by Kat Ross
“No, he wouldn’t,” I said softly. “Cold and arrogant, I imagine.”
“Extremely. Well, it took some convincing, but the lawyers finally got Moran to remove his shirt. He had scars on his back from being whipped with a leather strop. Terrible scars, Harry. When the judge saw it. . . . Well, I think he might have let Moran off the hook if only he’d showed some remorse. But he couldn’t quite manage it so the charge was knocked down to manslaughter and he got eight months.” She shrugged. “Still a bargain if it was premeditated. He could easily have hanged.”
I wondered what might have happened if James Moran hadn’t been sent to the Tombs. It was in that dank cell that the seeds of his criminal career were planted. Myrtle said he made crucial gangland connections in prison. What if he had been acquitted of all charges? Would his life had taken a different turn?
It was an unanswerable question and I set it aside.
“Is there a picture of Declan Moran anywhere?” I asked.
“I think so. He was a private man, but we commissioned a sketch . . . . Ah, here it is.”
Nellie handed me the page. I stared in wonder as the last piece fell into place.
“Striking resemblance, isn’t it?” she said.
“More than striking,” I said softly. “He’s the spitting image of his son.”
I thought of the blank hole on the wall where Declan’s portrait used to hang.
“Anything else, Harry? I’ve got a deadline.”
“No. You’ve been an enormous help, thanks.”
Nellie nodded. “Tell Myrtle I’ll come pay a visit before I sail. She must be ready to kill someone sitting around at home.”
I gave her a weak smile. “You’ve no idea.”
Chapter 13
It took most of the next morning to work our way through John’s list. We claimed to be searching for a long lost great-aunt and the orderlies were more than happy to pocket a few dollars in exchange for allowing us to view the registers. But none recognized the photograph of Klara Schmidt.
“It’s this one or bust,” John remarked wearily as we climbed the steps to the Association for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females on Amsterdam Avenue and Ninety-First Street. The building was a heap of crumbling brick identical to the last four and I had a sudden premonition that it was all a wild goose chase.
Moran might already be dead. If he wasn’t, he would probably kill me for interfering in his affairs.
The man behind the front desk had large rabbity teeth and looked so bored I had to suppress a yawn just looking at him. He greeted us with an obsequious smile. “How can I help you?”
John related the usual story and the attendant heaved a regretful sigh. “I’m afraid the names of our residents are confidential. We must protect their privacy at all costs.” He lowered his voice. “There are villains who would take advantage of these poor souls if they could. I don’t mean it as an insult, I’m sure you’re perfectly honest, but rules are rules.”
It was a familiar refrain. John laid a five-dollar bill on the counter. “That’s admirably diligent of you,” he said. “But if our dear Aunt Klara ended up here, she’d be glad to know she had family looking for her, don’t you think?” He drummed his fingers on the bill. “A small tip for your trouble.”
The man’s ennui evaporated and he looked thrilled at his good fortune. “Well, since you put it that way. . . .” He neatly palmed the bill. “As a matter of fact, Miss Schmidt has been with us for two years now. She’s just had her supper. I’ll take you up to see her right now if you’d like.” He came around from behind the counter and started for a flight of stairs.
John and I shared a triumphant look. “Oh heavens, it’s been so long!” I exclaimed. “I do hope she remembers us.”
“Yes, Cousin Gretel,” John replied loudly. “You were just a girl when last we saw dear Aunt Klara. It was at . . . Hansel’s wedding in Dusseldorf, wasn’t it?”
I shook my head violently and mouthed at him to be quiet. John sucked his lips in made a dramatic pantomime of twisting a key and hurling it away. The attendant spun back as we reached the staircase and the two of them eyed each other for a long moment.
“Is something amiss?” John asked innocently.
The man’s eyes narrowed. “No. I just thought I heard . . . Never mind.”
