantern trail showed me the direction. Ahead of me hulked a dark shape, a hotel that must have been grand and imposing in its day. It blotted out the stars, identifiable from its silhouette. I made out a large rectangle, four stories tall. How it escaped the flames that claimed most of its neighbors, I wasn’t sure. Or perhaps its owners had not been desperate enough to stoop to arson to settle their debts.
I heard the hum of voices as I drew closer, and when I was nearly upon the hotel, I saw glimmers of light escaping from around the edges of the windows. Someone had hung makeshift curtains to cover the openings, and while I suspected it might be in part to keep the wind from sweeping through shattered panes, I felt certain that the true purpose was to keep anyone from wondering about the lights on the mountain and coming to investigate.
A thick-set man with the stance of a boxer blocked the door when I climbed the steps to the Highland House’s porch.
“Jakob invited me,” I repeated as he eyed me. I tried to look unassuming, but that was nearly impossible given my height and heft. Just when I thought he might turn me away, a familiar voice spoke.
“He’s okay.” Jakob appeared from the doorway. It didn’t escape my notice how the guard immediately deferred. Jakob had some clout with the organization if his word and invitation held that much weight. Despite my advantages, I couldn’t help the nervous twist in my stomach.
“Glad you could make it,” Jakob said, leading me inside. “Ernst is our best speaker. You’re in for a good evening, and be sure you stay for the cookies.”
Anarchist cookies. Revolutionaries recruited by dessert. The world was a strange place.
Lanterns illuminated the entranceway and one large room to the right. The bones of the grand old hotel were still intact. Furniture and many of the fixtures had been removed, most likely either sold or stolen. Paint and wallpaper peeled from the walls, floorboards buckled from exposure, and the abandoned building sm
elled of mildew and disuse. Yet for having stood empty more than a decade, it was in surprisingly good shape.
Rows of folding chairs faced the front of what had probably been a dining room. I eyed the people who had arrived ahead of me. They appeared to be laborers and working men, like I was back in the day. Many of them had probably worked twelve hours today or more, so sacrificing their scant time off indicated interest—or desperation. Hardship and worry had carved their features, making them look older than their years.
A makeshift stage had been erected at one end of the room with boards laid over chairs. On either side, hand-painted banners hung from the picture rails. One had a sonnenrad, the wheel-within-a-wheel black sun. The other had the skull and crossbones—totenkopf. Emblazoned across the top, it read “The Free Society of Teutonia.” If I had any doubts about the group’s interests, those banners were confirmation.
The organizers urged everyone to take their seats, and the tired men shuffled down the rows. I chose a place where I could make a quick exit, and remain unnoticed, so I found a seat in the last row. Some of the attendees greeted each other with handshakes and backslaps.
“Greetings, my dear brothers!” a blond man said after he climbed onto the wobbly dais. I startled, realizing he was one of the men from my train ride, who had stared at me as if they knew my secrets. “We come together for the memory of the Fatherland, for the glorious history of our native Germany, and for the promise that our homeland will rise again, powerful and victorious!”
That raised cheers from the group, and a few men shouted defiant comments in German.
Ernest broke into Deutschland Uber Allis, the German national anthem, and that roused more energy from the group as they joined in, their rough voices deep beneath the leader’s clear baritone. After that, he led them through a few folk songs that everyone but me seemed to know by heart, songs that had enough memories associated with them that the men on either side of me teared up.
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