The Mammoth Book of Historical Crime Fiction (54 page)

The carpet bag caught Bo’s eye. He picked it up. The woman jumped to her feet. “You put that down. That’s private property.”

“Private property? You don’t say.” Bo opened the bag and pulled out a blood-stained blue coat. “Look what we got here, Dutch.”

“You have no right,” the woman said.

Dutch found the tear in the sleeve of the coat. “I’d be more careful about my friends if I were you, Missus Place.”

“Fire!” A cry from the hall. “Fire!”

Turning, they saw a burning piece of newspaper being slipped under the door.

With the distraction, the woman grabbed the carpet bag, scrambled to the door, threw it open, and ran.

Gunfire. From the hall. Six shots. Then: Click. Click. Heavy steps on the stairs. The woman lay bleeding near the landing. Dutch, closest to the door, stamped out the fire, then, Colt drawn, hammer back, he jumped over her body to chase after the shooter. More shots.

Weapon at the ready, Bo dragged the woman inside – he hoped it was to safety, but Bo Clancy never deluded himself. He heard Dutch’s .38 calibre rounds. Quiet. He checked the woman for signs of life. She was done.

Footsteps on the stairs.

“It’s me,” Dutch called. “Shooter’s gone.” Dutch entered the room carrying the carpet bag. “Found this on the stairs.” Blood dripped from his cheek. “Dead?”

“No question. Let’s see what all the fuss is about.” Bo upended the carpet bag on the narrow bed. Women’s clothing scattered, but the item of interest that came out last was a grey canvas bag.

A good shake of the canvas and out fell banded packets of paper currency.

Dutch knelt by the dead woman and closed her eyes. He paused. “Sorry, ma’am.” He searched for hidden pockets in her dress, her shawl.

Bo began to count the money. “Check her boots.”

The dead woman’s legs were slim, her stockinged feet narrow; her boots were still warm. Dutch’s big hands were ill-suited for the search, but his fingers touched a piece of folded paper in her left boot. He fished it out and unfolded it. He read it once, and again. He rose and offered the paper to Bo.

“Her real name was Jenny McCracken. She was a Pinkerton.”

14

“Holy shit!” Little Jack Meyers was standing on the corner of Essex and Delancey across from PINKYS, watching for any unusual activity, when who should show their Irish mugs and head into the saloon but Inspectors Clancy and Tonneman.

He’d been wedged in the narrow entrance of Moishe’s Delicatessen since noon, trying to ignore the pungent smell of corned beef. Moishe had chased him away twice before Little Jack gave him two-bits for a sandwich to leave him be.

As he took a big bite of the sandwich, he saw Pinky tossing out a couple of drunks and had to smile. The midget could hold his own. The tavern door slammed shut. Little Jack gnawed another bite of corned beef and drifted across the street and up to the door of the saloon.

He stepped back, considering the door. Was there an alley? He could hear Big Jack in his head. “Drag your arse back and use the alley.”

No, the coppers would check the alley. He played at pushing the door open – it was planked tight, all right. Big Jack always told him
never assume
, so he ran around the corner to check the alley, but Dutch Tonneman was there and just missed seeing him.

Little Jack returned to the tavern door. He pulled a small flask of rum from his back pocket and swallowed a mouthful. Eyes almost closed, lips slack, he let his body relax against the door. Couldn’t see anything, but maybe he could hear what was going on. The voices inside were muffled. Lots of yelling. Not only was Bo Clancy a
bulvan
, he was also a good yeller who could scare the shit out of a statue.

It wasn’t long before Little Jack heard the scraping sound of the plank being removed.

Shoving the last of the sandwich into his mouth, he sprinted back to the corner of Essex Street, dodging a horse and wagon, and colliding with a bearded man wheeling a pushcart full of roasting potatoes. The pushcart man cursed him: “
a broch tzu Columbus
,” which made Little Jack laugh because the man’s curse was aimed not at him but at Christopher Columbus.

In front of Moishe’s again, Little Jack saw the two inspectors leave PINKYS and head off east towards the river. Should he follow them? What would Big Jack think? Easy. Stood to reason, they’d learned something from Pinky; otherwise they wouldn’t be moving so fast.

He might have followed, but out came Pinky from his tavern, looked around, and off he went, turning on to Essex Street. Little Jack held himself in check for a moment, then he followed.

