by Scott Mackay
She blushed. ‘Of course, Mr President.’
Roosevelt gestured toward the East Room entryway. ‘Clyde?’
We left.
A servant in a black swallowtail coat followed to attend. We walked down the hall and soon found ourselves in the Red Room.
I could see at a glance that Theodore’s architect had moved the mantels from the State Dining Room to the Red Room, and had hung the walls with burgundy wallpaper instead of the more traditional crimson. Nothing stayed the same, I thought. McKinley dead, Theodore president, and the Red Room redecorated. I complimented the president on his improvements, to which he said, ‘Edith will have her way with the place.’ Then we sat on a red and gold sofa. The servant brought us drinks and retreated to the corridor so we could talk in private.
‘You say I saw a murder, Clyde. That’s interesting. I’ve always prided myself on my memory, but I honestly can’t say I remember witnessing this particular crime.’
‘Theodore, you might recall a flask.’
His eyes narrowed and a more serious set came to his face. ‘A flask, you say. I’m not much of a drinking man, but I have to tell you, I remember many flasks. I find they make good presentation articles, especially where the military is concerned.’
I raised my finger. ‘And that, Theodore, is precisely the species of flask I’m talking about. You presented this particular flask in 1895, while you were still the President of the Board of New York City Police Commissioners. It was given to a veteran of the Civil War, a Union Army regular by the name of Isaac Jensen, at a Grand Army of the Republic reunion. This would have been at Post 327, in Brooklyn. The Grant Post?’
He thought for several moments. ‘Ah, yes. It’s coming back to me. I remember the occasion. I’ve been to that post many times.’
‘No one has yet been able to give me a definitive description of the flask. One witness says it has an engraving of Abraham Lincoln on it. Another says it has one of Ulysses S. Grant.’ I now went into the details of how and why the flask was important, and how it had become a vital if confusing clue in the murder of Ephraim Purcell. ‘I would like to search Jensen’s rooms above his hat shop, and I must do so quickly because he and his family will be removing themselves to Elmira soon to start a new business venture. But before I do, I need an accurate description. As you’re the one who gave it to him, I’m hoping you might remember what it looked like.’
The president grinned. ‘I can remember precisely what it looked like, Clyde. I ordered those flasks by the gross. Except for the personalized inscriptions, they were all the same. On one side was engraved the face of Abraham Lincoln, and on the other was the motto: Where Liberty Dwells, There is My Country.’
I was relieved. At least I had something concrete to go on now.
We discussed the flask and the murder for a few more minutes, me letting Theodore know my intent to have Judge Norris sign a court order so I could search the Jensen premises, the president wistfully longing for his police work days of the mid-1890s.
He then turned his attention to a more delicate matter. ‘What happened to Miss Wade? The way you talked about her at Sagamore Hill last summer, I thought you would have been married to her by now.’
I hesitated. ‘The pressures of establishing my practice in Fairfield used up a great deal of my time. And it’s taken Miss Wade and I a while to bridge our differences since her summer romance with the junior assemblyman from Albany.’
Theodore stared at me. He shook his head as if he were disappointed in me. ‘Clyde, there’s a special resonance that comes to a man’s voice when he’s profoundly in love. I know that sound because I heard it in my own voice when I met Edith. And I heard it in your voice when you spoke of Olive Wade last summer. Now you come to my Christmas party with Miss Gregsby?’
‘Yes.’
‘But you don’t have the same tone when you speak of Miss Gregsby. I see that you have no serious intentions toward her.’
‘I don’t, Theodore. These were special circumstances.’ I told him about Henny and the Booths. ‘So you see, all I was trying to do was be kind to her. And I thought by bringing her to Washington, it would be an excellent opportunity to broaden her horizons.’
‘Yes, but there’s a difference between kindness and giving false hope. And so I’m more concerned about Miss Gregsby than I am about Miss Wade.’
I now grew even more sensible to the unasked-for part Henny unwittingly had played in the battle I seemed to be waging with Olive. I felt small, and even ashamed. I cursed myself for my own blindness, and was humbled that, in part, it was the President of the United States who was opening my eyes.
