These Honored Dead

by Jonathan F. Putnam

  “I didn’t know you also include ‘surgeon’ among your talents, Miss Patterson,” said Martha, sneaking a look in my direction.

  Jane blushed slightly, though whether at Martha’s praise or her attempt to interest me, it was hard to tell. “I assist my father when I can be useful, nothing more,” she said in a very serious tone. She examined Gustorf’s forehead, where I could see he had a three-inch gash running diagonally above his left eyebrow.

  “This will only take a few minutes,” Jane said to the foreigner. “Don’t pay any attention to what I’m doing. Miss Speed, favor us and hold his head just so, with his hair out of the way like this.” My sister took her place beside the prone man.

  Meanwhile, Dr. Patterson was cutting the cloth off Gustorf’s crippled lower leg. It was plain the bone was shattered, and I knew amputation would prove the only suitable treatment. Patterson began manipulating the leg gently and Gustorf screamed out again in pain.

  “Distract him while I attend to the leg, won’t you, Speed?” Patterson said from his end of the body. If the doctor still bore a grudge from our after-dinner conversation of the other night, he was showing no sign of it.

  I positioned myself so the Prussian could meet my eyes without moving his head, which Martha was now holding in place while Jane threaded her surgical needle. I knew I’d been given the opportunity to question a prime suspect in a time of weakness and I intended to seize it.

  “What brought you to Illinois, Herr Gustorf?” I began.

  “After the defeat of the Emperor, my father’s bank failed,” he said, “so I was obliged to seek employment far from home. I found your country very much to my liking.” Gustorf’s breathing was returning to normal, and his voice, though labored, was deep and clear. He appeared to be about thirty, with attractive features and a strong nose. His whiskers were narrow and well-trimmed.

  “I secured positions as a private teacher in German, first at Harvard and then at a school in New Haven,” Gustorf continued. “This winter—” He suddenly shouted out a vigorous Teutonic oath.

  “I told you to ignore me,” Jane said. She had just sewed her first stitch in the Prussian’s forehead, and the needle was poised in her hand to make another loop.

  “I’ll do my best,” Gustorf responded, gritting his teeth. “I spent the past winter in Philadelphia and I happened to talk at a gather—oh!—gathering with an Englishwoman, a Mrs. Martineau, who is collecting material for a book on your young nation for her . . . ah! . . . home country, and of course there’s Mrs. Trollope’s towering success, and Monsieur de Tocqueville’s new book about America has sold very well throughout Europe . . . ahhh! . . . and I concluded perhaps I could write about my own travels, for the German readership. So, after the final snows melted, I set off to the West, first by rail and then steamer down the Ohio and up the Illinois.”

  “Where have you been in our state, before reaching Springfield?” I asked. “I want to make sure you haven’t missed any place of note for your book.”

  Jane was sewing another stitch at that moment, so the Prussian took several deep breaths before continuing.

  “I started up north in Galena, to see your iron mines. It was there I obtained my carriage and steeds. From Galena—oh!—I’ve driven due south, more or less, some twenty or thirty miles a day, stopping where I find places of interest.”

  “Did you happen to see a settlement named Menard?” I said casually. My sister lifted her eyes to stare at me, but I ignored her look. “There’s a most interesting, er, blacksmith there. Very unusual method of heating the furnace.”

  “I think I may have done,” Gustorf said. “About a day’s carriage drive north? I passed through it, I’m sure, now that you mention. Charming outpost. Though I confess I missed the smithy if that was the principal attraction of interest.” My heart started beating fast. So he had also been at the site of the first murder.

  Gustorf gritted his teeth expectantly and looked up at Jane and Martha. “How many more?” he asked.

  “We’ve been done for a few minutes now,” said Jane.

  Gustorf relaxed from his clenched pose. “Your touch is agreeably light, Fräulein,” he said. “Yours as well,” he added with a nod and a particularly winning smile toward Martha. My sister blushed. The color was returning to Gustorf’s face, a development, I noted without pleasure, that made him look even more manly.

