Devil by the Tail

by Jeanne Matthews

  “Well, well, well. If it isn’t Detective Paschal. You lose another client to misadventure? There’s a fresh batch of corpses in the morgue if you’d care to look ’em over.”

  “Thank you, Captain, not today. My main reason for coming is to find out if you’ve talked to Garnick in the last twenty-four hours.”

  “I haven’t seen him since the three of us communed over the remains of Mr. Handish. Maybe the spell broke and your partner resigned from the detective business.”

  “You’re not the only one who wants him out of the business. Somebody burned our office to the ground last night.”

  Chesterton crumpled his lunch sack and got up slowly with a defiant look. The muscles in his neck and jaw bulged and squirmed. “Who did it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then there’s no point bellyaching to me. How do you know the fire was started on purpose?”

  “The trash barrel had been pushed flush against the building and I saw what looks like the stub of a half-burned cigar at the bottom.”

  “Rooting in the trash, were you, detective? Why didn’t the barrel burn if it was that close to the building?”

  “It did burn. Whoever pushed it against the building meant for it to burn with all the evidence inside.”

  “But not the cigar you say started it?”

  “Maybe there was water in the bottom of the barrel from that big rain we had. Oh, never mind. If you don’t want to investigate, I will. But I thought you’d at least want to help me find out if Garnick’s safe.”

  “Why wouldn’t he be?”

  “Because the man who murdered the Kadingers, and maybe Handish, too, knows we’re looking for him.”

  “Elfie Jackson murdered the Kadingers and we’ve got her under lock and key. That piece in the Trib about the hooker who cooked up a story won’t wash.”

  Quinn was sorry she’d wasted words on this lummox, but if she could wheedle her way past him to see Elfie, she wouldn’t count the visit a total loss. “You’re probably right, Captain. About Garnick and Elfie, too. And now with our office up in smoke, I’ll have to give up the crazy notion of being a detective.” She adopted a miserable tone.

  “You’re finally making sense.”

  “I know that now. I haven’t helped Elfie very much, have I? But if you’ll allow it, I’d like to speak with her once more before she goes to trial. I brought her a sandwich and some grapes and plums. Perhaps we can console one another.”

  “I can’t see the harm in it. Better give me a peek inside your bag in case you’re trying to smuggle a weapon.”

  She showed him the contents of the lunch sack. He didn’t ask to see the contents of her purse and she didn’t volunteer. She wondered if two women could pull off a jailbreak with nothing but a derringer.

  Chesterton led her into the jail and walked her down the tunnel-like corridor, through the sharp disinfectant smell to Elfie’s cell. Elfie lay huddled on her cot, black hair draggling on the floor like a tattered fishing net. Chesterton opened the door and Quinn went inside.

  Elfie lay so still Quinn couldn’t tell if she was breathing. “Elfie, it’s Quinn. I brought food. I hope you’re hungry.”

  “You’d better eat,” said Chesterton. “The cook’s tired of sliding a tray of his choice vittles in front of you and coming back to find it untouched. Hurts his pride.”

  Quinn gave him an imploring look.

  “All right, then. You’ve got half an hour.” He locked the door and left them alone.

  “A lot has happened since we last talked, Elfie. A lot of reasonable doubt as to your guilt has turned up and there’s a good chance you’ll be acquitted. Jemelle recanted the story she gave the police and we know Verner Kadinger had a fight with his father which makes him a suspect.”

  She didn’t move.

  Quinn sighed. As before, Burk’s name was all that could bring a response. She pulled the card he had given her out of her purse. Lucky she’d thought to take it away with her or it would be ashes. “Look. Burk set up a bank account for you. I don’t know how much is there, but he says it should be enough to carry you through for a while.”

  She rolled over and sat up. Her cheeks were sunken, her eyes glassy with tears. “Is he going to marry the banker’s daughter? The one you said he was sweet on?”

  “I don’t know. He calls her ‘compliant,’ which I suppose means she’ll marry him if he asks her to.”

  “If she’s like me, she’d do anything in the world he asked her to do.”