All of a sudden, Pinky turned around and rushed back the way he had come, running smack into Little Jack, giving him a mean shove out of the way. So, Little Jack thought, Pinky had changed his mind and chosen to go towards the East River, after Clancy and Tonneman.

Rutgers Street was packed full of coppers, wagons, horses, and an ambulance. It looked like most of the neighbourhood was on the street, and those that weren’t hung out the windows.

The area was blocked off by a sideways-parked wagon, with one patrolman standing guard.

“Uh oh,” Little Jack said out loud, hanging back behind Pinky. He saw right away that he’d messed up because Pinky heard, turned and looked at him hard.

Little Jack shrugged and wormed himself into the crowd. Good thing, too. Tonneman and Clancy were coming out of the tenement. Blood on Tonneman’s face.

“Hey, brass-buttons.” Pinky pushed his way to the patrolman, keeping his head low. “Another bank get robbed?”

The patrolman shook his head. “No banks here. Woman got herself shot.”

“Dead?”

The officer said, “… than a blessed mackerel.”

Pinky looked around. He couldn’t see Little Jack, who had ducked under a cart. Satisfied, Pinky shoved through the gawkers.

This time, Little Jack was more careful about being seen, and followed at a discreet distance. Pinky was heading back towards Second Avenue.

*

Pinky felt it in his bones. Someone watching him. “Don’t stand out,” Mister William liked to preach. “If you don’t stand out you can slip through the world and never be caught.”

Who was it? That
trumbanick
he’d bumped into? The one he’d seen again on Rutgers?

The school on Essex Street was letting out. Boys running, brawling, shouting. Pinky took off his cap, turned it inside out, and became one of them. He managed to blend with a group until Second Avenue, where he broke free. And at Second Street, he mounted the steps to the small three-storied brownstone. He lifted the heavy knocker and pulled it down hard against the oak door. A shadow appeared behind the diamond-shaped glass. The door opened; Pinky charged in.

The bearded man who’d opened the door removed the meerschaum from his mouth, and raised his right eyebrow. “Another crisis?” His accent was German. He raised his voice. “Our friend has arrived again with another crucial moment, Hughs.”

“Come in, sit down, my dear Pinky.” Hughs was clean-shaven and spoke like a toff. “Lowenstein, give him a minute. He’s a good fellow. Can’t you see he’s out of breath.”

Pinky couldn’t abide either of these fat-arsed snobs. They lived in this fancy house like their shit don’t stink, while he and Lorraine was grubbers.

“I got important information. I got to talk to Chicago.”

Lowenstein looked dubious. “What information?”

“The woman’s been killed.”

Hughs went at once to the candlestick telephone, cranked the ringer box, lifted the earpiece.

“Good afternoon,” an operator said. “Number, please?”

“Please let me speak to Chicago operator PA 12.” Hughs handed Pinky the telephone.

“One moment, please,” the operator said.

Within seconds a man’s voice came on the line. “Name and number.”

“Pinky. Number 79.”

“One minute, please.”

*

Never in a million years had Pinky thought he would become a detective. He and Lorraine was happy playing three-a-day at Mick Sullivan’s vaudeville house in Cincinnati, where they was billed as Pinky Pincus and the Pink Lady.

The two of them had started with Sam Smith, who had a magic act: The Great Smithsini. Sam taught both of them how to shoot, for a sketch he called “The Girl with the Vanishing Volumities,” which was Sam’s name for tits.

Pinky and Lorraine were both expert shootists. The big woman and the small man figured out almost at once that they were made for each other on and off stage. In their act, Pinky shot the Lady’s clothes off until she was naked, or appeared to be naked – depending on the town they were in or the house they were playing.

Their encore presented the lady chasing Pinky off, stage right. The velvet curtain billowed. Then the two of them would appear stage left, as the Pink Lady proceeded to shoot off Pinky’s clothes, only to reappear – BIG-FINISH-ACCOMPANIED-BY-DRUM-ROLLS – naked, except for the large pink flower covering his private parts.

Everything changed on the night Mister William Pinkerton caught their act and invited them to work for the Agency.

“You on the line, Pinky?”

Pinky began to sweat. “Good to hear your voice, Mister Pinkerton.”

*

Little Jack almost fell over backwards. He’d managed to hoist himself on to a window box, saw a broken pane and put his ear to the crack. Once more he said, but under his breath, “Goddam!” Pinky was actually talking to
the
William Pinkerton. Wait till Big Jack heard this.

