Magruder's Curiosity Cabinet

by H. P. Wood

  “Yes, but… Oh, Mr. Enzo, I’m sorry. It’s a cracking good story. I don’t mind, truly. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  P-Ray squeals and runs to them, holding up the fish to show Enzo. “What is it you have? Un pesce? È fantastico! Aha, a mummichog, you catch. Molto bene! You see these blue spots? This means he is…ah…” Enzo looks to Kitty to help him find the term. “He is…how you say, ah, looking for girlfriend?”

  Kitty grins. “Spawning.”

  “Sì, sì. Spawning. So we must let go.” P-Ray whinnies his disappointment, but Enzo eases the hook out of the fish’s mouth and hands it to the boy. “Now, we no stop amore.”

  P-Ray returns sadly to the stairs. He pets the mummichog and whispers a mournful good-bye, while Kitty and Enzo confer by the fence.

  “How goes the boy?”

  “Fine. Bored. And hungry—the food they bring us is rather dire. I found a hairpin in my macaroni earlier.”

  Enzo nods. “Is no better in the big house, believe me. And? How is the young lady?”

  “Me? I’m all right.” Unconvinced, Enzo arches the eyebrow on the unscarred side of his face, and Kitty smiles. “Better for your visits, sir. Any progress with the boat?”

  He groans. “Ach, these men, they work in the offices. I have to show which end of the hammer to use.”

  “Lucky they have you, then!”

  Enzo looks out at the bay and shudders. He confesses, “I, ah…I no like the water so well.”

  Kitty frowns. “You don’t swim?”

  Enzo shakes his head.

  “There’s nothing to it! I’ll teach you sometime.”

  He eyes her skeptically. “A lady swimmer?”

  She gasps in mock horror. “How dare you, sir! This lady swims brilliantly!” She grins at him, and Enzo grins back. “In any case, you aren’t alone—loads of sailors can’t swim a stroke. If we sink in New York Bay, a few swimming lessons probably won’t save you, anyhow.”

  “Is comforting, grazie. But we have nothing to…come si dice, control the boat. These tides…this is no lake, sì? We cannot just, ah”—he makes a flowing motion with his hand—“float along.”

  “Well, a sail, I suppose? You could steal some bedsheets?”

  “Signorina, none of us know the sailing. Tides like this? We no careful, we end up in Cuba!”

  “The food has to be better, right? Look, I don’t know terribly much about it, but Nate used to sail. Perhaps I could—oh, pardon me. P-Ray! Do be careful. You’re far too close to the water, and it’s rather slippery! Apologies, Mr. Enzo. So, as I was saying, I could try to help with the sailing, perhaps?”

  Enzo shrugs. “Is nice offer, but our problems, they are bigger.”

  “How can they possibly be so?”

  “You see, these men… They say when boat is finished, they take me. They take you. But they no take the boy.”

  Kitty frowns. “Why ever not?”

  He strokes his own cheek by way of answer. “Too dark. They no want.”

  “What! But that’s horrible!”

  “Sì, sì. So, I think, okay, I no help them. But boat is only option. I no know what else.” He shakes his head sadly. “Miss Kitty, I no know what to do.”

  “I know precisely what to do! You finish that boat, Enzo. You solve the navigation problem, you sail off with them—and once you’re far enough from shore, you clop their fat heads with an oar and toss them in the sea!”

  Enzo laughs, shocked. “Miss Kitty! You no serious!”

  “I’m utterly serious, Enzo. To leave a young boy like that, because of his race? It’s unacceptable!” She stamps her foot in frustration. “Bastards!”

  “You…” Enzo shakes his head. “You are…something I no know the English for.”

  “Well, I shan’t have it.”

  “Okay, okay.” He sighs. “I must get back, before they see I not there. I return soon.” He calls to P-Ray. “Addio, ragazzino!” He climbs the fence and heads toward the hospital buildings.

  “Mr. Enzo,” Kitty calls after him. “See if you can find The Hound of the Baskervilles for me. A lot of mayhem in that one—quite suits my mood.”

  He shakes his head and laughs. “She is the troublemaker, this one.”

  Kitty returns to the staircase, where P-Ray stands, watching sadly as his mummichog swims away to freedom. She puts her arm around his shoulder. “Don’t fret, sweetie. We’ll swim off too. Together. I promise.”

