“Ah, here’s Mr. Edison now with Mr. Morgan’s man.” Mary’s tone betrayed her unease at what she was seeing.
Mrs. Embry corrected her. “I’m afraid you’re mistaken. That man’s a detective, a former Pinkerton, very thorough I understand, and quite discreet. Many people of means have used his services. So has Mr. Edison on numerous occasions.”
Mary had assumed he was solely Morgan’s employee, because that was the only capacity in which she had encountered him. She realized that was another oversight on her part. A good detective never assumes anything. She turned back to the window and saw that the Bowler Hat was all alone. He put on his hat, the black bowler, and adjusted it, tilting it slightly to the side. He casually looked around, turning full-on toward the window facing Mary, then got back in the carriage. She was overcome with a strong sense of familiarity. Her brain flashed on the image of the dead Frenchman she had seen hanging in the train when she was a little girl, but she didn’t know why.
Edison entered in an unusually cheery mood. He pumped her hand.
“Good to see you, Miss Handley.”
“Good to see you, too, sir.”
Edison noticed that Mary seemed disconcerted.
“Don’t just stand there. Come in.”
He motioned to her, and she followed him into his office. Mary tried to regain her composure, but the image of the Frenchman kept haunting her. Edison grabbed a pen off his desk.
“Will five thousand be enough?” he asked.
“Five thousand?”
The images in Mary’s brain were piling up. This time she saw the Bowler Hat exiting the Frenchman’s compartment on the train.
“For the journal,” Edison explained. “Mrs. Embry said…Are you all right, Miss Handley?”
Mary now understood the reason for her royal treatment. “I’m afraid there’s a misunderstanding. I didn’t bring the Goodrich journal. I don’t have it, sir.”
Edison’s good humor instantly soured. Regardless, she had a mission to complete. She took a periodical out of her pocketbook and placed it on Edison’s desk.
“What I brought is a medical journal, one with a revealing study on cocaine. I know we’ve had our differences, Mr. Edison, but—”
“You interrupted my day with this hogwash!”
Disgusted, he tossed the journal at her feet. Mary looked down at the journal and shook her head. She was only trying to help Edison. Surely he couldn’t have known cocaine was harmful, or he wouldn’t have endorsed it. And most assuredly he wouldn’t have been consuming it. But as these thoughts were rumbling around in her head, she was jolted by another memory. Her brain put her back on the train again. Outside of the Frenchman’s compartment, the Bowler Hat turned toward her. She could see his face, and this time she recognized it. She cried out.
“It was you! You had him killed!”
“I did what? To whom? I say, Miss Handley, you really do seem ill.”
“Louis Godard, a French inventor, murdered on a train bound for New York.”
“Godard? Yes, twelve, thirteen years ago, but the poor man hung himself. Financial woes.”
“Findings his wife strongly refuted. You see, he was about to patent a new invention that would provide untold riches, a device that played recorded sound, over a year before your phonograph.”
Mary stared right at him. Instead of cracking, instead of denying, Edison laughed.
“My dear Miss Handley, I fear gossip from Eadweard Muybridge and Nikola Tesla has warped your pretty little brain.”
His condescension was annoying, but Mary held the trump card.
“I was there. I saw your hired assassin, the man whom you were just with, leaving Mr. Godard’s compartment with his invention in hand.”
She studied Edison for a reaction. She couldn’t read him. There was a reason he was Thomas Edison.
“What you think you might have seen as a child is irrelevant and most definitely a waste of my time.”
“I was twelve, and I know what I saw.”
“And a very mature twelve, too, no doubt,” he said mockingly. “It appears you may have caught whatever awful disease plagues your friend Miss Stoddard. Before it consumes you, you should consult that fellow who’s all the rage, Dr. Freud. He’s making great progress in the area of female hysteria.”
“Thank you for the suggestion. Maybe he can also explain why certain men crave glory, even if it’s unearned.”
“Miss Handley, you’ve had some modest success. Don’t let it go to your head. Now, I don’t personally care what you do, but if you make these unfounded and defamatory claims public, I guarantee you will become a laughingstock.”
