A Lesson in Love and Murder

by Rachel McMillan

  The sun was blazing. Ray was glad he had left his heavy black bowler at home in exchange for a light cotton cap. He peered at the small piece of paper containing Viola’s address. He had left behind the rest of the message he had scrawled at the office, so desperate was he to get to the train.

  He was perspiring and parched by the time he found the address—a tenement building with a room Viola shared with another family. A partitioned blanket separated their individual living spaces.

  His sister was in his arms before he even had time to remove his hat.

  She was never a large woman, but now he could feel her shoulder blades jutting from under her flimsy cotton dress, and when he pulled away, holding her at arm’s length, it was hard to recognize her. Her lovely black eyes were hollow, Tony’s temper was tattooed on her temple, and her cheeks were chalky and gaunt.

  Ray had trouble conjuring up a smile no matter how his heart quickened at seeing her. A slight one tickled his cheek. “Where’s Luca?”

  “Tony has him. Taking him out to see the big boats.” Viola’s smile tugged at him. “I am so glad you are here. We will be all right. And you came at the right time. If Tony saw you here… ”

  She pulled him into the cramped space his salary helped secure. A table and chairs, a bucket of murky water. Even her cottage in the Ward had been better than this. The smell was horrid in the summer heat. Through the worn cotton sheet separating her side of the room, he could make out the shapes of a mother and two children. One was crying.

  Viola had a cistern of fresh water near the stove, and she poured two glasses, setting them down on a scratched table still bearing half a loaf of bread and crumbs from their midday meal.

  “It’s worse than I thought.” He grabbed her hand and held so tightly his knuckles whitened. “Viola, come back with me.”

  “Tony has found some good work, Ray.” She reached into her apron and took out a few coins. “He brought this home! He’s taking Luca for ice cream.”

  Ray narrowed his eyes, confused. “Then why did you call me?”

  “I was scared. I had no reason to be. I heard a man talking about a job for Tony, and they exchanged words and he didn’t come home.” Viola laughed sadly. “I am a silly woman. Afraid of her own shadow, like Tony says.”

  The baby through the sheet wailed more loudly. Ray winced and mouthed an apology to his stricken sister. To live in that place! He shuddered. The coins in his pocket and his watch were all he had in the world. Would his inability to provide result in Jem and her baby relegated to the same hovel of a life as Viola? Unable to afford even the dingiest bed for the night?

  They turned at the doorknob and Tony’s voice. “Quickly, leave through the back entrance,” Viola hissed.

  “I want to see my nephew.”

  “Meet me at Arpeggios. The coffee shop on Michigan Avenue. Six o’clock this evening. Tony has a long shift tonight.”

  And Ray was huddled off into the yellow grass of the sickly yard.

  Chicago was spliced by a murky river. Sure, it glistened in the sun, but it was also plagued by drifts of wood and debris. Ray shuddered to think of being plunged into its sewery depth. Like Toronto, Chicago was forging an identity, grittily pounding its way to progress.

  The main streets were lined with towers of industry, scraping the blue sky, pronouncing their enterprise and commerce, offering wares and goods. The buildings were entered and exited by men with airs of importance and erect top hats, and women with plumes of feathers, taking the hand of a carriage driver, escorted to the swept sidewalk in pursuit of shopping. Beyond Randolph and State Streets, a large patch of grass was as yet untouched, and passengers in the railcars could look at it as they passed and wonder what would be built next.

  Lake Michigan, at the mouth of the city and yelping wide into the blue horizon, put Ray in immediate mind of Toronto. They had such a similar geography. But Chicago was bigger. Much bigger. Overpowering. Like Toronto, Chicago bore the mark of immigrant influx, possessing the same Babel-like confusion in overlapping dialects. Ray took it all in, sheets of journal-worthy sights and sounds, as he made his way to meet Viola.

  Luca had grown since Viola had left Toronto. Ray held out his arms, eager to feel his nephew’s hair under his chin, but flinched when Luca squirmed and pulled fussily away.

  “He doesn’t remember me,” Ray said, not hiding the hurt in his voice.

  “Of course he does,” Viola cooed, pulling Luca to her skirt. “He just doesn’t always sit still.”

