Dreamland

by Nancy Bilyeau

  “I speak my mind, I speak my mind,” announced Mrs. Taul. “Whether it’s Connecticut or Colorado, everyone knows I speak my mind. I’m on the board of four charities, and I won’t be a silent source of cash. If they want my millions, they must listen!”

  “Mrs. Taul, what kind of treats do you have there?” asked my mother faintly. “They look so pretty.”

  “Bon-bons, Mrs. Batternberg. Bon-bons sent in the post from Paris. I had them brought out of the box for you to sample today.”

  But you couldn’t wait for us to arrive before stuffing a few in your mouth, I thought with disgust.

  Mrs. Taul ordered her maid to bring the bon-bons around, and then commanded her son to leave so she could speak to the women more frankly. She’d already been overly frank, in my opinion. For the first time this year, I was sorry to see Henry leave a room.

  “I want there to be no misunderstanding,” said Mrs. Taul. “I’m fully reconciled to this marriage, but I was not happy in the beginning. Mr. Hezekiah Taul gave the union his blessing, and I do not contradict my husband’s wishes, ever. He felt it would be providential for our Henry to wed a daughter of Israel. He believes it’s a fulfillment of prophecy.”

  How offensive. I couldn’t bring myself to look at Lydia or my mother. I could only stare at the thick carpet and try to think of some excuse – attack of illness? – to get me out of this room. “Bon-bons, Miss?” asked the maid, her voice just above a whisper. “No, thank you,” I said distractedly, but then thought I might as well eat one to distract myself and I tapped the maid on the wrist to swing back. I didn’t intend it, but I pulled on her white sleeve, and a dark blue and purple mottled bruise appeared just above her wrist.

  I gasped. The maid shook her head, her eyes a terrified appeal, as she pulled down her sleeve. She hurriedly placed two bon-bons on my plate before making her way to my mother and sister.

  That kind of bruise was caused by a nasty wrench from someone possessing strength. I stole a glance at Mrs. Taul, who was gesticulating with beefy ringed hands. A wave of outraged repulsion rippled through me.

  “The most important reason I needed to see you today was that I know you are fond of this hotel, and I’ve found the salt-water-wrap treatments beneficial for my circulation, but we must consider leaving the Oriental after I read the newspaper this morning. Victoria, hand me the paper.” Seconds later, Mrs. Taul thrust the front page before us: “Immigrant Arrested in Dancer’s Murder.”

  “A Serb! Can you believe this – there are Serbs on the same island as us. Do you know what Serbia is? The Powder keg of Europe. That’s what they call it! A country bogged down in century upon century of strife. As if it weren’t bad enough with all the Russians and the Italians and the Poles, the dregs of Europe ...” I closed my mind to her, using all my concentration, my methods refined from years of shutting out Batternberg conversation.

  I had to help Stefan, had to make someone believe that he could never have murdered Louise or any other woman. How could I do that, though, if by campaigning for his defense and release within my family I’d be condemning myself to a terrifying exile, a hospital for the insane?

  By finding the real murderer.

  Yes. It was the only possible way to clear his name. Why did someone murder Louise? To me, it seemed like an attempt to throw suspicion on Stefan. She was his former lover, and Stefan was already a suspect for the police. But why choose Hell Gate, somewhere so public, as the place to leave the body? It seemed to contain some strange meaning, just like choosing that specific place on the beach to murder that other girl, Katherine O’Malley. There was something incredibly disturbing about this, a link between the two deaths that had been nagging at me from the start.

  Sitting in the room of Mrs. Henry Taul, it came to me, like a messenger riding toward me, emerging from the darkest forest. Stefan and I were the link. In both places we’d kissed, and in both places a woman was found dead afterward, spiking Lieutenant Pellegrino’s suspicion of Stefan. It could be a coincidence. But my instincts told me it wasn’t. To kill Louise seemed to me an attempt to point a finger at Stefan… and at me, too. I thought of what Aunt Helen had said when she talked about why someone would drug me: “To punish or to prevent.”

