by J. T. Edson
‘It looks like we’re too late, Father,’ the second man went on. ‘But it’s lucky we brought an ambulance and doctor with us. That young feller lying by the back stairs’s hurt bad and’s going to need attention.’
‘It’s your brother, Miss Gorr-Kauphin,’ the manager supplemented.
Hearing the comment being relayed by the men outside the window, Vera realized that her pretence of being a person deeply concerned over the well-being of those less fortunate than herself would suffer if she let it become obvious that she had not given a thought to Colin’s condition. So she managed to put aside her concern for the contents of the trunk and produced a well simulated exhibition of distress. Giving a gasping cry and clutching dramatically at her bosom, she rushed out of the dressing-room.
‘Well, dear girl,’ remarked the young man who had introduced himself to Phineas Branigan as “Patrick Aloysius Murphy” when trying to leave, but had answered to what was clearly a sobriquet—the Remittance Kid—outside the building. ‘From the look of things, the rest of the jolly old theater isn’t going to go up in flames.’
‘Do you think I wanted it to?’ the slender, beautiful young woman, who had accepted being addressed by what was just as clearly a pseudonym, demanded with some heat.
‘The thought never entered my head, old thing,’ the man declared placatingly. ‘Even though you’re here for the same thing that brought me along, but for the United States Secret Service, I know you wouldn’t put other people’s lives at risk.’
‘Why thank you ’most to death for your confidence,’ the young woman replied, sounding mollified and losing her air of asperity. Without either confirming or denying the comment about the United States’ Secret Service, she went on, ‘I wouldn’t have done it if there had been any other way.’
Although the couple had acted upon her suggestion that it would be inadvisable to remain near the rear exit, they had not withdrawn to any great distance from the scene of their respective disruptive activities. Crossing the otherwise deserted and poorly lit street behind the theater, they had selected an alley between two buildings which offered a view of the back door and the windows of the dressing-rooms as their point of vantage.
Once in concealment, the young woman had donned the Kerry coat and drawn up its hood to cover her boyishly short black hair and masculine attire. Then, without mentioning why she had taken it apart, she had reassembled the parasol.
The man had also made changes to his appearance, but they would not have been noticeable at a distance. On the other hand, they could have proved startling to anybody who was less well informed than his companion about his identity and means of earning a living. While she was putting on the coat, he had pulled away the large and broken-looking “nose” to expose his genuine and much more presentable nasal appendage. Having done so, he had peeled the “scar” from his left cheek and, after wrapping both in a handkerchief, put them in his jackets inside left breast pocket.
Discovering that the man she had met so unexpectedly was wearing a disguise came as no more of a surprise than finding out he recognized her and was aware of her official status. It was not their first meeting, which had accounted for him addressing her as ‘the Rebel Spy’. However, although she had served as a member of the Confederate States’ Secret Service during the War of Secession with such success that she had gained and well deserved the sobriquet, she was now a member of the organization he had mentioned. In spite of the nature of her work, she had seen nothing strange in his having known about it.
Belle Boyd had first met her companion while she was engaged upon a mission in the West Indies during the War and had learned his secret. Posing as a young wastrel whose misdeeds had caused his family to pay him a remittance to stay out of England, which had created his nickname, he was in fact Captain Patrick Reeder, Rifle Brigade, seconded to the British Secret Service. 12 Circumstances had caused them to work together and, before duty had caused them to go their separate ways, they had formed a liking for one another. Their paths had crossed again recently in Texas, where she had been sent on what had proved to be a most unusual and weird assignment. 13 Yet, effective as her organization’s sources of information mostly were, she had not known he was still in the United States.
In spite of having had no notification that the Remittance Kid was in the vicinity, Belle had deduced that they were both at O’Malley’s Grand Emerald Isle Theater for much the same reason. What she had not yet decided, or made an attempt to discover, was whether his interest and intentions were compatible to her own.
Neither the Rebel Spy nor the Englishman had spoken after they had entered the darkness of the alley. For all that, he had realized she was very worried in case the fire—which he felt sure she had started—should get out of control and caused some harmless occupant of the building to be hurt or killed.
