The Plague of Thieves Affair

by Marcia Muller

  Had he fetched his stash of money and fled the city for parts unknown? This thought gave vent to another, belated one and led Quincannon once more to Caleb Lansing’s rooms. The strongbox was no longer secreted under the loose floorboard; it lay open and empty on the dining table. Damnation! Corby, of course. The none too bright Lansing must have let the location of the hiding place slip at some point in their dealings. And now the fugitive was in possession not only of his own loot but Lansing’s as well—enough cash to take him a long way from San Francisco.

  On the slim chance that Corby might still be holed up in the city, Quincannon put out the word among his informants and information sellers—men such as Luther James, Breezy Ned, and Ezra Bluefield. Bluefield, the former owner of a Barbary Coast deadfall called the Scarlet Lady, was a particularly reliable source of information; he owed Quincannon two debts of gratitude, one for having saved his life when a rival saloon owner attempted to puncture his hide with a bullet, the other for assisting him in his aim to become a respectable citizen by selling the deadfall and using the proceeds to purchase an Uptown Tenderloin saloon and restaurant, the Redemption, where he now held sway. But he still had his finger on the pulse of the Coast, and knew or could often find out the whereabouts of wanted lawbreakers.

  No such luck in Corby’s case. When no word came from Bluefield or any of his other informants by Saturday morning, Quincannon, whose patience was already worn celluloid thin, decided the time had come to take another criminal bull by the horns, wrestle him a bit, and see what could be found out from him.

  Xavier Jones, for one. Cyrus Drinkwater, for another.

  Jones was his first choice, so he set out mid-morning for the West Star Brewing Company. Yesterday’s rain had gone and the sky was mostly clear, the February sunlight pale, the wind modulated into a cool breeze. A day made for much more pleasant activities than chasing after thieves, a fact which sharpened his determination.

  West Star Brewing was situated on Jackson Street near the site of the old Adam Schuppert Brewery, California’s first such enterprise established during the 1849 Gold Rush. The building was smaller than Golden State’s and, according to James Willard, produced an inferior brand of lager. But Quincannon’s visit there proved to be wasted effort; Saturday, he was told, was not one of Xavier Jones’s workdays.

  He had obtained the brewmaster’s residence, on Sacramento Street near Lafayette Park, from the city directory. But a trolley car ride there did him no good. Jones was not at home, or at least not answering his bell, and the large and well-populated building’s security was such that surreptitious entry for a search of Jones’s apartment would have been difficult.

  Quincannon settled instead for contacting a handful of Jones’s neighbors. One confided that the brewmaster’s favorite idle-hour pastime was playing cribbage and that he frequented an establishment on Polk Street called the Elite Cardroom and Pool Emporium. He found his way there, only to learn that the place’s elegant name was a misnomer—it was just another run-of-the-mill neighborhood gaming parlor—and that Jones was neither present nor had been there that day.

  Frustration had once again begun to weigh heavily on Quincannon by this time. Thwarted no matter where he looked for Jones, as he’d been thwarted in his hunt for Elias Corby. Would Cyrus Drinkwater be easier to buttonhole? Well, he would soon find out. He’d had enough of chasing around the city on the rail lines; he hired a cab to drive him to Rincon Hill.

  Drinkwater was a known habitué of the Cocktail Route, the nightly bacchanal in which wealthy businessmen of all types met with friends in one of more than twenty first-class saloons between the Reception on Sutter and Dunne Brothers at Eddy and Market, to discuss business, politics, and scandal involving others and themselves, all the while consuming copious amounts of liquor and food—a ritual that often lasted all night. Men such as Drinkwater seldom arrived home before dawn or emerged again before noon on weekdays, usually much later on weekends.

  The thought of rousing the old reprobate from his bed was a pleasing one, but he had no more luck at the lavish home than anywhere else on this day’s blasted runaround. The uniformed maid who answered the door informed him that Mr. Drinkwater was not in residence. Nor did she know, or refused to tell if she did, where he could be found.

