Solve by Christmas

by Amber Schamel

  “Have what?” The kid peered honestly at him with deep-brown eyes.

  “Folks who will wonder where you are?”

  “Nah, they don’t care. Mrs. Braugh has a passel of her own kids to chase around. If I’m not taking up space, she’s happier.” He took off his tattered brown jacket and slung it over a chair. “So what are you working on? Any leads on the culprit?”

  “I didn’t learn much at the newspaper office, so I’m still mulling over the information I have.”

  Denny rolled his shirtsleeves up to his elbows. “What’s all this?” He gestured to the pages spilling from Jasper’s notebook.

  “A project for Mr. Rudin.” Jasper didn’t care to explain it to the errand boy. Wasn’t the kid too young for such talk anyway? Besides, he couldn’t risk gossip if Denny didn’t know how to keep information to himself. “I met a friend of yours yesterday.”

  “Of mine?”

  “Eddie, a boy at the orphanage near Mr. Rudin’s home.”

  Denny’s brow dipped. “Why were you at the orphanage?”

  “Just asking a few questions for this project.”

  “Something to do with all the money Mr. Rudin gives them?”

  Jasper tilted his head. “Yes. Something to do with that. They told me you used to live at the orphanage.”

  With a shrug, Denny ran his hand along the back of a kitchen chair. “Yeah. Eddie’s a good kid. Likes to hear all about you.”

  “He likes to throw snowballs better.”

  The dimple showed. “He gotcha, huh?”

  Jasper couldn’t help but return Denny’s grin. “I got him, too, though.”

  They both laughed, but they soon fell into silence. Jasper swallowed. What thoughts pelted through Denny’s mind? Were Mr. and Mrs. Braugh rough with him? “I was surprised to encounter Miss Leslie there as well.”

  “Of course. If Bet’s not at work, she’s there. Or at her sister’s.” He raised his gaze to meet Jasper’s, and an ornery glint flashed. “You encountered her, huh? Sounds exciting.”

  Heat surged up Jasper’s neck, crowned his head, and spread into his ears. “I was—uh—surprised. I didn’t know she cared for charity.”

  A grin stretched across the boy’s face, revealing his large, round eyeteeth. He pulled out a chair, settled into it, and laced his fingers across his middle. “Well, maybe you don’t think she’s a troll after all.”

  Jasper picked up the dirty dishes and carried them to the sink. “My opinion hasn’t changed much.”

  Denny laughed. “You and Bet…you…Bet?” This time he threw his head back and howled.

  Crossing his arms, Jasper glared. “Don’t be ridiculous. I knew there was a reason I didn’t want little boys pestering me.”

  “Ha, I’m a little too old to be oblivious. You’re wishing I was a harmless little boy.” Denny wiped tears from his eyes. “You bet.”

  With a growl, Jasper stalked back to the window. Would it ever stop snowing?

  Denny followed him. “You know, detective, you can’t fall in love and get married to Bet.”

  Glancing over his shoulder, Jasper arched a brow. “What’s this? Does Denny the errand boy speak sense?”

  “It would absolutely ruin your appeal as a Sherlock Holmes character.”

  Rolling his eyes, Jasper returned to his study of the large, clumpy snowflakes. “Don’t start with the comparison again. I resent it.”

  “Have you even read it?”

  Jasper jumped when Denny poked his ribs.

  “Of course not. Such fancified accounts would spoil my logical processes.”

  “All right, let’s see your logical processes at work.” He crossed his arms and puffed out his chest. “What do you know about me?”

  Biting the inside of his cheek, Jasper contemplated the boy. “Mrs. Braugh doesn’t feed you much. You hate being alone. You’ve had to fend for yourself all your life. You especially love the link sausages from Jorges’s shop. I also say you play the trumpet and gamble at a pub after work.”

  Denny’s eyes widened. “I—”

  Jasper held up a finger. “I’m not quite done.”

  The kid clamped his mouth shut.

  “The only thing frightening you more than being abandoned is me finding out what the kind folks at the orphanage know about you. And the only family you’ve ever known is your brother, Eddie.”

