Murder in the Bowery

by Victoria Thompson

  “Who knows? They probably read it in the newspaper.”

  The telephone shrilled its jarring alert, startling them both.

  “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that,” Sarah said.

  “It’s early for a telephone call,” Malloy remarked, rising to answer it.

  Sarah could easily hear him out in the hallway, shouting into the mouthpiece of the candlestick phone.

  “What . . . ? Are they sure . . . ? Yes, of course . . . No, I’ll go myself. You stay in the office in case someone comes . . . Yes, I’ll telephone you.”

  Sarah laid her napkin on the table and walked out into the hallway where the telephone resided on a small table. “What is it?”

  Malloy rubbed a hand over his face. His eyes were bleak. “It’s that boy we’ve been looking for. He’s dead.”

  * * *

  Frank took a cab to Bellevue Hospital, where the city morgue was located. For some reason, he didn’t feel strong enough to make the walk across town, even in the cool morning hours. News of Freddie’s death had really taken the starch out of him.

  He found the coroner, Doc Haynes, in his office.

  “Malloy, I’m sorry to call you out like this, but the boy had your card in his pocket.”

  “How did he die?”

  “Strangled. Some drunk stumbled over him in an alley in the Bowery in the middle of the night last night. When I saw the card this morning, I called your office to see if you could identify him.”

  “I guess you told Gino the boy had a maimed foot.”

  “I did. Poor little fellow. Still, I’d like you to identify him officially, if you don’t mind.”

  “I expected as much.”

  “How did you know him?”

  “I was hired to find him, by his brother.”

  “Then he does have a family, at least.”

  “I’m not sure about that. The man claimed to be his brother, but I now have good reason to doubt it.”

  “Could he be the one who killed the boy, do you think?”

  Frank’s shock was wearing off and suddenly, he was furious. “I don’t know, but I’m going to find out. I promise you that.”

  Doc Haynes nodded and sent Frank down to the basement where the bodies were kept.

  The room was dark and dank, lit by feeble electric lights and cooled by the water they kept dripping over the bodies to slow decay until they could be identified. The attendant took him to one of the slabs, where Freddie’s body lay. Stripped naked and bloodless in death, he looked much smaller than he had in life. Like most boys who lived on the streets, he hadn’t enjoyed regular meals or even real meals, unless he was eating at the lodging house. His ribs stood out on his narrow chest, and his limbs looked like twigs.

  “Wonder what happened to his foot,” the attendant remarked. He was a big fellow who walked with a stoop. His face was creased in a perpetual frown.

  “Trolley car.”

  “Oh, that makes sense. Is the boy who you thought he was?”

  “Yes. Freddie Bert, or at least that’s the name I knew him by. He also went by Two Toes.”

  The attendant nodded, confirming the logic of the nickname. “I don’t suppose you know that one,” he added, jerking his thumb in the direction of a female body lying on the next slab. She was young and had been lovely once. In spite of the dripping water, her body was mottled with the beginnings of decay. Soon even her own family would not recognize her.

  “No, why would I?”

  “She was found in the Bowery, too, not far from your boy here, and strangled just the same.”

  “A prostitute then,” Frank said, thinking she looked much too young and pretty for that neighborhood. The Bowery was a girl’s last stop, when she was too old and diseased to work anywhere else.

  “No, her clothes are too good. She’s from quality, which makes it strange nobody’s come looking for her.”

  “Somebody’s mistress, then, and he dumped her in a place where nobody asks questions.”

  “You’re probably right,” the attendant said. “Just seems a shame, that’s all.”

  Frank made his way back upstairs to give Doc Haynes the boy’s name and tell him what he knew. “I’ll inform my client, and if he’s the one who killed the boy, I’ll make sure he gets arrested for it.”

  “Good. Did you see our young lady down there?”

  “I did. Harvey said they found her in the Bowery.”

  “Yes, early Sunday morning, but she didn’t belong there. Her clothes were too good and her teeth, too. She had a good life up until now.”

  “And she was strangled, like my boy, but that’s a pretty common way to kill someone.”

  “It is, unfortunately. No weapon or preplanning required. Somebody took some time with her afterward, though. She was stuffed into a trunk and carried down a back alley. She might’ve been there for days in another neighborhood, but some street arabs saw the trunk and thought what a good place it would be to live. It was too heavy to carry, so they opened it up to empty it and found her. She hadn’t been there more than a few hours, which is lucky. In this heat, she wouldn’t have been recognizable after a day.”

  “And yet nobody has come looking for her.”

  Doc shrugged. “Maybe the only one who would miss her is the one who killed her.”

  “Was she raped?”

  “There wasn’t any sign of it, or of violence at all except her neck and some broken fingernails, which probably happened when she was killed. Oh, and she’s with child. I’d say about three months gone.”

  “Which might be why she was murdered. You should put her picture in the newspapers. Someone will recognize her.”

  “The Wrecking Crew was here and did a sketch of her Monday, but I haven’t seen a story about her.” The Wrecking Crew was the portion of the Journal’s staff dedicated to tracking down sensational stories. It included a photographer and a sketch artist.

