“Of course.” Lincoln gripped the steering wheel harder as the car fishtailed on a patch of ice. He regained control, eyes peeled. “Been to the Seelbach dozens of times with Uncle Frank.”
“What exactly for?”
Lincoln shrugged. “Important stuff, you know. But mostly I’d wait in the car. He’d run in for about a half hour, then come back out.” Lincoln bounded over a pothole, and it sounded as if something had come off the right tire. Wolfgang rose up off his seat and his head nearly hit the ceiling. He braced his hands on the dashboard. Lincoln finally decreased his speed when the lights of downtown Louisville loomed just over the horizon. The traffic grew thicker as they neared the famous hotel. Lincoln rolled down his window and a rush of freezing air filled the car. He honked the horn at three women standing alongside Fourth Street. “Hey, dolls!” Wolfgang hunkered down in his seat as the ladies waved.
Big Fifteen leaned enthusiastically forward from the backseat. “Never been here before.”
Streetlamps were aglow. Snow flurries danced wildly through the air. The clip-clop of a horse carriage echoed off the walls of the surrounding buildings and storefronts. The road turned to cobblestone as they closed in, and the ride suddenly became much bumpier over the patchwork of stone and ice. Lincoln pointed to an old car parked with one wheel on the curb. “Got us a petting party inside that flivver.” Lincoln honked and whooped out the window. “Four of ’em with kissers locked.” Wolfgang glanced away. Lincoln focused on the road again, where the hotel loomed. “George Remus spent a lot of time at the Seelbach.”
“Who’s he?” Big Fifteen asked.
Wolfgang rolled his eyes. “Oh, Lord, here we go.”
Lincoln’s tone was serious. “Cincinnati mobster. Made a fortune running whiskey. That writer Fitzpatrick? He based the main character from The Great Catspee on Remus.”
“Fitzgerald,” said Wolfgang.
“What?”
“And it’s ‘Gatsby,’ not ‘Catspee,’ you baboon.”
Lincoln slowed the car and coasted past a brand-new Oldsmobile with a sharp-dressed couple inside. He tapped the steering wheel with his thumbs, looking for a place to park. The street was teeming with people standing, walking, talking, most everyone wearing extravagant suits and pretty dresses. Wolfgang’s modest clerical robes would hardly fit in, but they weren’t coming to socialize. If their three Waverly escapees were here, they’d quickly snatch them and be on their way. Wolfgang planted his palms against the dash again as Lincoln cut off a Desoto and dove into a parking spot vacated by a delivery truck.
“I’ll wait in the car,” Big Fifteen said.
“You sure?” Wolfgang asked.
Big Fifteen nodded and then pulled out the cigar Uncle Frank had given him. “Got a light, though?”
Lincoln tossed him the keys. “Uncle Frank keeps a Banjo in the glove department. A flip and it’s lit, Fifteen. Don’t burn the car down.”
Wolfgang and Lincoln hurried across the busy street. Lincoln’s face lit up as he looked toward the top of the hotel, which stood ten stories tall and dwarfed the buildings around it. “McVain said there’s a small alcove off the Oakroom where Capone plays blackjack and poker when he’s in town. He had a big mirror brought down from Chicago so he could watch his back.”
Wolfgang found himself stepping over the cracks in the sidewalk, limping noticeably. “And check out his opponents’ cards, I bet.” He folded his arms against the cold wind and moved beside a parked horse-drawn carriage. Long plumes of steam jetted from the horse’s nose as it fidgeted in the freezing temperatures. They passed a brick building with a poster attached to the front door—KEEP YOUR BEDROOM WINDOWS OPEN: PREVENT TUBERCULOSIS.
On the corner of Fourth and Walnut, the European-style hotel designed with the French Renaissance in mind was brightly lit and alive with people. It was the first skyscraper in Louisville, one of the grandest hotels in the country, and Wolfgang had heard rumors of women fainting the day it opened. Portions of the façade reminded Wolfgang of the grandeur of Waverly Hills. The Seelbach’s exterior was made of stone and dark brick pieced together with charm and elegance. Charles Dickens had been ejected from the hotel for showing poor manners. Presidents Taft and Wilson had stayed in the hotel, apparently without suffering Dickens’s fate. Already in its short existence, history seeped from every door and window, and Wolfgang felt a rush of blood to his head as he stepped under the canopied entrance and moved up the stairs. The merry atmosphere was contagious. A glass of wine would have felt appropriate for the moment. He remembered Rose and the nights they’d celebrated much as these people did now, carefree and tipsy from alcohol, despite Prohibition.
