Downtime
Page 5
“We believe you,” Derry said quietly.
I checked a sigh. It was tough to get through to people who needed to believe this kind of thing was real. They might catch on eventually that they were being taken advantage of by two men they called friend, but I wasn’t going to persuade them it was a con, not in the little time left to me here. They didn’t know me or trust me the way they trusted Ezra. What had led to the argument between Ezra and Henry, I didn’t know, but I suspected Ezra was the flashier one in their cons and Henry didn’t like it. Ezra’s charm no doubt drew more clients. People liked a good show.
I left the table and wandered into what Ezra had called Kathleen’s sitting room. It was more cluttered than Derry’s bedroom, and that was saying something. The sofa with its high back and arms bore up under more than half a dozen fringed and embroidered pillows. It looked like the most comfortable seat in the house and I didn’t see why I couldn’t have slept there as well as in Derry’s room. The loveseat cattycorner was piled with pillows as well. Two mahogany chairs similar to Derry’s stood on the other side of an even more ornate table, marble-topped with a handsome chess set. Another marble-topped table was laden with flowers.
Flowers were damned near everywhere. A vase in the corner shaded that part of the room with huge green fronds. The old rocker beneath it had a large pillow with a bible verse embroidered on it. The sigh I’d checked earlier found release. I knew die-hard believers still existed and always would, but in this era I vaguely recalled that traditional faith was starting to take a beating in the face of a growing interest in science. And pseudoscience. New Age wasn’t all that new. And neither was pure gullibility.
The far door creaked open and I saw the flutter of skirts. Hannah backed into the room, lugging a metal bucket full of coal. I’d worked at a young age too, but damn, the poor kid looked like she needed a break. I got up to give her a hand. Hearing me, she looked around and her face puckered with worry.
“I didn’t know you was in here, sir,” she said, trying to swing around with the heavy bucket.
I caught the handle and eased it from her grip. “ Hannah, right? I didn’t get a chance to say hello last night.” I held out my free hand and she stared at it, then at me, pretty thoroughly terrified, poor kid. I gave her shoulder a pat. “It’s okay. Just helping you out a little. It looked pretty heavy.” And it was. She was stronger than she looked, if she carried buckets of coal around like this every day. “Where do you dump it?”
She blinked and remembered to breathe. “In there, sir. You’d best let me.”
“I’ve got it.” I poured some of the coal into the bin by the fireplace. She stood glued to her spot by the door. “Why don’t you sit down for a minute? You look beat.”
“Sit down?” she echoed. “In here? No, sir. Please, can I have it back now?” She held out grubby hands for the bucket.
It wasn’t as heavy, but I still hated to hand it back over if she was headed upstairs with it. “You had some breakfast?”
“Yes, sir,” she whispered, hands still extended.
I reluctantly gave her the bucket. “Take it easy, all right? It’s okay to take a breather now and then. Sit down and rest,” I added in case I was being a little too twenty-first century for her to comprehend.
“Yes, sir.” She backed out, closing the door, and I heard her going off as fast as she could with that bucket in hand. I was making a hell of an impression on everyone here--not that I cared so much about it one way or another. If they’d snagged Leonard instead, he might’ve handled all this with a little more grace, but there was no way I’d fit in and I wasn’t going to be here long enough to worry about it.
“Quite the gentleman.” Ezra had witnessed the whole thing. A smile played on his lips as he lit gracefully onto the nest of sofa pillows and leaned sideways to pluck a white carnation from the vase. As he inserted it neatly into his lapel, he stole a look at me, genial despite the fact that I’d gotten him into trouble with Henry. I had the sudden suspicion he was trying to get on my good side. It probably threw him for a loop to find there was someone he couldn’t win over. Con artists were like that.
But I wasn’t biting. “Any chance we’re going to get to the museum before it closes for the day?”
He smoothed his lapels. “We’ll be off as soon as everyone’s come down. A game of chess?”
“I don’t think so.” I slid into a chair and propped my feet on the ottoman. “How much of a chance do I stand against a renowned psychic?”
