A Curtain Falls

by Pintoff, Stefanie

  Then he answered, and I realized he was simply having trouble finding the words to explain what he did not yet understand.

  “The letter was on her back,” he finally said.

  “You mean tucked beneath her shirtwaist?” It made perfect sense. Pinned as she was to the stage curtain, we’d been unable to examine her body closely.

  “No,” he said, “It was actually on her back. Permanently.”

  He looked me full in the eye. “He tattooed it in blue ink.”

  I am not a believer in the supernatural, but I prefer to visit the dead house in the daylight, when the sun’s warmth manages to dispel some of the gloom that lurks in dark corners and ill-lit hallways. To night, I felt the dark rather than saw it— and its chill permeated my bones in a way that was deeply uncomfortable. And though the autopsy room was lit with no fewer than six electric lights, it did little to dispel my uneasiness.

  Splayed out on the soapstone countertop— in the same room where we had learned the details of Annie Germaine’s autopsy just two days ago— was Emmaline Billings. She lay facedown, her head and lower body obscured by thick white coverings that seemed to accentuate the spidery blue markings we could see on the only exposed portion of her body.

  Dr. Wilcox’s assistant, a small man with a Hungarian name that I could never pronounce, came over to greet us.

  “I sent word as soon as I saw,” he said in soft, accented tones.

  Mulvaney circled to view the writing from a different angle. “Can we get more light over here?”

  “Certainly, sir,” the assistant said. He brought over an electric lantern and held it high above Miss Billings’s corpse.

  The lantern cast eerie, half-lit shadows all around us, but brightly illuminated the writing in question. It was done in blue ink, but the skin around it was irritated and inflamed such that, in the light, each letter seemed bathed in a red glow.

  “The ink looks to be a standard blue henna injected beneath the skin,” the doctor’s assistant said.

  Mulvaney shook his head sadly. “This is sloppy work. Do you see how uneven the lines are? Given that— as well as what we know about the Aerial Gardens, where she was killed— I think this was done by hand.”

  I saw the smudged lines that drew some alphabet letters closer together, kept others farther apart; they were thick in places, thin in others. The man who had done this work had taken little care, possessed poor skills— or both.

  “No doubt you’re right,” I said. “It’s too sloppy to be otherwise. Even an electric tattoo machine in the hands of an amateur would produce better work than this.”

  Mulvaney nodded. “Plus, he would have attracted attention carting a machine that large into the theater— or so I’d like to think.”

  We stared at the writing once more.

  “Who would still have access to an old hand machine?” I asked. The new tattoo parlors around Chatham Square— in addition to those tattoo artists practicing in the backs of saloons and even barbershops— had more or less switched to electric machines within the last ten years. And with faster, better methods, tattoos had become more popular, at least among certain groups: sailors, gang members, and the rebellious young men of the privileged classes.

  “Do you think he did this before he killed her— or after?” I asked.

  “I can’t say, sir. Perhaps Dr. Wilcox will have an opinion.”

  I hoped, for this victim’s sake, that the answer would be the latter. If she had been alive— and the tattoo had been done by hand— then Emmaline Billings had been subjected to the tortuous process of having dye injected, one needle prick at a time, until the two lines of verse were written.

  That would indicate a mea sure of cruelty that we had not seen in the two prior killings. It didn’t mean that he wasn’t capable of it, however. After all, I didn’t pretend to understand what kind of person we were dealing with. His blue lettering mocked us, sending chills down my spine, as I tried to imagine why he had left his message this way.

  I steeled myself to the task at hand and focused on the words.

  Lo! ’tis a gala night

  . . . its hero the Conqueror Worm

  I could only stare.

  “What the hell is this?” I finally said. “ ‘Gala night’ mimics the phrasing in this killer’s letter to The Times— but ‘Conqueror Worm’?” I knew I was missing something important.

  “Your professor will no doubt have plenty to say about it.” Mulvaney looked away, asking the assistant, “Do you have a camera for some photographs?” He made a face of apology to me. “I left ours at the station, unfortunately, in the rush to get downtown.”

  The assistant nodded, left us, then returned just moments later with a No. 2 Bulls-Eye Kodak just like the one at Mulvaney’s precinct. I took it and snapped several photographs— some close-ups to focus on specific letters, others far away to capture the two lines together.

  I removed the film and returned the camera to Dr. Wilcox’s assistant, thanking him.

  “Based on his opinion of the murder scene— even before we discovered this tattooed letter— I can guess something of what Alistair will say,” I said the moment Mulvaney and I were once more alone. “He will likely point to the theatrical nature of it. It isn’t writing that merely communicates; it makes a point visually . . . and viscerally.” I shuddered. “He has marked her body for the first time.”

  “But the tattoo didn’t kill her,” Mulvaney reminded me. “It appears he strangled her, just like the others.”

  “True. But it’s still a change in his behavior that may mean something,” I said. And I went on to explain all that I had learned during my interview with Charles Frohman— including how in addition to the theater magnate himself, I felt his closest adviser, Leon Iseman, was a suspect worth serious consideration. “Odd coincidence, isn’t it, that this message surfaces on Miss Billings’s corpse— the week Frohman is rehearsing his next premiere— or ‘gala night’?”

