“Send a fruit basket?” Merinda huffed. “It’s rotten luck for us. With Jasper gone, they won’t throw us any good mysteries, and then what will we do with our time?” She flicked a fanned-out paper with the tip of her shoe.
“You could find a job.”
“Serious suggestions only, please.” She tilted her head. “Besides, I have a job. I am an investigator.”
Jem studied the paper and bit her tongue. Nothing could come from pointing out that it didn’t count as a job unless one was paid. Instead, she commented about her coworker. “Tippy was in a strange mood today.”
Sometimes Tippy came over for dinner or tea after a long day. Occasionally, the three went to see a Nickelodeon.
But Merinda wasn’t paying attention. Something about the pictures of the young man holding a gun at the election party had caught her eye. “Fred O’Hare.”
“Who?”
“I told you last night. Fiona Byrne’s fiancé.” She pointed, and Jem looked at the caption identifying him.
“What about him?”
Merinda skimmed the article and then looked up. “Get your things. We’re going.”
Fred O’Hare was not a man who wanted to be found. But Jem and Merinda were determined, and soon they were in Corktown, following him up the street. Merinda tucked her walking stick under her arm and picked up her pace. Jem walked just at her heels. Without the restriction of skirts and stays they could easily cross the road and match his speed.
They caught up to him. “Stop, wait,” Merinda said.
Fred flinched. “I have no time for—” He squinted at them under their bowler hats. “Hang on. You’re a girl! And so are you!”
“You didn’t kill Fiona,” Merinda said.
He remained flummoxed. “I what? Yes! I mean, no! Of course not.”
“I know you were taken in for questioning,” Merinda said, “and I was there at the Elgin when… when Grace was killed.”
Fred cocked his head to the side, suddenly interested in what she had to say. “There’s a coffee house just up here past Massey Hall,” he said.
Merinda and Jem followed him in, and they sat and ordered a pot of black coffee.
Fred twisted his tweed cap nervously in his calloused hands. “How do you know I didn’t kill Fiona? I mean, I know I didn’t, obviously. But the police aren’t convinced, I fear.”
Merinda sipped her coffee. “I think it unlikely that the man who was enraged enough to risk his freedom by barging into Montague’s soirée waving a pistol would be the same man who carried off the murders of two young women. You were filled with grief, I think, Mr. O’Hare. Blinded by it, as your impassioned presence at the theatre demonstrated.”
Fred stared ruefully into his coffee cup. “And what’s it to you?”
“I’m investigating the Corktown murders for what they are,” Merinda said.
Fred sat very still, and Jem feared he might be preparing to stand and flee. But he stayed put. “They kept me in holding overnight. But they couldn’t find a motive or any evidence, so they let me out.”
“The two girls were strangled,” Merinda said as calmly as if she were discussing the weather.
He seemed to shrink. “Yes. Fee and I were engaged for a year. I was so close to saving enough.”
“Did you suspect she was… familiar with any other men?”
The tips of Fred’s ears flamed as red as his hair. He swallowed some of his anger with a long sip of coffee. “Of course not.” His voice croaked. “But she did go out.”
“She did?” Merinda leaned forward.
“Most Thursday evenings. To a dance hall on Elm Street. I went once or twice but I often worked the night shift. We were this close… ” A single tear snaked down his cheek, and Jem’s heart clutched at the sight. “This close,” he repeated, looking between them, “to being able to afford a home of our own.”
When they got back home, Merinda made a note of the Elm Street Dance Hall on the chalkboard in the sitting room.
Jem was just happy to recline by the fire and read a book, far away from danger and murder suspects. But the wheels in Merinda’s head were turning at a rapid pace.
In the tea room at Spenser’s Department Store the next day, as Jem enjoyed her break, a delivery boy she only knew in passing stared up at her with a gapped-tooth smile and asked, “Hey, Jem! Isn’t this your friend? This Merinda Herringford girl?”
“Yes, why?”
“You’re two steps from famous. Think I’ll hire you to find that fiver I lost on the shop floor last week.”
