by Kat Ross
“Think for a second,” Moran snapped. “Danny was already scared when he made the golem. It’s why he did it! Doesn’t that tell you anything?”
Thaddeus nodded. “Something else was already after him. The same thing that killed the others.”
“I don’t know for sure, but I intend to find out,” Moran said. “Did any of you see Francis’s double?”
They were silent. “Maybe Cash did,” Quincy said after a minute. “Maybe that’s why he killed himself. He knew he was next.”
“Or Cash had something to do with it,” Thaddeus said. “He knew something—”
“No.” Moran cut him off. “I’ve known Cash for years. Besides which, I saw him myself when he was supposed to be dead.”
Joseph jumped to his feet. “Someone’s messing with us!”
“Maybe.” Moran’s black eyes raked across his friends. “Or it’s one of you. No one else knows about the Pythagoras Society.”
The room erupted as they all started talking at once, shouting and arguing.
“Sit down and shut up,” Moran barked. “All of you.”
The men reluctantly complied.
“If it is one of you, I’ll find out,” he said. “And you’ll wish you were never born.”
“One of us what?” Quincy demanded acidly. “I don’t even understand what’s going on. If you do, please explain it to the rest of us.”
Moran regarded him. “Someone or something impersonated Danny and Francis. Cashel, too. Maybe this golem, maybe not.” He leaned on the table. “A few days ago, I saw someone who looked a lot like me. So you can imagine my concern.”
They all looked shocked.
“Christ, James. Why didn’t you tell us?” Quincy asked, sympathy mingled with fear on his face.
“Because it sounds insane.” He looked at them each in turn. “And I’m not sure who to trust.”
“What exactly are we talking about?” Thaddeus asked softly. “The devil?”
No one answered.
“We have to tell the police,” Quincy said, at the same instant Moran forcefully said, “No!” and Joseph gave a bleak laugh. “Tell them what? They’d never believe us.”
“I’ve already hired private investigators,” Moran said. “That’s as far as it goes for now. I can’t risk this getting into the papers.”
A brittle silence descended. Thaddeus Shaw took out a pocket watch. “I have to get to class,” he said, rising. “If there’s anything I can do, James . . . .”
Moran waved a weary hand. “We’re done here. For now.” He gave each of them a hard look. “You’ll keep your mouths shut about this. Not a word to anyone, understood?”
The young men all nodded. Thaddeus Shaw put his hat on. “I assume you’ll all be at the funeral tomorrow? For Francis.”
There was another round of glum nods. Thaddeus returned it and strode out the door with an awkward, hitching gait.
Joseph Allen White bounced to his feet. “I have somewhere to be, too.” He ducked his head. “Good luck, James. You know where to find me.” He left without a backward glance, clearly relieved to be on his way.
That left Quincy Hughes. He remained in his chair, his vivid blue eyes regarding Moran with a measuring gaze. “Three of us dead in the space of a month. What else do you know, James? You’re holding back.”
Moran sank down into the seat opposite. “It’s going according to the order of signatures in the society’s charter. There’s only one copy and I have it. So who the hell else knows about that?”
Quincy’s eyebrows rose. “Christ. I haven’t thought about that thing in years. You kept it?”
“Naturally. Assuming it wasn’t Danny’s fault, which of them strikes you as most likely?”
Quincy thought about the question for a long minute. He rubbed his forehead. “Neither, really. But if I had to pick . . . Joseph was the last one to see Danny alive. He’s always drawn trouble like flies to shit. Always taken a joke too far. The golem is a perfect example. Joseph’s pranks have a way of spinning out of control. If he did stir something up best left alone, I’d guess it was by accident.”
Moran nodded. “But . . . .”
“Yes, there’s always a but, isn’t there? Between the two of them, Shaw’s the one I still barely know, even after all these years. God only knows what he’s capable of.” His mouth twisted in distaste. “He works with corpses, disease, death. He’s comfortable with it. It’s a stretch, but I can almost imagine him cursing us out of some . . . I don’t know, macabre curiosity.”