  Denny shoved his hands into his pockets and rocked back on his heels, refusing to meet Jasper’s gaze. “Eddie isn’t my brother. That’s false, so how do you know anything else you’ve said is true?”

  “Your jacket smells distinctly of Jorges’s sausages, and you have a yellow mustard stain on your lapel.”

  “Sure, the sausages are easy enough, but you can’t prove the rest.”

  “Every time I see you, you smell like food, and you constantly accept candies and food from everyone you come in contact with, yet you stay skinny as a tram rail. Therefore, I can only conclude that you’re not fed much at home. Watching you interact with others, I can tell you’ve gained a talent for making friends and getting what you want because you’ve had to watch after yourself.”

  Denny straightened a chair with his foot. “You already knew I was an orphan, so it isn’t impressive. What about the trumpet?”

  “You have a musician’s mark on your thumb. I know you don’t play in a school band, but you must play somewhere. Your hair often smells like smoke, and I’ve spotted ash on your trousers. Eddie mentioned you know card tricks. Now, if I were a young man looking to make some extra money with a trumpet and cards, where would I go?”

  The boy’s lips pressed into a tight line, and his face colored. “I have to do something. I can’t stand it at that tiny house with all those rascal kids and the way she yells all the time. And I’ve got to make some money, or I won’t be able to live.”

  Jasper tipped the boy’s chin, drawing Denny’s brown eyes to his. “There are better ways to make money, kid.”

  Anger flickered in his dark eyes. He jerked from Jasper’s grasp and faced the door. “Like what? You won’t let me be your assistant. At this point, I’m doomed to errand boy indefinitely.”

  With a wince, Jasper sank onto a chair. “Mr. Rudin doesn’t have a position for detective’s assistant.”

  “He’d make one if you said you needed it.”

  That much might be true. Jasper rubbed his fingers together. If he let the kid share his apartment, he could probably keep the same wage as an errand boy. He only had one bedroom, but Denny could take the sofa in the main room.

  He’d have to talk this over with his mirrors later.

  Denny let out a long sigh. “How did you know I had a brother?”

  “Details, my boy. Details. The way Eddie talked, it seemed you two were pretty close. I figured a boy like you wouldn’t take such a liking to a younger boy unless you had a connection.”

  Denny peered at Jasper over his shoulder. “That’s it? They didn’t say anything else?”

  “If by ‘they’ you mean Eddie or Mrs. Yale, then no, not much more. Though with as sensitive to the subject as you seem to be, I feel I should go back and ask more questions.”

  “It’s none of your business.” Denny grabbed his jacket and strode toward the door.

  “Detectives are nosey.”

  Denny spun around. “Well, you ought to keep your nose in the cases it belongs in. Where’s your smart conclusions on the factory incidents?”

  “I have a few. Though the case hasn’t provided as many clues as you have.”

  “Then put your nose to work sniffing out more clues. Isn’t that your job?”

  Land’s sake. Such a tantrum. It piqued Jasper’s curiosity. But getting the kid riled up wasn’t going to help anything. Especially if Denny was going to have to stay until the weather let up. Jasper wasn’t sure he had the patience to have someone else around all the time. Guess this would be a good test.

  Wait a minute. How did Denny get here in the first place? With all the streetc
ars out of commission, and the streets too obstructed for his bicycle…

  “Calm down, kid. It’s not as if you can just sashay out of here unless you have a pair of wings parked outside the door.”

  Denny’s shoulders loosened a little, and one side of his mouth tipped up. “Almost.” He opened the door and grabbed a set of long thin boards curved upward at the ends.

  “Skis? Can you get around with those things in this weather?”

  “Well enough. They glide right over the snow, so as long as the wind isn’t unbearable, I do fine.”

  Peering toward the window, Jasper squinted. This could be helpful.

  “You want a taste of detective work, huh?” He turned back to Denny. “All right, I’ll let you in on this one. But you must do exactly as I say.”

  Denny’s eyes brightened. “You bet!” He snickered.

  Jasper narrowed his brows into a glare. “Don’t make me change my mind.”

  The kid chomped down on his lip. “Sorry.”

