by Amy Stewart
The Warren sat on a narrow street populated by saloons and dingy dance halls. Most of the doors along the block stood open despite the cold. I resisted the urge to look into the gaping doorways as I hurried by.
A sign in the Warren’s window advertised vacant rooms for men. I stepped into a small carpeted vestibule that accommodated only one person at a time. There was an odor of sulfur candles so strong that I had to bring my handkerchief to my nose. I took it to mean that bed bugs were being driven from the place and I hoped the effort had been successful. I stood a little taller to keep my hems from dragging on the ground.
Directly in front of me—for there was nowhere else to look—the reception window slid open to reveal an old man with an enormous red nose and an array of blue veins across his forehead. He pointed a polished wooden ear trumpet in my direction.
“I am here to see Alfonso Youngman,” I said, speaking slowly and distinctly into the trumpet.
“Any young man?” the old man shouted. “We’ve got a few dozen of them. What are you after?”
“That’s his name,” I said, louder than before. “Youngman. First name Alfonso.”
The old man dropped the horn. “Him? He went out feet first.”
“Do you mean that he’s dead?”
He didn’t need his horn to understand the question. “Hung himself from the steam pipe. Made a damn mess.”
“Can you tell me when it happened?”
The man shook his head and presented the horn again.
“When did Mr. Youngman die?”
“Just last month. Haven’t been able to rent that room since. Nobody wants to go near it.”
“Do you know why he did it?” I shouted into the horn.
“A girl. Name of Bea, something like that.”
“May I see the room?”
The old man grinned, revealing a yellowed set of vulcanite teeth. “You can rent the room,” he hollered, “as long as you’re a man and you have two dollars.”
I handed him four dollars and got a key.
Alfonso Youngman had lived at the end of the hall on the third floor in a room that looked out over the street. It was small and shabby, outfitted only with a metal bed, a wooden chair, and a small table and dresser. There was a tiny triangle-shaped sink wedged into the corner. The walls were papered in a faded pattern of brown acanthus and the floor was bare wood, although an accumulation of dust around the edges suggested that a carpet had been lifted up and hauled away. There was a fire insurance calendar from 1913 hanging on a nail, and two chipped plates on the table.
I slid open the drawers in the dresser, releasing the odor of moth balls, and closed them again. If Alfonso Youngman had any possessions, they had been taken away.
Finding nothing of any use, I stood in the corner and looked up at the bent steam pipe above me. There was a seam where it had been broken and welded back together.
CARRIE HAD JUST RETURNED from her parade when I got back to the hotel. As Ruth predicted, she was delighted to take up the search for Beatrice Fuller. We divided the city directories and sat in the telephone booths on our respective floors, ringing all the Fullers. One of her colleagues at the newspaper looked through the indexes and called any Fullers listed, the idea being that if the family was wealthy, they were also prominent enough to have been mentioned in the paper.
We took our supper together in Carrie’s room. “Why don’t you just ask the sheriff how to find Beatrice Fuller?” Carrie said as she blew on her soup.
“I—there’s been some difficulty with the sheriff. I don’t know where things stand with him at the moment.”
She put her spoon down and dabbed at her lips. “There’s more to the story of the sheriff and the escaped prisoner than you’ve let on. Why don’t you tell me the rest of it?”
“Are you going to write about it in the paper if I do?”
“Of course. I’m a reporter. That’s what we do. You ought to remember that, in your line of work. Everything you tell us will go in the paper.”
“Then I’m going back to my calls.”
It was the girl in the newsroom who finally hunted down Beatrice Fuller’s parents and telephoned, at around eight o’clock, to tell us about it. The Fullers didn’t want to see me, but the girl was apparently quite good on the telephone and made it sound as if they hadn’t any choice in the matter.
“She said it was an official call and that you’d be right over,” Carrie told me. “I only wish I had a sketch artist in my pocket.”