“Then I’ll see him dead,” Moran growled.
“You can rely on me, James,” Quincy said. “We need to stick together. The club served a purpose once, but we’re older now. And you and I . . . well, let’s be honest. We’re in a different class, aren’t we? We need to protect each other’s reputations.”
“I’m glad you see that,” Moran said dryly.
Quincy rose to his feet. “I’ve heard the rumors about you.” He sounded amused. “I’m not sure what you’re playing at, but as long as you keep the family name clean and leave me out of it, you won’t hear any complaints.”
“How kind of you.”
Quincy nodded absently. Moran’s ironic tone seemed lost on him. “Have you thought of leaving the country for a while? Until it blows over?”
“I don’t think it’s something I can run from.”
“Perhaps not.” He leaned forward, his expression suddenly intent. “What does it look like?”
“Like me,” Moran replied. “Exactly like me.”
“Are you sure—”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
Quincy put his hat on and buttoned up his cashmere coat. “Don’t worry, we’ll sort this out, James. I’m at your disposal.” He paused at the door. “I was wondering about something. According to the charter, who’s next in line?”
“You don’t remember?” Moran smiled. “It’s you, Q.”
Moran turned to the one-way mirror and gave us a nod. A moment later, we met him in the corridor and he led us into the empty office. The glass was indeed a perfect mirror on this side, surrounded by a gilded frame.
“So?” he asked, leaning against the table. “What do you think?”
I gathered my thoughts. There was a great deal to mull over. “Well, one thing I can tell you is that Joseph Allen White told the truth. There was a golem. Do you remember when I met you coming out of the sewers?”
Moran managed to keep a straight face. “How could I forget?”
“We were chasing the thing and we finally unmade it, thanks to John. But we never knew who had summoned the golem, so that was definitely enlightening.”
“It still doesn’t make sense,” John muttered. “Rabbi Mezritch said they had to be made by a man of God. Someone who’d studied the scripture for years. Danny doesn’t fit the bill at all. From the way Joseph told it, it sounds like a hare-brained, spur-of-the-moment impulse. So why did it work?”
We were all quiet for a minute.
“His luck,” I ventured. “Joseph said it was on fire that night. Maybe he somehow . . . twisted chance.”
Moran frowned. “Even if he did, I don’t see how it matters for me.”
“And the golem is most definitely dead,” John pointed out. “But whatever’s stalking you isn’t.”
“Then we’re back at square one.”
“Not necessarily. It might be useful to find out if the same phenomenon occurred with the others,” I said. “Think about it this way. The accidents they died in were very unlucky. But maybe it cuts both ways.”
Moran frowned in thought. “Odds,” he murmured. “Probability theory.”
He looked reassured and I understood that this was something he could finally understand.
“Precisely. I can’t say it will save you, but the more you know about how this all works, the better your chances.”
He nodded slowly. “Makes sense, Pell. So how do you want to proceed?”
“We need to know more about Cashel and Francis,
about everything that happened during their last days. That means witness interviews. Any ideas?”
“Francis and I have barely spoken in the last year, but Cashel and I stayed friendly. He was always close to his mother.”
“Would she see you?”
“She might. We can go after the funeral tomorrow.”
“I’m afraid I’m tied up with classwork,” John said apologetically. “Harry?”
“I’ll attend,” I said. Something still nagged at me and Moran picked up on it.
“What?” he demanded.
“I don’t know. I just keep thinking. There’s so many ways to kill someone. Why this in particular?” I met his eyes. “When we understand that, we’ll have our man.”
9
The funeral for Francis Bates was held under ashen skies at Calvary Cemetery in Queens. I watched from a distance in case my colleagues from the S.P.R. decided to show up. I didn’t see them in the crowd, but they could have been there. Half the mourners wore veils and it started raining midway through the service, so a forest of black umbrellas sprang up like mushrooms.
