Brooklyn on Fire (25 page)

T
HE MARQUEE OF
the Brooklyn Academy of Music read
THE ROBERT DAVIES PLAYERS PRESENT: A ROBERT DAVIES PRODUCTION OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE’S
HAMLET
STARRING ROBERT DAVIES.
Mary looked at it, thinking that this was a long way to come for an actor who, not long ago, was playing the bit role of the porter in a production of Ibsen’s
A Doll’s House,
and naturally she wondered how he’d managed such a dramatic turnabout. She had gotten his address from the police, but he had moved, having bought a spacious new brownstone in Clinton Hill. His neighbor, a round woman wearing too much jewelry, had told Mary where she could find him.

“He says he’s a Danish prince,” the neighbor had said. “If that pompous blowhard is a prince, I’m Pocahontas.”

None of this seemed to fit the man she had met who was wailing over Abigail Corday’s body the night of the fire, devastated by her death. When questioned further, the neighbor had very little other information about Robert Davies and emphatically stated that she had no desire to find out any more about him.

Inside, the theater company was in the middle of rehearsal. It seemed as if no expense had been spared for this production. The sets were already up and quite magnificent. There was no scrimping on the size of the cast either. If the play called for a crowd, there was going to be one, no matter how many actors with nonspeaking roles had to be paid.

When Mary entered, they were rehearsing act 3, scene 2 of
Hamlet,
where Hamlet instructs the actors how to perform a play, hoping the reaction to the play will help reveal that Claudius killed Hamlet’s father. The scene hadn’t gotten very far when Robert Davies stopped and turned toward the director.

“This doesn’t feel right.”

The director, the same one who had directed
A Doll’s House,
approached Robert. He seemed weary, as if this was a regular occurrence.

“What’s the problem now, Robert?”

“Robert? Who is this Robert? I am Hamlet, prince of Denmark.”

“Yes, you are. What can I do for you, Lord Hamlet?” The words “Lord Hamlet” came off his lips with a tinge of disdain, which either Robert didn’t pick up or he just ignored.

“It’s the early seventeenth century. I’m royalty and there is nothing more common than actors. Why would I be walking amongst them?”

“Because you want to convince them to perform the play the way you want it done.”

“I’m a prince. I can convince them from anywhere. Say…over there.” He nodded toward an isolated part of the stage.

“We need movement in this scene, and the problem we have if you deliver your speech from over there is that it becomes static and less interesting.”

“I see what you mean.”

“Good.” The director thought he was done, but he wasn’t.

“I know what we can do. When I’m over there, you can shine a light on me.”

“Shine a light on you?” The director obviously thought this idea was insane.

“Yes, that should make it more interesting.”

The director started to protest. “I think it’s a mistake to—”

“I want a light. If you don’t like it, there’s the door.” Robert pointed to the exit.

After the fiasco of
A Doll’s House,
the director, who had a wife and child to support, desperately needed a job. His relation to Louise Carnegie was very distant, his branch of her family tree being far from wealthy. Aware of the director’s desperation, Robert knew he could control him. It was an extra bonus that he got to order around the man who thought he was worthy of only a tiny role in
A Doll’s House
and wouldn’t even let him understudy the lead part of Torvald for no pay.

“All right, you’ll get your light,” the director said, exasperated at dealing with Robert. “Take a break, everyone.”

As they all went their separate ways, Robert picked up a copy of the play and sat in the first row of the theater by himself, studying it. Mary approached him carefully.

“Excuse me, Prince Hamlet, might I have a word with you?”

“Why certainly,” responded Robert as he turned to face Mary.

“Do you remember me?”

“You’re Mary Handley. How could I forget? What a tragic, awful evening that was. Almost as tragic as when that bastard Claudius killed my father.”

Robert had merged his realities: Prince Hamlet in the play and his own experiences as Robert Davies. Abigail evidently had never allowed that to happen. When she “lived a part,” she only recognized the world of that role. Robert obviously didn’t have the dedication or the talent that Abigail had, and Mary viewed that as a fortunate circumstance. It seemed he wasn’t denying the memories of Robert Davies as Abigail Corday would have denied hers, but she would soon find out. Mary decided to play along, acquiescing to his desire to parade around as a prince.

“If it pleases you, my lord, I would like to discuss that tragic evening.”

“Of course,” he said, beckoning her by patting the seat next to him. “Sit down. No need to be in awe of royalty. We have real emotions like you common folk.”

“Thank you. I was hoping you might be able to answer some questions about Abigail.”

“Ah yes, Abigail was a very dear friend. Her death was devastating to me.”

A good start. Needless to say, Mary wondered how an actor could gain any insight into his character amid the confusion of two opposing realities, but then reminded herself she wasn’t there to give acting lessons. She needed information.