  “How are you coming with that leg, Doctor?” I called out. “You’ll be wanting to sharpen your saw, I suspect. Shall I keep him talking while you do?”

  The doctor shook his head. “I have something else in mind,” he said. “Drink the rest of this bottle, won’t you, Herr Gustorf,” he added, handing the purple bottle back to the prone man. Gustorf sat up partway and swallowed the remaining liquor in several long swigs, which he followed with a loud belch.

  “You’ll have to stay for a spell, Herr Gustorf,” Dr. Patterson said. “I promise we’ll take good care of you.”

  “I shall be delighted,” he replied, casting a warm smile toward Martha and Jane. As I looked on, I could not figure out what to make of the mysterious foreigner. His behaviors were simultaneously suspicious and as uncomplicated as a child’s.

  “You’ll be feeling the full effects of my medicinal liquor shortly,” Patterson said, nodding. “There’s a new treatment for fractured limbs I’ve been wanting to try out, and your case presents an excellent opportunity. Those inscrutable Turks have finally shared something of use with the rest of the world.”

  The doctor called out for the hired girl, and when she materialized, he started giving her a complex series of instructions. He seemed to be directing her to soak cotton bandages in “Plaster of Paris,” though how this would facilitate the amputation of the Prussian’s shattered leg I could not fathom.

  I turned back to Gustorf and saw his eyelids fluttering rapidly. “The day you arrived in Springfield,” I said, talking loudly in order to try to hold his attention. “Where did you dine that evening? Did you happen to venture to a place called Torrey’s?”

  “There’s no need to keep distracting him, Speed,” the doctor said. “He’s almost out.” And, indeed, Gustorf’s eyes fluttered shut for a final time. “He won’t wake up until morning at this point, not with the whole bottle in his belly.”

  Patterson called out to the hired girl again and interrogated her about the state of the cotton bandages. Then he turned back to me and said, “It’ll be two hours until she’s got them all ready for me. That’ll give Herr Gustorf time to find his deepest ebb of sleep. Your mention of Torrey’s has me thirsty. Join me there for some refreshment.”

  I started to protest that I needed to return to my store, but Patterson grabbed my arm with a surprisingly powerful grip and leaned in close. His breath smelled like sour onions. “It wasn’t a question, Speed,” he hissed. “Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Even though the sun hadn’t yet set, Torrey Temperance Hotel was oozing with ne’er-do-wells when I heaved open the door and let Patterson enter before me. Together we pushed through the crowd in the public room, a low rumble of discontent, toward the bar, where the moon-faced Torrey presided in a filthy apron and a permanent scowl. Torrey greeted Patterson with a familiar nod, while the innkeeper and I glared at each other warily. Early in my tenure at A. Y. Ellis & Co., he’d passed me a private note that proved uncollectable; since then I’d typically stayed clear of his establishment and he of mine.

  An open barrel of busthead whiskey sat on the bar. A tray of chipped glasses rested to the side and a large wooden dipper hung from a nail in the wall. I thrust the dipper into the barrel and filled up a glass for the doctor and one for me.

  “I’ve no cause to mince words, Speed,” Patterson said once we’d squeezed next to each other on one of the tightly packed benches that lined either side of the room. “Have you an interest in my daughter?”

  My hesitation evidently told Patterson everything he needed to know. “I figured as much,” he said, nodding, befor
e I could formulate a response. He swallowed half of his glass at a gulp.

  “I’m not yet in a position to support a wife,” I said. “Someday I hope to buy my cousin Bell out of his share of the store, but I can’t yet, and if the Panic hits us with full force, as some are suggesting, it may be some time still. Until I can stand firmly on my own feet, I’m not in a position to support another, certainly not another as virtuous and worthy as your daughter.”

  The doctor grunted and drained the rest of his glass. He gestured at me to do the same and said, “Your caution is a credit to your name, I’m sure. I don’t bear you ill.”

  I expelled my breath and took a tentative sip. Torrey’s mash was actually better than I recalled. I finished the glass and did not object when Patterson offered to refill it.