A priest spoke the liturgy for the dead and then Francis’s parents each tossed a handful of dirt into the open grave. He had a great many friends from the theater and a large family. Moran told me that the funeral was delayed to allow two of his older brothers to travel back to New York from California, where they were building a railroad through some little town called Los Angeles.
The surviving members of the Pythagoras Society all showed up, though they barely acknowledged each other. Quincy Hughes spoke briefly to Moran, but the others hung back like he had the plague.
So much for undying friendship.
Moran clearly noticed it and was in a foul mood as we crossed the Brooklyn Bridge back to Manhattan. He stared out the carriage window at the turbulent waters of the East River and I let him brood until we pulled to the curb on East Seventy-First Street.
“What did you tell Cashel’s mother?” I asked.
“That I wanted to pay condolences.”
“About me, I mean.”
He didn’t turn his head from the window. “You’re my fiancé.”
“Oh no, Moran. I’m not playing at—”
“Can you think of a better excuse? Besides, it’s too late now.” He leaned across me to throw open the door of the carriage. “After you, darling.”
I gave him a filthy look and hopped out.
“I’ll do the talking,” he grunted, placing his palm on the small of my back and practically shoving me up the walk to the front door. I shook him loose, my voice a hiss.
“If you think you’re taking any liberties, Moran—”
I cut off as Mrs. O’Sullivan met us at the door. She must have been waiting at the window. She wore a dress of black crepe, which also covered all the mirrors in the drawing room. Her eyes were bloodshot, her face shrunken like an apple left in the sun. I could only imagine her suffering. It was one thing to lose your child in a horrible accident, but to find his body, dead from suicide, must be a mother’s worst nightmare.
Moran gripped my hand in his cold fingers. I couldn’t pull loose without making a scene and resolved to give him a good flaying when we got out of there.
“It’s so kind of you to come, James,” she said in a lilting Irish accent. “And you, Miss Pell.”
“I’m terribly sorry,” I said, feeling awkward. Our presence suddenly seemed like an awful intrusion, but Mrs. O’Sullivan seemed glad for the company. She’d laid out coffee and what looked like homemade raisin cookies.
“Da is working a shift down at the docks,” she said apologetically. “But he’ll be glad to know you came. We’ve had so few visitors . . . .” She trailed off in embarrassment and I understood. Suicide was a cardinal sin for Catholics. The poor woman must believe her son was going to Hell.
We ate some cookies to be polite and she asked after James’s mother. I remained mostly silent through the small talk, and then James broached the subject we had all been dancing around for the last half hour.
“Did he . . . . Did he seem off to you?” Moran asked finally. “In the weeks before.”
Her face crumpled, then smoothed out. “The accidents hit the poor lad hard. Very hard.” She paused. “And those rumors about Danny being seen up at school. You don’t believe ’em, do you?”
“Of course not,” Moran said.
“It’s rubbish. The things people say.” She twisted a strand of red hair around one finger, then tucked it behind her ear. “Have another cookie, James. You look like a wraith.”
Moran obliged, though I could see he didn’t want it.
“Did anything else happen? I’m sorry, I know it’s hard to talk about—”
“But you need to understand. I do, too. So I don’t blame you for asking.” Her eyes brimmed with tears. “He was happy, actually. Just a few days before. Happier than I’d seen him in a long time.”
Moran leaned forward. “Why?”
“The stutter. It went away. Just like that, one day to the next.” She shook her head in wonder. “He’d had it since he was six. So bad he could hardly get the words out sometimes, like they all jumbled up in his throat and got stuck there. You could hear him almost . . . almost choking on them.” She swallowed. “We brought him to doctors but they took our money and didn’t do a thing to help him. And then it just . . . stopped.”
The tears started flowing in earnest and Moran pulled out a handkerchief and offered to her. Mrs. O’Sullivan wiped her face. “I know he thought it could all change for him. That he might land a speaking part. He was wonderful when he wasn’t nervous, you know. When it was just the two of us and he’d read lines. Sometimes I’d read with him and we’d pretend . . . .” She started weeping again.