He handed her copy of the Hog. On the society and arts page was a small boxed advertisement:
Mystery or theft? No problem too big or too small for two lady detectives. Apply Herringford and Watts, 395 King St. West. Consultations and deductions for a reasonable fee.
Jem’s jaw dropped. All of Toronto had her address. She flung the Hog away and spent the rest of her shift plotting how best to ream her lodgemate out when she returned home. When Tippy returned from her own tea break, she could barely suppress the laughter teasing the corners of her mouth and lighting her eyes.
Tippy smiled broadly. “You’re a detective!”
“I am not!” Jem was adamant, and she dashed out as soon as she possibly could and sprinted to the nearest streetcar.
When she reached their flat, she saw a bold sign hanging in the front window: Herringford and Watts: Lady Detectives for Consultation and Hire.
Jem bounded into the sitting room, already imagining the riffraff they’d collect from the street with such blatant advertisement. “Mer-in-da! ”
“Jem! Isn’t it wonderful? We’re Sherlock and Watson.”
“We are nothing of the sort.” Jem tossed her coat at the longsuffering Mrs. Malone and wagged her finger at Merinda. “You can Sherlock all you want. I am starving and tired and I want to rip up that sign before half of the city is on our doorstep. How did you get the Hog to run the ad so quickly?”
“I paid DeLuca extra. Also, we really do need to give that fellow his coat and book and watch back.”
Jem flushed a little.
“He was so polite about it,” Merinda continued. “Gentlemanly enough to—listen to this—refer to you as nothing more than the odd hobo girl on the steps of the benefit.” She giggled. “Imagine his keeping that indiscretion to himself. The man I know from those muckraking pieces on the Don Jail would have hung you out to dry if it meant earning a few more pennies from the newsies on the Queen beat.”
“You talked to him?”
“I bartered. And here we are. An advertisement for our exciting new venture. A business! We’ll start with the Corktown Murderer and then move to the top.”
“What did you give him in exchange?”
“The promise of his coat,” Merinda smirked. “Take his things by the Hog offices tomorrow, will you?”
By eight thirty that evening, it seemed that half the city was standing on their doorstep or chattering in their foyer. Jem helped Mrs. Malone move chairs from every corner of the house, and she and Merinda received their clients one at a time in the sitting room.
“Why does no one ask our qualifications?” Jem broke into one girl’s soliloquy about a priceless family heirloom pilfered from her purse as she took it to the jewelers for appraisal. “Miss… Tremblant was it?”
“H-Harriet Tremblant.”
“Yes. Well, we are not qualified.” Jem thrust a finger in Merinda’s direction. “She is not qualified.”
“H-how much do you charge?”
“For you? A first-time client?” Merinda was near bouncing out of her seat. “It’s positively free!”
Harriet Tremblant clapped her hands.
By the end of the night, they had fifteen open cases. No one cared a smidge about credentials. They were lady detectives, after all, who could be trusted to handle delicate matters. When it came down to it, and despite all her reservations, Jem simply didn’t have the heart to turn these girls away. Many of them came straig
ht from the Ward, burdened with problems that pressed down their shoulders. Merinda had been right: The Hog did reach the widest number of readers. It was a rag, yes, and a cheap one at that. Two pennies cheaper than the Globe and Mail or the Daily Telegraph. But advertising with them was effective.
As the last girl was escorted out, Merinda gave a triumphant little dance. Jem still hadn’t had any supper and her head positively ached from hunger. Her temper, too, had worn thin.
“Finally, something exciting!” Merinda yawned. “Don’t forget to give DeLuca back his coat and notebook and watch tomorrow.”*
“Merinda,” Jem said, “you cannot possibly think that we can help these girls. They trust us. We are not qualified.”
“Your parents cut you off,” Merinda said. “What else do you have to do with your time?”
“Gainful employment!”
“We have on more than one occasion given aid to the Toronto Constabulary.”
“You have trailed Jasper Forth like a puppy dog, is more like it. And now look what’s happened to the poor man.”
