Nevermore

by William Hjortsberg

  “We’ve met … previously,” the magician said, striving to keep any trace of emotion out of his voice.

  “Isis is a most remarkable medium.”

  “Mr. Houdini knows that far better than you, Sir Arthur.” Her voice remained musical and subdued. “He once sat for a séance with me.”

  “By Jove! Is that a fact? We were just discussing the possibilities of conducting a session for me.” Sir Arthur beamed. “So, what was your verdict, Harry? Don’t mean to embarrass Mrs. Fletcher by asking such a question in front of her, but I know you never to let etiquette stand in the way of candor.”

  “Fear not. I’ve been embarrassed by Mr. Houdini before, Sir Arthur.” ‘

  “Indeed?”

  Houdini swallowed hard.

  “He interrupted a public séance of mine, but I forgive him.”

  “And why is that?” Sir Arthur cocked an ironic eyebrow.

  “Because I know he respects the truth.” Isis licked her lips, savoring every word. “The naked truth …”

  “Ah-hah. And what is the truth regarding your impressions of Mrs. Fletcher as a medium?”

  “Very … impressive.” Houdini glanced quickly at Isis.

  Sir Arthur bobbed on the soles of his feet like a fencer about to lunge. “No sign of fraud then, what? Would you say she is a candidate for the Scientific American prize?”

  The magician squirmed. “The results were … ah, inconclusive. It would take … another sitting.”

  “Would you categorize her séance as ‘tricks and mumbo jumbo’? To cite a recent newspaper quote.”

  “No,” Houdini blurted. “Of course not.”

  The knight’s eyes blazed triumphantly. “Then here is a medium who is not a complete fraud?”

  “Possibly, yes …”

  “What an admission! Would you be willing to make such a positive statement to the press? You certainly never hesitate to spread the bad news or blacken my reputation.”

  Houdini felt a profound weariness settle on his shoulders. “I never meant to discredit you personally, Sir Arthur. You must know that. I’m a fair man. I keep my eyes open and tell the truth about what I see.”

  “Mr. Runyon is here tonight. You’ve never been shy about talking with the press. Why don’t we go collect him so you might express your true opinion regarding Mrs. Fletcher’s abilities.”

  Isis grinned. “Yes,” she said, “I should think he’d have quite a lot to say on that subject.”

  “Now is not the right time,” Houdini said, a little too quickly. “I … ah, require at least another sitting before making any formal statement.”

  “Join me for the séance Isis is planning. Of course, Mrs. Fletcher, this invitation is subject to your approval.”

  “Personally, I prefer private sessions,” she purred, fixing the magician with her catlike stare. “But, I’ll gladly make an exception in this case.”

  “We leave tomorrow for the western portion of our pilgrimage. Texas … California … Colorado …” Sir Arthur counted the destinations on his fingertips. “Every other wild and woolly place you can think of. Won’t be back until mid-September.”

  Houdini fidgeted. “Our schedules don’t coincide. My summer tour doesn’t end until October tenth.”

  “Well then, Jean and I don’t sail until the ninth of November. That should be ample time, if there’s an opening in Mrs. Fletcher’s calendar?”

  Isis smiled. “My calendar is at your command, gentlemen.”

  “There’s still a problem.” The magician avoided meeting her gaze. “I begin a three-week fall tour almost immediately. October fourteenth. Boston, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo, Detroit, and ending up in Chicago. When I return from the West Coast, I’ll need every available minute just getting things ready.”

  Sir Arthur exchanged a conspiratorial wink with Isis. “Why do I get the feeling Mr. Houdini is avoiding us? Can it be he regrets his pledge to make an honest and unbiased report to the press?”

  “No! I stand by my word of honor!”

  “I suspect our bold magician is afraid of me.” The bewitching feline eyes danced with mockery. “I know too many secrets … universal secrets.”

  “Secrets be damned!” Houdini blurted. “Sir Arthur, as soon as time permits, I pledge to form an impartial committee to investigate her claims. Whatever I observe will be honestly reported.” The magician stared hard at Isis, who gestured teasingly with her black mesh purse. “And now, if Mrs. Fletcher will excuse us, I truly need to have a word with you in private.”