“Not if I locate Mr. Goodrich’s journal. He was very thorough, I’m told. I’m sure there’s a dated entry noting when Mr. Godard’s device arrived, possibly along with a check made out to the man you hired.”
“You truly are incorrigible. Good-bye, Miss Handley.”
Edison hadn’t so much as flinched. Mary picked up the medical journal. If he had been anyone else, she would have just left. But this was Thomas Edison, her hero, and she felt betrayed.
“You’ve achieved mythical status: a man who built an empire on pure intellect and foresight. How disappointing to find you’re just a common thug, like your robber-baron cronies.”
“I assure you, Miss Handley, there’s nothing common about me.”
“Incompetent then.” Mary was flying without a net, based on a spur-of-the-moment hunch. “How else can one explain why you hired that nincompoop Wallenski to kill me?”
Mary got her flinch. Edison was momentarily silent. He knew only too well that hiring Wallenski was his mistake, and he hated making mistakes.
“You know, maybe I underestimated you. What’s the saying? Oh, right,” he said as he stared directly at her. “There’s always next time.”
She had squeezed out the truth, and it was sending shivers down her spine. Mary began to wish she had left earlier, much earlier, while still in a state of blissful ignorance.
Cutting up lettuce, tomatoes, and vegetables for a salad gave Mary time to analyze her situation. She only had herself to blame. Goading Edison into revealing himself was good detective work, but it did little for her. She couldn’t arrest him, and it was a bad trade-off. When the case ended, she had felt free of threat. She no longer did.
Her terrified reaction to an unexpected knock at her door confirmed that. She immediately stopped cutting and listened, her heart pounding away. There was a second knock. Knife in hand, she slowly opened the kitchen cabinet and removed Charles’s pistol from the roasting pan, then made her way to the door, grateful he had given it to her. She had even practiced with it a few times. Fully armed, she was ready.
“Who is it?”
“It’s me, Mary. Charles.”
“Charles! I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”
Thrilled, she threw the gun on her bed and opened the door. Charles looked at her, and his eyes wandered to the knife.
“Father warned me I might return a gelding.”
Mary glanced at the knife, laughed, and then hastily put it with the salad fixings. Charles came in and closed the door. Mary had practiced what she might say if she ever saw him again, but now that he was here, she couldn’t find the words. Neither could he, but he eventually managed to say, “I’m very proud of you, Mary.”
“Charles, I’ve been so worried.”
“I did it, Mary. The morphine’s out of me.”
“That’s wonderful! I knew you could do it.” Her impulse was to hug him, but their recent history made her tentative. She wound up fidgeting and feeling awkward.
“Father and I leave for Atlanta tomorrow.”
Mary was confused. In her mind, one piece of news didn’t follow the other.
“You’re coming back, though? I mean, there’s no reason why we can’t—”
“I succeeded because I had to, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep it up.”
Charles was being
brutally honest about himself. Mary wanted to tell him how wonderful he was, how proud she was of what he had done. She wanted to list a litany of reasons why together they could conquer anything. But she knew it was no use. Only he could erase his self-doubt.
“You’ll make it. I know you will.”
“What, no sarcastic quip? I must confess, I’m not used to this new, upbeat Mary. I guess accomplishment does that for a person.”
“Charles, I…”
He had to stop her. He could feel his resistance weakening.
“I’m sorry if I caused you pain. You’re truly magnificent, my darling.”
He kissed her gently on the cheek. There was a finality to it she couldn’t ignore.
“Surely we can at least correspond,” she said tentatively. Letters weren’t even close to what Mary had envisioned for their relationship, but it was the best she could do at this time. She tried to hide it, but her disappointment was palpable.
“I’d like that very much,” Charles replied. “Yes, very much.”
He paused for a moment, also trying to suppress the upset he was feeling. Covering his anguish with a smile, he took a card from his wallet and handed it to her. “Our address: pemberton pharmacy with two small p’s. Father believes a lack of capital letters adds a smidgen of class.”