  “Probably because you haven’t seen a copy of the Journal this week,” Frank said. “The newsies are on strike, remember?”

  “Which means her family didn’t see it either, I guess.”

  “Or anybody else who might’ve recognized her.”

  “That’s too bad. Maybe while you’re nosing around down there, you’ll hear something about her, too.”

  “If I do,” Frank promised, “I’ll let you know. Meanwhile, I’ve got to find out who killed this boy. Oh, and I’ll take care of his funeral.”

  “I thought you said he was a newsie.”

  “He was.”

  “They’ll probably take care of him themselves, then.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The newsies, the ones without families at least, when one of them dies, they all contribute to pay for the funeral. They’re like a family. They look out for each other.”

  But many of the boys were on strike and not earning any money. “I’ll put the word out to them, but if there’s any shortfall, I’ll take care of it.”

  Doc nodded. “That’s nice of you, but maybe the brother will pitch in.”

  “If he really is the brother. All I know is the boy was just fine until I started looking for him, and now he’s dead. If something I did caused it, I’m going to do everything I can to make up for it.”

  4

  “You’ve gotta calm down, Mr. Malloy,” Gino said.

  He was right, of course, but Frank couldn’t seem to even sit still for a minute. The more he’d thought about that boy lying on a slab in the morgue, the madder he got. Fury boiled inside him, and he was more than ready to take it out on Will Bert or whatever his real name was. If Bert had anything to do with Freddie’s death, Frank was afraid he’d take matters into his own hands. The law, he knew, could be a fickle thing and didn’t always punish the guilty.

  At least not the way F
rank wanted to see them punished.

  Frank paced all the way around his office once more and then tried sitting down in his chair again.

  “If he sees you’re this mad,” Gino warned, “he’s going to hightail it out of here before we can even ask him a question.”

  “I’ll be fine, Gino. Don’t worry. I just need to get some of this out of my system or I’ll punch him right in the face the minute he walks in the door.”

  Gino grinned at that. “He probably deserves it, too, if not for this then for something else.”

  “You’re probably right. I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Frank found he still couldn’t sit still, but after he’d taken only a few more turns around his office, the outer door opened, and Will Bert tentatively stuck his head in, as if unsure of his welcome.

  “Mr. Bert,” Gino said, hurrying to greet him. “I’m so glad you could make it. Come in, please. Mr. Malloy is waiting for you.”

  Bert grinned stiffly. “Good news, I hope.”

  Neither man answered him, but Gino ushered him rather forcefully into Frank’s office and into a chair, closing the door to Frank’s office on his way.

  Bert looked up in alarm at the sound of the door clicking shut, but Frank distracted him with a friendly greeting.

  “So you’ve found Freddie again?” Bert asked. His grin was wobbling now, as if unsure of its position on his face.

  “We have,” Frank said, sitting down behind his desk.

  He seemed surprised at this, but Frank couldn’t judge exactly why. Was he genuinely surprised they’d found him again so quickly or did he already know the boy was dead? “Where is he then?”

  Frank waited, watching him glance uneasily at Gino, who stood with his back to the closed door, blocking any possible exit. Finally, he said, “You can claim his body at the morgue at Bellevue Hospital.”

  Bert blinked a few times and his grin slid completely off his face. “Morgue? What do you mean?”

  Frank was now sure Will wasn’t really Freddie’s brother, so he felt no obligation to be kind. “I mean the boy is dead. Someone murdered him last night.”

  Bert glanced at Gino again, then back to Frank. “You don’t think I had anything to do with that, do you?”

  “Could you have killed your beloved younger brother?” Frank mused. “What do you think, Gino?”

  “I think the boy isn’t his beloved younger brother, for one thing.”

  “What? That’s ridiculous. Of course he’s my brother.” Bert had started to sweat. The room was hot but not that hot.

  “And I think,” Frank said, “that neither one of you ever went anywhere on the Orphan Train.”

  Bert squirmed in his chair. “But why would I say that if it wasn’t true?”

  “To get our sympathy. It worked, too. I guess you didn’t know how easy it would be to check, though.”

  Bert stared at Frank for a long moment as the sweat thickened on his brow. Finally, he said, “All right then, we didn’t go on the Orphan Train. You’re right, I made that part up, but I figured if I told you I just lost track of my brother, you might not help me.”

  “And now I’ve told you that your brother is dead, but you don’t seem real sad about it.”

  “I’m sad! But how do I even know you’re telling me the truth?”

  “Why would I lie about that? It’s easy enough to check.”

  Bert perked up at that. “You’re right. I’ll go check.” He jumped to his feet, but Gino stepped over and pushed him back down into his seat.

  “Not so fast, Mr. Bert or whatever your name is. We have a few questions for you first,” Gino said.

  “What kind of questions?” He glanced uneasily up at Gino.

  “Oh, like what is your name, for one?”

  “I told you—”

  “And I told you, I don’t believe you. Now what’s your name?”

  He looked up at Gino again. “Arburn.”

  “Willy Arburn?” Frank asked, remembering his conversation with the bouncer at the Devil’s Den.

