Mrs. Edwards’s savage compassion was connected to an inexorable chain of events. He understood the Midnight Band’s ideals now. The campaign against the brothels and the campaign against what Reverend Weems called “the issue of sin” were one and the same. The insurance bait-and-switch was the dark side of the same impulse—one that paid the bills, too. There was nothing sweeter than making money doing good.
Insight didn’t equal acceptance, though. His blood rebelled against the thought. He had always been in an uproar, in vague and general opposition, but he now had something to push against, and in his rage he felt at home in his skin.
He knew Martin’s joke now, but not who had splattered his brains on the black-and-tan’s wall. Or why Harry Granger had ended up with clam shells stuffed in his mouth. In their own ways, both men had threatened this trade; but how, precisely?
“Even crazy people have their reasons. But this? How do they justify themselves?”
“You don’t get it? They think they’re serving God Almighty.”
In the morning, on their way to Faye’s, Max and Belle groped toward neutral ground. Just under the surface, her resentment still throbbed, but it was muted now. She had been too harsh. Look at his concern for Faye and Leon. Look at what he was writing for his wretched paper. Then she thought of Gretta’s watch, the one on the fine gold chain, and how it hung—as if she didn’t know—so suggestively between her fat breasts. Spite poured from some hidden gland, and Belle shook inside.
Max drove the thought of Belle’s other man from his mind, but he couldn’t quite wipe the after-image away. Suddenly his heart would clench, and he would see Belle, her chemise off one shoulder, her face buried in an anonymous, matted chest. Then he was grinding his teeth, as if he could chew up his torment and spit it out for good.
She managed a stiff politeness as her impulse to sting retreated. He became all manners too, killing the desire to fire off one last crack and a simultaneous urge to seize her hand. In the jostling Fourteenth Street crowd, their shoulders bumped, but they each pretended they hadn’t touched. Then a peddler spilled a whole case of braces in the middle of the sidewalk and, without thinking, he put his hand on her back. She didn’t brush it off.
Faye’s stairs ascended at an impossible angle; by the time they reached the sixth floor, they were both out of breath. In a loose robe, Joanne appeared at the door. “Oh, you just missed them. They went to catch the nine-eighteen.”
“What’re you talking about? I thought she was leaving tomorrow,” Max said. His Faye-trained nerves told him what was coming next.
“I don’t know. Danny was all hot and bothered to get out. He said Keith was going to dock them if they got to New Haven ten minutes late. I think he’s kinda nervous, if you ask me.”
Belle cut her off. “Where’s Leon?”
“With that lady down the block.”
“Damn it!” He couldn’t contain himself “Typical. She does whatever the hell she pleases.”
“When did she leave him?” Belle persisted.
“Oh, I think it was last night,” Joanne yawned. “Yeah. Late last night after Danny came home.”
“You see that! Right after she swore—”
Belle grabbed his sleeve to stop him. “Did she leave any instructions?”
“Beats me. Sorry, I’m all washed out.”
“It’s practically next door,” Belle said, leading him down the stairs.
“I’m ready to blow my stack,” he muttered.
“Don’t. There’s no time for that,” she admonished him. “Let’s just see what’s what.”
A junk wagon rattled to a stop near Mrs. Darling’s doorway. The nag pulling it wasn’t fit for a fly cab. A cloudy cataract skinned the mare’s right eye, and her ribs formed a visible cage under her dull brown coat. In a felt hat that threw a shadow over his forehead, the junkard’s face was only partially visible. Bits and pieces clawed at Max’s memory. The heavy forearms. The flat profile. The cascading mustache.
“Rrrraaaagggs! Bo-ones!” the man called out.
Could it be? Out of the thousands of rag-and-bone men … and this one unmasked, disguised only in his own skin.
An oilcloth package pressed to her chest, Marianne Granger emerged from Mrs. Darling’s tenement. Her face lacked all expression, but her yellow eyes darted up and down the street. Hunching her shoulders, she scurried across the sidewalk. Behind her, at a decorous distance, came Mrs. Edwards in mourning crepe, a long and deep basket swaying from one arm. In the other she cradled a muslin bundle tied with rough cord.