“It isn’t a night for sketching or for reporting,” I said, although going out at night to question the Fullers did have a sense of occasion about it. I’d already taken off my boots and loosened my dress, but I put myself together, gave Carrie my thanks, and ran downstairs for a taxicab.
The Fullers lived across town in a building of peach-colored stone with a wide green awning over the door. There were lights blazing in all the windows and a bit of laughter and cigarette smoke drifting down from a half-open window next door.
A maid stood waiting for me just inside the door. When I gave my name she looked down at my hands, expecting me to present a card. I mumbled that I hadn’t any but that I would give my particulars to the Fullers when I saw them. This must have sufficed, because she ushered me up a set of wide and elegant stairs, draped in a ribbon of carpet held in place with brass rods that looked like they were polished once a week. We arrived at a heavy oak door on the second floor. She held it open, announcing me as Miss Constance, and left me to make my way.
Inside was a little parlor, where Mr. and Mrs. Fuller were seated in deep stuffed chairs by the fire. They stood when they saw me and I was surprised to see that they were far older than I’d expected. Mrs. Fuller was one of those extraordinary women who aged much more beautifully than anyone else, so that even at the age of seventy or so, the young girl she’d once been was very much alive in her eyes and in her smile. Her hair was entirely white and as fine as corn silk, and she swept it into one of those smooth buns favored by European aristocrats. She wore a velvet evening dress that would have impressed Fleurette and seemed far too formal for a night at home.
Mr. Fuller was exactly her height—they were a charmingly compact couple, like one of those joined pairs of ceramic figurines—and he, too, was dressed for a night out, except that he’d exchanged his topcoat for an evening jacket as men of his class did at home. He wore a monocle and a silver mustache that curved up mischievously at the ends. I couldn’t help but think that someone should paint their portrait and sell it on postcards.
“I’m sorry to disturb you at this hour. It’s an urgent matter and I hope that you or Miss Beatrice might be of some help.”
A look passed between the two of them and they invited me to sit down. I perched on the edge of the settee. They took the two chairs across from it.
“We weren’t expecting a lady,” Mrs. Fuller said. “You didn’t come on your own, did you, dear?”
“Because there’s a young girl involved, the sheriff thought I should make the inquiries.”
“Sheriff? The girl from the newspaper wouldn’t tell us what this was about,” Mr. Fuller said, “but we don’t wish to have our names mixed up in any trouble.”
“You won’t,” I said hastily, and told them about von Matthesius’s escape, which they’d read about in the papers, and how my search for him had led me to them.
“Well, we aren’t hiding him here!” Mr. Fuller said with a nervous laugh.
“Of course not. I only wonder if you’ve any idea about his associates. Or could I speak to Beatrice? Is she at home?”
After another glance between them, Mrs. Fuller said, “Our granddaughter is under very good care in California. Her doctors hope to return her to us by summer. She isn’t to speak of that time and she certainly shouldn’t answer questions from the sheriff about it.”
I could tell from her tone that she wouldn’t tolerate many more questions. “Mrs. Fuller, we only want to see the man captured and put away again.
If Beatrice mentioned any names to you, it might give us some idea of where he’s gone.”
“The only one she ever talked about was that Youngman fellow,” Mr. Fuller blurted out, earning a sharp stare from his wife. “That’s why we sent her out West. I was starting to think she was going to marry that boy.”
I tried to proceed carefully, as I knew so little about what had happened. “From what I’ve heard, Alfonso Youngman tried to save Beatrice, and to put a stop to . . . to what was being done.”
“And he’s a very brave boy for that,” Mrs. Fuller put in, “but it doesn’t give him license to write letters and to keep trying to call on her. She’s in a very delicate state and it was wrong of him to take advantage of the gratitude we all expressed at the time.”
They didn’t know he was dead. But how could they?
“Apparently Mr. Youngman was in a delicate state himself,” I said, as gently as I could. “He was found dead in his room a month ago. I’m sorry to say that it was suicide.”