  “You can stay with me tonight. Then first thing in the morning, I’ll send you on a couple of errands, and we’ll see what we can find.”

  Rubbing his hands together, Denny grinned. “We’re going to make a great team. You’ll see.”

  Sure.

  Jasper leaned back and crossed one leg over the other. “We’ll start with a test. Tell me what you’ve gathered about the case thus far.”

  Folding one arm over his middle, Denny scratched his chin with his other hand. “Well, whoever it was got access to the factory’s inner rooms somehow. So he or she either is a factory employee, buying off an employee, or gained entrance without being noticed.”

  “Right. They stole a key from Mr. Rudin’s office. That’s how they gained entrance, but still, they had to know where to find it.”

  “Our biggest factor would be to discover a motive, but that is so broad at this point it isn’t much help. Next, we need to analyze every possible clue. We have two incidents to pull from. The first I would examine is point of entry. For the crystallization incident, the culprit used a key, but how did they get inside the building in the first place?”

  Jasper’s brows rose. The kid did have some deductive skill after all. “They could have slipped inside without notice somehow. Or they were already in the building.”

  “What about the lab? Did you figure entry there?”

  “The lock wasn’t picked. So either a key was used in that instance as well, or it is possible he came in through a window. One was unlocked.”

  Denny snapped his fingers. “After you and Charlie started on the hair mess, I checked a few windows in the Crystallization Room. One was unlocked there as well.”

  “Brilliant. Perhaps you do have the making of a detective. Still, if he’d used a window, why did he take the key?”

  A frown puckered Denny’s brow. “Good point. I wish I would have thought to check other windows. What about the window in Mr. Rudin’s office? It was unlocked when I brought the message from Bet.”

  Pointing one of his long fingers at the boy, Jasper winked. “There’s a good eye. Wonderful observation. Did you also notice if the carpet below the window was damp?”

  Denny dropped into the chair across from him. “No. I didn’t get that close.”

  “Now, that could either mean the intruder had gone in prior to our visit, or Mr. Rudin simply opened it to look out at the weather, which is highly probable. Not knowing what time the culprit slipped in to take the key is a hindrance.”

  “Right. So do you have any suspects?”

  “Everyone is suspect, my boy. Even Mr. Rudin himself is suspect at this point. It is vital that a detective draw no conclusions or preconceived ideas until he has enough facts to prove it. Surmising prematurely fogs the logical processes of the mind and distorts judgment and deduction.”

  Denny propped an elbow on the table and rested his chin on his fist. “That’s exactly what Sherlock Holmes says.”

  “Well, in that one point, the author is correct.” Jasper stood and scowled out the window once again. Dash this snow. “Denny, in your gallivanting about town, have you noticed where the Wobblies hold their meeting?”

  “Out on Broadway, I think.”

  Brilliant. This kid might be of some use after all. Tomorrow, if this confounded snow would let up, they’d gain some momentum in solving both cases.

  Chapter Nine

  December 5, 1913

  Frigid snow crept in the sides of Jasper’s shoes as he trudged through the street. Men and boys alike swarmed like living flurries, shoveling snow, piling it into wagons, and hauling it out of the city. Hopefully, they would get enough snow moved so the streetcars could resume operation tonight. In the meantime, Jasper would use this congregation of men in the street to gain some ground on this case.

  A tall man walked alongside a horse as it towed a wagon through the drifts. Jasper fell into step beside him. “Quite the operation here.”

  The man shrugged. “Most snow I’ve ever seen, and I was spawned here.”

  “All these men answered the newspaper ad for employment?”

  “I did. A man with a family to feed can’t sit idle just because it decides to blizzard. We have to get the city back to running as quickly as we can.”

  “I’m certainly in favor of that. My work is behind, too.” Jasper paused as they passed through another deep drift. “What do the Wobblies think about this snow organization?”

  “I haven’t seen any of ’em around. Funny now that you mention it. Can’t be long before one shows. Anywhere men are gathered, one stands up to talk.”

  “You’re right, indeed.” Jasper stepped back on the sidewalk. “Take care now.”

  The man nodded and continued down the road.

