A Golden Grave--A Rose Gallagher Mystery Page 3

We mounted the smooth steps of an elegant brownstone row house across from Central Park. The bay windows stood dark, shrouded in heavy velvet curtains, but a sliver of golden light between the folds hinted at life within.

  “Nice place,” Chapman said, scanning its stately facade. “Real nice.” He shot me a questioning glance but otherwise held his peace.

  A sour-looking butler answered the door. As many times as I’d called here, I’d never seen him wearing any other expression. “Good evening, Bertram,” I said sweetly, taking a petty sort of pleasure in the familiar greeting. The first time we’d met, I’d been a mere housemaid, a creature for him to look down upon—and look down upon me he had, with relish. Now the tables had turned, and it seemed only fair to remind him of the fact.

  But the old boot wouldn’t be conquered so easily. “It’s rather more night than evening, madam,” he said, drawing out his watch and consulting it with a disdainfully raised eyebrow.

  “I suppose that’s true, but I know what a night owl Mr. Burrows is. Would you kindly inform him of our visit?”

  The butler surrendered, though not what you’d call gracefully. He handled our overcoats and hats as though they were plague-infected, and upon depositing us in the smallest of Mr. Burrows’s parlors, suggested that we might warm ourselves by the fire, which is butler for “don’t sit on the furniture.” Only then did he forge into the inner chambers of the brownstone in search of his master.

  Chapman’s gaze did a slow tour of the room, taking in the fine gilt furnishings, the marble fireplace, the thick Persian rugs. “And here I thought Wiltshire was rich.”

  I didn’t respond, too busy admiring a sumptuous Gallé vase on the mantelpiece. There was something almost indecent about the way the blown-glass flowers opened in swollen relief, voluptuous and scandalously red, and I felt a touch of heat in my cheeks—which is almost certainly what its owner intended.

  “You said his name was Burrows?” Chapman’s gruff voice was like sandpaper against the soft opulence of the room. “As in the Burrowses?”

  “Of the Philadelphia branch. Jonathan Burrows is a close friend of Mr. Wiltshire’s.”

  “And he can help us how?”

  Before I could answer, the door opened to admit the gentleman himself. As I’d guessed, he was still in his evening attire, clad in a smart cutaway and sapphire damask waistcoat that brought out the bright blue of his eyes. He held a cigar in one hand and a glass of cognac in the other; the slight flush of his skin suggested it wasn’t his first round. “Why, Miss Gallagher,” he said with a rakish smile. “This is an indecorous hour for a young lady to come calling. Better you had sent me your card, and I could have come to you.” He punctuated this outrageous remark with a wink, in case I wasn’t already blushing.

  Sergeant Chapman cleared his throat, assuming by Mr. Burrows’s fresh behavior that he hadn’t noticed the presence of a third person in the room. But I knew better. “I would make the introductions, Sergeant, but I do believe Mr. Burrows has just introduced himself better than I ever could.”

  “How rude of me.” Mr. Burrows stuck out a hand, perfectly unabashed. “Jonathan Burrows. Sergeant—?”

  “Chapman.” The detective shook hands bemusedly.

  “Ah yes, Wiltshire’s mentioned you. From the Crowe case, isn’t it? Then we’re all friends here.” By which he meant, We all know about the things that go bump in the night, so we can speak freely. “How may I be of service this evening, Sergeant?”

  “Beats me.”

  Mr. Burrows cut me a sidelong glance.

  “Nothing to worry about,” I assured him. “Not for you, anyway.” Though Mr. Burrows had shown no sign of concern at the presence of a copper in his parlor, that didn’t mean much. Jonathan Burrows made a habit of keeping his true feelings to himself.

  “Not for me,” he echoed. “How intriguing. And where is Wiltshire this fine evening?”

  “In Harlem,” I said offhandedly, “rounding up another shade.”

  “Yet New York’s finest shade hunter stands in my parlor. The plot thickens.” He gestured for us to sit, settling himself into a leather armchair. “Very well, then, let’s have it.”