  “I’m sure that means he has something nasty to tell you about me.” Isis plucked a strand of hair from the corner of her mouth. “Nasty and unflattering. Sir Arthur, you know how to reach me. I will schedule time for you in the fall. À bientôt …” She took three steps and turned. “I don’t know which of you this concerns… . The room is so crowded. I’m receiving a clear and terrifying message. Beware of Halloween. Darkness, pain, and death await you on the Night of All Saints.” She turned quickly and hurried away.

  “By God, sir, you are the rudest individual I’ve ever encountered,” Sir Arthur fumed.

  “Better rude than dead.”

  “What can you possibly mean by that intriguing remark?”

  “Just this. I have reason to suspect Isis of being the Poe killer.”

  “Are you mad? I should certainly like to hear any evidence.”

  “I’m not at liberty to reveal it at present. She has good cause to hate me. I disrupted an important public séance of hers. A big fundraiser for the Temple of Isis.”

  Sir Arthur took this in, tugging his earlobe as he thought. “Was this public séance before or after the Esp murders?” he asked at last.

  “Well, after … but, think of my reputation as an enemy of mediums.”

  “There are many mediums. Given what you’ve told me, I see no reason to accept your thesis. Perhaps if you shared the other evidence.”

  Houdini glanced away. “Can’t do that. Not yet. Look. All the killings took place in New York. You leave the city tomorrow. I go out on the road next week. Bess and Dash go with me. I think we’re all safe as long as we’re away.”

  “I’ve given it some thought.” Sir Arthur nodded. “And I quite agree.”

  “Just be careful when you get back. You’ll be in town on Halloween.”

  “Boo!” Sir Arthur barked, laughing gently, while his right hand sought the cool solid weight of the revolver in his jacket pocket.

  22

  IN THE GOOD OLD SUMMERTIME

  AN UNRELENTING SUN BURNED DOWN on the transplanted palms. Eucalyptus scented a hot desert wind with their pungent medicinal smell. Pepper trees added astringent spice. Sir Arthur stared up into an empyrean sky as brilliant and magical as any Tiepolo ceiling. High on a rolling golden hillside, abrupt above the yucca and live oaks, letters tall, as billboards welcomed the visiting knight to HOLLYWOOD-LAND.

  Conan Doyle was having the time of his life in California. Unlike the East Coast, so like home with its lush, verdant springtime and glorious summer, the western half of the United States struck him as exotic as Africa; the perpetual sunshine and fierce azure skies above an unfamiliar terrain. Crossing Arizona, he saw his first large saguaro and felt very far from yew trees and boxwood hedges.

  Their first week in Los Angeles had been extremely busy. Sir Arthur delivered a lecture at the Trinity Auditorium to an enthusiastic reception. He and Jean were the guests of Sid Grauman at his palatial Egyptian Theater on Hollywood Boulevard for a showing of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, starring the protean Lon Chaney. A twenty-five-piece orchestra accompanied the film. The lush music and opulent, gilded make-believe presaged their entire stay among the movie colony.

  Louis B. Mayer treated the Conan Doyles like visiting royalty. He personally escorted them around the M.G.M. back lot, having only recently added his own initial to the studio monogram. They dined with Doug and Mary at “Pick-fair,” and found America’s Sweetheart and her swashbuckling husband to be
a charming couple.

  Visiting Chaplin the next day on the set of A Woman of Paris, they chatted about Pickford and Fairbanks, sharing the intimacy of fellow countrymen in an alien land. Chaplin praised his new partners in United Artists, calling them his only equals in the profession. Even so, he confided, for all their talent, they were little more than Babbitts.

  The red carpet remained out for the Conan Doyles’ entire stay. Hollywood craved their proper British respectability. The previous year had been a time of dreadful scandal for the motion picture industry. Director William Desmond Taylor’s unsolved murder had ruined the careers of Mary Miles Minter and Mabel Normand. The third Fatty Arbuckle trial, although it ended with the comedian’s acquittal, ruined his. Clean-cut Wally Reid, “the King of Paramount,” had died a morphine addict in a padded cell. A visiting knight provided a momentary veneer of honor and dignity. Sir Arthur found himself assiduously courted by former junk dealers and ragmen grown rich merchandising celluloid fantasies of the American dream.