  P-Ray looks up at her and nods. Then he coughs.

  “Oh, sweetie.” Kitty kneels down and wraps him in her arms. “No. Please, no.”

  Kitty ushers the boy back into the cabin as he coughs again.

  Chapter 35

  The Good Thing

  Nazan and Zeph gaze wide-eyed at the lavish grounds of the Manhattan Beach Hotel sprawling before them.

  “Would ya look at that?” Zeph says. “Two hundred suites in there. Archie told me about when it opened, ’bout thirty years ago? Ulysses S. Grant stood right there on those steps and made a speech. The man was right there! And now…” Weeds and patches of brown infect the once-perfect green lawn. Traveling along a path that leads to the hotel’s main entrance, they can see the telltale divots and ridges poking through the grass: the moles have arrived to reclaim their kingdom.

  Then Zeph does something he never thought he’d do if he lived a thousand years. He strolls across the veranda of one of the most exclusive hotels in New York City with a pretty lady at his side. On his own two hands.

  • • •

  The doors are locked.

  “Shit,” Zeph says. He looks up at Nazan. “Sorry for the language. It’s just…” He sucks his teeth. “So close.”

  “There must be another way in. Maybe if we go around to the—”

  Just then, one of the front doors pops open. A frantic-looking young man emerges, still in his waiter’s uniform, knapsack slung across one shoulder.

  “Miss Nazan!” Zeph says. “Quick, get the door.”

  Nazan leaps for the door just before it slams.

  Zeph addresses the waiter. “Hey! Hey, mister. Got a question for ya.”

  The waiter starts down the steps without looking back. “Sorry, busy.”

  “Where’s the Englishwoman?”

  He stops short and turns. “What did you say?”

  Zeph nods. “Uh-huh. Where they keeping her?”

  The waiter opens his mouth, then thinks better of it. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  “Sure you do. The bellhops been keeping some British lady hidden in the hotel.”

  “That’s absurd. Anyway, I’m a waiter. I don’t associate with bellhops.”

  “Come on, you telling me the staff don’t know there’s some Limey squirreled away someplace? Gotta be gossip item number one.”

  The waiter looks pointedly at his pocket watch. “I’m late. I’m the last one out of the building, and if I have any chance of catching a ferry, I have to—”

  “Don’t worry,” Zeph says reassuringly. “We ain’t cops.”

  The waiter arches an eyebrow, gazing from Zeph to Nazan and back again. “Really. The olive girl and the brown midget aren’t cops. What a relief.”

  Nazan frowns. “Hey, he’s not a—”

  But Zeph raises his hand—he’s heard far worse. “Easy mistake. Listen, please. We’re with the lady’s family. We’re not here to make any trouble. We just want her back, okay? In whatever…condition…she might be.”

  “Please, sir,” Nazan says from the door, suddenly sporting the single worst British accent Zeph has ever heard. “Please, it’s me mummy. I just wanna find ’er, take ’er ’ome. Can’t ye ’elp me, please?” She bats her eyelashes and pushes out her bottom lip slightly.

  The waiter sighs. “Fine. They were keeping her down in the laundry. I don�
��t know if she’s still there. I stay well clear of all that.”

  Nazan smiles. “Thanks ever so much, guv’nor! Now if you could tell me ’ow to find the laundry, I’d be proper grateful, I would.”

  “I’ll direct you to the laundry,” he says, “if you promise to stop speaking like that.”

  • • •

  Nazan and Zeph make their way carefully through the empty lobby while their eyes get used to the darkness. Completely shut down, the hotel is lit only by a few emergency lights.

  But despite the gloom, Zeph is giggling. “Oy, guv’nor! Spare a shilling, eh, guv’nor?”

  Nazan rolls her eyes. “All right, all right.”

  “Best stay outta show business.”

  “I convinced him to help us, didn’t I?”

  “Tortured him into it.”

  They creep slowly along the wall, feeling their way to a side door the waiter said would lead to the basement. “I didn’t notice you having any better—ah, here we go. These must be the stairs.” She opens the door to complete darkness. Gripping the door frame, she takes a deep breath. “It’s like stepping into my own grave.”

  “Nah,” Zeph says. From his back pocket, he pulls a fistful of Enzo’s handmade sparklers. He hands one to her and lights it. “We’re okay, Miss Nazan. We’re okay.”