  With a shudder of horror, I realized that if this were true, and someone wished to punish me through these murders, the killer could only be someone I knew well. Stefan thought a man followed us that first night. Was someone also following us during our ride through Hell Gate? I felt deeply uneasy at the thought of someone observing our kisses.

  Mrs. Taul’s voice had become so loud that she broke through my reverie. “The girls encourage everything they get in Coney Island. Those rides they go on are shameless. They dress like tarts.”

  I said, “So you’ve seen the girls in Coney Island, Mrs. Taul?”

  She rounded on me. “Can’t you see my health prevents me from venturing there – not that I would wish to be among them. My son tells me what he sees – and my servants. They are my eyes and ears. I know all about these girls leading men astray. Shameless. Why, I would bet that a fair number of them think that, even though they are stupid sluts, they deserve the right to vote, and yet—”

  “I support the suffrage movement,” Lydia said, interrupting her. “I believe that women are entitled to vote.”

  The time between Lydia’s declaration and my finding myself back in my room was not long. Mrs. Taul was dumbfounded. “I must rest – I need rest,” she sputtered. We took it as our cue to leave.

  On our walk back to our room, escorted by Henry, who did not know what Lydia said to his mother, I managed to squeeze my sister’s arm in support. I never knew she had political feelings for the suffrage movement – or anything else.

  In no time, Lydia had gotten away from Henry and our mother and was in my doorway, alone. “While you were gone yesterday, I spent some time here reading to make it look to others as if I were visiting you.” She stormed past me, headed for a table by my armchair. She picked up Town Topics, leafing through it frantically until she found the page she sought: “Saunterings.”

  “Oh, Lydia,” I said.

  “You knew?” she demanded. “You read that item and didn’t think to tell me?”

  “I couldn’t. I wasn’t completely sure.”

  “Well, I am sure,” she snapped. “It’s Henry.” Tears glittered, and her mouth trembled. I went to comfort her, but she waved me off.

  “Are you going to cancel the wedding?” I asked.

  She was silent for a moment. “I haven’t decided what to do, but when I do, it will be final and irrevocable.”

  At that moment no Batternberg had ever sounded tougher than my sister.

  “What about you?” she asked. “Something’s wrong. You’re acting funny and so is Uncle David.”

  I walked to the window. It was a brilliant sunny day, with waves merrily crashing and people walking on the promenade. A ferry steamed into the dock. It was quite possibly the most beautiful day since we came to the Oriental Hotel.

  “Uncle David was specific that if I talked to you about it, I’d suffer a fate worse than death, and I’m not being melodramatic.”

  Lydia shook her head impatiently. “Tell me. No one will know you did. I swear to you.”

  And so I told her about meeting Stefan in Dreamland and the woman murdered on the beach, and our going to the police, and seeing Stefan yesterday, and, finally, Louise’s killing. Watching her carefully, I told her that I was determined to clear Stefan by identifying the real murderer.

  She absorbed everything I said without a single question. A breeze wafted in the window, stirring the blonde ringlets cascading down the back of her frilly white dress.

  Lydia said calmly, “If the killer is someone else – and I agree with you that Stefan is innocent – it’s a person you know. Like Henry.”

  She took the most direct path to understanding the problem, like the way she slammed a croquet mallet with the utmost efficiency. If it were Henry Tau
l, her life would be turned inside-out. The whole country would be agog. In New York City, her reputation would be shattered beyond repair.

  I took a deep breath. “No matter what, Lydia, I have to find out who it is.”

  “Yes, you do,” said my sister. “We do.”

  My mouth fell open.

  “That’s right, Peggy. I’m going to help you.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  “Lydia,” I said, “if I agree to let you become involved, you need to know that, yes, I think the real killer could be someone I know here, but might not necessarily be Henry.”

  She stared at me, uncomprehendingly.

  I decided to also share with Lydia our Aunt Helen’s fear that someone put chloral hydrate in my Coca-Cola. “How horrible,” she said, truly shaken. When I added that Aunt Helen believed Ben was behind it, in order to rescue me and thus restore my trust in him, she protested. “But that’s madness.”

  “Yes, a form of it.”