From what the couple had seen, it had soon become apparent that Belle’s fears were groundless. Some of the audience had come pouring through the emergency exit which opened on to the alley under their observation and they had heard enough to assure them that the same was happening at the front entrance and other side. However, hurried as it was, the departure was being made without undue panic and they had known that, with the exception of Vera Gorr-Kauphin, there were neither women nor children on the premises to be endangered by the rush.
Nor, the Rebel Spy and the Englishman had noticed, had there been any threat of damage to the theater or adjacent buildings. Passed on by shouts, the alarm was raised to be answered in a short while by the distant, but rapidly approaching, clanging of a bell, the drumming of several sets of hooves and rumble of fast turning wheels. Furthermore, even before the fire engine had come into view, the fiery glow from the shattered window of the affected dressing-room had died away as the flames were smothered and there was no sign of the blaze having spread elsewhere.
So the Kid had made his comment to help relieve Belle’s pent up emotions.
Before the couple could continue their conversation, a horse-drawn manually operated pump 14 arrived at the front of the theater and was directed to the rear along the alley at the opposite end to their point of vantage. Although they did not know it, the vehicle was delayed slightly by men helping the Kid’s victim—who was just regaining consciousness—to his feet. It was followed by a tender carrying a water tank of two hundred gallons’ capacity. Bringing up the rear was a Rocker ambulance 15 with the words, Streetville Municipal Hospital, inscribed on the sides of the box-like wooden body. Coming to a halt, all three vehicles began to disgorge the men riding on them.
‘All the king’s horses and all the king’s men…’ the Kid began, watching a young man wearing a white coat and carrying a doctor’s bag spring from the ambulance’s box to hurry after the fire chief towards the rear door of the building.
‘Couldn’t put the money in the trunk together again,’ Belle continued, paraphrasing the next line of the nursery rhyme and watching her companion in the hope of discovering whether, as she suspected, her version had any significance for him.
‘Those aren’t the words I was taught at prep school, dear girl,’ the Kid objected, but in a casually disinterested manner which betrayed nothing of his true feelings. ‘Of course, you colonials may have a different version.’
‘Actually, dear boy,’ Belle answered, mimicking the Englishman’s drawling, yet somehow clipped manner of speaking with considerable skill. ‘It’s never been proven to my satisfaction that the world is divided into two parts, Great Britain and her colonies.’
‘Great Scott!’ the Kid gasped. ‘Do you mean it might not be?’
‘I’ve heard rumors to that effect,’ Belle declared in her normal voice, but sounding completely serious.
‘I hope nobody repeats them to my aunt, the Dowager Duchess of Brockley, it would cause her to have an attack of the vapors if she was told,’ the Kid responded. Then, although there was little observable change in his demeanor or tone, the next words informed the girl that he was retur
ning to the business at hand. ‘Anyway, old thing, how much do you know about those blighters over at the theater?’
‘I can’t say I know anything about them,’ Belle replied, exuding an aura of innocence. ‘But then, I don’t mingle socially with firemen so I wouldn’t, would I?’
‘It wasn’t the firemen I meant,’ the Kid pointed out. ‘But I get the feeling that somebody is playing the cards close to the jolly old vest, as you colonials—sorry, dear girl, old habits die hard—as you Yankees put it.’
‘Coming from the South, I don’t find being called a Yankee much of an improvement over Colonial,’ Belle protested. ‘And I rarely wear a vest.’
Once again, the couple were interrupted by the sound of vehicles approaching. Looking along the street in the opposite direction from which the fire engine had come, they found the leading vehicle was a ‘rockaway’ coach in the dark blue livery of the Chicago Police Department driven by a patrolman in uniform. Although its nearer lamp illuminated the police captain sitting inside, neither Belle nor the Kid could see the second occupant with sufficient clarity to establish his status. A buggy carrying two men in civilian clothes—one big, burly and heavily mustached, the other younger, clean shaven and dressed more fashionably—was following the coach.