If the remark offended, he didn't show it. “I promise not to cheat.”
“I’m in no frame of mind to lose my pocket change to a nineteenth century chess hustler. My money wouldn’t do you any good, anyway. You couldn’t use it to the pay the rent.”
He sobered, staring at me with a weirdly wistful air. “You really think that’s what I do, then? Cheat people out of their earnings?”
“Well, let’s ask Mrs. Hastings, shall we, Ez, old fellow? What did she get for the money she put in your pocket?”
“I did not take money from Lucinda Hastings.” His mouth twitched downward, eyes darkening to a twilight blue. “And it’s Ezra, if you don’t mind. Ezra Glacenbie, if you’ve a thought to summon a constable and have me clapped in irons.”
Well, what do you know? The boss was right. There wasn’t anyone alive or dead I couldn’t provoke into a display of temper. I gave Ezra a black-humored grin. “I would, but unfortunately I need you if I’m going to get back home.”
“Is everyone in the future as narrow-minded as you, Mr. Nash?” The brief flash of temper faded and the wistfulness returned. “Have we really taken such an enormous step backward after so much progress?”
Narrow-minded. If there was one thing I wasn’t… “You want to play it that way? Okay. I’ll give you a fair shot. Let’s see the psychic in action.” I leaned back and, elbows on the armrests, interlaced my fingers. “Go on. Tell my fortune or whatever the hell it is you do.”
“If you’re looking for proof—“
“I’m looking for evidence that you aren’t lying through your teeth to your buddies and that you didn’t con Mrs. Hastings out of her pension with some comforting little tale about how her husband is waiting for her on the other side. Think you can manage to convince me?”
“I think you have already fairly convinced yourself in the other direction.” Ezra appeared to be thinking it over, nonetheless. I’d seen that look before. Sizing up his mark. “I don’t really tell fortunes. Nor do the spirits, for that matter, unless they think it’s something vital you should know.”
“No kidding? Everything regarding my life would be pretty vital, in my opinion.”
“Of that, I have no doubt.”
I wouldn’t have guessed Victorians were such smart asses. Then again, I’d never really met any until now. “So what do they tell you about me?” I inquired with all the open-mindedness I could muster, which basically translated into no discernable sarcasm.
“They don’t.”
“They don’t?” It wasn’t quite what I’d been expecting. “What’s that supposed to mean? No one’s around? Or they just don’t want to play?” Or maybe it was just that one Ezra Glacenbie was too intimidated by the Fed from the future to expose the tricks of his trade.
“They’re here. They’re always here,” he added and let out a soft breath before going on. “But no, they’re not talking. They just seem to be…"
“What?”
“Laughing.” His eyes shone as if he found whatever they were laughing at just as funny. But after one look at me, he hastily shook his head. “Don’t mistake me. It is purely with affection." He cocked his head, pondering. “I think.”
“Yeah? So who are ‘they’?” This was where I nailed the smug little bastard.
He never even hesitated. “Archibald Nash and James Sullivan.”
Chapter Four
I had to give him credit. He was bold as brass, to go through my wallet for information he knew he might need
later on. He couldn’t have done it while I was changing clothes; I’d have caught him at it. He must have done it in the middle of the night. He’d seen the old photograph of me and my folks and had read Aunt Jean’s faded handwriting on the back. From behind my credit cards, he’d fished out Sully’s old Bureau ID and from there he’d hazarded that both men were old enough to have passed on. At least by Victorian standards of old.
"Searching someone's belongings for personal information is the oldest trick in the book, Ezra. You’ll have to do a whole lot better than that to prove your case and you know what? You’re not going to.”
I could see the others gathered in the front hallway. Derry, in the middle of pulling on a coat, peered around the door and motioned that they were ready to leave. Ezra waited until he’d gone back out before responding.
“Not that you have any reason to believe me, but I did not go through your belongings, Mr. Nash.” As I pushed out of the chair, he looked up at me. “I do realize I have no way of proving that or anything else to you. At least not before you’ve gone back home.”