  Jasper swiveled to take in the scene. The streets were mounded with automobiles half buried in white fluff. He chuckled and approached a Model T. Someone had built a snowman in the driver’s seat. The city hadn’t lost its sense of humor in the storm.

  He turned down Fourteenth Avenue and headed toward the Capitol Building. If the Wobblies were going to surface anywhere, that’d be the place.

  By the time he sighted the building, a young man was already standing atop a square pillar calling out to those passing by with shovels and barrels full of snow. Below him, another man stood with an armful of pamphlets. The man’s posture seemed somehow familiar.

  Something inside Jasper’s shoe sloshed between his toes as he quickened his pace. As he neared, he ground his teeth. He’d recognize those drooping eyes anywhere. He knew the old secretary had to be one of them. But where was Mr. Stosch’s monocle? Perhaps he didn’t wear it out of doors.

  Hoping to avoid notice, Jasper snatched a shovel leaning against a brick building and hefted a load of snow from the sidewalk. Working would make him less conspicuous as he listened to the Wobbly speaker.

  “Look at all of us out here slaving away in the frigid weather while all the bosses sit at home before their cozy fires. We have as much in common with them as ants have with last year’s derby winner. It’s time we bind together and make the changes leading to a better world with equal wages for all.”

  Jasper stifled a guffaw. Funny that the man standing around lecturing instead of working would make such a statement. He was too boxed in to his own thinking to realize that if all had equal wages it would leave no opportunity for anyone to get ahead. It would make all equally poor, not equally rich.

  The wind kicked up, and the two Wobblies braced against a gust of snow. The speaker climbed down and uttered something Jasper couldn’t hear to Stosch. Then both men tramped down the street in the opposite direction.

  “Hey!” A man had emerged from the alley and pointed a finger at Jasper. “Where are you taking my shovel?”

  “Oh, is this yours?” He pushed it at the man. “I was just finished, anyway.”

  Free of the shovel, he scanned the white streets for the Wobbly men. Snow clung to everything. Even the electric wires hanging over t
he street were coated with ice and clumps of snow. At last, he sighted them veering into an alley.

  He trotted along the sidewalk, running one hand along the building to keep from falling. He peeked down the alley in time to see the two turn a corner. The crunch of their footsteps echoed off the brick walls, growing louder as he gained on them. Finally, they stopped before a storefront. A globe with the inscription Industrial Workers Of The World adorned the window.

  Stosch flicked open his pocket watch. “I told you we’d be late. Walsh is going to be upset.”

  The one who had done the speaking pulled the door open. “Relax, Walter. These meetings never start on time.”

  With that, the two disappeared inside the building.

  If only he could somehow get an ear in that meeting. Jasper circled around to the rear of the building. He scanned the exterior for an open window. Of course, they’d have to be crazy to have opened a window as the blizzard abated, but maybe one was broken.

  He exhaled. No such luck. Although he did spot a vent along the side. Thank the Lord.

  Crouching down, he listened. Faint voices, but no discernible words. He glanced around to make sure no one had spotted him, and then inched closer to the vent, straining to hear.

  Mumbling. Maybe greetings. Someone clapped as if calling to order. One of them had a voice that would put anyone to sleep with its low monotonous tone.

  “Did you see the article about Rudin company?” A high-pitched nasally voice was loud enough to make out. “I think we can use it to our advantage. Rudin has been the most stubborn out of all the capitalists in Denver. If he goes down, one of our largest obstacles would be out of the way.”

  Easy, detective. Don’t draw conclusions too hastily.

  More murmuring.

  “Don’t be worried, Mr. Stosch. If Rudin goes down, his employees will find work at one of the other factories. Hopefully, a unionized one. Then they’d be better off. We’d be doing them all a favor.”

  At least Stosch had voiced some concern for poor Mr. Rudin’s company.

  The wind whistled above Jasper’s head. Snowflakes melted on his lips as he held his breath, listening. His knees cramped, but he sat for several more minutes. Finally, he gave up. Unable to make out anything more, he stood and took a few deep breaths. He needed to get out of sight before they disbursed into the street. They obviously intended to exploit Mr. Rudin and his company as much as possible. But what did that mean? What would be their next move?