  Manifest evidence of an underlying decadence provided ironic counterpoint to the self-congratulatory adulation. At the intersection of Sunset, Prospect, and Talmadge near the eastern end of Hollywood Boulevard, mission-style bungalows and unpaved streets surrounded the decaying remains of ancient Babylon. The Los Angeles Fire Department had condemned the towering set from D. W. Griffith’s 1916 epic, Intolerance, as a fire hazard, but still it stood, a wall three hundred feet high fronted by giant columns topped with crumbling plaster pachyderms.

  Conan Doyle frequently came here. His favorite walk took him across Mulholland Dam and around Lake Hollywood, a rustic ramble providing astonishing glimpses of wildlife. Sighting deer and coyotes within the city limits of a large metropolis delighted Sir Arthur but, in spite of such sylvan attractions, he was invariably lured back to the bogus Babylon.

  The knight stared up at the immense ramparts, grander in concept than any wonder of the ancient world, yet utterly insubstantial, the lath already showing through a deteriorating plaster surface. Here stood the very soul of America, he thought. Such introspection suited his mood. A certain ironic bitterness had replaced the uneasy dread of knowing one’s family to be stalked by a predator. His peace of mind increased with every mile he traveled from New York. He began taking a perverse pleasure in a dispassionate examination of the strange land he traversed. In Texas, he had stopped carrying his service revolver.

  After their first few days in Hollywood, the children tired of searching for movie stars and instead rode the Red Line trolley with their tutor every afternoon out to Santa Monica and the glories of the beach. Jean had embarked on a round of tennis lessons under the tutelage of Big Bill Tilden’s coach. With one remaining lecture scheduled in Pasadena, Sir Arthur felt free to roam as he pleased, after writing for several hours early each morning.

  The knight had a lot on his mind. Curiously, the further he distanced himself from the macabre Poe business, the more it occupied his thoughts. He had not seen the ghost again since the unpleasant encounter in the capital a month ago. No other murders followed Jim Vickery’s death in June. Sir Arthur felt certain none would occur while Houdini and his family were away from New York for the summer.

  There had been no contact with the magician since their chance meeting at Mrs. Astor’s gala. Twice, after reading Houdini’s continued attacks on spiritualism in the newspapers, Sir Arthur started to write angry letters. Both times, he’d thought better of it. As long as no mention had been made of him personally, there seemed little point in retaliating.

  “If thinking pained me as much as it looks like it does you, I’d give it up.”

  An unexpected voice interrupted Sir Arthur’s musing. The knight turned and saw a sad-faced man staring dolefully from behind the wheel of a sporty yellow two-seater Pierce-Arrow runabout parked at the curb. There was something familiar about the fellow, and although Sir Arthur couldn’t immediately pin a name on him, he answered without hesitation. “If you must know, I was thinking about the magician, Harry Houdini.”

  The stranger nodded, his woeful countenance unchanged. “Small world,” he said. “Houdini’s my godfather.”

  “Are you serious?” Sir Arthur masked his suspicion with a jovial smile.

  “Don’t I look serious?” the stranger deadpanned. “I was born in a trunk, as the saying goes. A vaudeville brat. My parents worked a double on the same bill with Harry and Bess. It was him named me Buster.”

  Of course. Conan Doyle immediately recognized the dour comic actor. He also detected the fruity aroma of alcohol. The man was drunk. The knight decided not to introduce himself. No point in getting embroiled in any inebriated misunderstandings.

  Conan Doyle was unaware that he too had been recognized. Buster Keaton spotted the author from familiarity with his photo in the Sunday rotogravure of the Los Angeles Times. The coincidental meeting struck the comedian as an almost divinely inspired stroke of luck. For weeks, he’d been wrestling with the scenario for a new motion picture, an off-kilter fantasy about a projectionist who walks into the movie he’s showing, stepping through the screen like an electric Alice to join the other characters in a detective plot. The working title was “Sherlock, Jr.”

  Keaton’s company owned the production; he was both director and star of the five-reeler. With the start of principal photography scheduled for next week, he had yet to decide on an ending: a problem of ulcer-inducing proportions. The comic had fled to the old Intolerance set to drink and brood. Conan Doyle arrived like a gift from heaven.