Max grabbed Belle’s wrist and drew her to the doorway next door. Together they watched the two women mount the wagon and arrange themselves on the plank seat. Without uttering a word, Mrs. Edwards turned and lifted the tarp a few inches, allowing Marianne to deposit the parcel she’d carried from the tenement beneath it. Then Mrs. Edwards deposited her bundle. Max heard a soft thump. He could not say the word, not even inside his own skull. He must not imagine, he must not speculate … despite himself, he groaned.
The entire procedure took less than a minute.
“Would you go see Mrs. Darling?” he whispered, his heart scuttling up his throat.
“Is this … ?” She grabbed his arm, her fingernails raking his skin.
The ancient cry rang out again, a singsong ditty of dissolution and decay. “Raaaaags! Bo-ones!!!!”
When the reins snapped, the junk wagon jerked forward. It wasn’t hard for Max to keep up with it.
chapter thirty-eight
He wiped his mind clean of terror. He knew what he feared, but he dreaded acknowledging it in words, even to himself. Simply to have fathomed the scheme made him feel tainted, queasy.
The city’s traffic was his main ally now. The junk wagon bumped along until it hit West Houston, where it ran into dueling omnibuses. The junkard managed to trot his nag around the paralyzed vehicles and then down Grand Street a bit, before turning right and slamming smack into Canal Street’s anarchy. A painted sunrise graced the side of a van stranded in a muddy trench. Blocking the carts and carriages seeking Lafayette Street’s relief, the tilting conveyance threatened to tip over. A teamster in a plug hat blasted his whistle. Hitting a more piercing note, another driver joined the ear-splitting serenade. Packed tight, two opposing geldings stamped and snorted, rattling their traces.
Max caught up without much effort. His shoes pinched at the heel, though, and he could already feel the back of his foot blistering. Terror was a distant sensation now, dammed up by sweet amnesia. He could go on as long as the word Leon, two simple syllables, stayed silent in his mind’s ear.
Standing half a block from the junker, he watched the wagon inch through the Canal Street melee. When it finally squeaked its way past the last vehicle, Max broke into a run. At 17 White Street the driver made a second stop. Marianne hopped off the plank seat, disappeared into a doorway, and then returned within minutes, a burlap sack in her arms. Mrs. Edwards held the tarp up, the African shoved her rough package underneath, and the nag lurched forward again.
Max’s eye raced down his list of church property. There it was in his own crabbed scrawl. Holy Trinity owned two buildings on White Street, including number 17. His best bet was to keep his distance from the rambling wagon, take notes, and see where the route ended. They would have to unload. He could see this was a swift, practiced routine, but beyond that his imagination failed. He wanted it to fail.
Mrs. Darling wouldn’t dare … Belle would see to her. There was nothing to worry about. So why did his own thoughts conspire against him? Why was it so hard to breathe? Faye had done it to him again. Would she still be a stone around his neck when he hit seventy? He could see her, toothless and hell-bent, careening over a cliff in her wheelchair, dragging him behind her.
Threading his way through the back streets, the junkard picked up speed. At times Max fell an entire block behind. Fearing he would lose sight of the wagon, he poured it on, bumping his way through the peddlers, spielers, ho
rseradish grinders, and reeling sailors. Soon he was panting like a dog. Too many cigars. Too many barstools. Was it his clothes or his sweat that smelled like Fitzgerald and Ives? Damned if he wasn’t raising a blood blister on his other foot now.
The pick-up wagon made another stop at 23 Desbrosses Street. Holy Trinity property too. With a sense of satisfaction, Max checked it off his inventory. Every fresh address, every new transaction, solidified his hypothesis. He would overwhelm Parnell with deal after deal, location after location. Baby farms honeycombed the corporation’s holdings. Every time she picked up the rent, Mrs. Edwards had business opportunities galore.
Le-on. Two wretched puffs of air. The dam collapsed, dread pouring through the breach. He felt light-headed. His heart rattled in his chest. Pretending was his only defense, pretending he had not heard the word he’d whispered against his own will. He had to go cold so he could go on. Become an instrument, a barometer, a fine lens, an acid-etched plate.
