The Silver Gun

by L. A. Chandlar

  “Yes. Something about you that I’ve been trying to place. A certain feeling.”

  “What is it?”

  “You feel like home.”

  I felt him take a big breath, and his hand came up and pressed my head to his chest.

  “Let’s keep dancing,” he whispered. I looked up at him. His eyes dark, he bent farther down and kissed me gently. He pulled me even closer, then we danced . . . and danced . . . and danced.

  Then we had a cannoli.

  CHAPTER 46

  I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day.

  —ML

  Much, much later, Finn took me home. We went up the front steps of my townhouse and slowly, reality started to come back to both of us. I had a box to open.

  After greeting Ripley, we walked into the quiet house; Mr. Kirkland and Aunt Evelyn were already asleep. We found the contents of the safe deposit box from Mr. Kirkland waiting for us. We both sobered. There was only one item. It was a shiny, heavy black box. Black lacquer, not unlike the shiny jewelry box Finn had given me. But this was much bigger, a good two inches thick and about ten inches square. I handed it to Finn. His strong yet gentle hands turned the slick box over, feeling the smooth, glossy finish, the satisfying heaviness.

  There was a note attached. It was in my father’s handwriting. It said:

  There’s a key for this box in the piece of furniture we gave you for your tenth birthday. Underneath, front right corner. The combination is the numbers that correspond to your real name.

  “Huh,” I said. “It’s like a treasure hunt. Let’s go!” I grabbed his hand and walked upstairs to my room. We walked into the blue and white room, which was softly lit by the lamp next to my bed. I nodded at the dresser.

  “Is that the piece of furniture from your parents?”

  “Mmm hmm.” I nodded. “They got it for me for my birthday. I wanted a unicycle. But I got a dresser. Let’s see. . . .” I said as I lay down on the floor in front of it, looking underneath. “Front right corner. Wow, there really is a wooden combination lock of sorts. Looks old.”

  I looked up at Finn and motioned for him to come down and see what he thought. He helped me up, then took my place on the floor, looking underneath. “So, the note said the numeric code to your real name,” he said, smirking. “But there are six spaces here.”

  “Uh-huh, smart guy. I recall you saying you knew what my real name was—my full name. Are you having second thoughts?”

  He stood up suddenly, with the smooth, powerful grace of a panther, and took me in his arms. I was so shocked at his sudden movement that I gasped.

  “Lane, I do know your name,” he said huskily.

  “How do you know?” I asked, just barely above a whisper.

  “It’s just Lane. I know you, Lane.” I believed him. His lips came down on mine heavily, urgently. A wave of pure, intense desire came up and over me. . . . He pulled away, bracing himself.

  “You better get that key,” I whispered.

  “Yeah . . . that’s a good idea,” he said, rather breathlessly, as his eyes lingered over my deep neckline. Then he nervously looked at my open doorway. A flicker of fear raced over his face as if he were imagining Mr. Kirkland’s form materializing before him. Or worse: Aunt Evelyn’s. I bit back a smile.

  He quickly lay back down in front of the dresser and started to work the combination. I bent down on the other side of him and watched him turn the wooden rollers underneath the dresser. I heard the old gears shifting and clicking as he turned, and I thought about those six spaces. If you used numbers for each letter in the alphabet, Lane was twelve, one, fourteen, five. Exactly six numerals, if you entered one, two, one, one, four, five. Honestly, whose parents do this sort of thing? Then I heard a little plink as something metallic dropped to the wood floor. It was the key. Goddamn, he did it.

  We grabbed the key and the box and practically ran down the stairs. We stopped in the parlor, and I turned on a couple of more lights. I went and sat down next to Finn on the sofa. I looked at him: his tousled hair, his dark eyes, his shirt that was loosened at the collar. He looked delicious.

  “Right. Okay, we’ve put this off long enough. You have the key?” I asked. He nodded. I gave him the box; he put the small key in the keyhole and clicked it to the right. It was smooth, like it had just been oiled.

  The top clicked as it unlocked.

