Winter at Death's Hotel (37 page)

“I don't, and I'm surprised you'd say it. But I'll tell you this, Mr. Roosevelt, if
you
mean to tell
me
not to investigate Harding now I know he's the woman's husband, then I'll say right off the reel, I'll quit the force and take it to the newspapers! It's one thing if a grafter like Cleary tries to get me to fudge an investigation, but you're a commissioner! You're
Theodore
Roosevelt
!”

Roosevelt took off his eyeglasses, polished the lenses carefully on a pocket handkerchief, returned them to his nose. He cleared his throat. “You remind me of my responsibilities, Dunne. Good for you.” He cleared his throat again. “Investigate Harding. The gloves are off there; it's common knowledge now that his wife was a fragile reed, so he can't demand we keep it quiet. Ask him for the names of her friends. Ask him about the man she was with. Maybe he knew all about him. Maybe he had a detective on them. Harding's a tough nut, so push him.” Roosevelt looked truculent but a bit uncertain; abruptly, he changed his tone entirely. “You're right—
I
took Harding to the morgue to identify his wife. I accepted his story about wanting his privacy protected, so I'm afraid I was guilty of warning Cleary off from investigating that side of things—although that was not my intention! You go ahead and investigate whatever you want!” He rapped his desk. “If that leads you here, so be it!”

Dunne looked at him with what might have been cynical disbelief, or perhaps simply practiced blandness. “I'm free to investigate
anything
, then?”

“Wherever the investigation leads you, I said.”

“Only that Harding's a friend of yours.”

“We belong to the same club, nothing more.”

They held each other's eyes for one, two, three seconds, and Roosevelt said, “And keep up the good work on that map. That's the kind of police work I like to see—it shows hints that we might be an intelligent lot, after all. Then start to put things together. I want an arrest. Soon!”

“We have a man in custody for the second murder.” When Roosevelt looked blank, Dunne said, “The pavement sleeper who found the body. We should let him go.”

“Did he do it?”

“He couldn't have. No way to move the body, no place to kill her—and we looked for one. Couldn't have lifted a grown woman off the ground by himself, that fella.”

They looked at each other again. Roosevelt took off his pince-nez again, remembered he'd polished them only seconds before, put them back. And took them off again. “The newspapers will savage us if they hear we've released the only suspect. “ He breathed on the lenses, putting them almost into his toothy mouth. “Keep him in the Tombs for the time being.”

“In fairness, we ought to let him go.”

Roosevelt looked away from Dunne. He pulled a pile of paper toward himself over the desk's surface. “Keep him in the Tombs until I tell you otherwise.”

As he got ready to leave, Dunne said, “Oh, by the way, Commissioner.” Roosevelt looked up, met a rather steely look. “On the night of the first woman's murder, you were walking the Sixteenth Precinct and ran into a patrolman. D'you remember?”

“If I looked in my notebook, I could be sure.”

“Well, the copper had it in his report that he met you, so it's certain. But what I was wondering, sir, was—when you were walking up to where you met him, did you happen to see anybody with a wagon? Anybody at all?”

Roosevelt frowned. “Why in the world would you think I had?”

“Only the pattern I showed you on the map. Such a man was seen four blocks farther south. If you'd seen him, you see, then I could say he was that far uptown for sure.”

“I remember nothing of the kind. And I am not the sort of man who forgets what he sees!”

“Right, sir. I'll be on my way, then. But I'd be appreciative if you'd just have a look in your notebook, as you mentioned.” Dunne pocketed his map but turned back from the door. “A detail, Commissioner. Cleary saddled me with a detective named Fink. Can I kick him off my investigation?”

“Is he a slacker?”

“He's a tale-bearer.”

“Get rid of him!”

An hour later, Dunne again came down the steps of Roscoe Harding's brownstone house and swung himself up into the police carriage that had brought him. Cassidy was waiting inside.

Dunne said, “Harding knew.”