Mrs. Fuller gasped and sat back in her chair. Mr. Fuller went and stood behind her. “If that’s true, Miss Kopp, then it’s another tragedy in a long string of them caused by this von Matthesius. I wish we’d never met him. I’ve still a mind to sue Dr. Rathburn. Someone’s got to stop him.”
“Rathburn?” I said.
Mr. Fuller helped his wife to her feet and it was clear that our visit was over. As we walked to the door he said, “It was Dr. Rathburn who was so insistent that we send our Beatrice to Rutherford for treatment. They were running this scheme together. My granddaughter meant so little to either of them that they were both trying to extort money from us over her care, and that’s to say nothing of what must have happened to the girl when she was too drugged to remember. I hope she never remembers. You tell the sheriff to lock both of them up for good this time.”
14
IT WAS BLUSTERY out on Fifth Avenue the next morning, with a bite in the air that hinted at snow. I pushed my way uptown past the hordes of shoppers and sightseers that always made this stretch of the avenue impassable. At several of the dress shops along the avenue the tailors had declared a strike and stood out on the sidewalk with placards. Their measuring tapes hung around their necks and tended to blow off in the wind. The young women employed as their assistants passed out leaflets and those, too, scattered in the street and flew in the faces of passers-by.
A blister worked at my heel, the consequence of being out in the rain and mud all week. Even my sturdiest pair of boots wasn’t serving me particularly well. I gritted my teeth against the pain and forced myself not to limp as I turned down Fifty-Fifth Street and counted the addresses over to Dr. Milton Rathburn’s office.
The Fullers had given me my last chance. If this doctor knew anything about von Matthesius, I might have another lead to follow. Without it, I had nothing. I could stay in New York and wait around train stations and ferry docks hoping to catch sight of him, or I could go home and face whatever was to come. I didn’t want to think what that might be. I couldn’t imagine waking up every morning knowing that Sheriff Heath was behind bars. I bent my head down against the wind and told myself that I simply wouldn’t leave without shaking something out of Dr. Rathburn.
He kept his medical practice on the third floor of a stone building that might have once been white, but looked now as though it had been scrubbed in charcoal. The door was unlocked and in the foyer I found a directory listing all the offices in the building, most of which belonged to doctors, dentists, and oculists. I climbed the stairs to the third floor and found Dr. Rathburn’s door open. A serious-looking, dark-haired girl sat behind a desk. Her hands were folded in front of her as if she’d been waiting for me.
“I’m here to see Dr. Rathburn,” I said. “I don’t have an appointment but wish only to ask him a question.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, ma’am.” She flipped through an appointment book on her desk with the end of a pencil. “The doctor is very busy today. Let me arrange a time for you.”
“I’m only here to ask a question,” I repeated. “It’s a private matter.”
She looked up at me and raised two fine lines on an otherwise unlined forehead. “He isn’t here.”
“Then I suppose I’ll wait.”
“I don’t know when he might be in.”
“I haven’t any other business today. I’ll wait.”
I read the newspaper in the little waiting room, then read it again, and picked up a magazine someone had left behind. The receptionist shuffled papers on her desk and tried to look busy. It was well after noon before Dr. Rathburn appeared. I’d grown so numb from sitting that I felt a little dizzy when I stood to speak to him.
He looked so absurdly the part of the mad doctor that I would have believed he was an actor playing the role. His black hair stood up in stiff clumps, pointing out at all angles like so many devil’s horns. He wore thick tortoise-shell glasses and an expression of perpetual surprise that came from eyebrows shaped like mountain peaks. He carried with him a rumpled tweed overcoat, not the white smock of a modern doctor.
“I thought I didn’t have anyone this morning,” he mumbled, looking down at the appointment book.
“You don’t,” she said. “Only this lady wants to speak to you. She insisted on waiting.”
“I’m here on behalf of my employer,” I said quickly, “and he wishes to know more about your treatments. He’s quite prominent and wants assurances of privacy.”