  “Are you ready, love?”

  “As ready as I’ll ever be,” I replied.

  Had I known what was coming, I would never have been ready. I should have taken more time to consider my options, and think about what this package that my parents so mysteriously gave me on my birthday might mean. I should have stayed Finn’s hand as he started to lift the lid. It was like it was in slow motion, and a prickly fear began to creep up my body.

  “Um, Finn, maybe we shouldn’t . . .”

  But it was too late.

  “Oh, my God,” whispered Finn.

  There, on black velvet, were two identical compartments that fit into each other like a malevolent yin and yang. One compartment was empty, and one was full. There, right in front of me, was the shiny silver gun with a bloodred scroll on the handle. The one my dad had retrieved when they killed Rex Ruby. The one that I must have seen and touched when I was young. My dad wanted me to have it for some reason.

  At that moment, I knew beyond a doubt the other one was still out there. Like the yin and yang that weren’t complete without their partners, that gun had a life of its own. Its destiny hadn’t come full circle. It was still pointing to more.

  The nightmare was coming back.

  I took a deep breath and looked at our parlor, which had been both a war room and also a peaceful place for my birthday celebration. I looked at Ripley, whose tail beat a rhythm on the wood floor expectantly. And then I locked eyes with Finn, who had a spark of adventure glinting from within and a small smile pulling at one side of his mouth.

  The power of the nightmare is the unknown and the inability to control it. But things had changed over the past few weeks. I had changed over the past few weeks.

  I thought about my city, which had been plagued with the effects of the Depression for years now. But we were still forging ahead. Still creating. Still loving. And still celebrating with cocktails. Who was to say we would’ve had the same intensity of innovation and brilliance that New York had at its heart without the wrenching demands of those years?

  Well, now. The silver gun had a destiny of its own.

  So did I.

  Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much, performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.

  —Vincent van Gogh

  EPILOGUE

  Her red hair shone in the light of the lamp. She’d been out cold for an hour or so after the doctor came in and stitched her up. Her eyes were starting to flutter; she’d be awake soon. Goddamn good thing he hadn’t let her out of his sight.

  It would have been workable if she’d been killed outright, he considered, but he couldn’t be one hundred percent sure it had been a lethal shot. And to have her in custody? No way. Not a chance in hell he’d let that happen. There was a delicate balance to his meticulous plans. It would be best if she were still around; it was optimal to still use her.

  As always, he was thorough, and he’d had the foresight to take some precautions. He’d gone to great lengths to protect what he’d been building. He had personally tailed Eliza for days, and had several of his people ready in the wings in case there was a hiccup in Donagan’s plans.

  He’d worked too hard to keep his anonymity and the power that came from that mystery, starting back in the Detroit days. But goddamn, after he saw that gun fly from her hand and topple over the side of the bridge . . .

  The silver gun. The gun he’d been certain was lost once Rex had been killed.

  Once he’d gotten Eliza into the ambulance he’d arranged, he had almost str
angled her himself over that loss. Where on earth did she get it? She must have had it for years.... He put a hand to her throat, his loathing almost getting the better of him. Almost. He withdrew his hand.

  Later, he’d scrambled to the point where he saw the gun fall as soon as humanly possible; it could’ve hit the side of the shoreline instead of sinking into the murky East River. Maybe. He scoured the area for hours but found nothing. It was lost. Once and for all.

  She moaned and started to sit up. “Oh, my God, I feel like I got run over by a truck.”

  “Worse,” he said as he threw back a shot of bourbon.

  “All I remember is that bitch and me fighting. I was just about to shoot her and then . . .”

  “Yeah,” he said coldly. “You were shot. Clean shot, hit closer to your shoulder than your heart. You’re lucky.”

  She turned her head sharply to him, then cringed as the sudden movement made her shoulder and chest spasm with violent pain, the nausea almost overwhelming her.

  “Unh,” she moaned again. “Yeah, real lucky. Do you have any more of that bourbon?”

