Mrs. Houdini (33 page)

Bess traced Harry's image on one of the photographs. “I found the letters he left, looking for you. I think he knew I would find everything eventually.”

She stood up. “And I'm wondering if there's a photograph there, too, that will give us the last piece of the code.”

The Boardwalk National Bank was an impressive, columned building with marble floors and crystal chandeliers. A large American flag was draped across one white wall of the lobby, and an enormous wooden clock hung on the other. There were a dozen tellers counting bills and signing forms behind tall glass windows, and every one of their stations was occupied.

“What do we do?” Gladys asked.

“I suppose we just stand in line.”

When they reached an open teller, Bess asked for a manager. Fortunately, she was recognized, and ushered into a large office off the lobby, where a trim, mustached man in a pin-striped suit greeted them.

“Mrs. Houdini,” the man said, taking her hand. “What a pleasure to meet you. I'm Richard Warren. What can I help you with?” He gestured toward the open seats across from his desk.

Charles helped Gladys into one of them, and then he and Bess sat down. “I believe my husband may have opened an account here,” Bess said. “But I'm afraid I'm not sure what kind of account it was, or what name it was under.” She slid a piece of paper toward him. “It could have been any of these names.”

“Houdini, Weiss, Rahner, Tardo,” Warren read. “Well, I can tell you with certainty there is nothing here under the name Houdini. I would have known about it if there was.”

“Of course. I didn't think so.”

“But if you give me a few minutes, I can check on these other ones for you.” He took the paper and went through a door that led to a suite of offices, where an army of pert, manicured secretaries clicked loudly on their typewriters.

“What if it's not here?” Gladys whispered.

“There has to be something,” Bess said.

Fifteen minutes later, Warren returned. He was holding a blue card instead of the paper Bess had given him. Bess stood up. “What did you find?”

He handed her the card. “There was no bank account under any of these names. But there is a safe-deposit box. It appears it was paid for in full for a period of twenty-five years. Under the names Beatrice Rahner and Romario Tardo.”

Gladys let out of a sigh of relief. “So either name could access it?”

Warren nodded and looked at Gladys and Charles. “But are either of you Rahner or Tardo?”

Bess stepped forward. “I'm Beatrice Rahner.”

The manager looked at her. “Mrs. Houdini, really, I can't just—”

“It's my legal name,” she explained. “My maiden name.”

“It is? I didn't realize.” He examined the paper and handed it back to her. “I'll escort you.” He opened the door to the offices again and led them down a long corridor to an elevator. Bess squeezed Gladys's hand.

“There has to be something,” Gladys assured her.

Warren led them into an enormous vault on the third floor, where thousands of tiny drawers lined the walls from floor to ceiling. Charles stared at them in amazement. “I've never been in a place like this.”

Warren walked along the far wall until he found the box he was looking for and pulled it out of its slot. He set it on the wooden table in the center of the room. “I'm afraid I have to ask. But did your husband leave you a key?”

Bess blinked at him. “A key?”

“Each of these boxes requires two keys to open it—mine and the box owner's.” He gestured toward the thin metal box. There were indeed two small brass key slots.

“But—what do you do if the owner's key is lost?” Bess asked.

“Well, in that case, I would have to issue a new key,” the manager said. “I'm so sorry. I hate to tell you this. But it takes a week to process the paperwork through the proper channels.”

“Oh dear,” Bess said. “I'm afraid I'm only in town for today. Couldn't you bypass the paperwork and open it for me now? I can fill out the forms afterward.”

Warren shook his head remorsefully. “I'm so sorry, Mrs. Houdini, but I have to follow procedure.” He held out his hands. “If the bank owner ever found out, I could lose my job.”

Gladys was studying the box with her hands. “Bess,” she said slowly. “Are you quite sure you don't have the key after all? Harry did leave you a number of them.”

Bess looked at the box and understood what Gladys was getting at. She felt like a dunce for not thinking of it sooner. She pulled her ring of keys out of her purse and thumbed through them. “Well, I'm a fool.” She laughed. “He did, didn't he? It must be one of these.”

The manager understood. “That solves the problem,” he said, nodding. “Surely it must be one of those.” He used his own key to open the top lock and then slid the box toward Bess. “I'll leave you in private now.” He gestured toward a bell on the wall. “You can use that to call when you are finished. It rings in my office.”

When he had gone, Charles looked at Bess. “So how are you going to open this without the key?”

Bess smiled. “I spent thirty years with the world's best locksmith.” She removed one of her hairpins and inserted it into the lock. “It's not too tricky.” She closed her eyes and tried to feel around the inside of the lock as Harry had taught her. After a few moments, it clicked open. Gladys heard the noise and clapped.

“What's inside?” she asked.

Bess slid open the lid. Inside, wrapped in velvet, were two dozen heavy gold coins. “Oh, Harry,” she said.

“It's gold,” Charles said to Gladys. “A lot of it. I've never seen anything like it.”

Bess held one in her palm and studied it in amazement. “They're just like the ones he gave your mother on our trip to the Catskills. Do you remember? He must have set some aside.” She handed one to Gladys.

