The Case of the Petrified Man (9 page)

I ducked & heard the cane whistle through the air only inches above my head.

The Coroner was between me and the door, blocking my escape. I had no choice but to retreat. I ducked down under the table with the two-part corpse & then shrank back as his cane came down again.

CRACK!

He gave the table leg a blow so violent that one of the corpse’s arms slipped down. The hand dangled only a few inches before my eyes. I could see that the fingernails were ragged & grimy. I deduced the dead man had been a miner, or maybe a prospector.

CRACK!

No time to ponder details such as dirty fingernails now. I feinted to the right, then scrambled around to the left. I am sorry to say I jostled the table a little & in so doing I made the top half of the corpse fall onto the floor with a splat.

The Coroner leapt back & let loose with a torrent of profanities unfit for publication.

I ran out of the morgue & tore through the outer room & into the bright October morning & down the alley to the C Street boardwalk with its welcome tinkle of piano music & the faint thudding of Quartz Mill Stamps.

I stopped to take a deep breath of the sage-scented air & glanced behind me, just to make sure the Coroner was not in hot pursuit.

He was.

COME BACK, YOU
scallywag!” bellowed the Coroner, Mr. G.T. Sewall. “I am going to thrash you!”

As I fled through the crowds of people, I felt the Coroner’s heavy, jarring footsteps behind me. They caused the whole boardwalk to bounce. His bellowed profanities made the crowds part before us like the Red Sea before Moses. I jumped down from the boardwalk & flew down steep Taylor to D Street & made a sharp left. Here I slowed to a fast walk & clamped my arms to my sides & made myself narrow as I wove among the crowds of bankers, miners, etc. When I spotted a break in traffic, I nipped across D Street.

This was a bold thing to do, considering the two-part body I had just seen, but I knew a well-delivered blow from that silver-headed walking stick could kill me as surely as being run over by a Quartz Wagon.

Up ahead, the spire of the Methodist Episcopal Church seemed to beckon me on. I reckoned the blaspheming Coroner would not follow me inside that safe haven.

The church doors were wide-open, but instead of going inside I quickly squeezed behind one of the wide-open doors. Sandwiched between the raw planks of the outside wall & the white-painted door, I listened with all my might for the sound of pursuing footsteps & cussing. But all I could hear was my heart pounding & my breath coming in rasps.

By and by, I peeked out of that narrow place.

“I believe the coast is clear,” came a man’s voice to my right.

A man in a vest & shirtsleeves was kneeling in the small garden in front of the church. Apart from him, the “coast” did indeed look “clear,” so I emerged from my hiding place.

“Are you praying?” I said.

“No, I am gardening. Planting rose bushes. They say no flowers bloom here and no green things gladden the eye, but I am determined to prove them wrong.” He put down his trowel & stood up & dusted off his knees.

He was tall & slim & blond with a billy goat beard!

It seemed such men were everywhere.

“If I am not mistaken,” said the fair-haired gardener, “you are Virginia City’s newest detective.”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“And I am Virginia City’s newest Methodist pastor.” He
stepped forward and held out his hand. “Charles Volney Anthony.”

Although he resembled a hundred other men in Virginia, I reckoned the Methodist pastor (& possible murder suspect) was someone whose name and face I should make a special effort to remember. So I used the trick Ma Evangeline taught me. In my mind’s eye I imagined him sitting down, with a vole on one knee & a big ant on the other: vole-nee ant-on-ee.

I allowed him to shake my hand & said, “I am P.K. Pinkerton.”

“Yes,” he said. “I know that, too.”

“How do you know who I am?”

“A certain Miss Feather in my congregation—a school-marm—is concerned about you. She described you to me and told me something of your history. There are not too many half-Indian children running about Virginia dressed in fringed buckskin trowsers, pink flannel shirts and slouch hats,” he said.

“My shirt is faded red,” said I. “Not pink.”

He gave me a keen look. “Are you fleeing someone? Is there anything I can do to help?”

“The Coroner was after me,” I said. “He thought I was pranking him.”

“Ah,” said C.V. Anthony. “I have not met the Coroner but I can see it might be hard for some people to credit a youngster would set up as a Pinkerton Detective.”

“My pa was a Pinkerton,” I said. “I hope to follow in his footsteps.”

“Your father must be the non-Indian half,” he said.

“Yes, sir. My ma was Lakota.”

“Are you working on a case now?”

“Yes,” I said. “A Murder.”

“A Murder?” he said. “Surely you jest.”

“No, sir,” I said. “I never jest. I am trying to find out who killed Miss Sally Sampson. The first step of my investigation is to go to the Scene of the Crime and look for Clews. Do you happen to know where her crib is?”

I did not mention Martha because I was not sure yet if I could trust him. Although he was a Methodist preacher, he fit the description of the Killer.

His smile faded. “Ah. Poor Sally.” He stared down at the ground. “Although I have not been here long, I did know Sally. She was a devoted and generous member of this congregation.” He pointed north. “She lived about half a block up on this side of the street. The crib with the yellow door. That is the scene of the crime.”

“Thank you, Reverend.” I replaced my slouch hat & touched the brim politely.

“P.K.,” he said.

I turned. “Yes?”

“I presided at your foster parents’ funeral last Sunday.”

“Oh,” I said. “Thank you. I was not there.”