  Ray ordered for them, and they took a table near the back, away from the window, in the shadows.

  “I hate that we have to meet like this,” Ray said sullenly. “Hiding.”

  “You know how Tony is.”

  Ray spread his hands on the table, watching Luca suck his thumb while looking shyly over at Ray from Viola’s shoulder.

  He was cowering, Ray noticed, terrified in the presence of a man. Ray’s heart rose, thinking of what Tony might have done to scare this little boy so. Watching Luca settled his rising temper, so he focused on the boy.

  “You don’t know what he’ll do next, Vi.” Ray kept his eyes on his nephew. “Which is why I am here, hundreds of miles from home.”

  The thin fingers on Viola’s right hand trembled as she gripped her coffee cup.

  “I would like to hear about my sister-in-law,” Viola said brightly, giving him a rare smile. “Something happy, yes?”

  “I up and left her to rush after you, Viola,” Ray said bitterly, staring ruefully into his coffee. “She’s probably furious with me. And you have never met her, Vi. It’s strange being married to someone you don’t know.”

  “But I will meet her. She is very beautiful in the pictures I have seen.”

  “Even more in person.”

  “And I am sure she would be lovely with Luca.”

  “She would love Luca,” Ray said shortly. Talking about Jem made him sad. Luca was staring at him intently, his black eyes wide. Ray cracked a smile.

  Viola transferred the boy across the table, and Ray hugged him tightly, pressing his lips to Luca’s cheek. “I missed you.” Ray positioned Luca on the side of the table, propping him up with his hands and giving him his pocket watch to play with. Luca gripped it with his little fingers.

  With his nephew occupied, Ray leaned over and closed the space between himself and his sister.

  “Jem is going to have a baby of her own, Vi, and I cannot keep supporting you the way I have.” He watched Viola’s face blanch with guilt. “I am not telling you this because I want you to feel bad. I just want to find a solution. For everyone. I can’t provide for you and Luca and Jem and a baby on my reporter’s salary. Tony is clearly not helping.”

  “If you tell him, Ray, if we explain… ”

  “He’s never listened to us before,” Ray growled. “Why would he start now?”

  “Ray, you must be so very excited. I am so happy. A baby. For Luca to play with!”

  “How can Luca play with a baby who lives in another country? This has to end, Viola. You don’t belong here.”

  “I belong with Tony.” She gripped the end of the table tightly. “But he cannot know that you are here because I asked you, Ray. I don’t know what he might do if… ”

  Ray nodded. “I know. But this has to be the end of it, Viola. I am here to take you home. Tony’s chances are over. He can either reform completely and find a respectable job by the time I hop on a train back to Toronto, or I will report him to the authorities and you and Luca will come back to Canada with me.”

  “Authorities?

  “Tony can’t go two feet without stepping into something illegal. I just have to find out what it is this time.” Ray rubbed at his unshaven jaw. “My stomach turns thinking of his hurting you or Luca, and I have my own family now, Vi. So I can’t ever leave Jem again and rush over here.”

  “You don’t understand. He doesn’t mean to… ”

  “You’re right. I understand less now than I ever did.”
Ray rose, tossing a few coins on the checkered tablecloth. “I would cut off my right hand before hurting my Jemima, so I cannot understand how a man who claims he loves you and Luca could treat you like this.”

  Silence followed them out of the café and onto the muggy street. Ray held tightly to Luca’s hand as they walked back to Michigan Avenue.

  “I need some money, Ray,” Viola said quietly. “We were turned out after you came this morning. Tony took the money you sent. And I have nothing more set aside.”

  Ray pulled Luca closer, tucking a truant curl behind his ear. He pressed a few coins into Viola’s hand. “Give this to your landlord for tonight. I’ll get more tomorrow,” he said with assurance, though he wasn’t sure how or where. He handed her the watch. “If you have to.”

  “Papa’s watch.”

  “If you have a choice between food and Papa’s watch, you sell the watch.” He pressed it into her palm. Viola smiled at the memories evoked by its familiar circumference in her hand. She flipped it open and found a picture of herself and Luca.

  “You are a good brother, Ray.”