  Such abject submissiveness made Quinn’s teeth itch. But it was senseless to be annoyed. Acceptance of male superiority was the foundation of most marriages. Medea killed her brother for Jason. Elfie robbed her mother for Burk. Had Delphine stolen her father’s will for him? “Move over, Elfie. I’ll set out our picnic on the end of the cot.”

  “Picnic.” A thin squiggle of a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “Are you always so chirpy?”

  “No, but then I haven’t been locked in jail for over a month.”

  Elfie tore into the first sandwich with gusto. She was gaunt as a scarecrow and slatternly from so many weeks without washing. Quinn would have to see about borrowing a clean dress for her to wear at trial and getting her a shampoo. Maybe Chesterton would parole her for a few hours. Now that she had a bank account, she could buy a dress and pay one of the women in the millinery department at the Field, Palmer emporium to style her hair. The irony wasn’t lost on Quinn that since her last visit, it was she who’d become the pauper and Elfie the woman of means – however limited those means might be.

  “You’re married,” said Elfie.

  “My husband was killed in the war.”

  “But you still wear his ring.”

  Quinn twisted the gold band on her left hand. She had long since shed her widow’s weeds, but not the ring. She didn’t know why. Habit, she supposed. Or maybe guilt. “It’s a kind of amulet, to protect a woman alone from unwanted attention.”

  “Is that what you want? To be alone?”

  The answer had never been so decidedly, categorically “no,” but wanting didn’t work like magic. “Have some grapes, Elfie. They’re really juicy. I should have asked Captain Chesterton for a pitcher of water. I’ll have him bring you one on my way out. And I’ll be back before the day of the trial to make sure you have clean clothes to wear. Do please eat your supper and try to stay optimistic. You have a little nest egg now and once the trial is over, you’ll be fine.”

  “Mr. Winthrop came by this morning. He said he wouldn’t call Jemelle to the stand to testify.”

  “What?”

  “He said she’d been tainted by the newspaper and he’d have to rely on a sympathetic jury and Burk’s good will.”

  “His good will? It’s decent of him to contribute a few dollars for your welfare, but he’s the one who told that reporter you were deranged by jealousy and driven by a desire for revenge. It’s because of Burk that you became the number one suspect.”

  “Mr. Winthrop doesn’t think Burk will say anything too damaging about me if the prosecution calls him to testify.” That squiggle of a smile played across her mouth again. “I wished her dead, but wishing’s not the same as lighting the match, is it?”

  Chesterton returned and unlocked the door before Quinn had time to question the oddness of that smile. “Stay hopeful,” she said from the bright side of the bars. “A lot can happen in a short amount of time.”

  Elfie nodded and took a bite of the second sandwich.

  Quinn followed Chesterton back through the jail.

  “When Garnick shows up, tell him I’m ready for some high-stakes poker. Seems there was a reward for your client Handish. The sheriff down in Cairo sent me a draft for fifty bucks for clearing him off their wanted list.”

  “Did he say anything more about Florrie, the woman Handish killed, or give any more information about the man?”

  “No, but he passed on a laugh. The crazy galoot wrote him a letter saying he was
innocent but didn’t think they’d give him a fair trial in Alexander County. Said he’d hired himself a Chicago lawyer.”

  Quinn had a premonition. “Did the sheriff happen to mention the name of Handish’s lawyer?”

  “Winthrop, same mouth-piece that’s been here quizzing Elfie Jackson. Said he’d tracked his wife’s killer to Chicago and soon as he got ahold of him, the lawyer would be in touch.”

  Chapter 22

  Lost in thought, only vaguely aware of her surroundings, Quinn began to walk. She’d told Winthrop about Handish. Told him Handish had hired Garnick & Paschal to find Jack Stram. Told him Jemelle said it was Handish who paid Stram to bribe her. Told him Handish had been shot dead in back of Lou Harper’s Mansion and, with all of that eye-opening revelation, he hadn’t so much as raised an eyebrow. That failure to remark upon the seemingly astounding coincidence that one client had blundered into the case of another, demolished the last vestige of trust in the man.

