Secret of the White Rose (25 page)

“You’ll make it right with the commissioner’s deputy?” I asked. Saunders was running the Drayson manhunt, and he was not a man I wanted to cross.

“Of course,” Mulvaney said with a nod. “Besides, I don’t expect you’ll find any complications. Sounds cut-and-dried. The sort of thing you can do in your sleep.”

“I wish I could.” Between my exhaustion and frustration, the last thing I wanted to handle was this case. The crime scene would be easy; the distraught family never was. But I had no choice. I got dressed and caught a hansom cab to 103rd and Broadway, resolved to make quick work of the visit. With the manhunt for Drayson, my investigation into the murders of two judges, and Alistair’s mysterious disappearance—I had far more urgent demands on my time.

Friday
October 26, 1906

CHAPTER 20

311 West 103rd Street. 4:30
A.M.

The gaslights flickered eerily on West 103rd Street, creating dancing shadows that half illuminated number 311, the middle row house in a line of red sandstone buildings. With a deep breath to steady myself, I ascended nine steep steps to the front door and lifted the brass knocker.

No one answered at first—which prompted my frustration to rise. Bad enough that I had drawn this assignment when more important work was being done downtown. Even worse if I had the wrong address.

I pulled a scrap of paper out of my pocket and read my hastily scrawled notes.
“311 West 103. Gunshot victim Allan Hartt. Found by wife Elizabeth.”

Reading the words, I felt a pang of guilt. There were two victims here: the man who had died and the family he had left behind. It wasn’t their fault that personal tragedy had struck the same night that Drayson had broken free.

Glancing up, I confirmed that I was at number 311. I rapped the knocker again, more loudly this time.

“Coming,” a woman’s voice called out. A lock turned, the large wooden door swung open, and I found myself face-to-face with a heavyset woman in her late forties, far too well dressed to be a servant. She had a tear-streaked face, and a small child—a sturdy fellow of about three or four years old—clung wide-eyed to her skirt.

“Didn’t they send more officers?” she asked, her eyes searching wildly behind me.

“Detective Simon Ziele,” I said, presenting her with my credentials. She barely glanced at them. “I’m expecting two medical men to join me shortly,” I finally added, putting the situation as delicately as possible. Dr. Jennings—not to mention every other coroner’s physician—had been put to use treating victims at the Tombs. But his office retained men on staff who would operate the coroner’s wagon at all hours of the day and night. They should arrive soon to take away this victim.

I regarded the woman for a moment when she remained silent.

“Are you Mrs. Hartt?” I asked. I would not have expected the victim’s wife to answer the door herself tonight, but the child’s presence made me uncertain.

To my relief, she shook her head. “I’m Mrs. Johnson—Mrs. Hartt’s mother. My daughter is resting upstairs. She is overwrought; I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course,” I said with a nod. “May I come in?”

She picked up her small grandson, saying, “There are two more children asleep upstairs.” Then she stepped aside so I might enter.

I glanced around the entry hall, which was lit by gaslight sconces. Apparently the Hartts had not yet installed electric lights.

“I believe a patrolman is here?” I asked. I’d been told that a night watchman had called in the report of Allan Hartt’s death.

“He’s in the back parlor,” Mrs. Johnson said, gesturing to the rear of the brownstone. Her lip trembled.

“You needn’t go with me, if you’d like to wait out here,” I said, indicating the front parlor to our right. “I won’t be long, but I’ll need to ask you a few questions momentarily. Probably your daughter, too.”

She nodded mutely, and—still carrying the boy—she took a seat on a sofa that stretched the length of a long bay window.

Meanwhile, I made my way to the rear of the building. Was there no one here except the family? While it was obviously not as wealthy a household as the Jacksons’, I’d still have expected such a large home to retain at least one live-in servant, if not two.

I started to push open the wooden door, but it opened from behind—and the night watchman welcomed me with obvious relief.

“Detective,” he said, “I’ve never been happier to see a superior officer. My name’s Will Blount.” He held out his hand, and I introduced myself, as well.

The lad was probably twenty-one, but he looked much younger: he had hazel eyes, large freckles that lined his nose and cheeks, and thick uncombed brown hair. I suspected he usually stuffed the hair beneath his cap, but tonight it stuck out in all directions.

“The victim’s in here?” I asked. It was a hint for the patrolman to let me by. In fact, the sickly-sweet smell of blood that dominated the room—an odor that never failed to turn my stomach—was all the confirmation I needed.

“Of course.” He backed away from the door but continued to talk in a rush as I entered the room. “It’s my first crime scene, sir. I’ve only been on the job for two weeks. And Frankie—that’s my partner, who’s been doing this for almost twenty years—had to pick this night to leave me on my own.”

“Where is Frankie tonight?” I asked, walking toward the figure obviously slumped in a chair at the window.

“He’s working downtown. Some emergency at City Hall,” the youth said, twisting one edge of his coat.

He meant the Drayson manhunt, of course. Only rookie cops like the young man with me now were exempt. It was where I ought to be now …

With another pang of guilt, I pushed the thought from my mind.

I stepped to the window, cracked it open, took a deep gulp of fresh air to settle my stomach, and then turned to face the chair where Allan Hartt had taken his own life.

A blood-soaked pillowcase covered his head—a small mercy, I supposed, designed to protect the wife who would probably be the first to find him. I walked around to the left and saw the perfect hole in the pillowcase where the bullet had entered and ended his life, most likely immediately. His arms hung lifeless over each side of the upholstered green chair.