  “Yeah,” he admitted warily. “They call me that.”

  “You’re a guide,” Gino said. “You take people slumming in the Bowery.”

  “So what if I do? It’s legal.”

  “I’m sure it is,” Frank said. “So what’s your story now? You’ve made your fortune taking swells slumming and now you want to find your brother and give him a good home?”

  “Look, this wasn’t my idea. None of it was my idea.”

  “Are you saying you’re not even the one who wants to find Freddie?”

  “I . . . I’m helping a friend.”

  “Maybe you’d tell us that friend’s name.”

  “And maybe I won’t.”

  “Then we’ll have to take you down to the police station and have them lock you up for murdering Freddie Bert.”

  Arburn’s eyes widened in terror. “I didn’t murder that little dago.”

  Gino took offense at the slur and cuffed him on the ear.

  Frank ignored his howl of protest. “Then who did?”

  “How should I know? It’s the Bowery. Somebody gets murdered there every night.”

  “Not quite, but why would somebody kill a kid? He didn’t have any money, and he couldn’t be a threat to anyone.”

  Arburn just sat there and glared.

  “Or maybe he could be a threat to someone,” Frank mused. “Is that it? Did he see something or know something and you had to get rid of him?”

  “Not me! I told you, I didn’t touch the kid. I didn’t even know where he was. You wouldn’t tell me, remember?”

  “But you figured it out, didn’t you? And then you found him and you choked him to death.”

  “No! I swear, I never even saw him!”

  “But you did tell somebody where he was.”

  “I told you—”

  “And I’ll tell you again, I don’t believe you. If you weren’t after the boy, you were working for somebody who was. Who are you working for, Arburn?”

  For some reason, the question scared him more than Frank did. The blood drained from his face and he pressed his lips together until they disappeared into a thin line.

  “It’s Black Jack Robinson, isn’t it?” Gino said softly.

  Arburn’s head jerked up at that. “Jack wouldn’t hurt the boy, either! He just wanted to find him.”

  “Why?” Frank asked.

  Arburn swallowed. “Because of the girl.”

  Frank exchanged a glance with Gino. “What girl?”

  “Jack’s lady friend. She . . . she disappeared. The boy would’ve been there that night, though, and Jack was sure he’d seen something.”

  “Why was he so sure?”

  Arburn swallowed. “Because he slept there, at the flat, most nights, and when Jack was there, the boy would sleep outside under the steps.”

  “At the Den,” Gino said.

  “How’d you know that?” Arburn demanded in surprise.

  “We’re detectives,” Frank said mildly. “The boy slept in the flat with the lady friend?”

  “No, not with . . . She didn’t live there. She only came when . . . when she wanted to.”

  “When did she disappear?”

  “Saturday night.”

  Gooseflesh rose on Frank’s arms. “What does this lady look like?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Frank just gave him the glare he’d perfected while interrogating suspects for the New York City Police.

  Arburn swallowed again. “She’s got blond hair, kind of curly. Pretty. Small boned but with . . .” He gestured over his chest to indicate an ample bosom.

  “She comes from a good family, too,” Frank said. “A family with some money.”

  “How’d you know that?” Arburn demand
ed.

  Frank felt no obligation to reply. “How would Black Jack Robinson meet a girl like that?”

  When Arburn didn’t reply, Gino guessed, “Slumming.”

  “Don’t look at me like that! It wasn’t my doing,” Arburn said, his voice shrill with panic.

  “You took a respectable young lady to the Bowery to meet a gangster?” Frank asked in wonder.

  “It wasn’t like that,” Arburn insisted. He pulled out a handkerchief to wipe the sweat now dripping down his face. “She’s not . . . respectable.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” Gino asked with just the proper amount of outrage. There was hope for the boy yet.

  “Just what I said. She might come from uptown, but she wasn’t a lady, not that one. The first time she came on a tour with me, she was dressed like a man. Nobody was fooled, but they all got a thrill out of taking a lady to those places. I guess I did, too,” he added sourly.

  “And she came back again?”

  “Again and again. She couldn’t get enough. She had this fellow she came with.”

  “A lover?”

  “No, some family connection, I think. She’d hardly even talk to him, though. She just needed him to bring her. And one night she met Jack.”

  “And then she didn’t need to go on tours anymore,” Frank said.

  “That’s right,” Arburn said with obvious bitterness. “She just toured Jack’s flat.”

  “Until she disappeared. What happened to her?” Frank asked, very much afraid he already knew.

  “That’s all I know. She just disappeared. She was supposed to meet Jack and he was late, and when he got there, she was gone. He went crazy. He told me to find the boy, because he was gone, too.”

  “Maybe she just went home.”

  “Don’t you think he checked? Like I said, she disappeared.”

  “What’s her name?” Frank asked.

  “Her name?”

  “Yes, stupid, her name,” Gino said, cuffing him again.

  “Estelle,” he said, rubbing his ear.

  “Estelle what?”

  Plainly, he hated giving this information. “Longacre,” he said through gritted teeth.

  “And what about the gent she came with on the tours?” Frank asked. “And don’t pretend you don’t remember.”