  • • •

  The Manhattan Beach Hotel basement is a maze of corridors, and both Zeph and Nazan pray silently that their directions were accurate. One wrong turn, and they may not find the laundry before Zeph’s sparkler supply runs out.

  But just as the waiter promised, around the next corner, they find the double-doored entrance to the hotel kitchens; he said the laundry should be just past there. Nazan holds up a sparkler so she can read the sign posted on the kitchen doors: CLOSED BY ORDER OF THE COMMITTEE FOR PUBLIC SAFETY. AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.

  “Hand me the light, would ya please?” Zeph says. “I want to see what they’re hiding in here.”

  “Zeph, it says authorized personnel only…”

  “Miss Nazan, this whole visit is unauthorized. Come on, let’s take a peek.” He leans his shoulder against the kitchen door and nudges it open. The smell thumps him immediately—rotting and sweet, like those two dead Committee boys in Magruder’s backyard, multiplied by a hundred. In the sparkler’s light, he can see a cabinet door left partway open. A gray, lifeless hand sticks out.

  “Okay.” Zeph lets the kitchen door swing closed again. “Seen enough.”

  • • •

  At last, the laundry. They pause in front of the swinging doors. “This, um…” Zeph trails off. “This might not be…”

  Nazan nods. “I’ll be all right.”

  “You hold the light, and I’m going to push open the door. You ready?”

  “Yes. No, wait.” She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “Zeph? Next time I announce I want to be bold…”

  “I’ll tell you to hush up.”

  “Thank you. Okay, go ahead.”

  The laundry is a high-ceilinged room lined with pipes to usher clean water in and dirty water out. A huge copper boiler sits in one corner, flanked by washing and rinsing tubs almost big enough to swim in. Like the kitchen, the smell is overwhelming. The stench of death, but other things too: urine mixing with starch, rotten food with bleach. The only sound is the industrious hum of hundreds of flies. Just before Nazan’s sparkler hisses out, she sees shadows cast by bodies lying in the tubs.

  Hands shaking, she lights another sparkler.

  Boys. Young boys, fourteen, maybe fifteen years old. They’d converted one of the tubs into a giant bed, and at least a dozen bodies are curled up among the sheets, wrapped around one another like kittens in a basket. And in the center, surrounded by fallen children still in their bellhop uniforms, lies an older woman, her eyes closed, her hair long escaped from what was once a proper British bun. In her arms, she cradles a boy with bright-red hair, his freckles unmistakable beneath the bruise-like spots covering his face. His mouth hangs open, and flies march in and out.

  “Hello,” Zeph says gently. “Hello, is anyone…is anyone still here?”

  In the buzzy silence that follows, Nazan starts to cry. Zeph reaches up and takes her hand. “We did a good thing,” he whispers. “It doesn’t feel so good now, but it is. This way, Miss Kitty will know. She won’t be left wondering forever.”

  Nazan nods and tries to speak, but a sob chokes out instead. “I know. It’s just…” They stand together for a few minutes as the sparkler burns down and goes out. This time, she doesn’t light another. She squeezes Zeph’s hand as hard as she can. “They stayed. They stayed with her.”

  “I know, and ain’t that a kindness, Miss Nazan? That she wasn’t alone?”

  “Zeph, I want to go.”

  “Okay, let’s go. It’s okay. I’ll see you out of here safe, don’t you worry.” He guides her toward the double doors.

  In the darkness, a woman’s voice, weak and lost. “Kitty, is that you?”

  Chapter 36

  Trust Me

  “That pea-brained, mollycoddled son of a whore!” Inside Magruder’s, Archie has been ranting at Rosalind for twenty minutes and shows no sign of tiring. “That imbecilic stinkard!”

  After issuing refunds to Archie’s customers, Spencer comes back inside with an apple box full of bottles. “You repugnant little shit,” Archie says. “Give me my product back.”

  Spencer grins. “Nah, I think I’ll keep these. Can’t have you selling those people false hope.”

  “False hope is the only kind there is, you boob.” Archie scratches at his scarred palm. “Who are you to interfere?”

