In a Gilded Cage

by Rhys Bowen

  “Uh—I came to meet Emily,” I stammered. “She told me she has her lunch break at one. I hope I haven’t missed her.”

  “No, she should be back any second now. She was sent out on a delivery.”

  “You must be Ned,” I said, although I knew quite well who he was. “Emily’s told me about you.”

  “You’re a friend of hers then?” he asked, eyeing me with interest. “From Vassar?”

  “No such luck. I met her through mutual friends. She’s a grand girl, isn’t she?”

  “Oh yes,” he said. “A grand girl. Very smart.”

  “She’s very proud of you. She tells me you’ve a promising career ahead of you.”

  He made a face and I couldn’t tell whether it was one of embarrassment or annoyance. “Someday, maybe. Right now I’m only an apprentice.” He glanced over his shoulder and lowered his voice. “And the old man doesn’t let me do much more than make up liniments for old men’s rheumatics. But I’m studying in my spare time and I hope to make something of myself someday.”

  “Ned—I don’t pay you to gossip,” came the sharp voice from the back room. “If the young lady hasn’t come to purchase something then I suggest she wait outside.”

  “You see what it’s like,” Ned muttered to me. “Never a moment to myself. Ah, here’s Emily now.”

  Emily burst in through the front door, her cheeks glowing from having hurried. “Sorry I’m late,” she gasped, “But I decided to stop in on Mrs. Hartmann, since she lives just across the street from the delivery.”

  “I don’t pay you to dillydally and gossip,” Mr. McPherson snapped. “Next time you want to go visiting, do it during your lunch break.”

  “Oh, but Mr. McPherson, she’s your own valued employee. I’d have thought you’d want an update on her condition,” Emily said.

  Mr. McPherson merely grunted.

  “Well, how is she?” Ned asked.

  “A little better,” Emily said. “Starting to sit up and take solid food again.”

  “Well, that’s good news. I must go and see her myself,” Ned said. “In my own time, of course,” he added, glancing back at his boss, then touched Emily’s arm. “And you have a visitor.”

  Her face lit up. “Molly. You’re better. How splendid.”

  “Your ministrations obviously did the trick,” I said. “I woke this morning feeling my old self again. So I’m anxious to get to work.”

  “Work? What work?” Ned asked.

  “Molly is a real live detective,” Emily said. “Have you two been introduced?”

  “Not exactly,” I said. “Being a detective, I deduced that this young man might be Ned but he doesn’t know my name.”

  “Oh, then let me introduce you now. Molly Murphy, this is Ned Tate.”

  We shook hands. His hand was slim and elegant, with well-manicured fingernails. Obviously a young man who thought a lot of himself, I decided.

  “Are you lunching with any of your other friends?” Ned asked. “Or is Molly not part of your rich socialite set?”

  Emily laughed. “My rich socialite set? Just because some of my Vassar friends have married well doesn’t mean that I’m part of any rich set.”

  “I only thought that your bosom pal Fanny whatever-her-name-is lived nearby and that you saw her frequently.”

  “Fanny does live in the Dakota,” Emily said, “but I hardly see her frequently anymore. Our lives are so different now. She has all the time in the world and I have none. Speaking of which, my precious half hour is rapidly disappearing. Come, Molly, we must away. If you’ll excuse us, Ned.”

  “I’ll leave you ladies to your luncheon then,” he said, with a polite bow. “I have to get back to work,” he added loudly for Mr. McPherson’s benefit.

  “Too right you do,” Mr. McPherson said, looking up from his table. “Does Mrs. Hartmann require any more of the stomach powders?”

  “No, she said she didn’t need anything,” Emily said. “She said she was on the mend.”

  “Well, let’s hope she’ll be back at work soon. You young slackers don’t know the meaning of work.”

  I followed Emily out of the shop.

  “So what did you think of Ned?” Emily asked. Her eyes were shining.

  “He is very handsome,” I said.

  “Isn’t he just? And so smart too. It was my lucky day when I answered that advertisement in McPherson’s window.”

  I couldn’t help wondering what it was about Emily that had caught Ned’s eye. Maybe I had misjudged him and he was more impressed with her intellect than her looks. He had certainly given me a once-over all right.

  “I usually just go to the café across the street,” Emily said. “They have a ten-cent daily special that is sometimes quite good. And I only have one gas ring in my room so it’s hard to cook at home.”

  “Fine with me,” I said. “As long as it’s quiet enough to talk.”

  We dodged the traffic and went inside a pleasant little tea room called the Black Cat. I could see why Emily came here. The other occupants were women and the tables had white cloths on them—overall an air of gentility. The waitress greeted Emily and two plates of the special were brought. It was some kind of meat pie and cabbage, mainly hot and filling but with little flavor. Maybe I had become used to good meals with Sid and Gus.

  After we had satisfied our immediate hunger I took out my little notebook. “So I’m anxious to get started on your case,” I said. “Let us begin with your parents’ full names.”

  “I believe they were William and Mary,” she said. “I think that’s what Aunt Lydia told me.”

  “And where in China were you born?”

  “I have no idea. In the interior, that’s all I know.”