  “How old is your daughter, may I ask?” I said when Patterson had returned with fresh glasses and a pair of soggy bread rolls Torrey had fished out of the pockets of his apron.

  “Seventeen.”

  “There’s plenty of time then. She’ll have her pick of suitors before long.”

  “I hope you prove right,” Patterson returned. He swallowed half his new glass in a long gulp. “I’d been hoping—well, to settle matters for her sooner rather than later.”

  I wondered what the doctor’s hurry was. My sister Martha was the same age, and I knew our father would not worry about finding a good match for several more years, at the least.

  “I wager they’re already lining up for her and merely trying to hide it from you,” I said. “No doubt they’re scared of you, being an eminent man of medicine.”

  He grunted and gnawed on a roll.

  Now that I had evidently avoided the doctor’s wrath, my thoughts returned to his newest patient. “How long will Herr Gustorf be laid up in your surgery?” I asked.

  “Two weeks? A month?” Patterson ran his fingers over his neat moustache. “I don’t have the first idea, to be honest. The Turks told us how to perform the operation, but they haven’t bothered to write down what comes next. I shall be most interested to learn for myself how the whole thing proceeds.”

  “That’ll give the sheriff plenty of time to investigate Jesse’s death more fully,” I said. “Don’t you think it dubious Gustorf was fleeing Springfield right after the funeral for the boy whose body was found in his carriage?”

  Patterson looked at me with interest. He seemed to have forgotten about his daughter’s plight. “I find it most suspicious,” he said. “It was such a tragedy, the boy struck down just as his life was so full of new promise.”

  “I know you’d attended him that very afternoon,” I said. “Had you known him before—”

  Suddenly there was a tapping on my shoulder and a gruff voice said, “Move aside, young man.”

  An older man with a bulbous nose and a tall plumed hat was two feet away, trying get past me to reach Patterson. It took me a moment to place him without the full military regalia, but I realized it was Major Richmond, the doctor’s adversary in the land suit. At the same moment I came to this realization, the doctor muttered loud enough for the men surrounding us to hear, “The Devil himself.”

  “I need my money, Patterson,” Richmond said, his face red and angry. “The money you owe me for the land.” His lips kept moving, but no further words issued.

  “Have you ever been treated by a psychiater, Richmond?” Patterson returned. He rose and faced the major. “You don’t need money. You need help—with your head.” He pointed with a forefinger to his own temple.

  Richmond’s lips moved in silent rebuke. Then he pulled from his pocket a clasp knife. In turn, Patterson drew a surgical knife out of one of the pockets of his heavy coat.

  I leapt to my feet. In the crowded tavern, I found myself wedged precariously between the two adversaries. Richmond had the advantage of three inches and fifty pounds or more, but Dr. Patterson had the advantage of somewhat less advanced age. It might be a fair fight if it came to that, I thought. Looking around, it seemed none of Torrey’s other customers were paying us any notice; incipient brawls, even between elderly combatants, were about as noteworthy here as men drunk as lords.

  “I wondered when you’d show your stinkin’ face again after the judge put you in your place, you scoundrel,” Richmond sneered.

  “You know where to find me at all hours,” Patterson shot back.

  “That’s right, your grand manse,” Richmond returned. He grumbled to himself insensibly and spat near Patterson’s boots before adding, “The house that desecrates Sarah’s memory.”

  “How dare you!” Patterson shouted. He raised his knife and took a step toward Richmond, although I pushed him back, out of self-preservation more than anything else.

  “Who was Sarah?” I asked.

  “My sister,” Richmond said, “whom he sent to an early grave.”

  That explained the animosity between the two men. Patterson had cared for Richmond’s sister but had been unable to save her life. Still trying to quell the confrontation, I said to Richmond, “The medical arts are never certain, are they, friend?”

  “She wasn’t a patient,” said Richmond. “She was his wife. Disappeared without so much as a trace four years ago. Met her Good Lord at his evil hands, I haven’t a doubt.” He waved around his own knife not far from my face, though he made no effort to advance on Patterson.