  She grabbed my arm. “But if it could be him, could it be Paul?”

  “I fear that anything is possible, any of the men could be capable,” I said. “Our brother is the only one I’m sure is innocent.”

  “Oh, this is our family,” she whispered. Yes, we’d known them and lived among them, depended on them, all our lives, and yes, family meant everything. But not if a person was a killer.

  It is true that hours after my suspicions crystallized, I felt the same urge to deny this. Whenever I pictured any one of the men we knew best closing his hands around the throat of a helpless woman, my mind went blank. It didn’t seem possible in my heart. But in my head, I knew it was possible.

  My determination to clear Stefan drove me forward – but what drove Lydia? After a long time, she said, “If it’s one of them, then he must pay for it.”

  Ever since Lydia was a child, she had seen the world in black and white and insisted on adherence to rules. To her, rule breakers, no matter who, must be punished.

  We put our minds to this and worked it out that any of them – Henry, Uncle David, Ben, or Paul – had the opportunity to commit these crimes on the days or nights in question. None reported their whereabouts to us or to anyone; they were wealthy men on holiday, free to go wherever they pleased at any time. While we women were accountable: watched, even followed. This wasn’t going to be at all easy.

  How did the murderer get hold of Louise, Katherine O’Malley, and Beatrice Stompers, the first victim? I needed to understand Coney Island better to even begin to come up with a theory. It might have something to do with the Bowery, that street of dance halls, taverns, and clubs. It had a raciness, but other than that I knew nothing. Lieutenant Pellegrino specifically asked me if Stefan mentioned it. If only I could speak to someone who knew one of the women, and hopefully more than one. It seemed to me that the best person to talk to was Marta. She was young, but Stefan had told me she had great knowledge of Coney Island, and obviously she’d known Louise Turner well. I felt I could persuade Marta to help me, if by doing so she’d help Stefan.

  “Do you think we could figure out a way to sneak over to Dreamland this afternoon?” I asked.

  Lydia shook her head. “They’ll be expecting you to try something along those lines,” she said. “You have to get them to relax their guard, make Uncle David and Ben think you’re not going to make trouble.” She made a face. “The trouble is, anyone who knows you realizes that that’s fairly unlikely.”

  “Indeed.”

  Lydia stood up. “I should leave. I fear my being in your room for hours will create suspicion. I’ll try to figure out how we can both escape scrutiny the day after tomorrow for a couple of hours.”

  “That’s too long to wait! Stefan’s future is at stake.”

  She said, “So is yours. We can’t afford to make mistakes. And Peggy, you must be careful. It’s not only that you may have been drugged. Remember the night someone turned the doorknob in your hotel room?”

  Unfortunately, I did. Lydia was right. Yet I couldn’t sit here doing nothing, or I’d go as mad as the women confined in that hospital. An hour after she was gone, I picked up my parasol and hat and went for a walk on the promenade along the ocean, staying close to the Oriental Hotel. The sight of the waves up close didn’t frighten me, though neither was I prepared to swim again. Seagulls screamed above, couples with wicker baskets strolled by, children tossed their balls. But I could not relax. I searched the crowd for faces I knew, and every few minutes I whirled around to see if I was being followed.

  I finally abandoned the walk, my nerves in tatters. That night I ate dinner alone in my room, struggling to regain my courage for the challenges to come.

  Due to sheer exhaustion, I slept soundly, and I woke filled with a new determination to help Stefan. But the morning brought news that threw all our embryonic plans into disarray.

  “We will check out of the Oriental Hotel in five days’ time,” Mother came to tell me, Lydia at her side. “I’ve sent word to Arthur to reopen the house.”

  “Five days?” I cried.

  “Henry and his mother are adamant,” said Mother. “He went on at great length over dinner last night about the criminal element of Coney Island, and how his mother felt endangered by immigrants.” She sighed. “It was something of an ordeal.” For Mother, that was quite an admission.

  I’d come to Coney Island reluctantly, and I wondered now if the rest of my family had balked inwardly at a summer in Brooklyn but gone along to please Henry and his mother, both creatures driven by tyrannical whim. Now we must disperse because of their whim.

