by Liz Freeland
“The most important thing I learned is that there’s a market for counterfeit passports in this town.”
Otto’s mouth turned down in a frown as he moved the razor carefully over his right cheek. “You think Ruthie Jones was part of that?”
“It’s the best explanation for why she’d steal passports from her customers. It also might show how she’d been able to save up money. She’d discovered a lucrative side business.”
He rinsed his razor in the shaving bowl, dried it carefully, and then wiped the towel over his face, getting rid of the last of the shaving soap. He dabbed aftershave on his palms and began to slap it on his face.
“But why did she hide the passports?” I wondered, stepping away from the pungent odor. “Sewing them into a cape . . . that’s not something you’d do if you were about to hand them off for money, is it?”
“Depends on how much money was at stake, and who she was dealing with.”
I narrowed my eyes on my friend. His insights often surprised me, but they shouldn’t have. Songwriting required a knack for getting to the heart of a matter.
“The question isn’t why Ruthie hid the passports, is it?” he elaborated. “It isn’t even simply their dollars-and-cents value. It’s whether or not someone was willing to kill her for them.”
Yes. That was just it. Why did those three hidden passports prove deadly? Unless it wasn’t just three. Maybe there were more that hadn’t been found, or that had been taken by Ruthie’s killer. Although . . .
I drew in a breath. Could it be I was underestimating the extent of Ruthie’s involvement in this passport scheme?
“What?” Otto asked.
“Maybe Ruthie Jones wasn’t just a cog in whatever this passport scheme was. Maybe she was the mastermind.”
CHAPTER 8
During my break the next day, I went upstairs to search as inconspicuously as I could for Lieutenant King. There were questions I needed to ask him about Ruthie Jones’s apartment, and I wanted as few of my colleagues as possible to witness my nosiness. No one I asked had seen King today, however, or knew where he was.
My manner must not have been as surreptitious as I’d hoped. When I was making my way downstairs again, a detective caught up with me in the stairwell. Not Lieutenant King, unfortunately. His partner, Stevens, caught my arm. “I want a word with you.”
My instinct was to slap his hand away. I shrugged it off instead. “I can hear you just fine. No need to maul me.”
Some women might have found Detective Stevens attractive. His individual features were appealing, but there was something taunting in his expression and tone, no matter the subject under discussion.
It was there in his voice when he asked, “You were asking after my partner?”
He stood on the stair above me, which gave him a height advantage. Even at the risk of being closer to him, I stepped up to his level.
“Yes, I was. Is Lieutenant King in today?”
“What’d you want to see him for?”
“I have a question to ask him.”
His lips tightened in impatience. “What you want to know?”
“Do you speak for him now?”
He studied me, then took a step back. “I see.” He gave his head a knowing shake.
“What?”
“A girl like you could do better than a fat, middle-aged fellow like King.” He shrugged. “But widowers are like catnip to some of you ladies, aren’t they?”
I crossed my arms. “Dry up, Detective. I only wanted to ask him about the Jones case.”
“The who case?”
Was he really that forgetful, or was he playing obtuse to get my goat? “Ruthie Jones—the woman who died in her flat a few days ago?”
“Oh, the crazy whore who killed her kid and herself. What burning questions concerning that mess made you chase after King?”
Oh, for Pete’s sake. “I wasn’t chasing him. I have no designs on your partner, aside from wanting to ask him about what was found in Ruthie Jones’s apartment.”
“I could have told you that. Why not ask me?”
Because I want to talk to a person who’s capable of acting like a human being.
Then again . . . why not talk to Stevens? I was already in an unpleasant conversation with him, so I might as well get something out of it. “I wondered if any kind of special materials were found in Ruthie’s flat.”
“Such as?”
“Well, parchment or other types of paper, or stamps, or ink . . . that sort of thing.”
I was ready for more argument, or more sneering, but his brows drew together in thought. “Not that I recall. The flat was just full of what you’d expect. Clothes, cookware, crockery, little gewgaws a cheap woman like her would collect. Perfume bottles, paste jewelry.”