  “Jane’s mother?” I said, turning to Patterson in surprise. Patterson had said at dinner Jane’s mother died shortly after her birth.

  “Her stepmother,” said Patterson. “My second wife. Vanished one morning. Richmond here and I searched side by side for her for days, to no avail.”

  “We didn’t find her because she wasn’t there to be found,” Richmond said. “You hid her body somewhere. My greatest regret in life is I never figured out where.”

  “You have no proof,” Patterson replied, his face as red as a beet.

  At that moment, Torrey bustled up. “Are you causing trouble, Speed?” he sputtered. “This is a respectable establishment. There’s no drawn knives allowed.”

  “Trying to defuse it,” I said. Looking at Patterson and Richmond I added, “No matter who’s right, the both of you are reckless for arguing like this in public. Remember what Judge Thomas said about keeping apart from one another.”

  “The judge’s writ doesn’t run to Torrey’s,” Patterson replied with a growl.

  “Yes it does,” said Torrey. He surveyed his wretched domain through narrowed eyes. “He’s right over there.” Torrey pointed to the far corner of the room.

  “Oh, Your Honor,” he called shrilly.

  A man who had been seated with his back to us and a cap pulled low over his head turned and stared. Through the haze of the tavern, I could make out the wide-set, florid face and telltale sneer. The judge squinted and shook his cigar hand, although I guessed he was in no condition to recognize the litigants, to say nothing of halting their altercation. Nonetheless, Richmond and Patterson sheathed their weapons and took a step back from each other.

  “That’s more like it,” Torrey said. “Now let me bring you both a fresh glass and you can drink to old times together.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Lincoln was already seated at the Globe’s common table the next morning, a half-eaten plate of breakfast in front of him, when Martha and I entered the tavern. An odor of stale smoke lingered about the place.

  “I’ll wager you a month’s rent,” I said by way of greeting as we slid in across from him, “you don’t know the source of the animosity between your client Patterson and that old veteran Richmond.”

  “You mean other than their being former brothers-in-law who had the great misjudgment to think they could engage in land speculation with one another?” he said. When he saw my disappointed expression he added, “I was just wondering where next month’s payment was coming from. I’ve solved a major problem before finishing breakfast. You’ve made my day already, Speed.”

  I recounted for Lincoln and Martha the confr
ontation between the two men from the previous night. “It does explain the depth of hard feelings, I suppose.” I paused. “You’re not actually going to insist on payment, are you? It’s poor sport to accept a bet with superior knowledge.”

  “It’s precisely what you yourself were attempting,” Lincoln said with a grin. “If only you’d displayed your sister’s curiosity about my docket from the outset, you could judge better where to lay down your wagers.”

  He turned to my sister. “Has Speed shown you around town, Miss Speed? I’m afraid there’s nothing in our little frontier village that compares with the finery and grandeur of Louisville.”

  “Oh, no, you’re wrong,” Martha replied earnestly. “I’ve discovered so many interesting things already. Did you know the iron nutgall ink sold at McHendry’s on the other side of the square is especially useful for writing long letters? It dries in less than a minute when held over the candle flame.”

  “I had no idea,” said Lincoln, his eyes twinkling.

  I told Lincoln about Gustorf’s attempt to flee Springfield and the long period of recovery the doctor said would follow his accident. “So the sheriff will have plenty of time to question him. I’d think he’s the most likely suspect, especially if we can establish he’d encountered Lilly as well.”

  “We?” said Lincoln, his eyebrows raised. “I thought you said you weren’t after the sheriff’s job.”

  “Of course I’m not. But that doesn’t mean I can’t be of help to him and Prickett in finding the blackguard. I was with the little fellow Jesse on the day he was killed. In fact, I was probably one of the last men on earth to speak to him. Are you going to tell me I don’t have a stake in finding his killer?” And I need to do it, most of all, for Rebecca’s sake, I added silently to myself.

  “Gustorf might be a potential suspect,” Lincoln said. “So could a number of other men, I imagine. But first you need a theory of the case.”

  “Meaning what?”