He led us up a cramped flight of stairs to the third landing. The place wasn’t as bad as some of the other homes we’d visited that morning, but it had an air of benign neglect. Cobwebs festooned the corners and the smell of boiled potatoes seemed to have soaked into the walls. As we started down the hall, a door opened and an old woman with a cloud of unruly white hair stuck her head through the crack like a tortoise peering out of its shell.
“Mr. Forsythe?” she called out in a high, wavering voice.
“Back to bed with you, Miss Castle!” he sang out in a not unkind tone. “I am currently occupied escorting visitors for Miss Schmidt.”
“Ooooh, how exciting,” Miss Castle said with a touch of envy. “I only wanted seconds of that pudding, if you might, Mr. Forsythe. It has raisins.”
He nodded sagely. “I’m well aware of your rabid fondness for raisins, Miss Castle.” He made a courtly gesture, bending one knee with a flourish. “Your desire is my command!”
She tittered at the plummy voice.
“Go on, dear.” He made a whisking motion. “I’ll be back in a tick.”
Miss Castle withdrew and Mr. Forsythe reverted to his usual voice. “Here she is,” he muttered, giving a desultory rap with his knuckles on a door at the very end of the hall. “I’m sure the old bird’ll be thrilled to see you. She hasn’t had a visitor in ages.”
John and I exchanged a nervous glance as a muffled voice sounded from within.
“Relations, Miss Schmidt,” Mr. Forsythe crooned in the sticky-sweet tone he seemed to reserve for the residents. “May we come inside?”
He didn’t wait for a reply but opened the door and admitted us to a surprisingly large, airy room facing the avenue. A tall, skinny woman sat by the window, grey hair ratcheted into a severe bun. I could only see her profile but she looked ancient. Her old-fashioned dress was flat black crepe, accentuating her extreme pallor and the blue veins snaking along the skin of her throat. A tray of half-eaten supper sat at her elbow.
As we entered the room, she shifted in her chair and I thought I saw a spark of knowing malice in her eyes, but then it was gone.
“Who are you?” she demanded, the consonants hardened by a slight Teutonic accent.
The cold voice dried my tongue, but John seemed unaffected.
“You remember us, don’t you?” he asked, approaching her chair. “From when you worked for the Morans.”
Klara Schmidt regarded him impassively. I hadn’t been able to tell her eye color in the photograph. Now I saw that they were a dark, rich blue. Her body looked wasted beneath the black dress, but I sensed a powerful strength of will.
The attendant hovered in the doorway. “Don’t you know these people, Klara?” he asked.
“I’ve never seen them before in my life,” she said with contempt.
He cast us a genuinely upset look and I realized that Mr. Forsythe wasn’t a bad egg. He felt responsible for his charges and assumed we were swindlers hoping to steal whatever little money she had hidden away.
“Klara’s not dotty like some of the others,” he said coldly. “If she knew you, she’d say so. I’m afraid you’ll have to go before I summon the police.”
Klara Schmidt started to turn away and I walked up to her, determined to speak my piece before she threw us out.
“Hey!” Mr. Forsythe called out in exasperation. “Didn’t you hear me?”
John murmured something appeasing, but my attention was all on the wizened creature who sat before me dressed like a mourner at a funeral. Like a crow, Moran had said.
“We know about the curse,” I said in a low voice. “It’s killed three people so far.”
It was im
possible to tell what she thought of this news. Her face might have been carved from marble.
“James is still alive, but he won’t be for much longer,” I said. “Please. Won’t you give us five minutes?”
Her thin lips clamped into a line. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
She was lying, I knew it. “Listen,” I said in mounting desperation. “I don’t think you did it, but I’ll bet you know who did.”
Something sparked in those cold eyes.
“That puts you in danger. Surely you can see that. We can protect you.”
She reared back in her chair like I was the Grim Reaper come to drag her down to Hell. “Who are you?”
“My name is Harrison Fearing Pell. This is my colleague John Weston. We only want to stop it. Please help us.”
Klara Schmidt’s gnarled hand went to a gold crucifix around her neck. “You said three are dead?” she whispered.