  At a grocer’s shop, she stopped to buy a bottle of fizzy water and continued walking. Did Handish bring his case to Garnick & Paschal on his own initiative without informing his lawyer? A supercilious snob like Winthrop probably wouldn’t credit a “brute” like Handish with the ability to write, much less write a letter to the sheriff of Alexander County naming his attorney and declaring he would soon be in touch. Ned Handish had no ostensible link to the Kadingers except Stram. Did her oh-so-respectable attorney also have an undisclosed link to Stram?

  The odor of burnt wood assailed her nostrils and she looked up. Without realizing it, she’d been walking toward the office, a homing instinct for a home that no longer existed. Head down, hands behind her back, she approached the ashes of her big idea, anger vying with grief. Garnick should be here. Even if all her problems were suddenly to evaporate and she could start again, without Garnick there’d be no one to share the stories with, no one to share the aggravations and the successes. Her thoughts returned to that lost moment when she’d stood on the brink and backed away. He’d opened the door, but she hesitated, afraid to take the chance. And later she’d put him off to go to dinner with Winthrop. Why were the Rubicons in her life visible only in hindsight? She seemed always to be looking back, bemused by how she’d arrived at this or that place, either too impulsive or not impulsive enough. Strange to think she hadn’t cried yet. Maybe the fire had cauterized all feeling. Maybe…

  “Hey!”

  She lifted her gaze. Garnick was stepping around from behind the blackened stone chimney. This time there was no hesitation. She ran flat out, threw her arms around him, buried her face in his shoulder. He held her close and buried his face in her hair. Neither spoke. She listened to the steady, reassuring beat of his heart. She didn’t know if she’d crossed another Rubicon. They were on the same side, together, and everything felt right again.

  She was the first to find her voice. “Where the Sam Hill have you been?”

  “Not where I should’ve been from the looks of this shambles. When did it happen?”

  “Last night while I was at the Opera House with Winthrop.”

  “Did the fire brigade save your trunk?”

  “Nothing.” Anger, loss, relief, desire — they all converged and she gave in to tears.

  “Jesus, Quinn. How did you—?”

  “Don’t talk.” She was having a lot of trouble with the desire part. “Kiss me.”

  He touched his mouth to hers and blood rushed through her veins like water through a broken dike. She had joined the ranks of Elfie and Medea. She imagined the Greek chorus commiserating over her shoulder. Ah, poor lady, woe to thee!

  Garnick broke away. “How did you make it through last night? What did you do?”

  “I walked out on Winthrop at the restaurant and came back here. The fire was raging. At first I was afraid you might be trapped inside.”

  “Where’d you spend the night?”

  “Lou Harper’s boudoir.”

  Surprise played across his face and then suddenly, simultaneously they burst into a fit of incongruous hilarity.

  “If everything falls apart and I can’t find another way to support myself, Lou says she’ll set me up in a new career.”

  “That won’t happen.”

  “I know. But I’ve become a lot more understanding of those who can’t find a port in the storm.”

  “Come on. The rig’s parked a ways down the block. Let’s find ourselves a quiet saloon and have a bracer and a powwow.”

  They stopped at a German tavern oriented to beer and family fare where women were allowed to enter by the front door. The place was crowded with stonemasons and construction workers engaged in building the new water tower and pumping station on Pine Street. The smell of frying sausages and the exuberant hum of conversation filled the big room. The detectives seated themselves at a table near the kitchen, away from the noise. Under the table Quinn’s legs jittered. She was still keyed up. She needed to cool her emotions and let this heightened intimacy sink in.

  Garnick said, “You look like you’ve got a lot on your mind.”

  “Megarian’s write-up, Winthrop, the fire, my night at the brothel. I know you want to talk about the other…I mean, the change in our relations. I do, too, but I have to think. I have to have words for it all. Could we hold off on any more kissing for a while? It’s too much all at once.”

  His eyes crinkled at the corners. “It’s been a right eventful week.” He called over the barkeep and ordered a beer. Quinn asked for fizzy water, but it wasn’t on the menu. The barkeep suggested a glass of johannisbeere. “Red current juice. Nice drink for nice ladies.” She eyed him doubtfully, but his bland face betrayed no hint of irony. He went back to the bar and she and Garnick sat in silence until the drinks were served.