Theodore squinted at me through his oval spectacles. ‘Miss Gregsby loves you. I can see it in her eyes. And that’s a pity, because love is a terrible thing to disappoint in an American so young. And so is hope. But disappoint them you must. Do you have any idea of the extent of the injury?’
For several seconds, I couldn’t speak. ‘Theodore, I admit, I’ve been rather a bumble-brain about the whole thing.’ I then explained my confused feelings about Olive Wade, about Everett Howse and the Bostonian, and about my lingering grief for Emily and how it had been exacerbated by Miss Gregsby’s arrival in Fairfield. ‘I didn’t realize what I’d gotten myself into until I was halfway up the hill.’
The president now grew reflective. ‘A young woman who’s suffered a recent loss is bound to be susceptible, Clyde. She’s desperate to belong to someone. And if the way she was looking at you at dinner was any indication, she believes she belongs to you. So now the question arises, what do you do about it?’ The president shook his head. ‘By Jove, Clyde, I don’t think you’ve done this much damage since you took out that artillery position on San Juan Hill. With that hill, you had to keep going. But with this hill, I think it’s time to turn around and come back down. And do it as gently as you can.’
When Henny and I got back to the hotel that night, and I delivered her to her door, she lingered in the soft electric lamp light of the corridor, her hat still on her head, her shawl around her shoulders. She looked up at me with shy eyes. I could see the president was right, that I had foolishly misled her without knowing it. I wanted above all to do the right thing. Her eyes filled with tears. I don’t know whether they were happy tears or sad tears; whether she still had hope or if she knew it had to end. One way or the other, they were tears of need.
I cursed myself for allowing this to happen – the last thing I wanted was to hurt Henny. Yet I could see what she needed. To be embraced, if only for tonight. To be shown that she still belonged to the world. And so, as I tried to do the right thing, I opened my arms and did the wrong thing. She came to me. She pressed her cheek against my chest. I closed my arms around her. And I held her near simply to reassure her, and to make her understand that she wasn’t by herself.
I could sense that for the first time since Martin Booth had walked into Lake Ontario, she felt safe.
As for myself, I felt like Martin Booth – that I was in too far over my head.
TWENTY
Upon my return to Fairfield, the sheriff and I gathered Deputies Putsey, Donal, and Mulroy, and rode posse-style to Jensen’s Hat Shop.
Much to my dismay, I saw that the curtains were shut and that there was a big sign in the window that said, ‘CLOSED. WILL REOPEN MONDAY.’
‘You reckon he’s running?’ asked Stanley.
I got off Pythagoras, tied her to the hitching post, climbed the wooden steps to the plank sidewalk, and peered through a crack in the curtains. The shop was dark, but I saw a light on in the back. The sheriff and the other deputies got off their horses and climbed to the boardwalk. I moved away from the window, went to the door, and rapped.
At first nobody came, so I rapped again.
After a minute, I saw the Jensen household maid, Sally Snell, appear. She was one of my patients, a short stocky young woman of twenty-one. My search party ranged themselves behind me. As the maid spied me through the glass, her lips
tightened, her eyes widened, and her face flushed. She gathered up her skirt and hurried forward. Reaching the threshold, she turned the bolt, then the knob, and pulled the door open.
‘Dr Deacon? Did you not read the sign?’
‘Merry Christmas, Sally. Is the family not at home?’
She looked past my shoulder and saw the sheriff and the deputies. ‘They’re in Elmira. They’ve settled on a property and they’ve all gone down to have a look at it.’
‘And so they’ll be back on Monday?’
‘Yes.’
‘Even Mr Jensen?’
Her eyes widened, and I could see that she was confused by my distinction. ‘Yes.’ She glanced at the posse – grim-faced men armed with rifles and shotguns – then turned back to me. ‘Is it hats you want?’
I pulled out my court order. ‘We have a warrant from Judge Norris to search the premises.’
Two spots of crimson climbed into her cheeks and she looked as surprised as new spring corn after a May snowfall. ‘What for?’
‘In connection to the murder of Ephraim Purcell.’