  Drinkwater maintained an office in a building on Turk Street near the Civic Center. He wasn’t there, either. Canvassing the array of saloons and restaurants where he might have gone to cure a hangover or fill his belly was an undertaking that held no appeal for Quincannon. He decided instead to direct his hired cab to the headquarters of the Gray Brothers Quarry Company on Sansome at Green. Drinkwater was known to make periodic rounds of his various enterprises, and his not-so-silent partnership in the Grays’ operations was second only to his ownership of West Star Brewing as a major source of income.

  The quarry site was the largest in the city. George and Harry Gray, that pair of equally conscienceless rogues, had been in the quarrying business for nearly thirty years. They had established their Telegraph Hill quarry and rock crusher some four years before, an ideal location for their purposes; the unstable cliff was composed of the sandstone geologists called greywacke mixed with laminated shale, a hard serpentine perfect for their manufacture of the artificial stone used for paving city sidewalks and curbs. They had blown up huge chunks of the rock face, reputedly using ninety kegs of dynamite in the original detonation—heedless of the homes perched on the hilltop nearby and the citizens who lived in them. In January of ’94, one explosion caused a rockslide that crushed a duplex on Vallejo Street, but despite the fact that the owner received a $3,000 judgment against the Grays, it did nothing to bring about so much as a temporary stoppage of the careless dynamiting. It wasn’t until a shoemaker’s house at the corner of Union Street and Calhoun Terrace was blown off its foundation the following year that a judge issued a permanent injunction forbidding any more blasting.

  But such injunctions meant nothing to such men as the Grays and Cyrus Drinkwater. The brothers opened another quarry on Douglass Street in Noe Valley, meanwhile making use of their powerful political connections and bribes to various city officials to keep that equally dangerous and damaging enterprise going. And to eventually resume their systematic destruction of Telegraph Hill in spite of the judge’s “permanent” injunction.

  From the look of the ruptured yellow-brown face of the hill now, the Grays’ publicly stated intention to level it entirely and to then open a brick factory on the site seemed a bleak likelihood. Tons of rock already had been crushed and transported to construction sites by teams of men and horse- and mule-drawn wagons, and even though it was Saturday, what appeared to be a full crew was at work in the quarry when Quincannon arrived. The chilly, now sunless afternoon was filled with the ring of singlejack hammers breaking rock, the thunderous grinding clatter of chunks being loaded into and pulverized by the crusher, the rattle of heavily laden dray wagons departing and empty ones arriving, the profane voices of the laborers.

  The quarry noise was matched by the passing clatter and rumble of railcars on the city’s unique minirailroad, the Belt Line, that ran along the northeastern waterfront, servicing businesses and transporting offloaded freight from ships anchored at the busy piers. The line had begun operations in 1890 and ran for 3.2 miles from the foot of Lombard Street to the Ferry House; rail traffic south of that point was controlled by Southern Pacific. Its small roundhouse was located nearby, at the corner of Sansome and the Embarcadero. If blasting were being done at the quarry today, which at present it wasn’t, the din in the area would have been deafening.

  The Gray Brothers offices were housed in a plain board-and-batten building farther up Sansome, at a safe distance from the ravaged hillside. Two conveyances were parked in the wagon yard alongside, one a large four-wheeled, four-passenger, two-horse Whitechapel carriage, its liveried driver lounging on the high seat. The carriage was painted a dark maroon color with matching dusters and folding hood, the moldings decorat
ed with a wide cream-colored stripe. It was deliberately distinctive among such equipage, often sighted on the city streets; as soon as Quincannon saw it and the waiting driver, a hulking individual named Bruno who doubled as Cyrus Drinkwater’s bodyguard, he knew he’d finally found the elusive businessman.

  A tired and grumpy-looking clerk—the Gray brothers, in addition to their other shortcomings, demanded long hours from their employees and paid low wages—informed Quincannon that Mr. Drinkwater had been in conference with Mr. Harry Gray for the past half hour. How long the conference would last he didn’t know. Quincannon said he would wait.