“Are you aware that Abigail impersonated Emily Worsham in order to engage my services?”

“Yes, a thoroughly misguided decision.”

“Why was it misguided?”

“Abigail was a true people’s performer. She would assume characters and go out onto the streets and entertain the masses for free. People started noticing her brilliance and began hiring her to perform characters at parties and other such whatnot.” He waved his hand in what he thought was a royal manner. “The people who hired her to play Emily told her she was doing a good deed, that John Worsham had been murdered and that the killers needed to be caught. It turned out to be an elaborate plot to embarrass an influential family.”

“The Huntingtons?” Mary asked.

“Yes…nouveau riche,” he said with disdain. “That kind doesn’t know how to deal with such matters.”

Nothing Mary had ever read suggested Hamlet was a snob, but she had no desire to contest Robert’s choices as an actor. It would only delay the relevant information she was seeking, so she proceeded. “Did Abigail ever mention that they had threatened her?”

“I don’t think those people give warnings. Besides, by the time the plot was exposed, she had gotten the part of Nora, and, deep down, though she’d never have admitted to thinking as Abigail since she was now Nora, she had to have been having second thoughts. She was on her way to becoming a huge success, and it could have all become undone with a scandal, like that actress/producer of
An American Cousin
when President Lincoln was shot.”

“Laura Keene? She continued to work after the assassination.”

“Yes, but her career was never the same. And what did she do? Simply produce and act in a play. Booth wasn’t her ally. He wasn’t even in her play. And by agreeing to hire you, Abigail was in the thick of a huge scandal involving very influential people.”

The more Robert talked, the more he dropped out of his Hamlet character. Finally, Mary couldn’t resist. “Prince Hamlet, I’m fascinated by your keen mind. Here you are living in the early seventeenth century, and yet you have knowledge of events in the nineteenth century. Are you clairvoyant?”

Robert froze, then finally dropped all pretenses. “You caught me, Mary. But you wouldn’t have caught Abigail. I could never get her out of character. That’s probably why she’s dead today.”

“Why do you say that?”

“She always took on the characteristics of the person she was playing, sometimes exaggerating them to truly understand who that person was. In a way, getting the part of Nora was her downfall.”

“Since Nora Helmer becomes a liberated woman and freethinker, Abigail became one.”

“She wanted to go public, naming the people who had hired her, revealing that they had lied to her and that she wasn’t aware the coffin was empty. It was part of Nora’s compulsion to be open and honest. If she were playing Lady Macbeth at the time, this never would have happened.”

“If she were Lady Macbeth, we’d have infinitely more corpses.”

“But not hers. I warned her not to cross these men, but I was just the lowly porter to her.”

“Did she ever mention who they were—the men who duped her into playing Emily?”

An announcement came from the director. “Break is over. Everyone back to rehearsal.”

Robert instantly became Prince Hamlet again. “Be there presently.” He then turned to Mary and shrugged. “She wouldn’t divulge any names, but I sensed they were powerful. Of course, since Abigail was playing Nora, she was fearless. It was frustrating. She wouldn’t heed anything I said.”

“You realize that no one would take the chance of going after Collis Huntington unless there was considerable remuneration?”

“I have to go, but you should really see this production. I have spared no expense. It’s going to be brilliant, a
Hamlet
like no one has ever seen before.”

“Yes, I’m sure it will be,” Mary said, trying to hold back the sarcasm that was fighting its way into her every syllable. His conceit not allowing him to think otherwise, Robert thought Mary had agreed with him. He nodded to her and started back to rehearsal. He had avoided her question, and it set her thinking. She called to him, “Of course, one does wonder how you came into all of this so directly after your friend’s demise.”

Upon hearing her words, he tripped, falling on the steps leading to the stage. The cast broke out laughing.

“Are you all right, Lord Hamlet?” said the director, stifling his own derisive laughter.

Robert looked up, trying to save face. “Yes, yes, I just wanted to provide all you commoners with a bit of amusement.” He then whispered intensely to Mary. “If you must know, a long-lost relative, someone I didn’t even know, died and left me a considerable sum. And I’d never have harmed Abigail. Because of her talent, I thought Abigail would get her break first and then help me.” Then he returned to being Prince Hamlet. “But as fate would have it, I had no need for her.”

“How fortunate for you.”

Mary’s tone didn’t provide Robert with the absolution he was seeking. Miffed, he turned and stomped onto the stage. Mary watched a few more minutes of rehearsal. If the words on the marquee outside weren’t enough evidence, what she saw onstage completely confirmed that it was clearly a vanity production. Robert didn’t seem to have the commitment or insight Abigail had. It was also entirely possible he had put too much of himself into the role. Instead of playing Hamlet as a tortured soul, he was mistakenly playing him as an insecure peacock. Now that he had money and was in charge, maybe that’s exactly what he was.