“And it didn’t appear as if anything had been taken?”
He chuckled. “You think burglars kill whores over ink wells? That’s a new one.”
My jaw clenched tight enough to crack a molar, but I managed a nod. “Guess you’re right.”
I hadn’t seen anything that looked specific to the forgery game when I’d searched the apartment, either, but I thought there might be a chance that the detectives had removed items during their search. I should have known better. The investigation had been perfunctory.
“That answer your question?” Stevens asked.
“It does.” I forced a smile. “Thank you.”
He grinned. “That’s more like it. You’re not half bad to look at when you smile, you know. What’s the expression? ‘You can catch more flies with sugar.’ ”
Instinctively, I leaned away from him, even though there was nothing but a wall at my back. If only I could have vanished through it. “I generally try to avoid flies.”
“You must like some fun, Two. You have to admit, I’m better looking than my partner.”
“Are you?” I asked earnestly. “I hadn’t noticed. But why would I? Whenever we meet, we’re at work. I try to keep my mind on the job.”
He seemed miffed that I didn’t melt at his having noticed me, though he covered it with a smirk. “Work isn’t everything.”
“That’s why I’m lucky to have so many good friends. Unfortunately, there’s rarely a moment to catch my breath. Like now—I really must get back to the cells. Thank you so much, Detective.”
“Maybe some other time,” he said.
I descended the stairs briskly, eager suddenly to be back at my usual post. The women’s cells might be in the dank, airless basement, but at least every step toward there took me farther from the loathsome Stevens. I turned the corner at the bottom of the stairs, where a short hallway led to the cells. A tall figure in front of me stopped me short. We only avoided a collision by inches.
“Officer Jenks.” Here was a frying-pan-into-the-fire situation. Sergeant Donnelly’s right hand always had an eye out for infractions large and small. “I thought Schultzie was filling in for me during lunch.”
He shook his head. From the look in his eye, I could tell he’d been eavesdropping on my conversation with Stevens. Damn. The way the grapevine worked among policemen, my name would probably be linked with Stevens’s within hours. I braced myself for teasing.
“Why all the questions about Ruthie’s place?” he asked.
“Just curious.”
His head tilted. “You asked Stevens about her flat. What was that about?”
“If you were listening—and obviously you were—you heard him tell me that there wasn’t a burglary.”
“Uh-huh. And you were asking specifically about paper and ink. That’s what you were really curious about, wasn’t it?”
He hadn’t just been casually eavesdropping, then. He’d picked up on details. I reached quickly for any plausible explanation for my curiosity. “Well, no suicide note ever turned up, did it?”
“No.”
“Isn’t that odd? After all, there was the baby.”
“The one she didn’t murder, you mean.”
> Hearing of her spoken of so off-handedly as a killer made me bristle, but I tried not to show it. “Exactly. She spared him, so you’d think she’d want to leave a note for someone to take care of him.”
“Ruthie was insane—she must’ve been to have killed that baby. And then after, I imagine she was insane with guilt and grief.”
Yes, she would have been. If that’s how it had happened.
“Anyhow,” Jenks said, “not all suicides leave notes. You probably haven’t seen that many, but I have. Besides, a lot of people can’t even write. Did you see any books in Ruthie’s place?”
I frowned, trying to remember. “Not books, no.” Nor magazines. “There was a short stack of old newspapers in the front room.”
He sniffed. “Newspapers. What’re they good for but taking out the trash?”
He had a point. There were so many newspapers in New York, the whole city could have been carpeted anew with them every day. Wrapping for garbage was just one of their ancillary uses. Having a stack of them wasn’t proof she could read.
“She couldn’t have written a note if she was . . . whatever-you-call-it,” Jenks said.
“Illiterate.” If she couldn’t write, it couldn’t have been she who wrote the name Silver Swan on that scrap of paper we’d found in the passports, either.