  His patience had worn thin and his mood was dark when the two conspirators finally emerged from the rear of the building. He had never had the unpleasure of meeting either, but their photographs had often appeared in the newspapers. They were completely different in size and appearance: Harry Gray, a large, graying, clean-shaven man with a substantial corporation over which he wore an immense gold watch chain; and Drinkwater, an inch above six feet, almost cadaverously thin, his bony face adorned with reddish Dundreary whiskers—the flowing sideburns, nearly a foot long in his case, named after those worn by the lead character in the popular British play Our American Cousin. Evidently their conference had been a successful one, no doubt involving money, rascality, or both; they continued to share a chuckle as they shook hands and said their good-byes.

  Gray went back inside his office and Drinkwater turned toward the door. He carried a maroon-colored umbrella so tightly furled that it also served him as a walking stick. As he passed the desk, the overworked clerk said deferentially, “The gentleman there is waiting to see you, Mr. Drinkwater. He wouldn’t give his name, sir.”

  Drinkwater’s pale eyes widened slightly when his gaze rested on Quincannon, who had risen. Then he donned a falsely sunny smile. “I know his name,” he said, advancing. “Though we’ve never had the pleasure of making each other’s acquaintance. How do you do, Mr. Quincannon?”

  “Well enough, considering.” He accepted Drinkwater’s extended hand, found it dry and leathery, and released it.

  “Good, good. How did you know I was here, may I ask?”

  “I didn’t. I came on the chance.”

  “Ah. Well, sir. What is it you want of me?”

  “A few minutes of your time. Private conversation on a matter of mutual interest.”

  The sunny smile dipped a little, sardonically. “At your service. Shall we go outside?”

  They went outside and over into the side yard. The quarry sounds, dominated by the thudding grind of the rock crusher, made Drinkwater raise his voice when he said, “Rather noisy here. Tell me, do you have equipage or did you come by public transportation?”

  “Hansom.”

  “Ah. Will you accept a ride to wherever your next destination might be? We can speak freely in the comfort of my carriage.”

  Quincannon saw no reason to refuse. “I will.”

  The Whitechapel’s seat cushions were covered in tufted velvet of the same dark maroon as its exterior, and cloud soft compared to those in the hansom cabs. Quincannon had to admit that the carriage was a pleasure to sit in. And to ride in; extra strong springs kept the jarring and swaying as the wheels clattered over cobblestones to a minimum.

  Once they were under way, Drinkwater asked him where he was bound and he said Market at Second Street would do. His growlingly empty stomach dictated the destination; Hoolihan’s Saloon, his favorite haunt since his Secret Service days, was on Second and its free lunch second to none in his estimation.

  “Now then,” Drinkwater said. “What is it you wish to discuss with me, Mr. Quincannon?”

  “Elias Corby, to begin with.”

  “Corby? I don’t believe I know the man.”

  “And Caleb Lansing.”

  Drinkwater pretended to consider the name. “Lansing, Lansing. Isn’t he the poor soul who committed suicide at the Golden State brewery? I seem to recall reading about that in yesterday newspapers.”

  “He didn’t commit suicide, he was murdered.”

  “Murdered, you say? By whom?”

  “His partner in the killing of Golden State’s brewmaster, Otto Ackermann, and the theft of Ackermann’s steam beer formula. Elias Corby.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “I’m an expert detective, as you’re well aware.”

  “Yes, I’ve heard of you and your accomplishments. But this man Corby. Just who is he and why come to me about him?”

  “He is or was Golden State’s bookkeeper, a fact of which I believe you’re also well aware.”

  “But I’m not. I told you, I’ve never heard of the man.”

  “Xavier Jones had dealings with him. Lansing, too.”

  “Jones? You mean my brewmaster at West Star? Are you suggesting he was involved in what happened at Golden State?”

  “Directly involved. He’s the one who hired Corby and Lansing to steal the formula.”

  The carriage slowed for a turn onto Market Street. Drinkwater tugged at one of his long Dundreary sideburns, sat frowning out the window for a few seconds before shifting his gaze, narrow-eyed now, back to Quincannon. “Hogwash. Why, Xavier Jones is a solid citizen, above reproach. He would never collude in such a crime.”