I stepped closer. I knew that we would have to remove the pillowcase—both to positively identify the victim and to ascertain whether he had suffered any other injuries before the fatal gunshot. I wasn’t looking forward to this task and decided I would wait until the coroner’s men arrived.

Looking down, I saw that the day’s newspaper sections were scattered on the floor. Something was missing …

“Where’s the gun?” I asked—for it should have fallen to the ground.

“I didn’t think to look,” Will said, flushing a deep red. “Probably under the chair—if not under some of the papers.”

He got on his hands and knees to search while I continued to survey the scene.

“Maybe his wife moved it?” I finally suggested when he came up empty-handed.

“Probably,” he said too readily. “She’s distraught, obviously. And I don’t know exactly how much time she spent in here.”

“Couldn’t have been long. Didn’t she report it right away?”

“She ran screaming into the street when she found him. Luckily for her, I was just three houses away. It took me several minutes to calm her down enough to figure out what was wrong.”

I turned, noting that the carpet in this room was threadbare, and the green upholstered chair was ripped. Mr. Hartt was obviously a man of some means to afford a brownstone of this size, but the interior did not match the grandness of its façade. Had they come into recent money troubles? This would not be an uncommon reason for suicide. And committing suicide at home, with a wife and children upstairs, suggested a severe desperation. Or callousness.

“Any neighbors hear? Someone must have come to help,” I said.

“Can’t imagine the neighbors
didn’t
hear,” he said, shaking his head. “But it was early this morning, and no one left their home.”

“So you came inside and called for help?” I had begun to walk the length of the room, trying to learn something more of Allan Hartt. He seemed to be a historian by hobby if not profession, for several books on United States and European history lined the bookshelves.

“That’s what I expected to do, but she doesn’t have a telephone. I hated to do it, but I had to leave her for several minutes while I walked back over to Broadway. That’s where I asked a cabby to go to the precinct house and tell them I needed help.”

The simple walnut table that served as Mr. Hartt’s desk was covered by a mess of bills and papers. I leafed through them quickly. He had been a frugal man, spending little—but no account appeared to be in arrears.

“Do you know what he did for a living?” I asked the patrolman.

“The missus said he’s a teacher at Barnard College.”

I nodded. It was a reminder that Mrs. Johnson had answers I needed.

“Stay here until the coroner’s men arrive, and don’t touch anything,” I directed the rookie as I left.

“You don’t want me to clean anything?” Will asked, obviously wanting something to do other than stand guard over this gunshot victim.

“Not now,” I said. “You may want to open the other window, though. Sometimes the fresh air helps with the stench.”

No doubt unhappy to be left alone, he complied—and I propped the door open as I made my way to the front parlor and Mrs. Johnson.

*   *   *

The front parlor was also sparsely furnished, but the sofa and chairs in the room were of a higher quality than the furniture I’d seen in Mr. Hartt’s study. Mrs. Johnson sat in darkness on a paisley sofa by the bay window that overlooked 103rd Street. It was not yet dawn, so the room’s faint illumination was provided by the street lamp just outside the window. At least her grandson was now asleep—stretched out beside her, head in her lap, as she stroked his hair gently.

I entered the room and sat in the gold-stuffed chair opposite her. “I’m sorry,” I said.

She shook her head. “I just can’t understand it,” she said. “Roddy’s birthday is next Thursday. He turns three. And what he wanted for his birthday was for my son-in-law to take him to see Barnum and Bailey’s new elephant.” She stifled a sob. “What kind of father would do this right before his son’s birthday?” Then, a moment later, she whispered, “What kind of man would do this at all?”

Everyone suffered pain or desperation at times. But I didn’t understand this: not the way he’d done it, not with his family at home upstairs.

“You mentioned earlier that your daughter has other children, asleep upstairs?” I took out a small notebook. I needed the details correct for my report.

“Ella, her oldest, is six,” she said. “And Luke is not yet a year.”

I nodded. “And how long has she been married?”

“Seven years. He was older than my daughter by a good deal, and thus was very anxious to start a family.”

“He was a professor—an historian, I understand.”

She gave me an awkward glance. “You may as well hear it from me; he was
her
professor. She met him while still a student, though he didn’t begin courting her until her final semester.”

“Forgive me, Mrs. Johnson, but it’s my job to ask difficult questions. Was your daughter happy in her marriage?”

“Happy enough. And so was he—or so I thought.”

“Any recent disagreements?”

“No.” Her voice was firm.

“Trouble with money?”

Again, she said, “No.”

“Had he been upset in recent weeks?”

At this question, she paused before shaking her head. It was a moment’s hesitation only, but it led me to ask her one follow-up question. “Did you notice him behaving differently in any way?”

“It was just—” She stopped, biting her lip before continuing. “He was more forgetful and distracted in recent weeks. I’m sure it was nothing, but my daughter didn’t usually have to remind him of things.”

“Things?” I raised an eyebrow.

“Simple arrangements that are part of our weekly routine, like how I come every Thursday night for dinner or that Ella takes a piano lesson Tuesdays after school.”

“But you know of no reason for this change?”

Shivering, she pulled the blanket that covered her grandson to the left, so that a portion of it reached her legs, as well. “I can’t understand it,” she said once again. “He has three small children. What’s to become of them?” Her eyes welled up with tears.

Wordlessly, I passed her a clean handkerchief from my pocket and sat with her while she cried. I hated these cases, for there was never a good answer to the question “why?” And there were never words to help the family left behind.

“Your daughter must have household help?” I asked.

“Just a woman who comes in three days a week to help with the laundry and cleaning,” she replied. “My son-in-law was both frugal and private. He never wanted live-in help—not even after my Elizabeth had their third child.”