  I found the fact extremely unsettling, but Mulvaney grunted in disagreement. “Actually, there’s one more thing I’ve got to tell you.”

  I groaned inwardly— for after this day’s revelations, I was hoping to hear no more discouraging news.

  He looked at me steadily. “We took the fingerprints off the syringe on the hypodermic needle that pricked Detective Marwin.”

  “And?”

  “Timothy Poe was the first guy I had them run the comparison against. They’re a perfect match to the set of prints we took from him when he was at the precinct station following Annie Germaine’s murder.”

  “How can that be?” I asked incredulously.

  An amused look crossed his face. “You can’t be hypocritical now, Ziele. You’ve always been a big advocate of fingerprinting, saying our department needs to do more to embrace new technology. So you can’t discount what it tells you, just because you don’t like the results.”

  He was right. But the fingerprint match went against every instinct I had. Poe had been duplicitous and less than straightforward, yet I did not believe him to be a killer. He made no sense as a suspect given the behavioral profile we sought, and I told Mulvaney so— knowing as I did that I sounded just like Alistair.

  “And,” I added, “you’ll need evidence other than just finger prints— unless you’ve got ten pristine prints on that syringe, your fingerprints won’t be admitted into court.”

  Fingerprint evidence had achieved partial acceptance in New York as a marker of identification in one case only: where the prints were clean and complete. The prisons, for example, already used fingerprints to identify and keep track of all inmates, because they could obtain ten quality prints from each inmate in a controlled setting. But in real life, prints were incomplete and smudged. And no one yet had fully trusted a partial print as evidence.

  Mulvaney regarded me indulgently. “There’s always a first time, Ziele. Besides, we’ll have more evidence shortly. While we were down here, I sent my men to Poe’s flat with a warrant t
o search his rooms and arrest him. He’ll be waiting for us at the precinct station.”

  But Mulvaney was wrong on at least that one count. When we returned, Poe was not at the precinct house. In fact, he was absolutely nowhere to be found.

  Mulvaney’s men were harried and exhausted when we met them. Ben Schneider and Paul Arnow had begun to show the strain of the day’s events— and they remained concerned about Marwin.

  “Poe wasn’t at home, Captain,” said Ben. “And his roommates claim they haven’t seen him the past two days.”

  “Days?” Mulvaney looked at them in amazement. “But they must have some idea where he’s gone?”

  Paul shook his head wearily. “They claim they do not. Poe apparently even missed his performance last night, which is unusual for him.”

  It was an infraction that Frohman’s stage manager would never tolerate— and the information I was now duty-bound to make public would doom his career in any event. But Poe was facing arrest on three charges of murder. He had larger worries now.

  “We ran to ground all leads, right? The places he frequents. The people he associates with.” Mulvaney cited the checklist of protocol almost by rote. “We’ll find him and bring him in— and secure the evidence that will close this case.”

  Despite the fact that I’d never known fingerprints to lie, I could not accept Mulvaney’s unwavering belief in Poe’s guilt. Still, I owed it to him to share what I knew about Poe’s whereabouts.

  I cleared my throat uncomfortably. “I’ve got another address for him you can try. It’s a flat down on MacDougal Street. Number 101. Apartment Five C. I’ve visited him there before.”

  Mulvaney stared at me for a split second, then ordered his officers to check it out. Once they had left, he pulled me into his office and closed the door. I expected him to be angry, for his temper could be fierce. But instead, he sat perfectly still.

  Eventually he spoke, his voice unnaturally quiet. “How did you know that Poe had a second address— and more to the point, why didn’t you tell me?”

  Reluctantly, I filled him in— telling him all about how Riley and Bogarty had given me the tip, how I had visited Poe there, what I’d learned, and how neither Alistair nor I truly believed Poe was culpable, despite his duplicity.

  “I repeat: why didn’t you tell me about it?” Mulvaney remained stone-faced.

  “Because with all the political pressure bearing down on you, I feared it would provide you with an easy— but incorrect— solution,” I said.

  “In other words, you didn’t trust me to get it right? To understand the basics of evidence?”

  “As a matter of fact, no— I did not. You’ve been prejudiced against Poe from the beginning, prone to believe him guilty before any factual evidence proved it so. How much more inclined would you be to assume his guilt, once you knew he had lied to us? That his lifestyle is an unusual one, sure to prejudice any jury against him?” I stopped for a moment to catch my breath. “And because the public would denounce him based on that fact alone, I had the man’s very career in my hands, to ruin— or not— as I saw fit. And I didn’t see fit. I didn’t believe him to be guilty, so I felt it was my duty to protect his interests.”

  “Your duty . . .” Mulvaney shook his head in disappointment. “We’ve found solid evidence connecting him to today’s crime.”

  “Which is why I have told you his whereabouts now.”

  But Mulvaney said, “We might have had solid evidence earlier, if you’d been more forthcoming. Your sense of duty to Poe may have cost another young woman— not to mention Detective Marwin— their very lives.”