“About the wife?”

“And about the gigolo who was with her. He had a private D on her. The gigolo came to see Harding the day before she was killed. He told Harding that for a thousand dollars he'd drop out of the wife's life and she'd never see him again.” Dunne smiled. “And Harding told him he could keep her, as he'd rather have the thousand.”

“He give you a name?”

“He did. And an address.” He swung out to call up to the driver. “Two-seventeen West Fifteenth Street.” He fell back into the carriage seat. “Let's pick him up and sweat him.”

***

By noon, Louisa knew that Minnie wasn't ever going to telephone her. It might be that she'd yet stop at the hotel, but Louisa was clear eyed enough to see that Minnie had been changed by the kiss—that liking had probably turned to fear, even to hate.

“I'm going out,” she said to Ethel, who was doing some sewing in her annex room.

“Galt thinks you're doing too much on that ankle, if you care what Galt thinks.”

“I do care, but I don't agree. You're seeing a lot of him, Ethel?”

“We had a coffee together yesterday, if that's a lot.”

“I didn't mean to pry, Ethel.”

Louisa dressed, mostly without Ethel's help, although out of habit she asked for assistance getting her corset fastened. She wore the gray wool again, in which she felt inconspicuous, even invisible. She wanted now, without ever putting it into words for herself, to blend into the crowds of New York. The only consolation for her deep funk was that she had stopped menstruating: one less bit of bother.

Ethel told her that it was cold out again and that there might be snow. Louisa put on a rather wide winter hat and took her heavy coat from the cupboard. “I intend to be back by supper. Don't wait for me.”

“It would be best if you tell me where you'll be, madame. Just in case.”

“I'm going to the
Express
offices in Printing House Square.”

Out on the street, she thought that Galt was probably right about the ankle. Still, she was getting along pretty well on the cane now, and she certainly didn't want to go back to the crutches.

She asked the doorman how to get to the Elevated, and he told her where to stand to get the cross-town tram going east. There was nothing to it, really, as she found when she'd done it—off the tram at Third Avenue, up the stairs with less fuss than she'd expected, drop a five-cent piece into a slot, and cross the platform. The little green station was made of wood, almost like a stationmaster's house in rural England, but without the flowers. She got on the steam train; a couple of men actually rose to offer her a seat—not what she'd expected of the completely democratic El.

And the El revived her: She saw ragamuffin boys, gentlemen in silk hats, Negroes, tired-looking working women heading home from the uptown sweat shops, a couple of tough-looking men in clothes too good for them—politicians? The car swayed as it went down the tracks, but she didn't care. The train was whizzing along the backsides of tenements. Few windows were open, but many were uncurtained. She saw a woman at an ironing board, a man sitting at a kitchen table, a man and woman arguing, a man and woman embracing: people living real lives within fifty feet of thousands who rattled past them every day. When the train made a slight bend, she knew (she'd looked it all up in her guide before she started) that Third Avenue had ended and they were now running down the Bowery. She was delighted as she had been on her first cab ride down the same street: here were those same buildings she had seen from below, seen a story higher: now the Bowery was a street of human beings, of homes, of kitchens and bedrooms and men in shirtsleeves and women in aprons and children coming in with books carried in a tightened strap. Maybe the men worked in the dime museums and the concert saloons; maybe the women did their work down on the street or in back rooms, but up here they were simply
people
, humanized and democratized by the Elevated Railway.

All
this
life! So many! How can we ever think we're special, even separate, when there are so many! We're not individuals; we're like herring coming in from the sea.
But then she thought of the two murdered women and how individual they were. They had separate identities because they had been savaged. Because they had been picked out.
But
how? And why?

She had planned her route and so got down at Chatham Square and changed to the Second Avenue line—not half so bad as she'd feared—and took the short hop to City Hall. Coming down to street level was a disappointment. But again to her surprise, an overweight sort in a checked suit raised his hat and offered his arm to cross the whirling traffic of Park Row; he looked like a tout, but he certainly behaved like a gentleman.