Wolfgang was first inside the lobby. Behind him, Lincoln paused to take it all in. The boy was awestruck. European marble everywhere, beautiful carpets, exquisitely carved wood, bronze railings, friezes and frescoes on the walls, brass chandeliers and wall sconces, and a skylight above made of hundreds of panels of glass.
Men in suits stood shoulder to shoulder smoking cigars or cigarettes, drinking and laughing, their faces flushed and happy. The women wore their hair bobbed—just like Rose’s, Wolfgang couldn’t help notice. They wore makeup and long, cylindrical silhouette dresses, Basque dresses, or the popular one-hour dress that allowed more freedom for dancing. They wore silk, cotton, linen, and wool with colors ranging from bright greens, reds, and blues to pastels. Assertive colors. Aggressive colors. Free-spirited, smart, and sexy. Women out on dates without chaperones.
Wolfgang squeezed his eyes shut. How times had changed. How dearly he missed Rose. Then, amid the chattering in the lobby, Wolfgang heard music. “Oh, my Lord,” he said. “Beethoven.”
Wolfgang fought his way through the clouds of cigar smoke to a larger crowd in the back corner, listening to a musical trio of piano, flute, and violin. Lincoln tapped Wolfgang’s shoulder. “I think we found them.”
Wolfgang wormed his way through the crowd, close enough to smell the alcohol and perfume and see the intoxication in their reddened eyes. But they all seemed fascinated with the musicians who had set up shop around the piano on the right side of the ornate stairs—a black man on the flute, a violinist with a chalkboard on his chest, and a piano player who dazzled despite missing three fingers on his left hand.
Their music soared high off the lobby’s tall ceiling. On the floor next to Josef’s feet sat an upside-down bowler hat, the same one McVain had worn the day he arrived at Waverly. It wasn’t large enough to hold the bills and coins that had already been dropped at their feet. Where had they gotten the nice suits? How long had they planned this? Wolfgang wondered.
Despite the fact that they needed to urgently remove these three from the hotel, ensuring that no one here got sick and that Barker was none the wiser, it was a beautiful scene to watch. If only Susannah had been there. Maybe one night they’d sneak out and have a harmless night on the town, away from the sanatorium, away from the patients, away from the hillside, and away from the death. There was a world moving on outside the woods in which they roamed daily, and he imagined Susannah’s hand in his grip again as he slithered through the crowd. And then he forced the thought from his mind. What was he thinking? And then he remembered McVain’s words to him the other night: “You can’t have it both ways…”
Wolfgang stopped abruptly. The row of men in front of him wouldn’t budge. “Get lost,” said a tall man with a pencil neck, evidently not seeing Wolfgang’s cassock—or just not caring.
A woman in an orange silhouette dress pointed toward the piano. “Darling, that man only has two fingers on his left hand.”
“He’s fantastic.”
They deserved every bit of this recognition, thought Wolfgang, but he had to get them out all the same. He thought of Mr. Weaver when a fat man with heavy jowls shouted, “Play some jazz! Jazz!”
“Ragtime!” a woman yelled. Ragtime? Jazz? Wolfgang’s trio didn’t pl
ay ragtime or jazz. But during a short pause, McVain, Josef, and Rufus huddled together. The crowd hushed.
McVain looked excited and utterly exhausted at the same time. His skin was so pale. Sweat beaded along his red hairline. Suddenly the three broke from their huddle and readied their instruments. Wolfgang couldn’t help but smile with pride, although it soon melted away with a horrific thought: what these crowds didn’t know could kill them.
Josef started playing a jazzy sound and McVain chimed in. Rufus joined them a few seconds later, to the delight of the crowd, many of whom began dancing in the packed lobby. Wolfgang felt his legs moving to the beat. When he turned around he saw that Lincoln was having a ball—he’d even found a girl to dance with him.
And then a tall, slender man with jet-black hair and a finely trimmed mustache barged his way into the crowd with an exquisitely dressed woman on his arm. Wolfgang hated him before he even opened his mouth. “Those musicians!” he shouted. Everyone looked at him. “They’re diseased!” The crowd hushed. “They all have TB! They escaped from Waverly Hills!”