  Ray kissed her on the cheek and ruffled Luca’s hair, and then he let the night close around him. First he’d find Tony, and then he’d find whatever work he could at the docks to secure himself a bed for a night and replenish the little he had given Viola. If there was any benefit to working muckraking pieces for McCormick at the old Hog, it was that he wasn’t overly particular about where he slept. As long as he had a roof over his head, he’d be comfortable.

  But finding Tony in a city this size proved more difficult than Ray had anticipated. He wound along the docks, peering into one seedy hovel of a bar after another. Music clanged and the smell of whiskey and sweat fogged the air. Ray fell back on his accent as he searched, making his English seem poorer than it was, and blending in with his open collar and threadbare shirt.

  Finally, the bars began to close. As their lights winked out and the patrons stumbled into the streets, Ray had to admit that he wasn’t going to find Tony tonight. He pulled his cap down low over his eyes, thinking. After giving those coins to Viola, he didn’t have enough left even to afford a flophouse for the night. Could he go back to her tenement and sleep on her floor? No, suppose Tony should turn up. It would have to be a park bench for the night. At least he had enough money for a hot cup of coffee in the morning.

  It was getting on evening the next day before he found him. Just as Ray was beginning to despair, wondering if Tony had fled the city, he stumbled on the right bar. The man looked gaunt, bloodshot eyes focused on a hand of cards, emitting a few curses through a funnel of boisterous laughter. Tony was in the corner seat, filmed by smoke, lubricated by whatever was in the tankard at his elbow, when he looked up and recognized his wife’s brother.

  “What are you doing here?” Tony slurred.

  “Wondering how you have money for drinks and games while I had to give the last dollars I had to your wife and son.”

  Tony slammed his fist on the table. The chips, cards and tankards rattled.

  “You’re finished here then, Valari?” a man seethed. “You were in over your head anyway.”

  Tony eyed his hand possessively. “I am not finished. I just have to… take care of something.” He tossed the cards on the table. “Deal me out next round but save my spot.”

  Tony was uneasy on his feet. His bloodshot eyes bored into Ray as they stepped through the doorway and out to the street: a symphony of wolf whistles, automobile horns, horse’s hooves, and drunken laughter.

  “Glad I found you,” Ray said, leaning against the side of the tavern and appraising Tony. The man looked even worse in the moonlight than he had under the garish lamps of the bar.

  “You bring that detective girl with you? Found yourself a looker, Ray. Even I can appreciate that. All the guys could. Forbes, especially. Liked the way she was built.”

  “Do you want me to drive my fist into your teeth?” Ray said lazily. “You don’t have anyone here to back you up, and you know I am much faster than you.”

  “I’m complimenting her.”

  “You’re the lowest kind of… ” Ray chewed his lip to stall himself. It wasn’t worth it. “Stop drinking your money in there. You’re already in the hole. Take care of the family you abandoned.”

  “I can provide for my own family.” Tony scraped at the dregs of his pride.

  “This is ending, Tony. I hate the way you treat my sister and Luca. I won’t do it anymore. I won’t sit and watch you hurt them and leave them to starve while you drink and gamble. You keep horrible company. You—you smell like a fish. Who knows where you go to work every day.”

  “I make a good income.”

  “Listen,” Ray said. “Let Viola and Luca go. You’re never home anyway. It would be no great loss to you if they were with me in Toronto.”

  “She is mine. She belongs to me and with me. The boy too.”

  “You’re talking about her as if she’s a tugboat. She’s my sister. I will provide for her and Luca and take care of them, and then you are free to do… well, whatever it is you do.” Ray took a step and grabbed Tony’s lapel. “But no longer at the expense of my family.”

  “It’s funny you’re telling me this, Ray.” Tony coughed as Ray tightened his grip. “To go home to my wife and family. When here you are a thousand miles from home. And what does your pretty wife think about that?”

  “She has friends who can take care of her,” Ray snipped. “Viola has no one.”

  “But she has you,” Tony mocked. “Of course she has you. It’s so convenient for you too, isn’t it? You can hide behind Viola. You can use her for an excuse when Toronto gets too hard and you realize you’re failing as badly as I am.”