Of course, the money presented another problem. His proclamation about “a long-lost relative” was at best flimsy. He could’ve been involved in Abigail Corday’s death, especially if someone promised him enough money to advance his stalled acting career. But even if that were true, and Mary highly doubted it, she still had to find out who that person was in order to tie the three murders together.

Fib or not, Robert’s “inheritance” started Mary thinking about the old lady who had been killed: Gabrielle Evans. A fire was never set in her house, which upset the pattern in Mary’s theory. Maybe whoever hired Shorty had told him not to burn it because that person was going to inherit it. The question was: who would benefit from Gabrielle Evans’s death?

L
ESTER
H
ACKEL
J
R.
was a very organized lawyer who believed there was a definite order in the universe and lived his life that way. He carried fastidiousness to its ultimate level and then some. Every paper in his office was in its correct place, as was every pen, chair, table, and picture on the wall. If at one point a picture had tilted ever so slightly to the side, Lester would notice it and immediately straighten the offender. He had two windows behind his desk covered by two shades. Every morning when he entered the office he would lower each shade exactly halfway, then study and adjust them to make sure both shades were the same distance from the tops of the windows and completely even with each other. Anything otherwise was disturbing. It led to chaos, and Lester couldn’t get his work done when there was chaos.

Lester was in his late thirties and had taken over the law practice from his father, Lester Hackel Sr., who had retired two years earlier only to tragically die when he was kicked in the head by a horse whose shoe he was trying to straighten. It was early afternoon, and Lester had just returned from Schmidt’s Bean House, where he had his regular Monday lunch of sausage and baked beans. Sitting at his desk in his Monday outfit—brown suit, brown shoes, and a brown tie—he had an unexpected visitor. Anything unexpected gave Lester a nervous stomach. And his reaction didn’t vary one iota even though his visitor was an attractive young woman.

“How do you do, Mr. Hackel? I’m Mary Handley.” Mary stuck out her hand to shake his but she was left holding air.

“Junior,” he said.

“Excuse me?”

“I’m Mr. Hackel Junior. My father was Mr. Hackel, but he is no longer with us.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Mary finally lowered her hand to her side.

“No need to be. He went as he would have wished: trying to restore order in the world.”

“Oh, well then, that must be very…comforting.”

“It is, but what is not comforting is that I don’t seem to remember us having an appointment, Miss…”

“Handley. Mary Handley.”

“Yes.” He glanced at a paper on his desk. “I make a specific notation of all of my appointments for each day—”

“I’m afraid I don’t have an appointment.”

“Well then, Miss Handley, you must make one, and then we can speak.”

“What I have to say won’t take long.”

“Good, then make a short appointment.”

Mary could see Lester would be hard to dissuade. “When is your next appointment?”

He looked at his paper again, then checked his pocket watch. “In fifty-eight minutes.”

“Then I’d like to schedule an appointment in two minutes.”

“I’m sorry, but I need at least fifteen minutes’ lead time. That’s my policy.”

“All right, fifteen minutes.”

“Splendid. I’ll put you down.”

As Lester wrote Mary’s name on his appointment sheet, she walked out into the hall and waited. It was maddening to waste fifteen minutes when time was so precious, but she knew that she would waste even more time trying to convince the officious Mr. Hackel Jr. otherwise. Exactly fifteen minutes later Mary walked back into the office. Lester stood.

“Ah, Miss Handley, good to see you,” he said as he rose while checking his pocket watch again. “And right on time.” This go-around they shook hands, and he offered her a seat. Lester was a step or two beyond odd, but he had information she needed, and she got right to it.

“Mr. Hackel Jr., I understand you are in the possession of Gabrielle Evans’s will.”

“I’m afraid you’ve been misinformed. It’s not a will but rather a revocable living trust. My father originally drew it up, but when he retired, the responsibility of her trust was passed on to me. I am also the executor.”

“Good, then you can tell me about her heirs.”

“I’m afraid I can’t. I am not bound to reveal that information. Besides, there has been a delay in the distribution of assets.”

Mary knew this was not the type of man who would break protocol. “Can you tell me when the assets will be distributed?”

“Sometime this week. That’s all I will say.”

“It’s been many weeks since her death. That’s quite a delay.”

“It’s called doing my job. As executor, I was also given the duty of making financial decisions for the estate. Mrs. Evans owned a considerable amount of stock in one company that was involved in a buyout. As the executor, I decided it would be in the best interests of the estate to sell the shares, and that transaction was just completed this past Friday.”

“What was the name of the company?”

“It’s all a matter of public record now. The Long Island Water Supply Company.”