  Sergeant Chapman went over what he’d told me about the deaths at the Grand Opera House, including his suspicion that the coroner was lying. “Miss Gallagher seems to think you can help us out with the investigation,” he concluded, his tone making it plain that he didn’t see how.

  Neither did Mr. Burrows. “I’m not much of a political fellow myself. I know several of the delegates, and I could perhaps be of some assistance in arranging interviews, but other than that…”

  “I had something else in mind,” I said. “You’re not going to like it, but I do hope you’ll agree.”

  Mr. Burrows eyed me warily.

  “We have our suspicions that the cause of death wasn’t really typhoid, but we need to be sure.”

  “I don’t understand. I’m not a doctor, what could I…?” He trailed off, eyes widening in horror. “Dear God, you can’t possibly want me to…?” He let out a sharp laugh. “No. Absolutely out of the question. Have you any idea…? Thank you, no.” He tossed back the rest of his cognac, wincing.

  “It would only take a few minutes of your time.”

  “That’s not the point and you know it! It is quite simply the most revolting idea I’ve ever heard. You wouldn’t put horse manure in your mouth to find out what the animal has been eating, would you?”

  “Well, I don’t think it’s quite the same…”

  “No, it’s worse!” He sprang to his feet and poured himself another dram of cognac. “Really, Miss Gallagher.”

  “Sorry, folks,” Chapman interrupted, looking annoyed. “What’re we talking about here?”

  I looked at Mr. Burrows, silently asking permission to reveal his secret. “Sergeant Chapman knows about our work,” I reminded him, “so this isn’t going to be much of a stretch for him.”

  “Oh, well in that case, be my guest.”

  Pretending to miss the sarcasm, I turned to the detective. “You see, Sergeant, Mr. Burrows has a unique talent. A sort of extra sense, if you like, in addition to smell and taste and the rest. He can sense the composition of things just by touching them.”

  Chapman’s brow creased. “You’re gonna have to talk me through that, Miss Gallagher.”

  “When he touches an object, he can tell exactly what it’s made of, down to the elemental level. Not only that, he can sense what it’s come into contact with recently. Say he were to pick up your hat, for instance. If you’d just come from a railway station, he would know it, because he would sense traces of smoke. Or if you’d been to the Gashouse District, he would sense the coal gas. He can sense people, too. If you lined up a bunch of identical hats, he could pick out which one was yours, because he’s shaken your hand and so he knows … well, your body’s unique signature, I guess you could call it. Any bit of hair or skin you’d left behind, even if it’s too small to see, would tell him whose hat it was.”

  I’d struggled mightily to understand all this when it had been explained to me, but Sergeant Chapman got it straightaway. “That sounds like a real handy talent for a fella in my line of work.”

  Mr. Burrows rolled his eyes. “So Wiltshire is constantly telling me. If you ask me, it’s a very dull gift indeed.”

  “How’s it done?”

  “It’s a form of what’s called luck,” I explained, “which is just a broad term for any sort of extraordinary ability we don’t really understand. There are lots of different types. For instance, do you remember the bounty hunter who helped us track down Freddie Crowe’s killers?”

  “The one with the foul mouth. I remember. Said she could smell where the killers had been.”

  “Ah,” said Mr. Burrows, “that must be our dear Annie Harris. They call her the Bloodhound.”

  Chapman’s glance cut between us. “You all got lots of friends with these sorts of talents?”

  “Less than one percent of the
population is lucky,” I said, “but it’s hereditary, so families with luck do tend to end up moving in the same circles.”

  “How come I never heard of it?”

  “Because families like mine go to great lengths to see to it that you never do,” Mr. Burrows said. “Luck has made many of us here on the Avenue very wealthy, and we have no desire to have it known how we came by our fortunes.”

  A trump concealed is ten times more powerful than one your opponent knows you’re holding was how Mr. Burrows had explained it to me. I understood it, but it still brought a stab of resentment to my breast. Being dealt a trump card was one thing. Concealing it, though—that’s called cheating.

  But we didn’t have time to get into any of that. “I think Mr. Burrows can use his luck to determine whether those men really died of typhoid.”

  The scowl returned to Mr. Burrows’s handsome features. “Have you any idea what you’re asking? You might as well have me lick a corpse.”