“Are they enough to cover your debts?” Gladys asked.

“Yes, and more.” She looked at Charles. “But you know, half of these are yours.”

Charles stared at her. “Mine? No, I don't think so.”

“The box was in both our names. He intended these for us both.”

“But you need them.”

Bess pressed one of the coins into his hand. “There are more than enough here. Did you think I was really going to bring you into my life and then cast you aside when I got what I wanted?”

Charles looked inside the box again. “But, Bess—there's no photograph.”

Bess had almost forgotten about the photograph. She turned the box upside down and examined it, but could find nothing else, even hidden inside. “That can't be . . .”

“There's nothing else?” Gladys asked. “Not even a letter? Nothing?”

Bess's voice cracked. “No.”

“Maybe there is no other photograph. Maybe the whole point was to lead you to find this.”

“No, no.” Bess shook her head. “Money wasn't the point at all. Of course, there was always the debt issue, but I still haven't found
him
. He promised.”

Gladys touched her shoulder. “Why do you want to find him so badly? Isn't it enough to know that he loved you?”

Bess's hands began to shake. “It's not enough. I need to know that this isn't the end for us. That I'm going to see him again.”

Gladys's voice was soft. “But perhaps it's time to say good-bye and move on.”

Bess looked at the cold steel boxes, stacked around them like bricks. “I suppose I'm no different than everyone else. I'm afraid, too, of what there is after all this”—she waved her hand—“is gone.”

“I believe you will see him again, in another life,” Charles said. “But maybe he just can't find a way to tell you that. You'll just have to believe it will be.”

“My whole life, I have
believed
. Believe in the sacraments, my mother said, and I did. I believed. Believe we'll be famous, Harry told me, and I did. Believe people will come see the shows. Believe Hollywood will embrace us. Believe I will come back.” Her whole body ached; she could feel herself growing older, the slight papering of her skin, the slow laboring of her heart. “But I'm tired of believing. I just want to
know
.”

By the time they arrived back at Charles's house, she felt deflated.

Charles cleared his throat. “Of course you both must stay the night here. There's some food in the kitchen. If you help yourselves, I'll make up the guest rooms for you.”

She wasn't hungry. When she was finally alone in her room, Bess closed the door and stood looking at her case. She barely had the energy to open it. It was still early, but she wanted nothing more than to take a bath and put on her robe. In one sense, her search had been successful, but in another, she felt a long journey had come to an end. She had finally, and definitively it seemed, lost Harry.

Charles had made the bed and placed three folded towels on top of the quilt. On the bedside table, he had leaned the cardboard photograph he had found in Harry's library against the lamp. She lay on her side on the bed and stared at the image. His boyhood face stared out at her, a reminder that perhaps she hadn't lost everything.

Suddenly, she sat up. She went to the door and flung it open. “Charles! Gladys!” she called into the hallway. “Come quickly!”

Charles rushed into her room, Gladys following with her hand on his shoulder. “What is it?” he breathed.

Bess waved the card in front of him. “This is it! This is the last photograph! It was here all along.”

Charles looked at her skeptically. “But I didn't take that photograph. And there are no words in it anyway. How can that be the one we were looking for?”

“But you're
in
it. It's practically the same thing. Look!” She pointed to the painted studio backdrop. “Here.” Behind Charles's left arm, in the faded black-and-white clouds, was a fat-cheeked baby angel in white sleeves. On the cuff of one of the sleeves was a small embroidered heart. The little symbol seemed, somehow, out of place, as if it had been pasted on.

“It's the expression—wear your heart on your sleeve.
Where your heart has ever been . . .
They're the words from the song.” She waved the photograph at him. “Don't look at me like that. I know you think I'm reaching. But this is exactly the kind of game Harry loved. He loved wordplay like this.” Riddles had thrilled him. He'd hid them in the notes he passed her from floor to floor of their house, always trying to stump her: palindromes, double entendres, puns, and rebus puzzles, messages hidden in pictures. He would write out the letters of the alphabet, for example, leaving out the letter
u,
to mean
missing you
. Or he would hide their dinner plans in an acrostic disguised as a love poem.

Charles examined the photograph closely. “I suppose . . .”

Bess shivered with excitement. “There's something to this, I'm telling you.”

Gladys turned to the light coming through the window. “Let's say you are right—what does it all mean?”

“It means there's a message here.”

“But how do you know there are only four pictures you're supposed to be using, and not more?”

“I don't. Can you fetch the other three?” Bess asked Charles. “I need to look at them all.”

When he came back, she spread the four photographs on the floor in front of them, in chronological order, starting with the most recent, and squinted at them. She felt a curious energy surging through her. “Charles, help me. My eyes are failing. Do you see anything else on these? Any other words?”

Charles opened a drawer in his desk and rummaged through its contents. After a moment he pulled out a magnifying glass and knelt down beside the picture of the yacht. In the far corner was the back half of another boat, mostly obscured.

“I remember this . . .” he mused. “This was the only boat I've ever come across named after a male.
The William,
it was called.”