“And who bought it?”

“I’m not at liberty to tell you that. I promised to let it come out in the newspapers first.”

“Really, and whom did you promise?”

“If I told you that, I’d be telling you who bought the company. But very clever, Miss Handley, very clever indeed.”

“Thank you. It was worth a try, but you’re too smart for me.” She smiled, hoping her compliment and friendly demeanor might convince him to reveal more than he was willing to divulge. “And would you say the estate was worth five thousand dollars, ten thousand, a hundred thousand?”

Lester didn’t respond.

“You won’t disclose that information either?”

“I will. I’m just waiting for you to reach a number that’s high enough for me to confirm.”

Mary was speechless. Gabrielle Evans’s estate was worth north of one hundred thousand dollars! That was more than enough motive for murder.

A
NDREW
H
ASWELL
G
REEN
was not having a good day. As days went, this one exceeded lousy and was bordering on miserable, even worse than the day when he had punched the wall. The extortionists had carried through on their threat. They didn’t openly accuse him of anything. Instead, they were torturing him by placing items in the newspaper filled with innuendo.

The latest attempt to unmask him was particularly annoying. It was a line in a newspaper article concerning a benefit he had attended to expand Central Park. An excerpt from the article read, “And Andrew Haswell Green attended, accompanied by his male companion.”

Green was livid. His “male companion” was his brother John, a doctor who had just returned from working in Chile and was visiting from Worcester, Massachusetts. Of course, there was no mention of that.
If they did mention John,
Green thought,
those vultures probably would have alluded to some sort of incest
.

He knew Joseph Pulitzer, the owner of the
World,
the newspaper in which this garbage was printed, and contemplated paying him a visit. He soon decided it would be unwise. Even if Pulitzer backed him, he would eventually be faced with the question “Are you or aren’t you?” and that would be problematic. If he denied being a homosexual, he was implying that homosexuality was evil and wrong, an implication he surely didn’t believe. He was also honest to a fault and absolutely refused to lie. Besides, any denial would just bring more attention to it. Of course, some would claim that making no response was an act of admission. However, he was a lawyer, and he knew there was no concrete proof of anything. Reasonable doubt was ever present.

It was late afternoon, and Green was in his study sipping chamomile tea, hoping it would calm him. It didn’t. His butler entered and informed Green that he had a surprise visitor: Collis Huntington. That increased Green’s anxiety level. He had no idea why Huntington had come or what he might want, but he told the butler to show him in.

“I understand you’ve been dealing with some adversity,” said Huntington before tossing a newspaper onto the coffee table in front of Green. It was the
World
.

“Collis, don’t tell me you’re the one who—”

“No, no, it’s not my style. When I attack, I start with a little scratch and allow it to build over a long period of time, letting it get larger and larger until the person bleeds out. It’s obvious this garbage is purely for motivational purposes.”

“So, you’ve come to revel in my problems because I forced you to withdraw over yours?”

“I prefer commiserate. We have both been attacked by the same man, and I’ve already set in motion plans to get him off our backs.”

“I’m glad you know our adversary, because I certainly don’t.”

“Hugh McLaughlin. It’s really quite obvious when you think about it. That sneaky mick desperately needed to stop the consolidation project in order to retain his little fiefdom of Brooklyn. So he went about attempting to remove the two biggest obstacles to his success: me and you.”

“And you’re certain of this?”

“As certain as I am about anything, but if I’m wrong, he still goes down and not us.”

Green wanted to know more. “Would you like some chamomile tea, Collis?”

“Don’t mind if I do, Andy,” Huntington said as he sat down on the club chair facing Green. “I usually prefer something a bit stronger, but this will be a nice change.”

Green called to his butler and asked him to bring another cup and saucer for Huntington. “And see what proper snacks we have. Is that all right with you, Collis?”

Huntington nodded and the butler left. He nestled himself into the club chair, getting comfortable as he looked around the room and then at Green.

“I want you to know, Andy, I count several sodomites as my good friends.”

Green winced but decided not to protest. What would be the point?

G
EORGE’S BUSINESS DEALINGS
were finally complete, and Mary asked him to watch Lester Hackel Jr.’s office. The meeting of Gabrielle Evans’s heirs could be at any time, and since the officious Mr. Hackel Jr. would not reveal their identities, they had to keep a vigil. Meanwhile, she paid a visit to the Long Island Water Supply Company.

It was in a town called New Lots that had been annexed by Brooklyn four years earlier. Mary stood across the street and stared at it, the irony fully implanted in her brain that this unassuming building could hold the key to Sean’s freedom. All records that contained lists of stockholders were routinely sent to the state capital. Albany was far away, and hoping that she could save precious time, she had decided to go right to the source.