  “He would if he was ordered to.”

  “Who would issue such an order?”

  “His employer, of course.”

  Drinkwater stiffened perceptibly. The muscles in his bony face worked up an expression of indignation that was patently false. He said, making an obvious effort to retain his composure, “Are you accusing me of wanton theft and suborning murder?”

  “Theft, if nothing else.”

  “That is an outrageous falsehood. Outrageous, I say.”

  “James Willard doesn’t think so. Neither do I.”

  “I don’t care what Willard believes. Or what you believe, Quincannon. If you dare to make such a ridiculous accusation to the authorities or anywhere in public, I will have my lawyers sue you for slander, defamation, and grievous mental anguish.”

  “I won’t. Not until I can prove it.”

  “You’ll never prove it. Never.”

  “Won’t I? I wouldn’t wager against it if I were you.”

  Drinkwater glared at him for several seconds, his eyes glinting with the sharpness of knife points. Abruptly, then, he reached up to slide open the roof panel that allowed him to communicate with the driver. “Bruno, stop the carriage immediately. Immediately, I say!”

  Bruno obeyed. The Whitechapel swerved to the curbing, came to a jolting halt. Drinkwater then pointed the ferruled tip of his umbrella at Quincannon as he would have pointed a pistol or long gun. “Get out,” he said angrily. “I’ll have no more of your company.”

  “With pleasure, sir. My thanks for the ride and the illuminating conversation.”

  “Get out!”

  Quincannon took his time stepping down. With the door still open, he grinned in at the cadaverous rogue. “You’ll be hearing from me again.”

  “If I do, you’ll hear from my lawyers.”

  Drinkwater reached over to yank the door closed, then shouted up to Bruno to proceed. The carriage clattered off into the Market Street traffic.

  Quincannon stood on the sidewalk looking after it, feeling well pleased with himself. He’d stirred the pot for fair and with the desired results. Satisfied himself beyond the slightest doubt that Cyrus Drinkwater was behind the theft of Otto Ackermann’s steam beer recipe. And served notice that he was not about to get away unscathed.

  13

  SABINA

  Saturday evening’s attendance at Reticules Through the Ages was somewhat smaller than Friday’s, despite the better weather. Still the ebb and flow of well-dressed ladies and gentlemen was substantial enough to please both Marcel Carreaux and Andrew Rayburn. Sabina, dressed in her second-best gown, a silk taffeta of pale gold, saw several familiar faces, including a few who had been present at the exhibit’s gala opening. The c
orpulent art connoisseur from Sacramento, Thaddeus Bakker, was one; the man with the pince-nez who had seemed offended by the French Brie was another.

  The one person she didn’t see was Charles the Third.

  She’d heard nothing from or about him after her unsatisfactory meeting with Roland Fairchild and his bitch (yes, bitch) of a wife. The small hope that he might attempt to contact her at the agency, or that word of him might come from one of her informers, had kept her there all afternoon. That hope was even smaller tonight.

  But her main concern now that she was at the gallery again was the allegedly planned theft of the Marie Antoinette handbag. Was Charles the Third’s suspicion valid or not? There seemed to be no way a thief, no matter how cleverly professional, could manage to steal the bag in front of the watchful eyes of herself, Carreaux, Rayburn, his two clerks, and dozens of guests. The reticules were prominently arranged on tables set behind standards of red velvet rope, the display tables well lighted; no one could get close enough to them to snatch the Marie Antoinette and hope to get away with it. To even step over the ropes, much less touch any of the bags, was forbidden and cause for immediate expulsion.

  Still, no matter how addlepated Charles the Third might be, the information he had gathered and imparted in the past invariably proved to be factual. And so she was extra vigilant tonight, carefully scrutinizing each new arrival, continually circulating among the guests with one eye always on the exhibition.

  “Ah, Mrs. Carpenter. A pleasure to see you again.”

  She turned to find Thaddeus Bakker at her elbow. His bow was rather clumsy, a product of his bulging midsection. “Good evening, Mr. Bakker. Back for another view of the treasures?”