The doctor sighed and ran a hand through his hair in an unsuccessful attempt to settle it down. “They’re all prominent,” he said, a bit wearily.
“If I could just have a moment.”
He nodded and held open the door to his office. I followed him into a luxuriously appointed room, with tall windows, a grand electric chandelier suspended from the ceiling, leather chairs, and an enormous polished desk. It was a room intended to give people the expectation that they’d be parting with a great deal of money.
I’d prepared a simple story for Dr. Rathburn, thinking only that I should find out more about the sort of business he conducted before inquiring directly about von Matthesius.
“As I explained, my employer insists upon complete discretion. He learned about your services when his sister was treated at a sanitarium in New Jersey. I’ve forgotten the name of the doctor, but you must know him because he spoke so highly of you. It was a German name—how silly of me to have forgotten it.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Dr. Rathburn drummed his fingers on the desk blotter. “I correspond with colleagues all over the country. Many of them have sent patients to me, and it’s not uncommon for me to recommend a patient to any number of sanitariums outside the city where they may be treated with discretion. Please assure your employer that we offer the most modern treatments for any sort of nervous condition, and no one need ever know.”
He pushed his chair back to suggest that the interview was over, then cocked his head and scrutinized me over the rim of his eyeglasses. “In what capacity are you employed with this man?”
“I started as his wife’s social secretary, and now I oversee all of their engagements and manage the household staff. Sometimes I handle more delicate matters as well.”
“And would your employer be satisfied with the arrangements?” He said it with fatigue in his voice. The rich must have been tedious for him, even as they paid him so handsomely.
I smiled brightly at him. “I’m sure he would. You’ll be hearing from him.”
He swept his arm toward the door and followed me back out to the front room, where the receptionist sat with her hands folded on her desk, just as she had been when I first arrived.
I thanked her for her help and tried to maintain the posture of the socialite’s secretary. As I turned to go, I said to the doctor—casually, as if I’d only just thought of it—“You know, I think that sanitarium was in Rutherford. Are you sure you don’t know a man up there? Von Matheson, a name like that?”
He might hav
e flinched when I said it, or it could have been a speck of dust in his eye.
UNTIL I MET DR. RATHBURN, I’d been plagued by an uncomfortable suspicion that I should have never taken Henri LaMotte’s advice. How would I ever find von Matthesius if I avoided the very places he was most likely to turn up—at his brother’s apartment, at a train station, at any of the other places Sheriff Heath might have been watching at that very moment? Instead I’d been making inquiries of people who didn’t want to talk to me. I’d turned up heartbreak and terrible secrets but they gave me no ideas about where von Matthesius might be hiding.
But there was something in the air at that office, something that told me I was getting close. It was the first time I had lied to anyone in the course of my investigation. It was the first time I hadn’t stated plainly whom I was looking for and why I was looking for him. It was the first time I’d given into the electric thrill of my own instincts and followed where they led me.
And it was nothing but instinct that kept me in the hall after I left Dr. Rathburn’s office.
His door had a frosted glass pane that let in a little light and let out quite a bit of sound. I stood next to it, pressed against the wall, and listened.
“Telephone over to Murray’s and get Mr. Kyne on the line,” he was saying to his receptionist.
I heard her ask the operator, and then there was a little tapping sound, as if someone were fidgeting with a pencil.
After a bit of a wait the receptionist said, “It’s Dr. Rathburn for Mr. Kyne.” There was another long pause in which I could hear them mumbling to one another but couldn’t make out what they were saying. At last Dr. Rathburn’s voice boomed into the telephone, “Pat? It’s Milt. Has your cloakroom girl got anything for me? Yes, I’ll hold the line.”
The receptionist said something that I couldn’t hear, and then the man came back on the line. “Are you quite certain, Pat?” he shouted. “It would’ve been a fellow named Felix von Matthesius. Same one as last time. He hasn’t been by? All right, I’ll send my girl over.”