‘Here come a few more of the king’s men,’ the Kid drawled.
‘I’d say it’s Humpty Dumpty himself,’ Belle corrected, recognizing the captain and wishing she could see more of the man sitting next to him.
‘Do I detect a lack of respect for Captain O’Halloran’s ability?’ the Kid inquired.
‘He’s not the most efficient officer in the Chicago Police Department,’ Belle replied, guessing her companion was of a similar opinion.
‘From the little I’ve heard, I don’t think you could put him in the first hundred,’ the Kid answered. ‘But I’d say that’s all to the good, dear girl. Unless those chappies with him are more efficient, I doubt whether much will be achieved in finding out who started the fire.’
‘I doubt whether General Handiman will lose any sleep over that,’ Belle replied, knowing her companion was aware of the head of the U.S. Secret Service’s name. ‘And I certainly won’t.’
‘Or me,’ the Kid admitted. ‘And now, dear girl, what do you say if we take ourselves off to somewhere with enough privacy for us to do a little horse trading?’
‘I thought you’d never ask,’ Belle smiled. ‘But I’d like to see if we can learn any more here before we go.’
‘It’s your country, dear girl,’ the Kid assented. ‘I’ll even go so far as to let you select the venue for our exchange of news.’
‘I’d like to get into some different clothes,’ Belle stated. ‘So we’ll go to my hotel, if you’ve no objections.’
‘Your wish is my command, ma’am,’ the Kid declared, bowing gallantly and receiving a graceful curtsy in return. ‘We’ll go there as soon as you’re ready.’
Four – Fell, Or Was Kicked?
‘How is my poor dear brother?’ Vera Gorr-Kauphin gasped, exhibiting alarm and anxiety, as the group consisting of a police sergeant, two patrolmen and four stagehands, each holding a lamp who were gathered at the foot of the stairs leading to the rear exit moved aside to let her through. ‘He isn’t too badly hurt, is he?’
‘I’m afraid he might be,’ answered the fresh-faced young doctor who had arrived in the Rocker ambulance, so impressed by the actress’s histrionics that he rose without having carried out a thorough examination of the unconscious actor. ‘There’s nothing I can do for him here.’
‘Then take him to hospital as quickly as possible!’ Vera ordered, falling to her knees by her brother. Continuing to display emotions which appeared to be genuine, she went on in piteously pleading tones, ‘You will do all you can for him, won’t you?’
‘Everything,’ the doctor promised, but he was aware that such serious injuries as his patient had suffered would be dealt with by a member of the Streetville Municipal Hospital’s medical staff with longer and more extensive experience than his own.
‘Spare no expense!’ the actress authorized, looking up with such well-simulated distress that the assembled men murmured their sympathy. ‘Money is no object where my poor dear brother is concerned. Please don’t let anything happen to him, doctor.’
‘Don’t overdo it, you stupid bitch!’ thought “Father Matthew Devlin”, having followed Vera together with the fire chief and the theater’s manager, knowing that she had not previously shown so much concern for her brother. Raising her to her feet and speaking with a greater gentleness than he was feeling, he continued, ‘There now, Miss Gorr-Kauphin, don’t go taking on so. The Holy Mother and the good Lord are watching over him. Now let’s be giving the doctor here a chance to do what has to be done.’
‘Wh … Whatever you say, Father,’ Vera assented, with forced meekness, taking a warning from the hard squeeze applied to her biceps as she was being lifted. She managed to exhibit what passed muster as relief at receiving such spiritual comfort. Wanting to find out the extent of the losses they had suffered as a result of the fire, she went on, ‘Take me back to the dressing-room so I can compose myself, please.’
‘That I will,’ the impostor confirmed. ‘And then you can put your cloak on …’ Sensing from the glance darted at him that the woman did not understand his suggestion, he elaborated in a somewhat less solicitous tones, ‘So you can go to the hospital with your brother and see all’s well with him.’