  I grimaced in spite of myself. “Surely it’s not that bad?”

  “It’s not far off,” he said hotly.

  “I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important. But if Sergeant Chapman is right and the coroner is lying, they’ll bury the evidence before we have a chance to prove it.”

  “Surely the matter proves itself? We’ve all known people with typhoid. A child could tell you it doesn’t work that way. Why, my cousin Agnes was bedridden for nearly a month before she succumbed.”

  “New strain, is what they’re saying.” Chapman’s tone made it clear what he thought of that explanation. “Kills within a few hours. Coroner claims they must’ve caught it at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, where they was all gathered before the convention.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “Reckon so, but I gotta be sure before I go pointing fingers at the higher-ups. It’ll be the end of my career if I’m wrong.”

  “And if you’re right? No one would take my word as evidence, even if I were prepared to disclose my secret. Which, by the way, I am not.”

  “But you might be able to tell how they really died,” Chapman returned doggedly. “That’d be something, at least.”

  “Surely you have a theory?”

  “The beginnings of one, anyhow. Witness saw a man take a couple of the victims by the scruff of the neck. Nothing too rough—like he was greeting an old chum, say—’cept the victims didn’t seem to appreciate it. Few minutes later, they keeled over. Witness said one of ’em was clutching at his chest, like maybe he was having a heart attack.”

  “Killing at a touch? That sounds like a shade.”

  “That was my first thought. No ice on the bodies, though, like you would expect if a shade got ’em. And the witness didn’t mention nothing odd about his appearance. Described him as a tall, gangly fella. Nothing about him resembling a ghost.”

  “Even so, surely Miss Gallagher—”

  I shook my head. “I can only sense them when they’re nearby, not after they’re gone. But if it was a shade, you might find traces of ice left inside the bodies.” Like a half-thawed side of beef. I kept that last bit to myself, figuring it wouldn’t help my cause.

  Mr. Burrows’s lips pressed into a thin line. He was wavering.

  “Please, Jonathan,” I said, greatly daring.

  It worked. My use of his given name caught him off guard, and he met my eye. That was his undoing. A gentleman of Mr. Burrows’s disposition simply cannot refuse a lady. “I must be mad,” he growled. Then he poured himself another drink—this time a good deal more than a dram. “I daresay I’m going to need this,” he said, and downed it in a gulp.

  CHAPTER 4

  MISERY LANE—LA FOLIE FRANÇAISE—THE INVISIBLE AUTOPSY—HOT WATER

  “So,” Mr. Burrows said as we waited for his carriage to be brought around, “are you going to tell me the real reason you’re not with Thomas this evening?”

  I avoided his eye, watching Sergeant Chapman’s cab fade into the mist. We’d catch up with him at the morgue and go our separate ways afterward. “There’s nothing to tell. He gave me the night off.”

  “And yet here you are.”

  “Sergeant Chapman called and I decided not to wait. Matters like these are highly time sensitive, you know.”

  “Indeed. And now you have your first case as an independent agent.”

  There was something altogether too knowing about his smirk. “Unless you count the time I solved Thomas’s kidnapping,” I said coolly.

  He just laughed and offered me his arm, as though we were stepping out for a pleasant evening at the Astor House instead of heading for the city morgue. Though he clearly didn’t look forward to the grim business ahead, having framed his mind to the task, he was back to playing the carefree rounder.

  “You really are incorrigible,” I muttered, allowing him to escort me down the steps.

  It was well after midnight by the time we arrived at Misery Lane, that blighted passage of Twenty-Sixth Street between First Avenue and the river. Bellevue Hospital reared up out of the shadows, its brick facade stained a ghoulish red in the glow of the gas lamps. My gaze roamed involuntarily over the grounds, and I couldn’t suppress a shudder, recalling all too vividly the horrific descriptions in Harper’s Weekly of wasted souls in agonies of disease. At least the beggars and thieves had long since dispersed from Charities Pier, ferried off to their grim fates on Blackwell’s Island.

  “This way,” Chapman said, and we followed him into the morgue, our footfalls echoing along the empty corridor.