I nodded. “Daniel Cherney. Francis Bates. Cashel O’Sullivan. All friends of James.”
She fell silent for a moment. “I remember them. They would come to the house.” She sniffed. “Very loud, ill-mannered boys. I would never have stood for it if I was the mistress, but Tamsin never had any backbone. And Emmeline . . . .” She trailed off. “What do you want from me?”
“Those boys died horribly. I think I know who’s behind it, but I still don’t know why.” I regarded her steadily. “But you can tell us, can’t you?”
Klara said nothing. I decided to switch tacks. “You were at the house when James killed his father.”
This time she gave a reluctant nod. “The Moran blood runs strong,” she muttered.
“What do you mean by that?” John asked. “Is Emma his mother?”
Klara stared at us. Then she started to laugh. It was a most unpleasant sound. “You know nothing, do you?”
The attendant shifted impatiently in the doorway. “What have you decided, Miss Schmidt?” he asked. “I can’t leave the front desk unattended. Shall I show them out?”
“They may stay.” She waved an imperious hand and he withdrew with a roll of his eyes. Klara pointed a gnarled finger at the bed. “Sit.”
Our rumps hit the coverlet simultaneously. The woman reminded me of Mr. Kaylock, only much worse.
She folded her hands in her lap and regarded us. “Tamsin is his mother, but the boy has as little of her temperament as he does of her looks. He despised his father, but they’re more alike than he cares to admit.”
“I suppose you knew the family very well,” I said.
“For more than sixty years,” she said with a touch of pride. “I raised Declan and his brothers, and then little Emmeline when she came to live at the household.”
“When was that?”
“Shortly after her parents died of smallpox.”
I couldn’t keep the surprise from my voice. Typically, Moran had neglected to mention that fact. “The Bayards are dead?”
Klara sniffed. “Both families are cursed. A month after Tamsin and Declan’s wedding, there was an outbreak in the Bayard household. One of the chambermaids died and the house was quarantined. Half of them were dead within the fortnight.” She paused, a look of pity on her face.
“Emmeline was spared, but it must have been hard on her. Smallpox is no easy death. I saw it in Germany when I was a girl. The ghastly blisters and vomiting. Later Emmeline told me she was trapped in that house for a month, watching the adults around her die one by one.”
“Poor child,” John murmured. “Why weren’t they taken to the smallpox hospital on Blackwell’s Island?”
Klara’s mouth tightened. “Her parents refused. Blackwell’s was for dirty immigrants. Afterwards, when the infection had run its course, Tamsin brought Emmeline to live at her marital home. Declan Moran’s mansion on Fifth Avenue. He ordered me to care for the girl, so I did.”
“You were there that night,” I said. “When James shot his father.”
She turned to stare out the window again. “Yes.”
“Would you tell us what happened?”
“Why do you want to know?” she demanded. “What business is it of yours?”
“James hired us to get to the bottom of this whole mess. And I think the seeds of it were planted that night.”
She looked at me for a long moment, then gave a reluctant nod. “He claimed self-defense at the trial, but I knew better.”
“It was him who did it though?” I asked.
It had crossed my mind that Moran might have taken the blame for someone else.
She gave a dry smile. “Oh, yes. I’d come downstairs to make a cup of tea before bed. It was just after ten o’clock. My room was in the servants’ wing and the shortest way to the kitchen was through the back hall. When I passed the drawing room, I saw Declan sitting in a chair by the fire, reading the newspaper. James came in the door from the foyer. He had a gun in his hand, but he was holding it down by his side.” She mimed gripping a pistol.
“Did he seem agitated?” John asked.
“Not in the least. He was very calm. He pointed the gun at his father and cocked it. Declan started laughing. He told James he didn’t have the guts. He sounded a little drunk, but that was nothing unusual.”
“What happened next?” John asked softly.
Klara Schmidt let out a sudden cackle. “What do you think?” She clapped her hands together. “Bang!”
