Winter at Death's Hotel (21 page)

He had learned at the Authors Club that Arthur Conan Doyle had been staying in the city on the day before the first Bowery murder, and that he had been staying at the New Britannic Hotel. Presumably he had a wife and it had been the wife who had written to Roosevelt. To Dunne, this meant one of two things: because well-off people (all authors were well off) didn't usually involve themselves in murder cases, the wife had written to Roosevelt either because her husband wanted some publicity or she thought of herself as Roosevelt's social equal and was writing to him as a class thing.

Dunne wasn't a class warrior, but he knew that America had classes and he mostly disliked the fact, as he disliked Roosevelt's Harvard-bred assistant and as he'd have admitted, if driven to the wall, that he disliked Roosevelt. Dunne didn't like it that some people started the hundred-yard dash fifty yards ahead of the rest.

He got down at Fifth Avenue and stood there and looked across the avenue and Twenty-Third Street at the New Britannic Hotel. Five stories and a penthouse, mostly brick with some nice stonework here and there; a wide entrance with bronze doors and a canopy of black metal and brass; three marble steps up from the street and a uniformed doorman who looked like something out of an operetta.

There's my man.

Dunne crossed Fifth, then crossed Twenty-Third and watched the doorman for some seconds. He was tall, beefy, tougher than the uniform suggested. He got three tips while Dunne watched. Not bad.

Dunne walked up the steps and waited for the doorman to climb to his level, when he said, “Hey, Gerrigan.”

Gerrigan looked him over with the acute, quick stare of experience, dismissed him but said, “Sir?” just in case Dunne was more than he looked.

“You want to have a little talk with me.”

“Sir?”

“Dunne, Detective-Sergeant.” Dunne held his card in the palm of his hand so that nobody could see it but Gerrigan. “You're Fred Gerrigan, two to five for assault in Attica, three for statutory rape, New Jersey State pen. Don't fuck with me, you understand?”

Gerrigan had got red in the face, then pale. Somebody came out of the hotel and he hurried to get the door, then hurried down the steps to wave in a hack. When he'd pocketed his tip he looked up at Dunne and then came more slowly up to him. “I don't want no trouble.”

“Neither do I. They know about you here? No? No reason they need to, so long as you're square with me. What I want to know is—”

A cab stopped and Gerrigan ran down to get the door and help a couple down; then he strode ahead of them to open one of the bronze doors and then pocket his tip. He came back, and Dunne said, “There was a woman's body found in the Bowery a few days ago. You ever see her here?”

“I wouldn't know if I did.”

“Her picture was in the paper.”

“You think I got time for the papers? You seen how they run me ragged?”

“I think you'd remember this one. Red hair, a lot of it. A looker.”

“No idea.”

But Dunne thought he was lying, so he said, “You want me to take you down to Mulberry Street? You want me to turn you over to a couple of Clubber Williams's old boys to work on you? You know, you lie to the police, that's a third conviction—Sing-Sing this time.”

“For sweet Christ's sake! Okay, maybe I saw her. So what?” His Irish accent had got thicker.

“How come you remember her?”

“You just asked me, for Christ's sake, like I
should
remember!”

“But you see all sorts of people. How come you remember her?”

Gerrigan let more people into the hotel and more out, and he came back and he said, “The hotel detective told me they were coming, now, didn't he?”

“They?”

“Her and a fella.”

“A matinee.”

“Yeah, something on the order of that.”

“The detective was on the take.”

“I suppose he was, indeed.”

“What'd he give you?”

“Couple bucks.”

“So you saw her go in. Did you see her come out?”

“She musta come out after I went off duty, like. Six o'clock and it's me for home.”

“The guy?”

“Indeed, I saw him come out. Half-past five, something like that. I remember my feet were killing me, I saw him and I thought, ‘You sure had a better afternoon than I did, me boy.'”

“Describe him.”

“Shorter than me, good-looking if you like that type—smooth, you know? Little mustache like you drew it on with a fountain pen. Nice clothes, a little too sharp, not what you'd usually see here—good but a little, you know, extreme. Could have been a Jew or a Dago, a little dark, y'know, dark eyes like women go nuts over. Maybe thirty.”