*

Little Jack wasn’t the only one to react. Another exclamation of surprise came from a man positioned more than a hundred feet away.

Davey Collins couldn’t be seen by most people passing by. As a matter of fact, Davey, known as Davey Bear, was standing on spikes halfway up a pole that the telephone company had put up, off to the side of the street. The pole was masked by a tall tree with snow-laden branches.

The Boss had a lot of people around the city letting him know what was going on. When he used the information fast enough and in the best possible way, the bucks came rolling in and people like Davey Bear got walking-around money. He’d heard enough to make the Boss happy. Now, he had to disconnect from the brownstone’s telephone so he could tap into another wire. “Boss, it’s Davey.”

*

Little Jack didn’t know if what he had learned about Pinky was worth anything. But Big Jack would. And Little Jack was betting it was plenty. He turned west on Fifth Street and heard someone above him, talking. Goddam. Up the pole. Little Jack came to a dead stop.

*

“That little Jew, Pincus?” Davey told the Boss.

“What about him?”

“You sitting down?”

“Tell me right fucking now or I’ll break your head.”

“Pinky Pinkus is a Pinkerton Man. For sure; also, those two foreign bird gawkers. And the woman in the blue coat from the bank robberies? She’s one of them, too.”

15

All the doors of the houses on Gramercy Park house wore evergreen wreaths, studded with red holly berries and pine cones. Some of the wreaths had big red silk bows. In the park itself a plump spruce sparkled with tiny electric bulbs. A definite feeling of festivity hung in the air.

The winter sun cast frugal light, which Esther knew was ideal for the proper exposure she would need. The weather had turned mild. Esther unlocked the gate to the private park and held it open for Wong to pull in the wagon carrying her wooden tripod and her box of glass plates and her Scovill camera.

She motioned for the man and woman – who had come calling and commissioned a photograph – to enter, closing and locking the gate behind them.

“Wait here, please,” Esther told them. She moved down the path, evaluating the light and the shadows, until she found a suitable space, then beckoned to them.

If Wong was surprised that morning to see on the doorstep of No. 5 Gramercy Park the men called Robbie Allen and Harry Kidder, who’d brought Miss Esther home after the bank robbery, and with them the tall and attractive young woman named Henrietta de Grout, he gave no indication. He was pleased, however, to see that Robbie Allen only stayed long enough to make flirting eyes at Miss Esther before he went on about his business.

Henrietta de Grout wore a long, green velvet coat with a high collar, white lace ruffle, fur cuffs, and flowing skirt. Pinned to her lapel was an elegant gold watch. Her thick dark hair was rolled, framing her oval face, ending in a topknot surmounting her head. She had removed her hat for the photograph. Standing close beside her, Harry Kidder looked handsome and serious in his broad-shouldered, black, single-breasted suit, high collar and narrow grey silk cravat, held in place by a diamond stickpin.

Because the photograph was to be in honour of the couple’s engagement, Esther had put aside her Kodak and rolled film for her more reliable Scovill and the glass plates and fine lenses.

“Please stand perfectly still.” After Esther focused the lens, she inserted a glass plate into a holder and placed it in the back of the camera. “Ready?” she said. “Do not move, please.” The light was perfect, the weather benign.

“Ready.” Miss de Grout’s husky voice was steady, sure. She had a casual grace, standing there close beside her man.

Esther made the picture.

It felt right. But she removed the plate, inserted another and made one more picture.

*

Robbie Allen strolled down towards Union Square. On Fifteenth Street, he looked in the window of Tiffany’s, where Harry had bought Henrietta a gold lapel watch and, for himself, a diamond stickpin.
Bought
, no less. Damn it all, they’d lost their voodoo.

Harry had anyway. He was all wrapped up in Henrietta and being a father, and now he was talking about ranching. In New York.

Goddam, in the old days they would have just held up Tiffany’s and cleaned it out.

He had the itch, same as he’d felt as a boy in Utah. Still, there was time. He couldn’t push Harry too hard just now. Another couple of weeks wouldn’t hurt, while they saw a few vaudeville shows and enjoyed some of the night life. They’d taken rooms again at Missus Taylor’s boarding house on West Twelfth Street, so they could celebrate the New Year and shoot the moon. Next week he’d get himself to the steamship lines on the East River and buy those tickets to South America.