Rufus dropped to his knees and stuffed money into the hat. Josef grabbed his coat. McVain quickly stood from the piano. They looked around for an escape route. Wolfgang and Lincoln used the moment of stunned silence to skitter past the crowd and join their musicians.
The man was still yelling arrogantly: “They threatened me on the trolley tonight. They let the nigger sit with the decent folks!” The crowd quickly backed away from the trio, gasping. A woman fainted in a red heap to the floor.
The front doors were now blocked, some people still coming in to see the excitement, others now fleeing. Around them, the crowd’s fear soon turned to anger. “Up the stairs,” Wolfgang said. Lincoln was the first, leading them up the curved stairs. Wolfgang hurried past McVain, who smiled. “Hey, Father.”
“Come on.” Wolfgang grabbed him by the elbow and urged him along.
The crowd cursed and shouted below them. Wolfgang was afraid McVain would collapse, but adrenaline must have spurred him along. He matched Wolfgang step for hobbled step. Wolfgang yelled to McVain over the chaos. “I’m glad you’re having so much fun. You’ll probably be dead in the morning.”
McVain laughed. “Lincoln…to the Oakroom.”
From ahead, Lincoln waved them on. “This way!” He led them directly into the Oakroom, past elegant diners and stunned waiters carrying plates of lobster and pasta and steak. Wolfgang tripped over someone’s foot, stumbling into a bullish bodyguard, who then lost his balance and toppled a table of shrimp. The mob was gaining. While the guard was down on the floor, struggling to unwrap himself from a stained tablecloth, McVain moved toward a door in the back of the room. He knocked—three quick taps, a hesitation, followed by one more tap. He closed his eyes, as if willing it open, and then it did. The five of them rushed inside a small, cramped room swimming with cigar smoke. A spring-loaded door slammed behind them, locking them inside just before the guard grabbed for Josef’s shirt. Pistols cocked. Five gun barrels materialized through the haze and were pointed their way, one for each of them.
A man’s clipped Chicago accent penetrated the smoke. “Don’t move a fuckin’ muscle.”
Wolfgang stared across a poker table at five men in white button-downs and suspenders, sitting around a card table drinking bourbon and playing blackjack—or at least that’s what they had been doing before this unfortunate arrival. Now they pointed pistols. One of the men held an automatic weapon so big it required two hands. His nose had been broken so many times it no longer resembled any nose Wolfgang had ever seen before. “Butch let you in?”
“Who’s Butch?” asked Wolfgang.
“The man supposedly guarding the door,” the broken-nosed man said.
McVain discreetly touched Wolfgang’s arm. “Yes, Butch let us in.”
“Now, why would he do that?” The man who sat in the middle, bald with coal for eyes, yanked the wet stub of a cigar from his mouth and eyed Wolfgang. “Never killed a priest before.”
Maybe this was why I wanted the priesthood, Wolfgang thought. For the exact moment in life when he’d stumble upon a table of gangsters and his life would be spared because of his clothing. “I hope you won’t start now,” he managed to say.
A knock sounded outside the door, the same knock McVain had made. One of the gangsters started to get up, but the middle man said, “Leave him out there.”
The mob outside the door was growing louder. They began to pound on the walls. Lincoln stood beside Wolfgang, grinning like a fool. Wolfgang watched him from the corner of his eye.
“Wipe that smile off your face, you fuckin’ cake-eater.” The middle man chewed on his cigar. He locked eyes with Josef. “What’s with the violin, paleface?”
“He’s a musician,” Wolfgang said. “We’re all musicians.”
“I didn’t ask you, Father.” He pointed his gun at Josef. “Can’t you talk?”
Josef wrote on his chalkboard. NO.
“He’s got—” Lincoln started.
“Got what?”
“He’s a mute, sir,” Wolfgang said.
“This some kind of traveling circus?” The middle man gave Rufus a good once-over. Then McVain next. “This clown’s missing fingers. What instrument do you play, carrot top?”
McVain was sweating profusely. He straightened himself against the back wall. “Piano.”
Middle man laughed. On his front tooth rested a speck of brown from his cigar. “How’d you lose them fingers?”
“The war.” McVain buffed the nails of his five right fingers against his lapel. “Not that it’s any of your goddamn business.”