I jumped an inch off the bed. The woman might look frail, but she could holler like a stevedore.
“James shot him right between the eyes. I saw Declan’s brains splatter the wall.” She snorted. “It was an execution.”
“And he didn’t say anything before he did it?”
“Not a word. He had his reasons and Declan knew what they were.”
“But you didn’t tell the police what you saw?” John asked.
Her mouth tightened a fraction. “No.”
“Why not?” I pressed. “Did James threaten you?”
She waved a hand dismissively. “He didn’t even know I’d seen. I was standing in the dark hall. I never spoke to him about it after.”
“Yet you covered up for him. Why?”
Klara raised her chin. “Declan was a monster,” she said softly. “He terrorized the entire household, but his wife and son most of all. He was a perfectionist, impossible to please.” She shook her head. “I never heard him use his son’s Christian name. Not once. Declan always called him boy. He’d berate him in front of the servants and worse when they were alone. It never stopped, not for a single minute.” Klara Schmidt’s voice went cold. “The man deserved what he got.”
“But not everyone thought so,” John said.
“No, Mr. Weston. There was one person who mourned him.”
“Emma,” I guessed. I’d figure it was either her or Tamsin, and Emma was the one who wore hairpins.
“Yes. Emmeline.” Her lips curled. “After the old goat stopped twitching, James dropped the gun to the carpet and left. Then she came running in. When she saw her lover lying there in a pool of blood, she fell to her knees, weeping over the body, the stupid woman.” Klara shook her head. “I was about to withdraw when Emma looked up and saw me. That girl gave me the most venomous look I’ve ever seen. Then she stood up, dried her eyes, and went to summon the police.” Klara’s hands picked at the blanket in her lap. “Emma knew I’d seen her. That I knew about their affair.”
“She loved him,” I said slowly. It explained a great deal. As much as Emma despised Moran, he was a constant reminder of his father. The spitting image. How confusing that must be! For a woman who was already unbalanced, it must have been maddening to see him day after day.
“Emma was never very bright,” Klara continued. “I suppose she thought he’d leave Tamsin for her, but Declan would never have suffered such a scandal.” She gave a cackle. “He dragged the family through the mud in the end though, didn’t he?”
“Was Tamsin aware of it?”
“Who knows?” She l
ooked at me. “You’ve met his mother, I take it.”
I nodded.
“So you understand how the boy is doubly damned. Tamsin has her own money, lots of it. She and Emma shared the Bayard fortune when the parents died. A different woman would have left a long time ago and taken her child. But Tamsin chose oblivion.”
“Yet James loves her,” I said.
“She is his mother. Compared to Declan, she must seem a saint. At least she showed James affection when her wits were about her.”
We were all quiet for a moment. I wondered if Klara Schmidt had any inkling of what he’d been up to since prison.
“So Emma put you here,” John said.
“She couldn’t wait to get rid of me. As soon as the trial was done, she ordered me to pack my bags. I thought she was going to throw me out on the street, but she said she had found a place for me and that she’d pay for it as long as I kept my mouth shut.” Klara shrugged. “I was in no position to argue with her. I had nowhere else to go. The young master was in jail and Tamsin never did have the spine to stand up to anyone.”
Contempt tinged her voice. “So I accepted Emma’s offer.” She looked around the room. “It’s not so bad here. Emma kept her promise and paid the bill every month. At Christmas, she would even send me a little gift. But she always left it with the attendants. She never came inside.
“I didn’t hear from her for two years. Then one day, she appeared in a towering fury. She said James had been released from prison early for good behavior. I already knew because Mr. Forsythe reads us the newspaper every day. Emma expected him to serve a much longer sentence.” Klara sighed. “She told me she had gone to a medium and contacted Declan in the spirit realm. That he spoke to her.”
I gave a bitter shake of my head. “Miss Schmidt, I’ve dealt with plenty of those so-called mediums. They’re experts at staging séances for financial gain. I’m sure whoever it was took advantage of Miss Bayard.”