  “What about your birth certificate? Doesn’t that give all those details?”

  “I have no birth certificate,” she said. “That’s the problem. As I understand it, a cholera epidemic was raging when I was born. My parents died when I was only a few days old and a devoted servant whisked me away to safety. I was deposited at the nearest mission and eventually brought back to America.”

  “What a romantic story,” I said. “Tragic, of course, but the fact that you survived against all odds is amazing.”

  She nodded. “I know, isn’t it?”

  “So where did your parents come from?”

  “Massachusetts, I believe. As I said, Aunt Lydia, who could have told me these things, died when I was too young to ask the right questions, and Uncle Horace showed no interest in me whatever.”

  “Your parents were your aunt’s relatives, then?”

  “I believe my mother and Aunt Lydia were second cousins, or second cousins once removed. Not close relatives, at any rate.”

  “And what was your aunt’s maiden name?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t even know that.”

  “That should be easy enough to discover. She died when you were five. There will be a death certificate.”

  “Of course.”

  “So I could go to her birthplace and check for other relatives.”

  “I understood that there were none. They took me in because they were my only surviving kin. At least that’s what Uncle Horace said once.” She saw my look and gave me a sympathetic smile. “I’m sorry. I knew this was not going to be easy.”

  “I love a good challenge,” I said. “And it can’t be that hard. After all, how many missionaries could there be in China at one time? Maybe twenty or thirty at the most. I know,” I perked up as a bright idea hit me, “we could start with that couple who came into your shop. You said they didn’t know your parents, but you also mentioned that they had been in China for twenty years. I presume you are older than twenty—”

  “Yes, I’m twenty-five.”

  “So it’s quite possible that they didn’t arrive until after your parents had died.”

  “That’s quite possible,” Emily bucked up at this.

  “At any rate, they could give us details of the various denomination
s of missionaries who were working in China twenty years ago, then all I’d have to do is contact their headquarters.”

  “Molly, you’re a genius.” Emily beamed at me. “I’m so glad I came to you. But as to your fees . . .”

  I hesitated. Part of me wanted to say that I’d work for nothing, but the other, more practical part reminded me that I had to eat and that this case would be occupying my time as well as costing me money in transportation and stamps. “How about we start with twenty dollars,” I said, “and if I find that I need to travel or take considerably more time, then we can decide how far you wish to proceed.”

  “Oh, that sounds wonderful,” Emily said. “But twenty dollars—I’m sure you usually charge much more.”

  “We working women have to stick together.” I smiled at her. “So what information do you have on the couple who came into your shop?”

  “It was about three weeks ago. They were called Hinchley and they were only passing through New York. They were staying at a hotel.”

  “Do you know which one?”

  “We filled out a prescription for them, so it will be on file at the shop.”

  “Then we can look it up after lunch.”

  “It will have to be surreptitiously,” Emily said. “Mr. McPherson is sure to make a fuss if he sees me nosing through his prescription files.”

  “Then I had better not accompany you. He was clearly annoyed by my presence the first time,” I said. “Drop me a note with the name of the hotel and then I can go to work.”

  “Of course. I’ll send it out in the afternoon post, with Old McPherson’s stamp on it too.” She laughed. “Dear me, that doesn’t sound like the child of dead missionaries, does it? But he really doesn’t have to be so unpleasant.”

  “Is he equally nasty to Ned?”

  “Marginally less so, I’d say. But Ned sticks it out because he is learning a lot. Whatever his temperament, Mr. McPherson certainly knows his stuff. He is a whiz at compounding.”

  “Compounding?”

  “Mixing the various remedies to exactly the right proportions. It’s a delicate business, as you can well imagine. Some of our cures contain deadly elements that can kill in larger doses. A druggist has to be extremely precise.”

  The waitress came to take our plates and I insisted on paying the bill.

  “But I’m the one who is hiring you,” Emily protested.

  “You’ve already hired me and now we’re on my time.” I laughed. “So when should we arrange to meet again? Do you have free time at the weekend? I should have something to report by then.”

  “Usually I have alternate Saturday afternoons free,” Emily said. “But Mrs. Hartmann, the other counter assistant, who has been with the firm for years, is out sick with some kind of grippe, so I will be doing her Saturday duty. But Sunday afternoon I’ll be free.”

  “What about Ned? Doesn’t he have priority over your free time?”

  “He goes to see his mother on Sundays. She lives in Brooklyn and is not in the best of health. He’s a most devoted son. He gives her a generous portion of his earnings.”

  “So will you be required to have her in your home when you marry?” I asked.

  She blushed again. “He hasn’t yet officially proposed to me. He wants to establish himself in his career first, so I know we may have a long wait. Oh, but he is worth it, Molly. I know he’s bound for great things.”

  “And in the meantime,” I said, “what about you? I understand from Gus that you were one of the most gifted students in your class. Can you also not further your education in some way like Ned?”

  “There is little point if Mr. McPherson won’t even let me into the dispensatory room. One cannot learn pharmacy skills by reading and observing. Ned provides me with books to read and notes from his lectures, so I am quite well informed, but there it must probably rest.”