  Tony’s instincts had slowed, and when Ray flung him back, he toppled over, spitting and cursing. “I have a game to finish. Stay out of my life.”

  “Gladly. But I won’t stay out of hers. And I won’t stay out of Luca’s.”

  Tony fingered his bleeding lip. “You haven’t changed. Controlling everything. Needing to be perfect. Needing her to worship the ground you walk on. You need to… ”

  Ray didn’t stay to hear the end of the sentence.

  He stalked away, his eyes low. What he really needed was a place to spend the night and enough money to see Viola and Luca through whatever Tony was losing of theirs back at the gaming table. He swept the immediate vicinity with intent eyes, finally settling on the least intoxicated man in the alley. “Any idea where I might find work?”

  “Hedgehog,” the man said hazily. “Terror of a man at Burnham Harbor. Look for tugboats four and ten.”

  “Four and ten.”

  The man nodded drunkenly and then slurred, “And a right fancy Benz truck. Hedgehog numbers his fleet.”

  One of Ray’s talents lay in blending into a situation and pivoting it to his advantage. It was what made him such a good journalist. He belonged in any manner of congregations of the destitute or working class. So when he eventually found Hedgehog‡ and his men, reeling in a dinghy from the bopping waves, he knew how to fit in. He turned up a full smile, and with a poor grasp of English and a twinkling eye, he offered himself to their shady enterprise.

  “I could always use manpower,” Hedgehog said. “Got several fellows who sound just like you. Make you feel at home.” Ray was aching to ask what work he would be doing, what they were transporting, but this ragtag crew seemed the type that would lift and haul anything for a few bucks.

  So, under a sky brightening with stars, he joined men with haggard, unhappy faces as they moved cargo from a tugboat and onto a truck that seemed worth far more than any of these “workers” could afford.

  “Fancy automobile,” Ray sneered to a tall, wiry man.

  “Boss here, Hedgehog, says in order to be legitimate you have to look legitimate.”

  Ray yawned. He’d barely slept on the overnight train from Toronto, he’d spent the night before on a bench, and as the hours ticked by, it looked
less and less likely that he’d find a bed before dawn.

  “There’s one more!” a man from the deck of the boat called. Ray saw that the men who pulled shift after shift of this grueling work night after night—probably without even as much as a nap before their next job—were groaning and yawning.

  Winning easy admiration, he jogged over and stole up the ladder swinging from the side of the bobbing vessel.

  The man was standing on one side of a long rectangular box. “Bit like a coffin!” the man joshed. “Probably jam or something, mate. No need to worry.”

  Ray wondered why jam would need to be undocked in the cloak of darkness, but he merely smiled and prepared for the count-off.

  “One… ” the other man said as Ray fit his hands over the sides of the crate. “Two… ”

  On three they heaved up, but in doing so, the damp wood creaked and the bottom fell through with a thud. Ray and the man flung the beams and planks away to discover a heavy canvas bag.

  Bile rose in Ray’s mouth. He knew what he would find inside. The tell-tale shape and weight meant one thing.

  He looked up at his companion, and they shared a solemn nod.

  They pulled back the canvas to reveal a gray corpse, its stench overpowering them, the features bloated from days on a boat. Ray’s companion emitted a string of curses before finally ending in a hasty, pleading prayer for the poor dead fellow and leaving Ray with the body while he reported it to the foreman.

  Ray tried to see it as Jasper or Merinda would. What a story this would make, he thought, adrenaline pumping. Then he recollected himself and looked over the corpse’s bulky, veined hand, hard to make out in the dim light.

  It was when he turned away to call for help from the docks that a tiny piece of something caught his eye in the spreading light. It must have toppled out of the canvas. He leaned down and pinched it between his thumb and forefinger.

  A piece of something that was all too familiar.

  He slipped it into his pocket, looking around to see if the slight action had been noticed. But no one seemed to care about the body at all. Ray looked beyond the corpse’s greenish-gray face and over his stiff limbs down to bare feet. Near the right foot something glistened, and Ray reached over, flinching his fingers a bit before grabbing it. It was an empty, sticky bottle. Syrup, by the looks of it. The label was faded, but he could still make out the logo—he’d seen it a thousand times. Spenser’s.