Bless her loyal heart, she took the order and read it carefully, a frown coming to her face. At last she looked at me, as feisty as a sparrow protecting a bread crumb. ‘Try not to muss the place too much. Mrs Jensen and I spent hours cleaning it for Christmas.’
‘Perhaps you might help us, then, Sally?’
Her brow arched. ‘How?’
‘We’re looking for one item in particular. A flask.’
‘Oh. Well, now. Mr Jensen has a whole collection of them in his study on the second floor. He must have twenty-five.’
‘And are you responsible for dusting those?’
‘Oh, no, sir. Mr Jensen’s very particular about his flask collection. He dusts them himself.’
‘I see.’ I thought for a moment. ‘Do you recall seeing a silver flask with a portrait of Abraham Lincoln on it?’
She hesitated. ‘I’ve never seen one like that, no, sir.’
‘Very well, Sally. If you would let us pass.’
She moved out of the way. ‘Mind you wipe your feet.’
We filed in one after the other, dutifully wiping our shoes and tipping our hats in nervous greeting like cowed schoolboys.
I then gave orders. ‘Putsey and Donal, you take the third floor. The sheriff and I will search the second. Mulroy, you check the shop.’
We split up.
Stanley and I climbed the stairs and entered Jensen’s study at the front of the building. We went through his flask collection.
He had all manner of flasks – silver ones, glass ones, even a specimen fashioned out of an antelope horn. Nowhere could we find a flask with a portrait of Lincoln on it.
We did, however, discover an ornamented pine keepsake box that was of some pertinence to the case.
We opened it and saw the kind of mementoes a woman might bestow upon a favoured gentleman: a garter, a hairpin, and several photographs. The earliest of these photographs was dated 1867, and was of the daguerreotype variety, while the latest was from 1901, courtesy of Eastman Kodak. I looked on the back of the 1901 photograph and saw a name: Hattie Whitmore, the same woman Jensen and Purcell had fought over when they had been in business school in New York years ago. I looked at an 1875 photograph of the same woman. She was beautiful in this one, had a cascade of curly brown hair, skin that was like the light of the moon, and a bewitching grin as hypnotizing as da Vinci’s Mona Lisa.
Then there was a stack of letters, some yellowed with age, others as new as last month.
I turned to Stanley. ‘Looks like Jensen has remained in contact with Hattie Whitmore.’
We took the box and contents into evidence, then checked the window ledges for any signs of rifle-fire, powder burns, or other ballistics matter; but, as Sally Snell had said, the place had been scrubbed clean for Christmas, and we found no firearms clues.
Just as I was despairing that the whisky flask was nothing but a big red herring sent to mislead us (we still couldn’t reconcile the wound angle with the flask robbery), we heard Raymond Putsey calling us from the third floor. ‘Sheriff? Deputy? I think I found something.’
We moved out into the corridor.
Ray came clumping down the third-floor stairs. He had in his hand a silver flask. As he came towards us he presented the piece, raising it in his hand, holding it between his thumb and fingers. ‘It’s got a picture of Abe Lincoln on it. That’s the one you’re looking for, right?’
The young deputy surrendered the flask to me. Lincoln, intaglio, stared at me with kind steadiness from the sterling silver surface. On the other side I found the words: Where Liberty Dwells, There is My Country. Included also was a personalized inscription: ‘To Private Isaac Jensen, presented for bravery in the line of duty, Friday, September 20, 1895, by Theodore Roosevelt, President of the Board of New York Police Commissioners, Grant Post, GAR, Brooklyn, New York.’
I looked at Putsey. ‘Where’d you’d find it?’
He pointed up the stairs. ‘There’s a crawlspace on the third floor.’
I nodded and turned to Stanley. ‘I guess we wait till Isaac comes back.’
Stanley was doubtful. ‘If he comes back.’
I had my own concerns, and a moment later, the sheriff picked up on them.
‘Clyde? You all right?’
‘I’m just thinking of the wound angle again.’
Stanley thought about it. ‘I know. It doesn’t make sense.’