“Charles…” Mary started to speak but could not continue. No words could fit what they were both feeling. Like a magnetic force, their bodies were drawn together, hugging one another tightly and clinging for what seemed like a long time. Neither had the willpower to let go, because they both knew that meant the end.
Finally, as if the same magnetic force that had drawn them together let them know it was time to part, they both let go. Charles and Mary stared at each other for a moment, sharing a sad but loving smile, and then he left. Mary took several steps toward the door, determined to go after him, then stopped. Deep down, no matter how much it hurt, she had to let him find his own peace, or it wouldn’t be his.
Mary turned back toward the kitchen and the salad she was preparing, briefly glancing at the card Charles had given her. Suddenly, her emotional state changed. She felt a flush of excitement, an excitement that had nothing to do with Charles. It involved Roscoe.
34
Mary had spent many a night bemoaning the fact that Charles Goodrich’s final entry in his date book read only “Meet Roscoe at his place.” It had always seemed too general for a man who was so exact. The lettering on John Pemberton’s card changed her perspective. What if “his place” was the name of a restaurant or place of business rather than Roscoe’s apartment? Mary did some research and soon discovered there was a tavern called “his place” down on the Bowery.
The Bowery was one of the most dangerous sections of New York. It bordered on an area called Five Points, which was infested with gangs and the bane of New York law enforcement. The Bowery had its own gang, the Bowery Boys, and the darkness, dirt, and noise brought on by the elevated subway, the Third Avenue El, made it a haven for criminals. As Mary trudged through the teeming streets, the sounds of poverty were all too familiar: a bloodied storekeeper screaming for police who never came, prostitutes calling to johns, a pushcart peddler chasing street urchins who regularly pilfered from his cart, husbands and wives battling over the misery of their lives. Every so often, as an exclamation point, the Third Avenue train blanketed the area with its roaring, nerve-wracking clatter, shaking the ground below and any building nearby.
Mary wasn’t scared. She knew how to handle herself in this environment. To her, the privileged world of Edison and Morgan was scarier. On the Bowery, you could spot your enemies, and the probability was that they’d come directly at you. The rich were more deceptive, being unwilling to dirty their own hands.
Mary entered his place and instantly realized it wasn’t just a tavern. It was a full-fledged “resort.” She had heard about resorts, meeting places for homosexuals, but she had never been to one, and his place was doing a booming business. Smoky, mobbed, and lively, the bar was packed with mostly men and some women, as were the tables. There was a dance floor on the far right next to a staircase, which led to a second floor that contained rooms for couples desiring more privacy. A man wearing full makeup and dressed in formal tails sat at the piano playing and singing “I’m Called Little Buttercup” from Gilbert and Sullivan’s H.M.S. Pinafore. The waitresses were men dressed in drag who joked and flirted with the customers. There were two hostesses, also men in drag, one a redhead and the other a blonde. They noticed Mary.
“My God, as I live and breathe,” the redhead exclaimed dramatically. “She looks just like that lady detective.”
“If I had those cheekbones, I could look like Mary Handley, too,” declared the blonde, sucking in his cheeks.
“In your dreams, dearie,” the redhead replied, then turned to instruct Mary. “Try more rouge and some wave in your hair.”
“I’m looking for a man,” Mary began to explain.
“Aren’t we all?” the blonde interrupted, sighing.
“His name is Roscoe. Spanish, dark, handsome, late twenties.”
“Oh, Señor Gorgeous,” swooned the redhead, then pointed to the far left corner. “He’s over there. But you’re wasting your time. He’s strictly for men only.”
At that, both the redhead and the blonde ran off, hopping into the laps of two customers, laughing and flirting with them.
Mary walked the length of the floor and turned left at the bar. When she passed, a man at the bar stuck his neck out from the crowd and watched her go. It was Samuel. He had told his employer that Mary Handley would find his place. She was that good. Her presence there was important information, and he promptly left to report it.