  Spencer twists open the cap and sniffs the bottle’s contents. “Hmm, quite a bouquet. Who am I? I’m the new owner of Magruder’s is who I am, and if you want to sell people a bunch of claptrap, you can use your own damn name. Although I wouldn’t advise it, because I’m going to be keeping my eye on you.”

  Archie stalks up to Spencer. “Oh, you do that. You keep an eye on me. That way, you’ll be sure to see me laughing while your whole world burns down.” Archie turns and stalks out of the museum.

  Rosalind grins. “That’s our Archibald. Question is, what do we do with this elixir now?”

  Spencer takes a swig. “Hmm, not bad. Zeph can serve it at the bar.”

  “Like a martini,” Rosalind suggests. “A plague-tini.”

  Suddenly, a familiar voice drifts in from the street. “Hey! Hey, y’all home in there?”

  “Zeph!” Rosalind rushes to the door with Spencer following close behind. Out on the street, they find not only Zeph, but also Nazan, who is pushing a large, wheeled laundry cart. The side of the cart is emblazoned with the logo of the Manhattan Beach Hotel.

  Spencer goes to her. “Miss Nazan, are you quite all right?”

  She smiles. “Hello, Spencer. Yes, I’m fine. A bit tired—this cart is very heavy!”

  Rosalind shakes his head in dismay. “Is looting a hotel truly a good use of your—”

  Zeph rolls his eyes. “Show them, Miss Nazan.”

  She pulls back one of the sheets to reveal an older woman, unconscious, her skin nearly as gray as her hair.

  Rosalind and Spencer exchange glances. “Asleep or dead?” Rosalind asks.

  “Somewhere in between,” Zeph says. “It’s Mrs. Hayward! Come on, you two. Help us get her inside. Poor Nazan’s been doing all the work—she got herself stuck with a partner who can’t walk and push at the same time.”

  She smiles at him reassuringly. “You did well, Zeph.”

  Spencer frowns. “Partners now, is it?”

  “Spencer,” Nazan says, “please don’t…”

  Zeph says, “Come on. Y’all can argue about this inside.”

  Rosalind stops him. “Wait, wait, wait. This woman has the plague, Zeph. The plague. Y
ou can call it ‘the Cough’ all you want, but we all know this is—”

  “This is Kitty’s mama, Ros.”

  “This is an infected person! You’re risking us all by bringing her here.”

  “Rosalind does have a point,” Spencer says carefully.

  “And what do y’all suggest? Leave her on the street? We gotta look after her.”

  “How?” Rosalind says. “We can barely look after ourselves these days.”

  “We talked about this, actually,” Nazan explains. “A man told us that there is a doctor, over on Twelfth Street, who is selling medicine. Spencer, perhaps you could go?”

  “She’s too far gone for any medicine, Nazan. Just look at her.”

  She rounds on him. “And how would you know? Are you a doctor suddenly?”

  “Nazan, please…”

  “Look,” Zeph says. “Y’all don’t have to cuddle her—we just gotta keep her safe till Miss Kitty gets back.”

  “Yes,” Rosalind says, his anger rising. “And what about that? Have you all forgotten about Enzo and P-Ray? Suddenly, all you care about is this half-dead—”

  Zeph’s jaw drops at the insult. “Damn it, Ros, nobody’s forgotten nobody! My heart hurts every second thinking about our boys. You know it does! But we gotta be able to care about a couple of things at the same—forget it, I’m through arguing. Let’s get her inside.”

  “I want no part of this.” Rosalind turns on his heel and stalks back into the Cabinet and up to his room.

  Spencer is inclined to agree with Rosalind, but after a stern look from Nazan, he sighs and takes hold of the cart, maneuvering it into the Cabinet while Nazan holds the door. But just past the doorway, he loses his grip on the cart, and it rolls away, smacking into the wall inside. The jostling awakens Mrs. Hayward, and she sits up, panicked. “Kitty! Kitty, where are you?”

  Nazan goes to her. “It’s all right, ma’am. Kitty isn’t here just now, but we are her friends. We’re going to look after you until she—”

  “You ungrateful girl!” Mrs. Hayward shrieks, wide-eyed and hysterical. “You wretched, ungrateful little girl! How dare you abandon me like this? Your brother would never treat me so! I never wanted a daughter like you!” She weeps, great heaving sobs. “You wretched girl…” Exhausted, she closes her eyes and falls back into unconsciousness.