“I know,” said the Reverend C.V. Anthony. “I gather you were trapped down a mine shaft with three desperados on your trail. But like Daniel you emerged unscathed from the Den.” He looked down at his rose bushes. “I intended to visit your foster pa and pay my respects. But alas! I tarried and thus missed my chance. I regret that.”

I did not know what to say, so I said nothing.

He cleared his throat. “Do you share your foster parents’ faith?”

“Yes, sir,” I said. Then I remembered how I promised my dying foster ma never to kill a man nor drink nor gamble, but did all three within three days of her death. So I added, “Although I might have backslid a little.”

“Oh?” said he. “But would you call yourself a Methodist?”

“Yes, sir,” I replied. “I may be half Lakota, but I am one hundred percent Methodist.”

The Reverend C.V. Anthony nodded. “In that case, you should probably not be frequenting D Street Cribs.”

“Thank you for your advice, sir, but I must pursue this investigation. I have set my heart on Being a Detective.”

“Why?” he said. “Why that particular career?”

“Three reasons,” I said. “First, it is a noble calling: a Detective is someone who uncovers the Truth & brings Justice. Second, being a Detective will help me understand people and the things they do. Third, I hope one day to work alongside my father at the Pinkerton Detective Agency in Chicago that was founded by my uncle Allan. That is why I have set up shop as a Private Eye here in Virginia,” I added. “To hone my Detective Skills.”

“Well, P.K.,” he said. “I cannot argue with your motives. I can only pray that you will not be corrupted by the lower elements of this place and thus come to grief.”

“‘Unto the pure, all things pure,’” I said, quoting Saint Paul’s letter to Titus.

But maybe I should have recollected Proverbs 12 & verse 15:
“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes: but he that hearkeneth unto counsel is wise.”

If I had hearkened to the Reverend’s counsel, maybe I would not be writing this account in jail beneath the shadow of the hangman’s noose.

I LEFT THE REVEREND
C.V. Anthony to his rose bushes & made my way to Short Sally’s crib at No. 8 North D Street. The yellow door was locked, but the right-hand window was open a crack. Peering through the glass, I could see a long & narrow room with a door at the far end. There was no furniture and even the walls were bare.

I put my ear to the crack of the window and listened. I have ears as sharp as a rabbit’s but I could hear nothing. I put my nose to the window & sniffed. I caught a faint whiff of lemon oil & tobacco juice. I needed to get in, to make a proper investigation.

The sash window in its frame was warped, but with a bit of wiggling, I managed to raise it enough so that I could squirm through.

I was favoring my wounded left arm, which had started to throb, so I did not land in a symmetrical fashion. I tumbled awkwardly onto the floor & banged my nose hard enough to bring tears but not blood.

I blinked a few times and my vision cleared.

I now saw a stove on the other side of the door but nothing else apart from a Brussels Carpet over most of the floor & lace curtains on the windows & over against the far wall some little drifts of fine dust & fluff & other trash. The carpet was slightly faded from where the sun had shone on it, so I could see faint geometric shapes where there had been a rectangular couch & round table and at the back a big square bed. The only piece of furniture remaining was that cast-iron potbelly stove in the front corner near the door.

I remembered the Notice in the newspaper said that Sally’s possessions were to be auctioned on Saturday at Currie’s Auctioneers, up on B Street. That must be where everything had been taken.

My heart sank.

There were no clews to be found.

I crossed the empty room & opened the door there to find a narrow closet at the back of the crib. There were wooden pegs on the inner wall & another door in the outer wall & also a dustpan & broom. It was even smaller than the room at the back of my office. I could smell Martha’s hair oil and I reckoned this closet must be where she slept.

I closed the closet door & looked back into the main room through the latch hole, which was bigger & cruder than a keyhole. Even though the bed was over on the right, I reckon Martha could just about have witnessed the dastardly deed.

I wondered if Martha had stifled a cry or a sob when she saw the killer strangulating her mistress.

I wondered if that noise had made him turn his gaze towards her hiding place.

Martha must have been terrified as he started for the door. Terrified enough to flee barefoot in nothing but her nightdress and night bonnet.

A single step took me to the back door. I opened it & almost tumbled out but caught myself. Then I saw that the back of the crib was on stilts with a ladder going down to the steep slope.

My nose told me that was where people emptied their chamber pots. I did not want to go down there. There was other rubbish down there, including lots of tin cans. Farther down the slope was a lumberyard and beyond that the outskirts of Chinatown.

I went back into the front room & I looked around at the Scene of the Crime.

“Show me, Lord,” I prayed. “Give me a sign.”

Immediately the terrible image of my own murdered foster parents rose before my eyes. I tried to push it away.

Then I had a Thought.

In tracking animals, sometimes the Lack of Sign can be as important as the Presence of Spoor. I went over to the brighter square of carpet that had been hidden under the bed.
Neither the Brussels Carpet nor any of the floorboards by the wall carried even the faintest stain of blood. If Sally’s throat had been cut, the room would not be this clean. Even if the bedding had soaked up most of the blood there would have been drops from the blade. There would be a big old bloodstain right there. Even if it had been scrubbed there would be a mark.

I sniffed the air. No lingering scent of blood. Only the faint smell of Sally’s lemon perfume mixed with the rank undertone of tobacco-tinted spit, which was pretty much everywhere in Virginia City.

Short Sally must surely have been strangulated, not cut. My client had told me the truth.