And she couldn’t have been the ringleader of a passport forgery operation. She would have been incidental to any scheme involving those passports. A cog. And yet, something about her involvement may have cost her her life.
“You’ve given me a lot to think about,” I said.
“Leave thinking to the detectives. I only mean this as friendly advice, you know. I’ve been waiting a long time for a promotion, and do you know why?”
I had a few guesses, but none that he’d want to hear. “Why?”
“Because sometimes I seem a little ambitious. The brass don’t always like that.”
“Sergeant Donnelly seems to trust you.”
He raised his hands. “There again—maybe I come across like I’m in Donnelly’s pocket. So Donnelly doesn’t want to show favorites by putting me forward for anything. See what I mean?”
“It’s very considerate of you to warn me of possible missteps.”
His long face broke out in a grin. “You’re a nice girl. No reason we shouldn’t be pals.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Just think about it,” he advised. “Go easy on these questions about Ruthie. Last thing men around here want is pushy policewomen telling ’em how to do their jobs.”
He patted my arm, nearly earning a reflexive swat. But I nodded instead, and we parted amicably. Had he really been imparting collegial advice, or was that his awkward method of flirtation? Or maybe there was something else entirely going on. His eavesdropping couldn’t be denied. My suspicion that Leonard Cain had a spy in the precinct rose another notch.
* * *
That evening I stopped by my aunt’s. Discovering she was out, I headed to the kitchen to see if I could beg something for dinner from Bernice. “I want to make something for Callie,” I explained. “She’s been working so hard.”
Bernice leveled a dry look on me. “You mean you want me to make something, and you to take all the credit.”
“No one appreciates your culinary genius more than we do, Bernice.”
She wasn’t impressed by flattery. “You’re turning into an old scarecrow under those uniform rags of yours. Can’t you even bother to learn how to make yourself supper?”
“Who has the time?”
“If you haven’t got the time to learn how to feed yourself, you’ve got no business breathing air. You don’t have to slave over a stove. Get yourself a ham. Cut it up and cook yourself some vegetables. Any fool can do that.”
“Ham,” I repeated.
“Smoked ham. It’s the meat that keeps.”
I laughed. “You should go into magazine advertisements.”
She wasn’t amused. “Might as well. I’m wasting my breath with you.”
“Do I hear Louise?” my aunt called from inside the house.
In the next moment, she swept into her gleaming white kitchen, providing an eye-popping contrast in a blue silk crepe poplin dress with orange velvet insets at the neck and waist. Lace adorned her cuffs and fluttered when she raised her arms to embrace me. She’d obviously just come from the hairdresser; her curls looked almost as if they’d been shellacked in place. Circling the narrow hobble skirt of her dress were her two toy spaniels, just in from their walk. Walter had taken them out, Bernice had informed me when she and not he had met me at the door a few minutes earlier.
“Did you see what was delivered?” Aunt Irene asked, a light in her eyes.
“I haven’t been here long. I brought back the clothes Otto borrowed from Walter.” I didn’t mention my ulterior motive of cadging food.
My aunt bobbed with excitement. “You must come to the parlor.”
I let her lead me away, albeit not without casting a longing glance back at the pie Bernice had made, which she’d informed me was pear-apple. She’d just been preparing to slice off a healthy wedge for me.
“I’ll wrap some up,” she promised.
The assurance helped me focus on whatever it was that had Aunt Irene so excited. Her hands, still cold from being outside, held mine in a firm grip as she tugged me toward the parlor. When we arrived, she stopped before a beautifully carved rocking horse, two feet high, gleaming white with a red saddle and black bridle with gold-painted trim.
“Isn’t it wonderful?” Before I could answer, she followed up with the question, “Do you think he’ll like it?”
“Who?” I had two boy cousins back in Altoona, but they were in their teens now, far too old for a toy like this, exquisite as it was.
She blinked at me. “Who else? Eddie.”
I glanced back at the rocking horse, biting the inside of my cheek. “It’s . . . a little large for him, isn’t it? I mean, he’s just a baby.”