‘Excuse me, Father,’ the sergeant put in, looking up the stairs. ‘But Cap’n O’Halloran’s here and he’ll maybe be wanting a word with the lady before she goes anywhere.’
‘Very well,’ “Devlin” replied. Swinging his gaze to the rear exit, while placing his right arm across Vera’s shoulders in a gesture suggesting protective support, he discovered that the captain of the Streetville Precinct was not alone. He also noticed that, although two of the men in civilian clothing halted on either side of the door, the third continued to accompany the captain. ‘You’ll have to bear up for just a little while longer, Miss Gorr-Kauphin.’
‘I … I’ll do my best to,’ the actress promised, only just managing to conceal her irritation over the delay with a veneer of patient resignation.
‘I came as soon as I heard what’d happened, Father Devlin,’ Captain Michael O’Halloran greeted, sounding apologetic. Being aware of the ‘priest’s’ connections with various important local politicians who could affect his career adversely, he wanted to avoid any suggestion of neglect or disinterest. Indicating the man who was descending at his side, he felt sure his next words would be a help in that direction even though they were not exactly true. ‘This’s Lieutenant Ballinger from the Detective Bureau at Headquarters. I asked him to come along in case he’ll be needed.’
Although the newcomer was too lacking in perception to realize it, the last statement was not being received as he anticipated.
Big, thickset to the point of obesity, O’Halloran was in his early fifties. There was nothing about his florid features to suggest subtlety, diplomacy, or brilliance of intellect. It was common knowledge that he had attained his rank and current position by a combination of long service and a willingness to comply with the wishes of the district’s political hierarchy.
From “Devlin”s’ point of view, the latter in particular would have made the captain ideal to conduct an investigation of the incident. On the other hand, every instinct possessed by the impostor suggested that the same might not apply to the man he had brought with him.
Equaling O’Halloran in height and almost twenty years younger, Lieutenant Edward Ballinger 16 was more slender; which did not make him puny in build. Although far from handsome, there was a rugged attraction about his craggy features. His curly brimmed brown billycock hat, grey suit, white shirt and sober dark blue tie were all of the latest Eastern style, but they were not sufficiently expensive to suggest he had an income outside his official salary.
‘Good evening, Fath
er,’ the detective greeted. His tone was polite, but lacked the hint of servility shown by the captain. Nor did he wait for his nominal superior to commence questioning. ‘Can you tell me what’s been happening?’
‘There was a fire in Miss Gorr-Kauphin’s dressing-room,’ the impostor replied. He had no intention of mentioning the foul play he suspected had taken place. ‘Her brother must have found it and was going to raise the alarm when he slipped and fell on the stairs.’
‘How much longer before you take Colin to the hospital, doctor?’ Vera put in, no longer able to restrain her curiosity and seeking an excuse to return to the dressing-room.
‘My men are bringing the stretcher now,’ the young intern replied, pointing to the two attendants from the ambulance who were coming through the rear door.
‘Then I’ll go and fetch my cloak!’ Vera stated and hurried away.
‘Do you know how the fire started, Father?’ Ballinger inquired, as the impostor began to turn.
‘That I don’t,’ “Devlin” replied. ‘It was going when we got there. Now I’d better go and give Miss Gorr-Kauphin spiritual consolation, if that’s all right with you?’
‘Go ahead,’ Ballinger authorized, without consulting O’Halloran. As the bogus priest strode after the actress, who had already entered the dressing-room, he went on, ‘How bad is it, doctor?’
‘I could be wrong,’ the intern replied, in a manner that suggested he considered it most unlikely he was mistaken. ‘But I believe the back of his skull is fractured.’
‘How soon will he be able to answer questions?’ O’Halloran asked, deciding that he should be making a more active contribution to the conversation.
‘Not for some hours,’ the doctor stated definitely.
‘He’s not going to die then?’ the captain suggested.
‘I can’t say for sure until I’ve carried out a much more extensive examination at the hospital,’ the doctor answered, watching the attendants moving the unconscious actor on to the stretcher. ‘We can only hope for the best.’