“Your instincts are dead-on there. And since I can’t arrest you, let’s just leave it at that.” I zipped up my jacket and headed to the hall.
As soon as Henry and Ezra went out, Derry slipped to my side. “Not that it’s my business, Morgan, but I’ve not seen two more glum countenances since the tax collector last called to threaten us over a payment past due. You’re not finding Ezra a kindred soul, I take it?”
“Let’s just say we have inescapable differences of opinion. What’s with the snack?”
His heavy brows lifted questioningly, then he glanced down at the basket in his hand. “Ah. The hamper. Kathleen packed it for your journey home.” A guilty smile touched his lips. “She believes you’re setting sail and I couldn’t tell her otherwise.”
“But they’d serve meals on the ship, wouldn’t they?” I asked, thinking back to a late night movie set on a steamship. “Pretty good meals, with champagne and all?”
“They do in first class, but Kathleen thought the meals in third inadequate. She did not wish you to go hungry.”
I would have imagined Kathleen was just glad to be rid of me. My surprise must have showed because Derry nodded wryly. “You’re thinking she’s a hard woman, my sister.”
“Well, she is a tough cookie, Derry.”
“A tough cookie,” he echoed thoughtfully and, as I looked at him, grinned from ear to ear. “You’ve a way with words. But you mustn’t mind Kathleen. She’s always been independent-minded, as our mother was, God keep her. But the Lord knows I’d have been lost without her.”
“Ezra told me. I was sorry to hear about your wife.”
“Aye, my dearest heart, she was.” He eased a watch much like Ezra’s out of his vest pocket and opened it to show me a photograph of a small, slim woman with thick coils of dark hair and a warm friendly demeanor like Derry’s. “My own Ailis. Too good for this world,” he said softly.
The poor damned guy. No wonder he wanted to believe everything Ezra told him. “She looks like a sweetheart. I’m sorry, Derry.”
He returned the watch to his pocket. “Kathleen has been my saving grace. She took me in hand, until I found the flavor in life again. And Ezra’s coming along was a comfort, too.”
“He says that he talked to your wife after…”
“He did.”
Derry’s sigh was wistful. He picked up his step as we walked down the sidewalk, trailing Ezra and Henry to the corner where the bus had dropped us off yesterday. I was reluctant now to burst Derry’s bubble. He needed it afloat. But I had some lingering curiosity I couldn’t shake. “Henry doesn’t seem to have the same faith in Ezra," I said, choosing my words with care. “In fact, he seems to resent that Ezra’s even in the same profession.” If you could call it that.
“The Lord gave Ezra a gift, Mr. Nash. And it seems He gave it to Henry in lesser measure. Mind you, Ezra doesn’t see it in that light. Truth be told, it troubles him at times.”
“Yeah? How can you be sure Ezra’s just not a little more accurate with his guesses than Henry is?”
“With guesses like Ezra’s, he would fair be reading my mind to be so accurate.”
“Or doing some thorough research, maybe.”
Derry’s face lit up with good-natured humor. “It’s a detective’s mind you have. Oh and you’ve every right to question it, I don’t say you haven’t.” He sobered a little, gaze dropping to the stretch of sidewalk. “When the Lord gathered up Ailis and our wee son, I’d no notion that she’d already put his name in the Good Book. It was weeks after when Ezra told me--when Ailis told me--she’d named him.” He looked at me. “I ask you, how could Ezra have known? There was no researching that, nor taking it from my thoughts.”
I saw the brightness in his eyes, emotion he was barely keeping in check. I knew when to drop a subject and now was definitely the time. He wasn't going to hear a word against Ezra, no matter what I said, anyway.
On the ride to the museum, I watched the passing scene with my first inkling of regret that I wouldn’t be seeing more of it. But the dread that Ezra wouldn’t be able to send me home at all was a persistent worry that I couldn’t shake. This little impromptu vacation had to come to an end -- and quick.