  “Here,” he said as he handed her a cold glass. He was watching her closely, carefully weighing the pros and cons of her worth. She’d really fucked up.

  She looked up at him, trying to read his unfathomable face, his dangerous thoughts. “You think this is my fault, you son of a bitch?”

  “Careful, Sis. Don’t forget, we are related,” he said, in a mocking voice.

  She took in his countenance. His wonderful hair, beautiful eyes. His collar was opened a couple of buttons, as he’d taken off his tie. She thought that she had never seen a more diabolical face in her life. She’d been raised with that face and had learned from that face all her deceptive mannerisms and tricks of the trade. But, by God, he was flawless. He could look so innocent, so wholesome. And then turn around and have a smile that would say he was about to strangle the life out of you with his bare hands, and he was going to enjoy doing it. She marveled at his talent just as much as she was horrified by it.

  With that sobering thought, an even more horrific thought crept into her foggy mind.

  The gun. She’d lost the silver gun.

  The blood drained from her face. But then again, he hadn’t known she’d had it. No one did. Did Donagan? She tried hard to remember if he’d seen it back on the bridge. She just couldn’t recall. She wrestled her temper and fear into submission. She’d better do her best not to provoke him. Or let him see her anxiety. She turned her face to him, but kept her eyes on the floor, unable to look straight at him.

  “All right, I’m sorry. Thank you for getting me out of there. I admit it, the plan was fouled up. I thought I had her, too. She is such a goody-goody, goddamn pain in the neck.” Her anger was coming back, obviously. She took a steadying breath. “I suppose you haven’t made any more inroads with her?” she asked him.

  He’d been watching her mental gymnastics and was fairly certain she’d remembered the gun and was debating whether she could keep that loss a secret. At her last remark, his face clouded over, and she flinched a little. “No, Sis,” he said condescendingly. “I told you, there was something holding her back, something keeping her from giving in to me. Like they all do sooner or later,” he said, with a one-sided smirk. He was smug and arrogant, and he was right. She’d never seen more women go head over heels for any other guy.

  “I have to admit, she was maddening; hot one moment, cool the next.”

  “Oh, I can tell you what was in the way. His name is Finn Brodie. He played us all, even Donagan. He’s in love with her.”

  He looked carefully at her, with an intense scrutiny that made her uncomfortable and agitated. She shifted around, anxious in his piercing gaze as he fingered the large ruby on his pinky finger. “Hmm. I’ll have to give that some thought. Finn Brodie. I take it he’s an undercover cop?”

  “Yes,” she said derisively.

  “Well, well, well, little Lane likes a little danger in her men, huh? Not the innocent, reliable farm boy for her.... Maybe I’ll take a different tack.” He poured himself another glass as he ruminated over this new approach. Then he murmured to himself as he shook his head with a small, self-deprecating smile, “God she was funny.... Fantastic kisser . . .”

  “What did you say?” she asked, with a demonic look in her eyes.

  “Ah, yes, Eliza, dear. I’ll work on a new tack with Lane. I have big plans for the future, and I feel certain I can pull her in. I’ve never failed yet,” he said, with a sneer.

  She nodded. Eliza had no doubt he’d be able to do it. She drank a big swig of her bourbon, then inhaled deeply, preparing for what lay ahead. She exhaled and looked directly into his blue, piercing eyes.

  “All right, Tucker. Give it your best shot.”

  A WORD FROM THE AUTHOR

  Most of Fiorello’s antics were taken right out of reality. I’ve often told friends that he was so outrageous, people won’t know which events in my books are fiction and which ones are truth. The Artichoke King event (with the trumpets), hammering slot machines with a sledgehammer, scurrying all over the city (especially the fires), having an office and two gun compartments in his car, listening to a line of people with problems every day at city hall, the Boner Day awards, and the funny escapade of jumping onto a motorcycle, complete with sidecar, yelling, “I am not a sissy!” actually happened in real life. And much more . . . He has many more antics to come.