  Lydia said, “We are going to have to make the most of our holiday while we’re still here. That’s why I’d like Peggy to come with me to hear the musical program at the Manhattan Beach Hotel. It starts at two o’clock, but we will have to go over early to get the best seats for Sousa.”

  “Yes, please,” I said, guessing that Lydia had worked something out.

  “But Peggy, you don’t like Sousa,” said Mother, puzzled.

  “Oh, you’re wrong,” I said as convincingly as I could manage. “I am just mad about marching music these days.”

  It wasn’t until Lydia and I hurried along the pathway to the Manhattan Beach Hotel that she told me her full plan. We would meet the Campions and contrive to move as far into the dense audience seating as possible. Then, far from spying eyes, we’d make our way out the side door she knew of, and hurry past the Brighton Hotel on foot over to Coney Island. Before the concert was over, we’d return to be among the hotel audience as the program broke up.

  “Brilliant,” I cried.

  Her plan worked perfectly at first. We met the Campions, who gamely agreed to her whispered request to cover for us while we took care of some urgent secret business. The four of us made our way into the crowded music hall, one with a capacity for five hundred people. In no time, Lydia and I scurried out of the hotel. Now it was my turn to lead Lydia as we crossed from the east side to the west of the island, plunging into the heart of the amusement park.

  As soon as we paid the coin of admission to Dreamland, however, the plan’s weakness was exposed. Two uniformed police officers stood just inside the turnstiles. Neither was Lieutenant Pellegrino or Detective Devlin, but I turned my head and spoke gibberish to my sister as we walked briskly toward the first major attraction inside Dreamland. “Are they following us?” I asked my sister. She glanced over her shoulder and assured me they weren’t.

  Another obstacle lay ahead. Not two but three police officers stood outside the Art Building. Marta might very well be inside, standing guard over Stefan’s paintings, but it was madness to seek her out now. Quite a few of the officers got a good look at me at me just two days ago

  “Maybe they’ll move on,” I said to Lydia, desperately. “Let’s wait and see.”

  The minutes ticked by; Lydia scrutinized all the nearby attractions with interest, for she’d never set foot in Dreamland or any other part of the amusement park. She laughed with delight whe
n Little Hip the elephant lumbered past us. She was most taken with the Infant Incubator Hall, and I told her what Stefan told me, that a real physician, one named Dr. Couney, performed medical miracles by keeping prematurely born infants alive in incubators. The rescued babies were on display inside.

  To my frustration, all the time that we talked, the police showed no interest in moving on. I checked the timepiece I’d brought. The one-hour mark was approaching, half the time that we could safely be away from the Manhattan Beach Hotel. We’d accomplished nothing.

  Giving up on the Art Building, I said, “There’s one other place I might find Marta – we have to try it.” I led Lydia to the steel pier where Stefan had once taken me. My heart leaped when I saw the blonde girl I sought – Marta – along with her brother, Wiktor, stacking boxes of buns.

  “I’m so glad to find you,” I said to the siblings, out of breath. “I need your help.”

  Wiktor looked from me to Lydia, shaking his head. “You need help?” he said. “I say Stefan is one who needs help.”

  “Yes, I agree,” I said. “I’m trying to find out who really killed Louise, and the others. But in order to do so, I need to obtain some information. I must ask you some questions.”

  Wiktor waved me off with a flurry of hands. “The police talk to us for hours and hours last night. Some questions about you. If not for you, none of this ever happen, I think.”

  Feeling hurt by his dislike and blame, I glanced at Marta. Her light blue eyes, set within that narrow face, gave none of her feelings away.

  Wiktor put on a hat, pulled down the sleeves of his jacket. “I go to jail now, request to see Stefan as visitor,” he said. “These first days, I fear what other men in jail may do to him.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, panicked. “Isn’t he safe from other men in a jail?”

  Wiktor shook his head again, disgusted, and left, walking back toward the center of Coney Island. If I could, I would have gone with him, demanded and pleaded with Lieutenant Pellegrino to ensure that Stefan was well protected. But I could not go anywhere near the jail.