  “You want to talk about the case?” prompted Garnick. “Because I’m mad enough to start cracking heads.”

  Her confidence rebounded. They were back to business. Together. Collaborating. Her legs stopped jittering and she started to talk. All the facts and suspicions and anxieties and inferences she’d been holding in surged out in a narrative rush. She didn’t slow down until the name Winthrop curdled on her tongue. “You were right about him all along.”

  “I was jealous. I envied his way with words. He talks like a book. Like you.”

  “He’s a barefaced liar, Garnick. I can’t believe I let him bamboozle me.”

  “You had no cause to doubt him. Lawyers generally try to bamboozle the party their client hires them to bamboozle, not their own client. But why didn’t he come straight out and say Handish was a client? It would’ve been easy enough to pass off as a coincidence.”

  “Unless,” she said, “the admission would implicate him in Handish’s murder.”

  “Even if Winthrop’s crooked as a dog’s hind leg, it doesn’t mean he killed anybody. Could be he’s got some other kind of a swindle percolating.”

  “Like what?”

  “There’s a couple of possibilities. You asked me where I went last evening. I paid Mr. Silas Jones a visit.”

  “Rolf Kadinger’s clerk?”

  “Since Bayer took over the company, Jones has moved west, nearabout halfway to Naperville. He’s a gossipy old cuss. Had a lot to say about Miss Delphine. Since her mama died, her daddy didn’t have much control over her. Once or twice he tried to marry her off, but she shunned his advice. Kadinger didn’t divulge the names of any of her paramours, but Silas got the impression she kept company with ‘rogues and pleasurists.’ The only one of her suitors Kadinger took to was Bayer. He made no bones that Bayer was marrying the girl for his money, but opined that Bayer wasn’t a wastrel like Verner. He thought Bayer would help him build the family fortune.”

  “That sounds like he intended Bayer to inherit,” said Quinn. “I guess Verner lied about the will being faked, not that lying sets him apart from anybody else in this quagmire. I still believe Bayer is lying about something. Did Jones have any idea where Kadinger kept the will?”

  “In
a lockbox at his home, he reckoned.”

  “That would have made it easy for Bayer to steal it with Delphine’s help and alter it to suit himself. Blood is thicker than water, possibly thicker than tobacco juice. Did Jones know anything about Verner’s shenanigans in Germany?”

  “You want a jigger of whiskey first?”

  “It was that bad? What did he do?”

  “Two weeks before Kadinger died, he wired two thousand dollars to his brother in Arnsberg, Germany to cover damages to his steel plant caused by Verner. Seems junior flew into a rage and upended a vat full of molten metal ready for casting. It set off a fire and two workers got burned pretty bad.”

  “Dear God.”

  Garnick throttled his beer mug. “If it transpires he’s the one who torched our office, I don’t know if I can hold myself back from killing him.”

  Verner seemed prone to tantrums. It was easy to imagine him flying into a rage lobbing a kerosene lantern into the draperies. But Rhetta hadn’t seen or heard him on the night of the fire and he didn’t seem dispassionate enough to kill quietly, escape unseen, and avoid being caught. “Did Silas say anything about Handish or Stram?”

  “Never heard of ’em.”

  “What about Winthrop?”

  “I didn’t ask. Didn’t want to think about him squiring you about pitching woo.”

  “You needn’t have worried. But you said he might be up to some kind of swindle. What are you thinking, Garnick?”

  “You say he didn’t want you pestering Tench or any of the other councilmen. Suppose he’s their lawyer? He could be helping them fudge the way they account for their shady income. Shining up to the city leaders is one way to get that law practice he wants off to a booming start.”

  “That fits Micah like one of his bespoke suits.”

  “Here’s another thing to chew on,” said Garnick. “The last few months old man Kadinger’s company had run up against a dearth of prime logs. To compensate, he was lending out some of his workers to the city. Jones didn’t know what for. Kadinger recorded the work slips himself. There was no contract and Kadinger told him not to ask questions. It graveled Silas. In the past he’d always been trusted to oversee routine business dealings. He still kept the books and from the first of the year till Kadinger’s death, the city sent the company a check for a thousand bucks a month.”