This time, both women entered the tenement’s dark mouth. In the brilliant sunlight, the driver pulled out a crumpled package of Sweet Caporals and lit up. A truck hauling beer barrels bounced over the humped stones. Observing meaningless action soothed his raw nerves. A bread delivery wagon followed hard by. A flatbed piled high with fresh lumber rolled to the corner. Above, the narrow slash of sky vibrated warm and blue. Max leaned against a nearby loading dock and caught his breath.
From underneath his seat the driver produced a pail and filled it at a nearby hydrant. Holding it up to the nag with one hand, he patted her head while she lapped away. Gnats swirled around her head. Her matted tail quivered, and she let go a few pats of horseshit.
This was no shadow world. It was broad daylight. The junk wagon was just one among thousands, delivering, picking up goods, moving them through the city’s indifferent streets. Its cargo was like any other. There would be paperwork, payments at every point along the route. The milkman, the cheese man, the iceman did the same. Who knew if there weren’t receipts? Every business needed to keep careful accounts. Perhaps there was no shadow world. Maybe the Midnight Band’s trade puttered along right out in the open.
When the women emerged, Marianne was clutching a package wrapped in a checkered tablecloth. Mrs. Edwards held another coarse bundle under her arm, her basket swinging gently at her elbow. Who had gone under her smothering cloth? A pang of fear shot through him. No, not fear exactly. Intense discomfort. Not Leon, certainly not him. Faye had kept up her payments; Mrs. Darling had no incentive. Anyway, the baby farmer seemed to be in awe of his sister’s renown.
His chest tightened. Doggedly, he tramped further east.
In the netherworld between Wall Street and the docks, sailors’ boardinghouses came into view. Grog shops were doing brisk business on every corner. Max stalked past a crazy quilt of chandlers, clam houses, and tumbledown wooden structures that had been thrown up before the Civil War. Business bubbled and squeaked in every nook and cranny. Barter was the blood of the city, commerce its very soul. He was swept along, a molecule in the turbulent stream. Making his way up Front Street, he came upon a block of peak-roofed Georgian buildings.
Wagons full of imported goods rumbled by. Silks from Genoa, wines from Bordeaux, watch movements from Geneva, wools from Manchester. Dealers, sailors, brokers, and longshoremen crowded the street. Sweet’s Restaurant occupied 2 Schermerhorn. Next to it stood a naval supply house, its soot-covered window obscuring the goods inside. Nearby, an old rope merchant, clay pipe in hand, sat on a barrel outside his door. Two seagulls fought bitterly over some tasty offal. The air stank of rotting fish.
Finally, at 8 Schermerhorn the wagon stopped. He didn’t bother to consult his records. He knew who held title to the soot-streaked warehouse.
The women descended, but only Marianne Granger went inside. Taking her leave, Mrs. Edwards strolled toward a nearby excursion boat. Its thin black stacks spewing smoke, the side-wheeler Thomas Starling rocked at its slip. For a moment he considered following her, but the warehouse drew him back. Its mute walls attracted him, and repelled him too. Didn’t he know enough? Did he have to witness the final transaction? As if to answer his own question, he crept closer.
The name came to him now. This was not only the junkard from a couple of weeks before. It was Joseph MacNamara, Stephenson’s former rag. The junkard whistled through his teeth, the nag hesitated, and then the wagon wobbled toward the side of the building. He wasn’t wearing the rubber mask now, but it had to be the same man.
The chipped gilt lettering on 8 Schermerhorn’s window read DR. SLURRY, DISPENSARY. Still puffing on his clay pipe, the rope merchant remained on his barrel.
Like a trained dog, Max began doing reporter’s tricks. Muffling his fears, he put the soothing routine in motion. “You know those ladies who went in there?”
The man’s face looked like stained leather. “Nope.”
“Ever seen them before?”
Meditating, he took a long pull on his pipe. “Nope.”
“Any women like them?”
The old shopkeeper shrugged.
“Is the dispensary still in business?”
“Don’t know.”
Had he heard right? “The doctor’s out of business?”
“Maybe yes, maybe no.”