Dunne was writing in a notebook. Gerrigan ran back and forth a couple of times and asked when Dunne was going to finish, because people would notice and think he was talking to a newspaperman and there'd be a stink. Dunne said, “You had a Mrs. Conan Doyle staying here that same day.”

“Yeah, Mrs. Doyle, lady on crutches; she's still here. Jeez, funny you should ask about her;
she
was after me about the woman and the guy she was with.”

“
Was
she. Well, well.” Dunne put away his notebook and pencil. “I'll just step inside and have a look-see. What's the house D's name?”

“Manion.”

Dunne nodded and pursed his lips as if to whistle but made no sound. He stood in front of the bronze doors, and when Gerrigan didn't move he said, “Well,
open
them.”

Dunne didn't think much of hotel detectives. In his view, they weren't detectives at all; worse, they were mostly as crooked as a dog's hind leg. Even if they'd once been cops. Maybe
more
so
if they'd been cops, but at least if they'd been cops he usually knew them. But this Manion was different—nobody he knew. And his first glance at Manion across the lobby told Dunne that he didn't like him.

Dunne had him pointed out by the swell at Reception, who raised his eyes to heaven when he saw Dunne's police card. Dunne expected to be told to wipe his feet, or maybe change his clothes, but the swell only pointed and sniffed. Dunne went over to where the house detective sat in a leather chair and pulled another, less comfortable chair close and sat in it. Leaning close to Manion, he held up his card and said, “Cop.”

“I saw.”

Dunne disliked him even more close up—the mustache was too thin, the suit too tight. The guy looked like an actor playing an Irish crook who's made it. “Your name's Manion.”

“So?”

“So we don't know each other, so I just want you to know that if you're not square with me I'll take it amiss. Get me?” When Manion said nothing but then shrugged, Dunne smiled. Manion, he thought, was afraid of him. That was a good start. “Okay. So tell me about a red-haired woman who passed through the lobby the day before the first Bowery Butcher murder.”

Manion frowned. Dunne knew the frown: he'd said something surprising. Why was it surprising? Usually, that kind of surprise meant somebody had been found out and hadn't expected to be. He said, “It was fixed?”

“What?”

“Her and the lady killer she was with. You got a little what they call a ‘lagniappe'?”

Manion sighed and told him that there had been an arrangement, yes; he'd seen the woman and the man, yes; he'd seen the man leave but not the woman.

“That's it?”

“That's it.”

“You don't want to shit me.”

“That's all of it.”

Dunne watched him, decided he was being truthful. He said, “A woman named Doyle.”

Manion almost jumped. This time he was
really
surprised. Dunne liked the effect, but he, too, was surprised: why the reaction? Because a man like Manion, who was only one step up from a gigolo himself, had been turning the charm on for this Doyle woman? He let Manion dangle there while he thought about it, and then he said, “Mrs. Doyle is one of the guests. She got some particular importance to you, you seem to recognize the name right off?”

“She's been here a while. Fell and hurt herself.” Now Manion set his jaw, as if to tell himself too late that he wasn't going to be pushed around by some cop.

Dunne smiled. “Nice woman?”

“I suppose.”

“You suppose. What's her connection with the woman I asked you about first—the woman was here with the gigolo?”

Manion shrugged. “No connection at all, that I know about.”

Dunne leaned in. “We were getting along so fine, you and me. Now you're stringing me. You don't want to do that more than once.” His voice changed. “What's her connection with the woman?”

Manion looked him in the eye. He'd decided to take a grip on his balls. “Why don't you ask her?”

Dunne snorted. “How'd you come to be a so-called detective?”

“Pinkerton. I was a Pinkerton.”

“Beating up strikers? Shooting organizers in the back?”

“I thought that's what cops do.”