Who was it who had toured America and been so sharp eyed? Mrs. Trollope, of course, but she was more sharp tongued than eyed, much too harsh, in fact rude. No, the other one—Tocqueville, that one—he would have understood the man in the loud suit. He was the essence of America, both mannerly and mannerless, both tasteless and tactful. Perhaps she would write about him to Arthur, about the idea of capturing an essence in a single example. But of course, Arthur would think she was telling him how to write.

She went up to the
Express
offices in the grubby lift and went straight to the newsroom and this time didn't shilly-shally. She said to the first man who looked up at her, “I'd like to see Miss Fitch, please.”

The man was working at a typewriting machine. He had on an eyeshade and had a pencil between his teeth, and he wasn't wearing his jacket, which was draped over the back of his straight chair. He looked up at her and said through his pencil, “Isn't here.”

“She must be here. It's after three.”

“Hasn't been here all day. Out on a story, prob'ly.”

She tried one of the copy boys, got the same answer, so asked around with a pushiness that surprised her and got referred to an eminence called the city editor, who was perched in a tiny office that overlooked the newsroom as if he were a warder in some sort of institution.

“Excuse me?”

He looked up. “
What?
”

“I was told to ask you where Miss Fitch is.”

“Who the devil told you to ask me?”

“One of the men there.”

“Which one? I'll skin him alive!” He was a peppery little man of about sixty, and, she thought, more manner than substance, as if he'd read that newspaper editors were supposed to be tough and he was still trying to get it right.

She said again, “I'd like to know where Miss Fitch is.”

“Wouldn't we all! Who the devil are you?”

“I am Mrs. Arthur Conan Doyle, and Miss Fitch is a friend.”

“This isn't a tearoom. Help me out by not bothering those guys over there; it's hard enough to get any work out of them as it is. Nice to have met you.” He started to close his door.

“Have you heard from Miss Fitch today?”

“Would I look this worried if I had? She's got a deadline coming up on tomorrow's story and she hasn't filed and I haven't heard from her, and if you see her you can tell her from me that she's about one hour from being booted! Now go somewheres.”

She limped away to the newsroom entrance. As she got there, one of the copy boys shot out of the swinging wooden gate and stopped in front of her as if he were on skates, leaning back to keep his balance. He said, “You the one's looking for Fitch?”

“Yes!”

“She ain't here and she ain't been here! Fer a dime I'll tell you something.”

Money, money
. Louisa produced a dime. The boy said, his voice low and conspiratorial, “Old Woebegone sent Jackson over to her place and she wasn't there and
hadn't been there all night
AND Woebegone's been tearing his hair out 'cause she's between the sheets someplace with some fella!” He laughed and fled.

What
a
vulgar
child. What a terrible place for a child to be, all those rough men. And how terrible for Minnie.
Of course, she didn't believe for a second that Minnie was with a man if she had a deadline and a story due, because Minnie lived for reporting, not romance. And this story was supposed to make her a star—her word.

She stopped at the elevator. While she waited, she couldn't help reading the graffiti. She again read the one that said, “Fitch eats the hairy banana.” Somebody had crossed out “banana” and written “muff” above it.

She could figure that out, too. She blushed. Had that been written because of something Minnie had done or said—was it the kiss? Or Louisa's telephone calls? She could imagine the jokes, made loud enough for Minnie to hear: “Fitch's lady friend,” “Fitch's girl.”

At least “hairy muff” made more anatomical sense than “hairy banana.”

But none of that was important.
Where
was
Minnie?

She stared at that question. She heard the elevator crash its gates on the floor above. Minnie hadn't been home all night. Minnie hadn't telephoned in. The Butcher had murdered another woman. She confronted a possibility.

She turned around and marched back to the newsroom and grabbed the arm of the first man who passed. “Where is McClurg, the sketch artist?”