That night, I read through Hattie Whitmore’s correspondence to see if I could find clues and background to the unfortunate triangle between herself, Jensen, and Purcell. There was no return address on any of the letters, perhaps for discretion’s sake.
Even upon a first reading, I could tell that Hattie was still deeply in love with Isaac. In a letter dated as recently as March of this year, she made a plea, apparently for the hundredth time: leave Tilda and come live with her in Manhattan.
Then I came upon incriminating lines in a letter written just two weeks prior to Purcell’s murder, ones that made me grip the missive more tightly and lean forward: ‘I don’t blame you for wanting to kill Ephraim, dearest Isaac. He is a snake. And after the way he trespassed against me during his recent visit to Manhattan, he certainly deserves to see the dark interior of a penitentiary for many years. Is it right that we take matters into our own hands and mete out the punishment he so justly deserves? Only God can judge.’
I let the letter sink to my lap. Out the window, I heard a group of carollers singing ‘Joy to the World’ on Culver Street.
I now had a mind to go over to the Sheriff’s Office and release Billy Fray from jail, no questions asked, for it seemed the burden of guilt was shifting in significant ways toward other suspects.
TWENTY-ONE
That night, a blizzard moved in, and wind and snow howled around the surgery. The drive got buried deep. The temperature plummeted.
I was just going out to make sure the stove was still lit in the stable so Pythagoras and Archimedes wouldn’t freeze, and to make certain that their horse blankets hadn’t come off, when, out on Culver Street, I saw a sledge pulled by a team of two turn up my drive, its lantern blurred by the wind-driven snow.
I turned from the stable and walked down the drive, surmising I was faced with a medical emergency.
I raised my kerosene lantern so whoever was driving would see me. ‘Hallo, there!’
I now saw young Clarence Swinford and Mrs Cora Wiley, the druggist’s wife, sitting on the driver’s box. Mrs Wiley looked distressed, her features drawn, her eyes wide with anxiety. Clarence’s face was no better; he was pale with fear.
In a high fretful voice, Cora Wiley said, ‘Doctor, Mrs Swinford’s been injured in a most horrible way.’
I took a few more steps toward the sledge. ‘What’s happened?’
‘She’s been shot!’ cried Clarence. ‘You gotta help her, doc! She’s lost a lot of blood!’
I took a moment to assimil
ate this information, then left off being a doctor and became a deputy. ‘Who shot her?’
Clarence jerked on the reins and brought the horses to a stop. ‘I did, doc. I went out hunting rabbit, and when I got back, I guess I forgot I had a round in the chamber. I was putting my rifle on the table, and somehow the dang thing went off and got my ma right in the shoulder while she was sitting there sewing my pa’s britches.’
So, an accident. I dismissed the deputy and became fully a doctor again. But it was rather odd that here were the Swinfords again, again involved in a life-and-death situation. The weight of their possible involvement in the Purcell case hovered in my consciousness.
The sledge was of the market-wagon variety, used for heavy winter farm work. I moved to the back where I saw Albert Swinford kneeling over his wife. ‘Mr Swinford? Is she all right?’
He turned, his expression grim, a notch away from irritable, and gave me a gruff nod. ‘Sorry to trouble you so late, doc, but I’m afraid we’ve had a shooting accident. We went to Doc Thorensen’s place – he’s our reg’lar doctor – but it looks like he’s going to be gone a spell.’
‘How badly hurt is she?’
‘She ain’t dead yet.’ A catch came to his voice. ‘But pretty darn close.’
‘All right. Let’s bring her inside. I’ll get the stretcher.’
‘Much obliged, doc.’
I quickly had Munroe and Henny out of their beds, and soon had the patient on the exam table.
I then banished everybody but Henny.
I studied Mrs Swinford as Henny first took away the homemade bandages, then snipped away the woman’s shirtwaist, and finally her chemise. She was roughly forty, with sandy hair pinned up in a mound on top of her head. She was a pretty woman for her age, with a fine nose and lips, but lines here and there that spoke of a hard life. She looked at me, and tears came. I could see that there was a lot more hurting going on than just the bullet wound to her shoulder. I detected deep shame in her eyes.