  “What brings a proper English gentleman like yourself down to the corpse of this colossal flop?” Keaton asked.

  Sir Arthur gestured at the framework towering above them. “ ‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings,’ ” he quoted. “ ‘Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’ “

  Keaton’s face remained impassive. The appraising hangdog eyes never missed a trick. This blowhard’s more Watson than Sherlock, he thought. Just what the doctor ordered.

  When Houdini’s troupe embarked by train for their ten-week Western tour, the magician remained behind in New York. He told Bess certain business matters required his immediate attention, promising to rejoin her in two or three days. When she insisted on staying, he dissuaded her, explaining he needed her to manage the company accounts in his absence. “Without Jim Vickery, poor Collins has his hands full. He won’t have time to look after the books.” In the end, Bess did as Harry wished, just like always.

  Houdini had a busy schedule in the city. He spent most of the first morning at the Pine Street offices of Dumphry, Hale, and Simmons, his accounting firm in the financial district. The magician spoke with those who had known Ingrid Esp, asking many of the same questions the police had asked back in April. The secretaries and stenographers cooperated because they knew him to be a famous man and an important client.

  Secretly, they wondered what point there was in going over it all again. He repeatedly inquired about clairvoyants or mediums or whatever. Ingrid had been a quiet Norwegian girl who kept pretty much to herself. She lived with her mother and didn’t have any beaux, as far as anyone could recall. One thing sure, she wasn’t the sort to waste her hard-earned paycheck on fortune-tellers.

  After a quick lunch on the fly, grabbing a hot dog and a dope from a pushcart vendor, Houdini set about tracking down “Dapper Dave” Conrad, first stopping at the Palace, where the house manager obliged him by searching through his April booking sheets for the name and address of the hoofer’s agent.

  Arnold Small’s office consisted of a single dusty room above a pawnshop on Forty-fifth Street. The agent was a lean, nervous man with springy red hair thick as an Airedale’s. His natural arrogance transformed instantly into obsequious flattery upon recognizing the eminent magician. Small assumed his client was up for a job and Houdini did nothing to correct that misapprehension.

  “Call it luck, call it fate,” Small gushed, “Dave Conrad is at this very moment auditioning just around the corner for
the chorus in the ‘Vanities.’ “

  Despite Houdini’s protests, Arnold Small insisted on walking him to the Earl Carroll Theater. They entered by the stage door and waited in the wings, watching a succession of energetic tap-dancing young men buck-and-wing and shuffle-off-to-Buffalo. Dapper Dave’s turn came at last and he was half a minute into his triple-time step when an unseen voice in the darkened house called, “Next!”

  The disgruntled hoofer stalked offstage scowling. He brightened into a smile immediately upon spotting his agent. By the time introductions were made, the three men were out in the street. Small proved harder to shake than a summer cold, but Houdini managed to give him a polite brush-off, saying he needed to speak with the client alone. Never one to queer a deal, the agent motioned them off, standing on the corner of Fiftieth and Seventh, waving like someone left behind on the station platform after the train pulls out.

  The magician and the hoofer walked across Times Square to the Automat on the west side of Broadway between Forty-sixth and Forty-seventh Streets. This was the first of Horn & Hardart’s popular novelty cafeterias. Since it opened a decade before, a dozen others were flourishing around town. They entered the gleaming white-tiled room beneath the two story stained-glass window designed by Nicola D’Ascenzo. A poor man’s palace with grinning plaster gargoyles and elaborate frondescent moldings, the white marble-topped tables hosted an early afternoon crowd of out-of-work vaudevillians nursing mugs of cold Java and leafing through the New York Star or the daily Variety. Many of these old-timers recognized Houdini and stood to shake his hand as he headed for the chrome-plated coffee urn.

  “Look,” the magician said, dropping two nickels in the slot to fill a pair of cups with the steaming brew spouting from dolphin-shaped spigots, “let me level with you. This isn’t about a job. I want to ask you some questions about Violette Speers.”

  “That bitch!” sneered Dapper Dave. “What d’you give a damn about her for?”