“Oh, but he’ll grow into it.” She gave the horse a tap on its flank that sent it rocking. “In the meantime, we can hold him while he sits on it.”
We?
Pleased, she folded her arms as she watched over the horse’s slowing movement. “It was the nicest one at FAO Schwarz’s toy bazaar. Walter and I were there for over an hour.”
My aunt and Walter at the children’s toy store was an image it would take a while to wrap my mind around.
I remembered something that had puzzled me a few days earlier. “Was it you who visited Eddie in the orphan’s hospital and took him such nice toys?”
Her eyes twinkled. “Did you see them?”
“Sister Mary Grace showed me.” I didn’t mention that her rattle had put mine in the shade. “That was very generous of you.”
She crossed to her sofa. Dickens and Trollope hopped up after her. “After you told me what had happened to that unfortunate woman, my heart when out to the poor little soul.”
“The sister told me that it was a couple who’d brought Eddie the toys.”
“Walter was with me. He was concerned for Eddie’s welfare, too. And Walter lives here, so he’ll feel the changes that come about almost as much as I will.”
I frowned. “Changes?”
“Concerning little Eddie.”
“How . . .” Understanding dawned. “Are you thinking of taking him in?”
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful?”
“Yes, but . . .” My mind reeled. Was this desire to help an orphaned baby sincere, or a mania like her interest in fortune-telling? Either way, I worried my aunt was getting her hopes up and not considering all the obstacles before her. “From what I’ve heard, the foundling hospital is particular about adoptions.”
My aunt’s face fell. “Do you think I would be a deficient candidate for adopting a baby? Am I too old? Am I not loving enough?”
“Not at all.” I rushed to her side, displacing a dog. My aunt had a heart as big as a mountain. But I knew so
mething of adoptions, even if I couldn’t tell her how much, and I doubted her path to becoming Eddie’s guardian would be smooth sailing. “Any child would be lucky to have you looking after him or her. But these hospitals . . . don’t they try to find married couples to adopt babies?”
She bridled at that. “Marriage—what does that mean? It means a man provides for his wife and children, but isn’t it always the woman who does the actual work of raising a child? Well, I am a woman, and I have a regular income of my own. I could be father and mother. And I have a nice home to offer him, and a brilliant future.”
I worried the hospital wouldn’t see it that way. Then again, if anyone could convince them, I was pretty sure Irene Livingston Green was that person.
“Besides,” she added, “Eddie’s not just any baby. How many couples are going to want a mute child? But I can provide him with a good life. What’s more, I want to.”
Where had this maternal instinct come from? “I never knew you wanted children.”
“I never did, either. But then you told me about Eddie, and I couldn’t stop thinking about him. I guess I hadn’t realized how alone I felt, especially since poor Ogden . . . went away.” Her friend, Ogden McChesney, was in jail. “Here I am, a successful woman, and yet I’ve lost my dearest friend, and though he was an old fool, I’ve found nothing to fill that void. Not really. Even a full house on Thursday evenings just makes the place seem emptier the rest of the week.”
“I had no idea you were feeling this way.”
“No reason you should. I’m no mope. I have a good life. But when I heard about Eddie I thought, there’s that boy alone in the city, an orphan, and here I am, a spinster writer with room to spare in my house and my heart. Ever since Walter and I went to see him, I haven’t been able to concentrate on anything else.” She gazed at me. “You’re young, and your ambitions are young, too. Perhaps you don’t understand what I’m feeling for that little boy.”
I understood more than she could ever know. An empty ache took up residence in my chest in moments of idleness, in the small hours of the morning when I couldn’t sleep, and on days that seemed like unavoidable traps now set throughout the calendar year—the anniversary of my leaving Altoona, or arriving in New York, or a child’s birthday I couldn’t acknowledge, much less celebrate. I understood, and I sympathized. And if my aunt’s dreams of adopting baby Eddie were realized, I would be happy for her.