Only Wolfgang’s stifled groan broke the frozen silence.
Then, from outside—sirens.
“Police,” one of the men said.
“Fuckin’ bulls,” said another. They heard screaming outside the doors.
Something clanked and a whoosh of air sucked smoke from the room. The middle man was gone in a flash. A wood-paneled door opened behind the table, and he quickly disappeared down a dark staircase. One by one his men, each of them pointing their weapons at them one last time, followed him down the secret passageway until they were left alone in the smoky room staring at their reflection in the mirrored wall.
Lincoln nudged Wolfgang. “Told you.”
McVain labored around the table toward the secret passage. “Those men didn’t recognize me.”
“I assume that’s a good thing?” asked Wolfgang.
“Understatement of the year,” said McVain.
“How did you know the knock?”
“Educated guess,” said McVain. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
McVain pushed the secret doorway open. The door behind them nearly rattled off its hinges. “You guys gonna wait around for them?”
They funneled in behind McVain. Lincoln could barely contain his excitement. Rufus patted Wolfgang on the back and winked. “You saved us, Father.” Wolfgang didn’t feel like a hero. His outfit had only bought them time until the police arrived, which Wolfgang thought ironic. Most likely the police had been called to detain his trio of TB-infected musicians, not the hidden gangsters. Wolfgang waited for Josef to pass and then took up the rear as they all headed into the secret passage. The scent of bourbon and cigars led them down the dark staircase and into an even darker kitchen, where McVain doubled over into a coughing fit. Rufus helped McVain along.
Lincoln grabbed a biscuit from a food tray. “They went that way.” He pointed to another set of downward stairs. At the foot of the stairs was a basement full of wooden crates, old furniture, broken sinks, brooms and mops, slop buckets, and bottles of bourbon. “Real bootleggers,” Lincoln cried out to no one in particular. “This is the best.” His voice echoed off the cold, curved walls. He led them into a drainage tunnel that smelled of dirty water, mildew, and cigar smoke. Moistur
e had collected on the ceiling and dripped to the floor from one central spot. Lincoln inhaled the dank, coppery air. “This is probably how they make the bourbon.” He put a finger to his lips. Up ahead, the boots of the final gangster climbed up an iron ladder attached to the grimy walls of the tunnel. The Waverly group waited for a few minutes and then hurried to catch up, the manhole cover in the street still tossed aside. A faint light shone into the tunnel and snow flurries spit downward. Wolfgang was the last up the ladder, and just as he poked his head up into the fresh, cool air of some unknown street, he heard the squealing of two cars. Just like that, the men from the smoky room were gone.
McVain staggered out into the middle of the street. The lights from an oncoming car grew brighter. The car squealed and slid to a stop on the icy street and honked at them. McVain collapsed in the middle of the road.
***
They all crammed into Uncle Frank’s Cadillac, and Lincoln drove straight to the sanatorium with McVain barely breathing in the backseat, his head resting on Big Fifteen’s lap. “Don’t die on us…don’t die,” Big Fifteen said repeatedly, stroking McVain’s red hair. As soon as Lincoln skidded to a halt on the packed ice and gravel before the entrance, Big Fifteen pulled McVain from the car, cradled him in his arms, and ran into the sanatorium while Wolfgang and Lincoln held the doors.
“Take him to the operating room,” Wolfgang said. “First floor!”
“Should I get Dr. Barker?” asked Lincoln, his face near panic, his night of fun a distant memory.
Wolfgang hesitated. “Yes. Go get him.” Dr. Barker was a better surgeon, and they couldn’t risk McVain’s life to conceal the night’s events. “Go. Hurry.” Lincoln sprinted out across the road while Wolfgang led the way to the operating room.
Dr. Barker was ready within ten minutes. He didn’t ask any questions, just ordered a quick x-ray and got down to business. He said nothing of their pulling him from his slumber in the middle of the night. There was a man’s life to be saved, or at least prolonged. Dr. Barker first tried the pneumothorax procedure, inserting a needle in between the ribs that encaged McVain’s left lung. He attempted to push air through the needle and into the pleural cavity that surrounded the left lung, which in McVain’s case was the one with the largest lesions. His right lung was diseased as well, but according to the x-rays they’d taken since his arrival, the small lesion on the right lung had not grown. By introducing the air they would be able to collapse the left lung and allow it to rest.
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