“Not as easy as sitting on your ass in a hotel lobby, what cops do.” Dunne put his face close to Manion's; Manion pulled his head back and swiveled his eyes around the lobby. Dunne growled, “Don't let me ever hear you say anything against cops again. Hear me?” He punched a stiff index finger into Manion's collarbone. “I know your type inside out. You're not a cop; you couldn't
be
a cop. Because you got no guts. Am I right? You're all show. You sit on your ass, scare the drawers off kids, and try to get off with the lady guests, am I right? And take a few bucks from tinhorns who want a nice spot to bring their girl friends to, am I right?” He punched the collarbone again with the finger. “Well, I'll tell you something—I think your spine is made of baby-turds. You want to argue with that? Come on down to Mulberry Street, I'll lock the two of us in a room, they can come in in fifteen minutes and scrape you off the walls.” Dunne sat back. “As you say, I'll ask the lady. Of course, you don't know her room number, do you? Of course not.” He stood over Manion, his coat billowing out like a cloak. “I don't want to take you down to Mulberry Street, but I will if I have to. You haven't told me everything you know yet, but you will.
Everything.
Mr. Detective.” He snorted and turned away.

***

New York's City Hall looked to Louisa rather like a railroad hotel in some aggressive but lesser city such as Birmingham. She first saw it when she was wondering if she was being taken on some wild goose chase so that the cab driver could charge a huge fare because she was a foreigner and virtually helpless. The ride had gone on for far too long, she thought, to get from Twenty-Third Street to the bottom of the island. And when she did see City Hall in all its overdone assertiveness, it seemed to her that there were still miles of New York beyond it, because all she could see were more buildings and more streets. Where was the water? Where was the statue of Liberty Enlightening the World?

But Minnie was there to meet her, although in a bad mood because Louisa was late. Minnie muttered, “I ought to be sleeping right now, you know,” and led her impatiently to the building, not the main entrance but one far around to the side and much less elegant, with an iron railing that led down, not up. Minnie sent in a message; somebody came out to meet them, and Minnie hurried away.

Louisa's guide was a youngish man with dandruff on his alpaca jacket and spectacles on his nose; behind them, he seemed a reasonably good-looking man, if a little short on chin and, she thought, intelligence. “My name's Cullum.”

“I'm Mrs. Doyle.” She had decided not to use Arthur's name, proud as she was of it. She was, she thought rather thrillingly, “under cover.” “I'm to look at property records.”

“Oh, sure, Fitch told me all about it. You in the newspaper game, too?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“Pay pretty good, does it?”

“Enough to live.”

He was trying to hurry; she was hobbling on the crutches. He was nice enough about it, but it was clear he had other things to do. She was aware of his giving her several appraising looks—hat, bodice, gown—and, although she'd dressed conservatively on purpose, she thought he disapproved. She had the feeling he had totted her up and found her too well dressed. She saw a few other women in the corridor and an office; they were all in shirtwaists and skirts. It was true, next to them her gray cashmere with the beaded bodice looked ostentatious.

Tomorrow, I shall borrow something from Ethel
. She couldn't afford to buy anything, certainly.

She was put at a table at the far end of a basement area as big as a ballroom, though with a far lower ceiling, where rank after rank of shelves held records in accordion files that were tied with faded tape; sometimes, frustration with the knots had caused the tapes to be cut or broken, and the ends hung limp and chewed-looking.

Cullum pointed at a wooden thing like a tea cart, but with smaller wheels. “Fitch said property records for Manhattan. Brooklyn stuff isn't here; you got to go to Brooklyn for that. Different city. These here are Manhattan Ward One. Put them back on the cart when they're done. When you've done them all, put them back on the shelf.” He explained notations. “Mind you don't mix them up. Upstairs really hates it when they're mixed up, and then
I
catch it. I'll be back in to check, but I can't stay.” He told her where the ladies' convenience was, apparently most of a city block away, but at least in the basement. “Sorry I can't give you a hand with these things, you being crippled and all, but that's life.”

She was appalled by the quantity of material. What could Minnie have been thinking of? Then she realized that a very young man working at another table a dozen feet away seemed to be doing the same thing. When he saw her looking, he came over. “Name's Rogers. You Miz Doyle? Pleased t'meetcha. Minnie said you'd be in. You get the dope on the layout? It ain't as bad as it seems. My advice, you can go through Ward One like a dose of salts; it ain't a likely ward. Where we wanna look is from Five Pernts north, mostly east, all the way uptown 'cause that's where the cheap properties are, you follow me? It's a matter of logic, am I right?” She thought he might be all of twenty years old.