The conversation turned to reminiscences and I excused myself to use the powder room. On the way down the hall, I passed an open door and paused. The ceiling fixture in the room beyond had been wrenched half out of the plaster. I paused, but Moran and Mrs. O’Sullivan were talking quietly, out of sight.
I stepped inside. Bright theatrical posters were tacked to the walls. A coat had been slung over the back of a chair as though waiting to be put on. I wondered if it was the same chair he’d stood on when he looped the red scarf around his neck.
My gaze roamed over the scripts piled on a small side table near the bed, and a bookcase with holdovers from childhood gathering dust on the lowest shelves. A few boys’ magazines and a raggedy edition of Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson.
I didn’t want to linger too long and was turning to go when I saw the edge of a piece of paper peeking out between two of the magazines. Feeling slightly guilty, I slipped it out. It was a photograph. I guessed it had been taken five or six years before. Cash had his arm slung around Moran’s shoulders. They were teenagers and they were both laughing. Each had a parasol propped over his shoulder.
Just two boys goofing around as I’d seen John do with his brothers a hundred times before, and it wasn’t so much Cashel who caught my eye, though there was certainly pathos in knowing how this laughing boy would end up. No, it was James Moran.
The picture must have been taken before he killed his father. There was an unguarded lightness in his expression that was hard to imagine now. I stared at the photograph until I heard Moran calling my name. I hastily slipped it back between the pages and hurried back to the drawing room.
When I returned, Moran seemed to guess what I’d been up to for he arched a heavy brow in a questioning look. I gave the barest shake of my head and sat down. Moran rose to his feet and expressed his condolences once again to Mrs O’Sullivan. She seemed sad we were leaving and I imagined that the house was a very lonely place for her now, but she said goodbye to us with warmth and dignity.
“Digging through his things, were you?” he muttered once the door was closed.
“I wouldn’t call it digging. The door was open.”
“And did you find anything?”
“Not
that bears on the case.” I glanced up and down the empty street. “Where’s your driver?”
“Emma wanted to go shopping on the Ladies Mile,” Moran replied. “For an avowed spinster, the woman spends a bloody fortune on clothes.” He glanced at me with disdain. “Are your poor tender feet too tired to walk?”
In answer, I strode off and Moran hurried to catch up.
“Cashel wasn’t bullied only for the stutter, was he?” I said as we crossed Park Avenue.
He shot me a look, his eyes narrowing. “What are you after?”
“Only the truth. He liked other boys. Am I right?”
Moran grunted.
“And that didn’t bother you? I find it surprising given your intolerance for the perceived weaknesses of others.”
“What do I care who fucks who?” he said bluntly. “Cash was a loyal friend.”
I frowned at him. “If you mean to provoke me with foul language—”
Moran let out a chortle. “Oh, pardon me, your highness.”
“I know you’re sad and angry, but you don’t have to take it out on the person who’s trying to help you.”
He fell silent. Another block passed before he mumbled an apology.
“Quincy’s a pompous ass,” Moran said. “He always acts like we’re better than the rest of them, but Cash was worth twenty of his kind.”
“Plus you Irish stick together.”
“Aye,” he replied in his best brogue. “That we do, lass.”
“I’ll walk you over to Fifth and then take a streetcar downtown,” I said.
Dark clouds had massed over the city while we were with Mrs. O’Sullivan. Moran glanced at the sky, then quickened his pace. We entered Central Park through the Gate of All Saints at West Ninety-Sixth Street and took a meandering pathway south. Within minutes, a thin rain began to fall. I unfurled my umbrella. Moran turned his collar up, hunching his shoulders.
I’d always liked the park in late September. The crowds of summer were gone, yet the leaves were still on the trees and although autumn was close, it hadn’t quite arrived yet. The grass was still a deep, lush green and squirrels darted through the undergrowth, burying acorns for the winter.