  Many of the specific places in New York City that are mentioned are around today. I tried to bring in as many real places as possible. The neighborhood where Lane lives still has many of those stores and restaurants. The original city hall is alive and active; you can even get tours on Wednesdays. The scroll really is on the Glade Arch bridge near Cedar Hill in Central Park, and you can still admire Jagiello’s statue.

  Blackwell’s Island is now Roosevelt Island and is a lovely place to live. You can still see the octagonal tower of Metropolitan Hospital (now an apartment complex with a pool in the back), the ruins of the smallpox hospital, and those red and white factory smokestacks are still there, too.

  Hulbert Footner, in his book New York: City of Cities, said, “Every night [New York City] is the same yet not the same.” After living here for almost two decades, I understand what he meant. The city is always changing. Restaurants and buildings come and go. Fashion and music and car designs progress. But there is this element of the city that the more it changes, the more it stays the same. Maybe it’s the long history it holds, with those wonderful ghosts and memories sticking around. Because of that, I mentioned a couple of places that are accurate to the feel of the time and scene, but are modern (such as Firenze restaurant) to add just another touch of the city’s peculiar way of straddling time and space. And once in a while, I created a completely fictional place because I needed a certain element for the story.

  I have loved the work and the thoughtful words of Vincent van Gogh for a long time. He wasn’t always a household name, and I thought that taking a look at his words might be interesting. Of course Aunt Evelyn is fictional, but I do believe that she and Vincent truly would have liked each other. All of ML’s quotes are Vincent van Gogh’s actual sayings, taken from the many letters that he wrote. However, the one quote from Chapter 12, “I would rather die of passion than of boredom,” is actually credited to both him and the artist Émile Zola. Vincent quotes Émile in a letter to his brother, but Émile is the originator.

  What I love most about taking a fresh look at the Thirties, a time period that is usually pigeonholed in the era of the Dust Bowl and The Grapes of Wrath, is that it has something profound for us today. Despite the afflictions of the day, the people of the Thirties kept striving and accomplished truly great things. We live in a similar era as Fiorello and Lane. Economic depression, crazy steps forward in technology that are hard to keep up with as much as we love it, great strides toward human rights and the environment, yet deep-seated corruption, too. However, despite the odds being
stacked against real change happening, it did. And it can today. With all the humor, love, zest for life, and, of course, cocktails to boot.

  If you’re interested in seeing some of these places as they are now, you can check out @LAChandlar on YouTube for behind-the-scenes stories.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  It really does take a team of wonderful people to take a book from an idea, to the first draft, to a better draft, and on and on until it’s read in its final version.

  My profound thanks to my husband, Bryan, who witnessed my satisfied tears the first time I wrote those magical words The End. You’ve been my best friend and the one who knows just how much my writing and my stories mean to me. You have my heart and my eternal gratitude. To my amazing sons, Jack and Logan, you have been so supportive and compassionate during the hard parts of “putting yourself out there” and have celebrated joyously with the victories. You’re just the best.

  My thanks to my first readers of what my friend Suzy calls the SFD. The Shitty First Draft. You were my cheerleaders and careful critics. I love you dearly: Judy and Fred Freeland, Bob and Lin Cracknell, Alicia Horvath, Arlee Leo, Michelle Beaker, Mindy Kaspari, Angela Koch, Colleen Fleshood, Patty Oeffinger, Beth Ann Harper, Melissa Moskowitz, Amy Liblong, and Christy Krispin. I would also like to thank Amy Elizabeth Bennett for your splendid early round of editing. To Suzy Welch, I so appreciate your guidance and encouragement in this whole process. And thanks to Heather Greenberg for loving history with me, and for your excellent counsel with regard to dear Vincent van Gogh.

  Thank you so much to my crew of friends who have been super supportive and encouraging through talking things over a coffee (or a wine . . . or a martini), asking great questions, and just being interested. It has meant so much! Thank you, Pam Mittman, Heather Greenberg, Meredith Berkowitz, Karen Reeves, Troy and Allison Patterson, Don and Darla Wilson, and Jeff and Mindy Kaspari.