  “This isn’t my first visit to a morgue, you know,” Mr. Burrows said conversationally. “I toured one in Paris a few years ago.”

  “What, for amusement?” I made a face.

  “You needn’t look so horrified. It’s a major attraction, right along with Notre-Dame. Not my cup of tea, I’ll grant you, but the French are positively mad about it. Then again, the French are mad on a great many counts.”

  Chapman cut him a look that suggested he thought Mr. Burrows was a bit touched himself. “Through here.”

  He led us into a narrow white-tiled room, where a row of marble-topped tables stood under the glare of a single electric light. Upon these tables lay half a dozen corpses, pale and naked but for the towels draped discreetly across their private parts. Their clothes hung from hooks on the wall, as though they were merely guests for the night and might fetch up their coats and hats and depart at any moment. The place reeked of chemicals and a fleshy sort of odor that reminded me of a butcher’s shop, and I had to force myself not to bring a handkerchief to my face. It wouldn’t be fair to Mr. Burrows, given what I’d asked him here to do.

  “They’ll be loading ’em into pine boxes anytime now,” Chapman said.

  I looked at him, startled. “What, no autopsy?”

  “Like I said … fishy. So we’d better get on with it.”

  “I’d better get on with it, you mean.” Mr. Burrows looked ill at the prospect, but he was as good as his word, handing me his hat and stick and tugging off his gloves. Then, with only the slightest hesitation, he reached out and touched the hand of the first victim. His features twisted in disgust, but he soldiered on, pressing his fingertips to the dead man for several minutes before moving on to the next. He repeated the process for all six, and though he flinched a little less each time, I could tell it was a struggle for him.

  When he’d done, his skin had taken on a greenish hue, and the look he gave me smoldered with resentment. “That was easily the most repugnant thing I’ve ever experienced.”

  “What’d you get?” Chapman asked, looking half awed, half skeptical.

  “Besides the fact that this chap had oysters for dinner and that one had a fondness for cheap sherry? Nothing.”

  “You sensed their stomach contents?” My own guts twisted at the thought.

  “How else to be thorough, Miss Gallagher?” he asked coldly. “Or did you not consider what you were asking of me? Nor was that the worst of it, I assure you.”

  I sta
red at him in dismay. He was right—I hadn’t thought through what I was asking of him. I’d been too busy trying to prove something.

  “So you didn’t sense typhoid?” Chapman asked, sticking to the matter at hand.

  Mr. Burrows gave a curt shake of his head. “It’s been a long time, but I didn’t detect anything that reminded me of the disease my cousin suffered from. Nor did I find any trace of ice or anything else that would suggest a shade—though I’m not entirely sure what I’m looking for.”

  Thomas would know. I could tell from Mr. Burrows’s expression he’d had the same thought.

  “What about poison?” Chapman asked.

  “I don’t think so. There were any number of things I couldn’t identify, but none of them were common to all six. Whatever killed these men, it’s no longer present in their systems. Not being a physician, that’s all I can tell you.”

  I glanced over at the nearest body. “I suppose someone checked them for wounds?”

  Chapman nodded. “Nothing to speak of. This many hours after the fact, even strangling would leave a mark.”

  “It must be a shade, then. There’s no other explanation.” At least, none that I could see.

  “That’s why I came to you all.”

  “What about your witness? Might we speak with him?”

  “Sure, if I had a name. He was hustled outta there before I could even finish my interview.”

  “What do you mean, hustled out? By whom?”

  “Byrnes himself, if you can believe it.”

  “I’m sorry, who—?”

  “Inspector Byrnes. Chief of the Detective Bureau. Haven’t seen him at a crime scene in I dunno how long, and suddenly he’s personally escorting a witness down to HQ?” Chapman shook his head. “Fishy.”

  “No other witnesses?”

  “Not so’s I’ve heard.”

  We stared at each other, at a loss.

  “Well, then,” Mr. Burrows said, drawing his gloves back on, “it seems we’ve reached the limits of our collective experience. So if you don’t mind, I’d like to repair to my library and get extremely drunk. I presume you’ll need a lift, Miss Gallagher?”