“Can’t you just see the headlines? ‘Herringford and Watts stomp out the Morality Squad!’ ”
Jem threw up her hands. “ ‘Herringford and Watts get thrown in jail!’ ”
“ ‘Herringford and Watts become Toronto’s premiere investigators!’ ”
“Herringford and Watts better get fed soon or Watts won’t be long for their new enterprise.”
Merinda stuck her tongue out. Jem stuck out hers in answer. Still, despite herself, Jem couldn’t help but grin.
Toronto had no idea what it was in for.
* Merinda Herringford’s deductive powers failed to stretch far enough to recognize the possibility that while Jem had every intention of returning Ray DeLuca’s watch and coat, the journal had winnowed its way into her heart and was worth far more to her than a few interesting notes from his muckraking stint in the Don Jail.
CHAPTER FIVE
Toronto is an endless maze. Even its most adventurous citizen may never completely unravel every one of its corners and nooks. I try, as any intrepid reporter might, to follow the heartbeat of the city. But where does that heartbeat lie? In St. John’s Ward, with the newly arrived immigrants exhausted from their journey and terrified of what they might find in their new, safe start? In City Hall, where Horace Milbrook works through the mire of corruption to exact some kind of good and social promise?
An excerpt from a journal Jem is not supposed to be reading
Ray DeLuca had many wonderful qualities: his loyalty to his family; his quick mind, which allowed him to soak up English and make it his second language; his smile, which, when fully stretched across his face, could force clocks to stop and crocuses to bloom; and his unwavering passion for societal reform.
His temper, on the other hand…
Ray dashed around the circumference of the small room with the air of a perturbed fox. He’d spent the night at Vi’s place again, after stopping to bring her dinner and discovering Tony, once again, missing. He couldn’t be there all the time, but he would be there as often as he could.
Viola’s eyes narrowed at him as she hoisted young Luca higher on her hip. “What’s got you so agitated?”
Ray exhaled. He went to the old basin and splashed ice-cold water on his face. At least he felt awake. It was when he caught his reflection in the mirror that it hit him: St. Joseph’s! He had left his hat there to reserve his space in the crowded bunkroom. There was a sort of collective trust at the house, so he figured it would still be sitting there when he returned. He exhaled.
“Ray?”
“Yes, Viola?”
“You’ll see again about a job for Tony?”
Beautiful Viola with her black hair and dark circles around her eyes. In the daylight, he saw bruises that had been cloaked by the darkness of the night before. He took in the absent way her long fingers wound themselves in Luca’s small sprout of curls. Beautiful Viola, whom the morning light had once courted so well. Beautiful Viola and her horrid taste in men.
“I’ll try, Vi.”
Find Tony a job. If only it were that easy. Ray had played this game before. The first step was always finding Tony at all. The next steps were to convince him to come home to his wife and baby and to not buy liquor with every last penny he made at the roundhouse or the brickworks. Then Ray would have to convince Tony to stop yelling and stop hitting and…
He grabbed an apple from a chipped bowl on their small table and tossed it up and down. “Ciao, mio piccolo anatracoccolo.” Goodbye, my little duckling. It was what Ray had called Viola since they were children. He kissed her on the cheek and mussed Luca’s hair before stepping, coatless, into the September air.
The autumn breeze and the early morning sun drained the last of his frustration. As it did every day, the city talked to him in all the languages of the world. He loved its vivacity and vibrancy, the unending music of footfalls, of trolleys on tracks, of the horses’ hooves. He loved hearing the merchants hawking their wares from one side of the bustling street to the other.
As he sloped southward to the harbor, the glistening lake caught the kiss of the sun, and he tuned his ears for the bellow of the ships’ arrivals. Ray could imagine the girls in pigtails and the boys playing with yo-yos way back in third class, their parents in overworn outer clothes, threadbare and not warm enough to see them through the onslaught of winter. He could see all of them inching their way toward a new life.
Ray still believed in this new life. Despite the prejudice waiting for all immigrants—including himself—at every corner. Despite the meetings in the back of the new City Hall claiming Canada for Canadians. He believed in it as his mother had, though she had not survived the sea voyage. And he would make the most of her memory, even if it meant continually putting Viola’s needs ahead of any chance he could have for a personal life.