“Thanks a ton.” A cart rattled past, a fresh flounder splatting onto the stones. “Can I ask you a question? Does anybody ever pick up the fish?”
“Nope.”
He didn’t bother to ask about the smell. He was already adjusting to the stench himself. At first he tapped on the dispensary’s front door, and when there was no response he rapped hard with his knuckles. He tapped the dusty windows, too, but still no one appeared. Wiping some grime off the plate glass window, he peered inside. No desks. No chairs. No examining tables. No instrument cases or sinks. Just a long, narrow space. Finally, he grabbed the doorknob and twisted it, but to no avail. He headed around to the back of the building.
At the rear dock, the wagon stood empty. MacNamara had made his delivery.
Max had no choice. He was a seeing machine. He had to name the thing in the oilcloth, even as he prayed it had no name at all.
Of course, the rear loading door was bolted too. Standing on the deserted dock, he craned his neck to look up. A second-floor window was open a crack. An exterior stairway hung from the wall at a sickening angle; the first four steps had rotted away. From directly underneath the structure, he could see the rusty bolts that had once held them to the brick.
Rolled on their sides, a few sprung barrels lay empty at the dock’s lip. Positioning one under the staircase, he used it for a stepstool. Stretching, he lifted his weight up to the first intact slat above his head. Under his weight, the worm-eaten strip of wood screeched. Bits of grit and stone showered down on his head. His heart in his throat, Max waited for the entire stairway to peel from its moorings, but the creaking construction held. Satisfied, he started climbing.
When the window wouldn’t open farther, he gripped it tight and yanked as hard as he could. Grudgingly, the frame slid up a few notches. Now he bent his body low, scraped through the narrow opening and onto the floor. When he landed, his ankle bent sideways, pain searing through it. Groping in the pure blackness, he touched a cold, hard object. Lighting a match, he illuminated the few feet around him. Immense anchor chains lay rolled, curled and piled about him.
He rubbed his ankle, tested it for a step or two. It ached but seemed sound. Lighting another match, he crept deeper into the darkness. The low, beamed ceiling pressed down on him. Torn sails, pulleys, rope, pots and pans littered the floor. The airless loft smelled of dust and dead mice. Max stopped and considered whether to creep back to the window, but another adventure on the rotting staircase didn’t appeal to him. In the dense silence he turned slowly, trying to sense the slightest flaw in the darkness. At the far end of the loft, faint stripes of light leaked through the planks, forming a rough square.
Holding his breath, he made his way t
oward the glowing outline, taking care not to trip over the ship supplies. He stubbed his toe once, and he stumbled over a large metal object, but he kept his balance. As he approached the trapdoor, he paused several times to listen, but the stillness remained unbroken. The loudest noise was his own breathing, amplified by the utter silence around him. Bending down, he grasped the trap’s frame, lifting it ever so slightly. Lit by gaslight, a sliver of floor below became visible.
He stopped and waited a long moment, his blood pounding in his ears, but when the quiet persisted he shifted the trap a few more inches, revealing a narrow aisle between crude shelving. He made out a wooden box jumbled with hardware and a peeling wall streaked with dirt. The floor below seemed barely seven feet away. He dragged the trap away, this time exposing the entire opening. Crouching, he bounced on his toes a few times. His ankle didn’t feel too bad. Keeping his knees bent, he took the leap.
He hit the floor harder than he expected, the jolt turning his ankle a second time. Before he could catch himself, he muttered “Sonofabitch!”
Biting his lip, he pressed himself against the shelves, waiting to be discovered. Frozen, he let one minute pass, two, three. Where were they? Why didn’t they come after him? When he finally felt safe, he tiptoed down the aisle, examining the goods: screws, knives, tar, lamp wax, and inventions he couldn’t quite identify. The first floor was another storehouse for the shipping trade, though the blanket of filth suggested that the equipment had long since been abandoned.
In the front room, a dispensary, covered with dust, stood empty. A torn curtain hung limp next to an enamel table. Arrayed on a towel gray with silt lay instruments of the trade. Ancient, stained linens. A reflector on a long handle. A selection of knives and bandages.
The Midnight Band of Mercy Page 37