  “That’s a shame,” I said.

  “Life is unfair. I’ve come to accept it,” she said.

  With that we parted company.

  Seven

  Emily’s note arrived for me in the mail the next morning. The hotel was on Broadway, not too far from McPherson’s. I took the El again, noting as the train made its way north that spring had indeed finally come to New York City. Windows on the second floor, beside the track, were open, and bedding was laid out to air. Some windows even sported window boxes with a bright splash of daffodils or tulips. Women below were beating rugs, scrubbing steps. It was spring cleaning time. Which reminded me that I should be doing a little of the same myself. I put that thought aside. I had done enough housekeeping during my formative years to cure me of any desire for extra tasks. My mother had died when I was fourteen and I had taken care of three untidy brothers and an equally untidy, ungrateful father. I resolved to ask Sid about her Italian window washer.

  The train stopped at Seventy-third and I alighted. The hotel was a block to the north on Broadway. As I reached the corner, I paused to admire the imposing new building called the Ansonia, now almost complete. In fact, I stood like the little country bumpkin that I still was, staring up as its amazing seventeen floors rose up into the sky, all richly decorated in carved stone and tipped with turrets like a French chateau. I understood that it was to be an apartment hotel, a temporary home for the very well-to-do. If all the hotels around here were of that class, then my missionary couple were not the humble Christian folk I had taken them for.

  Of course, when I located the Park View hotel, not a stone’s throw from the glorious Ansonia building, I had to take back my uncharitable thoughts. It was a severely simple establishment with a plain brick façade and only a sign over the front door advertising its presence. And “Park View” was definitely a misnomer. It was, at most, five stories high, and could only have a glimpse of the park from its roof.

  I opened the door and found myself in a dreary lounge with a couple of faded armchairs, a brass spittoon, and a tired aspidistra. The woman who appeared at the sound of my feet was the sort of harridan who seems to flourish as a landlady.

  “Yes?” she said, with little warmth in her voice. “Can I help you?”

  “You had a couple to stay here a few weeks ago. A Mr. and Mrs. Hinchley. They were missionaries from China.”

  Her face softened just a little. “Ah, yes. Lovely, refined Christian people they were, too. They held a prayer service after dinner one night.”

  “I need to contact them rather urgently,” I said. “I wondered if they gave you their home address.”

  “And what would this be about, miss?” she asked.

  “I’m here on behalf of a dear friend,” I said. “Her parents were missionaries in China at the same time as the Hinchleys. She has questions she needs to ask them.”

  “Fellow missionaries from China, were they?” I had clearly won her over. “I’d really like to help you, miss, but I’m afraid I can’t. When they left this establishment they were going to take the train clear across the country, prior to sailing for China again out of Vancouver.”

  “Oh, I see.”

  “I’m sorry, miss. And sorry for your friend, too.”

  “Would you happen to know which of the missionary societies they were with?”

  “I’m afraid not. In this line of work you don’t get a lot of time for idle chatter. They were honest, sober folks and they paid their bill. That’s usually good enough for me.”

  I bade her good day and came out of the hotel feeling distinctly annoyed. Back to square one. I had hoped to show up on Emily’s doorstep on Sunday with her whole case solved. She had been so impressed with my profession that I wanted to live up to her expectations. I had to admit now that I was being unrealistic. My experience as a detective has always been one step forward and two back, mostly paths that lead nowhere, and failure always a possibility.

  So what was my next line of inquiry? Find out the names of all the missionary societies and get in touch with them. I wasn’t sure how to do this, having never been inside a Protestant church in
my life. Would their pastors know of such things? At least it would be a place to start. I walked down Broadway looking for a church. It had always struck me that there was a church on every street corner in New York, but of course when I wanted one, I walked several blocks without seeing a spire.

  I was becoming increasingly irritable when I passed a bookshop and paused to look in its window. I have always had a love of books. In fact if I ever came into money, the first thing I’d buy would be a grand library for myself. I gazed with envy at the rich leather covers and wondered if I dared go inside and treat myself. Then I decided that maybe those serving as missionaries in China might sometimes write their memoirs. At least it would be a start. I went inside, savoring that wonderful dusty, leathery smell that lingers around good books.

  “May I help you, miss?” an elderly gentleman asked, appearing from behind a counter at the back of the store.

  “I was wondering about missionaries in China,” I said. “Do you know if any accounts have been written of their lives there?”

  “Of course there is the new book about the massacre,” he said. “We received the first copies only a few weeks ago and it’s been flying off the shelves ever since.”

  “Massacre?”

  “The Boxer Rebellion. You didn’t hear about it? Shocking it was. They were all killed. Every one of them. Men, women, children. The whole city was abuzz about it. It can’t have been much more than two years ago.”

  “I’m afraid I was in Ireland two years ago and the only shocking events I heard about were the battles in the Boer War in South Africa where our own boys were fighting,” I said.

  “Well, it was a terrible tragedy and it’s all documented here in this little book.” He went to a shelf and brought down a slim volume with a red paper cover. “I only hope the brutal events described therein won’t be too much for your delicate sensibilities.”