Mary stopped before she got to the corner booth and set her eyes on Roscoe for the first time. By all reports, he was a handsome Spaniard. Mary would have added that he was also very masculine and sexy. If she had any doubts that this man was Roscoe, they were erased when she saw that sitting next to him was her old friend Mortimer.
“Roscoe?”
Roscoe rose and smiled charmingly. “Well, it’s about time you found me,” he said with a slight accent and a twinkle in his eye as he suavely took her hand and kissed it. He then nodded toward his companion. “I’m sure you remember Mortimer.”
Mortimer waved and smiled meekly.
“Please join us,” said Roscoe. “We have before us a recent invention by a bartender in San Francisco. It’s called a martini, and it’s quite scrumptious.”
Mary joined them, and Roscoe ordered another pitcher of martinis for the table. They sat and drank and talked and drank some more. Mary had many questions, and Roscoe was not shy about giving answers.
“I couldn’t come forward,” Roscoe explained. “It would’ve been too easy to pin the murder on the homosexual, and then forget about it.”
The fact that opposites often attract was a well-known phenomenon, but one would think Roscoe’s open, debonair personality and Charles Goodrich’s closed, reserved manner wouldn’t have been remotely compatible. The reasons governing human attraction had been a puzzle since people had walked on this earth, and Mary wasn’t going to solve it that evening. It was this factor though that tipped Mary’s tone to the incredulous when she wanted to confirm what was now obvious.
“So you and Charles Goodrich were…?”
“We were lovers. Why is it so hard for the world to understand? It’s just love.”
“We live in intolerant times,” Mary said.
“Yet I suspect the intolerance will end for you before it will for me.”
Mary raised her drink in a toast. “Here’s hoping it ends for all of us, sooner rather than later.”
They clinked glasses and drank. A good-looking man of about thirty came to the table and asked Roscoe to dance. Not in the mood for frivolity, he declined. Mortimer had no problem being second choice and left with the man. Mary was trying to pace herself and was slowly sipping her second martini, which she f
ound to be as delicious as described. By now, Roscoe had imbibed four that Mary had seen, yet the only effect she recognized was that he was much freer in expressing his emotions. His frustration and pain were very visible.
“Poor Charlie struggled so with who he was. That’s the only reason he got involved with that Stoddard woman.”
“He saw you the night he was killed, didn’t he?”
“Charlie begged my forgiveness and asked if I still wanted him. Of course I said yes.”
Trying to suppress his agony, Roscoe downed his drink and poured another one. Mary hated to keep probing into an issue that was clearly painful for him, but she couldn’t stop. There was another piece to the puzzle, and she had to find out about it.
“Did Charlie ever mention a journal, one that contained sensitive information?”
Roscoe nodded. “He gave it to me that night to hold for him. He seemed quite concerned.”
“I’m sure he was. He was about to expose Thomas Edison, opening a box of misdeeds that would make Pandora blush.”
“Well then,” he stated rather cavalierly, “we must finish what he started. Meet me tomorrow. The world will no doubt believe you before it will me.”
He handed Mary his card. Her detective work over, she allowed herself to feel the tragedy of Charles Goodrich.
“Edison said he had no gumption,” she told him. “Yet he was showing more guts than ten men.”
Roscoe could stand no more and finished his drink. He then delighted the man at the next table by asking him to dance. Before they left, Roscoe turned to Mary.
“Tomorrow,” he said, and he was gone.
Mary was gathering herself to leave when she spotted someone at the bar. Samuel had returned, and he was trying to be inconspicuous. He was good at his job, but it was hard for a man his size to blend into the background. Mary grabbed a spoon off a table and stuck it in his back.
“You’re feeling my derringer. It’s small, but it can blow a hole clear through you.”
As Mary guided Samuel to the exit, the piano player returned from his break. He dove right into “When I Was a Lad” from H.M.S. Pinafore. The redheaded and blond hostesses mimed the song and played with the customers while Mary pressed the spoon harder into Samuel’s back, and they stepped out into the Bowery night.
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