“You need to get out more, Mr. DeLuca,” Skip McCoy told him daily. “You’re not a bad-looking guy. Some girls will swoon for that accent of yours. They like all the poetic Italian stuff. Go to the dance halls. There’s one on Elm Street. I’ll take you. Dance a little. Live a little. Right now, your primary relationship is the Hog, and believe me, it’s not worth it. She’ll never love you back.”
Ray did as he usually did when Skip had one of these moments: He avoided his eyes and shuffled papers around on his desk and bellowed for another typewriter ribbon.
“I’ve a nice girl for you.” Even McCormick, the Hog’s editor, was willing to step up. “You gotta watch that temper of yours and your odd ways, DeLuca. But I know someone from my wife’s knitting circle who hires a seamstress. Cute. Catholic girl. You’re a little on the short side, but my wife says if you smile more often—full-on smile—the ladies will line up around the block for a glimpse of you. I wouldn’t know anything of this kind of stuff myself, mind you. But she says—”
Ray had raised his hand to stop him. His purpose was not to find personal happiness but to keep his sister and nephew’s heads above water. He was fortunate enough to do this while scratching out a living as a second-rate hyperbolic wordsmith. At least the job required words. Ray couldn’t live if not by words.
Ray strolled across the red brick road to a warehouse overrun with old printing presses and the smell of ink, ambition, and sweat. These were the crude offices of the Hogtown Herald. He made for the tiny lean-to off the furnace room, where his overturned-crate-for-a-chair and table waited. The tabletop was slanted, ink-spotted, and scarred from years of use. His office.
Ray dipped the nib of his pen in a small pot, and the first of the day’s many black spots splattered on his hand. He wondered when Miss Watts would come by with his belongings. Merinda Herringford had promised the return of his coat in exchange for the prompt placement of her advertisement.
Certainly the girl wouldn’t have had the audacity to go through his coat pockets, would she? Certainly she wouldn’t find his journal—and read it. Or would she? He already knew she had
the nerve to plant herself, broad and brash as can be, under a streetlight clad as a man. She’d pulled off the disguise fairly well, right up until the moment when her drawers had dropped. She certainly hadn’t looked like a man in that split second before he’d turned away.
A few hours later, Ray had crafted an editorial piece on Montague’s rally and the second corpse that he thought was a cut above the usual muckraking drivel he was known for. Suspected murderer and mayor, Montague shrouded in secrecy and death. Ray was inspired, typing swiftly, until he couldn’t tell where his fingers left off and the keys of his Underwood began. He was lost in thought when Skip knocked at the wooden beam framing his cubby.
“A young lady to see you, Mr. DeLuca.” His voice was formal. He leaned into Ray’s ear. “A very attractive young lady.”
Ray turned around in surprise and found himself facing a beautiful woman, well-dressed and looking at him with bright eyes and a rather flushed face. When their eyes met, Ray blinked several times. This was the awkward and squeaky girl from the other evening? Surely not, for this was no girl. If ever a figure was worthy of the word woman, it was she.
“Thank you very much for loaning me your coat.” She handed him his coat, her cheeks deep red. Doubtless she was playing over the last time they had met.
“You’re very welcome, Miss Watts.” He studied her face. “I didn’t recognize you.”
She studied him right back. “You’re staring at me.”
Ray raised an eyebrow. “You’re staring at me.”
“Sorry,” she said as a dimple appeared on her right cheek. She was so very pretty. Innocently pretty. Fresh-faced pretty.
He laughed, surprised. “You’ll pardon me, but on our previous meeting I didn’t see that you were so beautiful.”
Her cheeks flushed deeper red. “Thank you for running our ad,” she said.
“Yes, of course. Anything to get my coat back.” He laughed while noticing her proper, corseted curves and fashionable daysuit. “At least now I know why you were there last night. A lady investigator!” He patted the coat. “Did you happen to find anything in the pocket? When you were”—he held up his sleeve and searched for a phrase—“making my coat smell like flowers?”
The Bachelor Girl's Guide to Murder Page 5