Quick did not appear to be a word in Ezra or Henry’s vocabulary, however. Insisting that I was not dressed properly to follow them into the museum offices, they left me sitting outside while they went in search of the book. Derry stayed to keep me company and if he was trying to contain his own anxiety, he was doing a lousy job of it. Producing a pipe from somewhere in his coat, he puffed away on it as he bounced back and forth between our bench and the door. We waited in silence for ten minutes, then managed some desultory conversation for another twenty before Derry finally dropped down beside me with a worried grunt. “What can be keeping them?”
"I can find out."
As I got up, Derry grabbed my arm. “I’ll go.”
Succinct for Derry. He probably thought I was going to lose my cool and get Henry and Ezra fired. Chances were, I would. I sat back down and let him do the initial scouting. Intending to give him five minutes, I looked at my watch and then remembered it wasn’t working. Instead I counted off the minutes. It kept me from storming the place.
When Derry finally came back out, my vague fears took on a more substantial form. He laid a hand on my shoulder and confessed the book had been misplaced. I bit back what people even in my time would consider unacceptable language.
“What do you mean, misplaced?” I started for the door without waiting for his answer. The museum was busy, for a museum. Museums in my time didn’t seem to be the first or even the tenth choice for weekend entertainment, but in the absence of sports bars and television, apparently the nineteenth century made do. It'd take a while to find Ezra and Henry without Derry's help so I waited for him to catch up. When he did, he took my arm firmly, intending not to lose me again.
“Morgan, please. Mr. Brooke will sack them both with very little provocation. You must let Henry and Ezra hunt it up. They know where to look.”
“So where are they?”
“In the reading room. It’s a rather slow process, so we’ve a little time to kill. I know where there’s a coffee house—“
“Where is the reading room?”
“They won’t let you inside without a ticket.” His attention flickered to my side, where he knew the gun was holstered. “And you cannot force your way in. There’s always a constable about, somewhere.”
“Do you have a ticket?”
“Be sensible, lad.”
“Just let me borrow it.”
“Oh no,” he protested. “You can’t ask that of me. If we’re caught—“
“We won’t be.” I held out my hand. “Give me five minutes. I’ll bring it right back, safe and sound.”
Derry looked uneasy, but he produced the ticket and handed it over. “They'll never let you in. Not in those clothes.”
The dim, musty library I was expecting turned out to be something far different. The room was constructed on a grand scale, designed to impress. A blue and gold dome stretched high above me; the windows that circled it sending down shafts of sunlight to illuminate tier upon tier of books. Despite the considerable number of people, mostly middle-aged and elderly men, who occupied the long tables radiating from the center of the room like wheel spokes, a somber, respectful hush rested over the place. Only a few heads lifted to take a look at me as I scanned faces in search of Ezra’s. Those who noticed me seemed to conclude I wasn’t alien enough to worry about and returned to their work.
At the hub of the wheel, I spotted Ezra bent over a waist-high bookshelf, scribbling on a scrap of paper. I cleared the space between us without attracting any more attention and coming up behind him, gave him a poke in the ribs. “Hey, what the hell is going on?”
Startled, he sucked in an exasperated breath. “How did you get in here?”
“This.” I showed him Derry’s ticket and he promptly snatched it out of my hand.
“For heaven’s sake. You can’t use his ticket. They’ll revoke it and he won’t be allowed in again.”
“No one’s going to find out,” I retorted with equal parts annoyance and guilt. “What happened to the book?”
“We’re looking for it.”
“Where’s this Brooke fellow?”
“Upstairs. Henry talked to him and apparently Mr. Brooke passed it off to another cataloguer who may or may not have shelved it already. Henry’s asking around.”
“Who’d he give it to? Did you talk to him?”
“Adam Whitby and no, he’s not here. According to his assistant, he’s on holiday for two weeks.”
The whole damned world was conspiring against me. “Where’s his office?”
Ezra’s eyebrows rose. “Office? He doesn't have a private office, Mr. Nash. We will have to search the most likely places he would have left it.”