  “If that’s the case,” I said, nearly collapsing into my chair, “do you think I won’t remember it every day for the rest of my life?”

  Stung by what ever he had heard in my words, he immediately retracted his charge. “You know I didn’t mean that, Ziele. We make the best decisions we can, based on what we know at the time. It’s all we can do.”

  He was right. With limited knowledge, it was our only choice.

  But that was something we would learn to live with— eventually. It neither corrected the mistake nor altered the terrible consequences resulting from it.

  Had I missed seeing the truth about Poe? And were my instincts wrong— when they had always served me so well in the past?

  I did not sleep that night, but in my tossing and turning, I decided I was right about Poe. What ever his failings, he was not the man I sought— the one whose monstrous words and deeds tormented me mercilessly, deep into the night.

  Monday

  March 19, 1906

  CHAPTER 21

  The Nineteenth Precinct House

  Timothy Poe was not at 101 MacDougal Street, but a vast array of drug paraphernalia was. Unfortunately for him, it was more than enough to raise the eyebrows of even the most jaded of Mulvaney’s men: a stash of opium, a bottle of Bayer’s heroin, some cocaine toothache drops, and a dozen hypodermic needles of the type that had pricked Detective Marwin. Though it was not illegal to possess any of these items, it was frowned upon by polite society— and their discovery would do Poe little good.

  The presence of similar hypodermic needles was purely circumstantial, of course. But taken together with the fingerprints that damned him— not to mention the jury of his peers who would no doubt take a dim view of his lifestyle— the case against Poe appeared strong. The prosecution would have little trouble painting Poe as an unsympathetic, amoral man. So it was unlikely that his personal testimony would trump the circumstantial evidence stacked against him, as I had witnessed first-hand in the poisoning trial where Mrs. Snyder had been acquit ted. It seemed a lifetime ago, but it had been only a week.

  Mulvaney’s men had eventually located Poe— and by Monday morning, when I met with Mulvaney at the precinct house, Poe was under arrest. I reviewed the evidence against him myself. It was solid— and should have satisfied me on an intellectual level.

  But the nagging sensation in my gut was another matter. I was convinced of Poe’s innocence, despite the persuasive evidence now presented to me. I simply didn’t believe him capable of committing these particular murders.

  “Even the best of us make mistakes.” Mulvaney clapped a sympathetic hand on my shoulder. “I’ve certainly made my share over the years. Luckily, your mistake didn’t cost us too much time in finding our man.”

  I looked at him sharply. “Where was Poe hiding?”

  “I sent my men down into the Bowery to talk with some of the drug suppliers we use as informants. And they got lucky: they found Poe, semiconscious, in the back hall of an opium den on Mott.” He looked up, distracted by a sudden commotion outside. “Speak of the devil.”

  We both looked through Mulvaney’s doorway just in time to observe Timothy Poe being brought out, sullen and catatonic, as two policemen dragged him from the holding room, down the hall, to the waiting police cart outside.

  He caught sight of me and lunged in my direction. “I didn’t do it.” Wild with panic, he beseeched me, saying, “I swear it. You’ve got to believe me.” He looked me in the eye as he reached a long, thin arm toward me, grabbing on to my leather bag as though for dear life. I noticed his once-white sleeve was now dirty and mottled with yellow and green stains, and I detected the stench of vomit.

  “Sorry, sir,” the policeman apologized to me before he shoved Poe away. “Tell it to the judge.” He pushed Poe forward. But Poe continued to protest all the way down the hallway, as if seeing me had awakened a sudden desire to talk.

  “We held him here overnight ’til he sobered up; now that we’ve interviewed him, we’ll book him at the Tombs,” Mulvaney said. “We hope to get a confession now that he knows how much we’ve got on him. We even found his prints in the elevator leading to the Aerial Gardens theater.”

  “You’re certain?”

  “The thumbprint was a perfect match.”

  I was silent for a few moments. “But he’s said nothing so far?”

  “Noth
ing important. He claims he’s innocent. But during the past twenty-four hours he’s been missing, he can’t remember a thing. According to our Mott Street informant, he’d been at the opium den since yesterday morning. In other words, since shortly after Miss Billings’ murder,” he added significantly.

  “Did you bring in Walter as well?” I asked, remembering the tall African man with whom Timothy Poe shared his quarters on MacDougal Street.

  Mulvaney made a noise of frustration. “We’ve heard about Willie from the neighbors, but there’s been no sign of him— and I daresay there won’t be, as long as he knows we’re looking. Apparently someone tipped him off we were coming.”

  I knew that any reply I made would sound hollow. I shoved my hands deep into my pockets and leaned against Mulvaney’s desk. “What do you need help with now?”

  “Nothing.”

  Mulvaney’s sharp tone caught me off guard, and I regarded him quizzically. “Not even a report summarizing my work for you? Doesn’t the liaison department usually want that for accounting purposes?”

  He shook his head. “Even if I wanted your help . . . even if the case wasn’t all wrapped up . . . well.” He paused, then finally said, “Charles Frohman was displeased with your visit yesterday. He telephoned Mayor McClellan, who telephoned Commissioner Bingham, and . . .”

  “Ah,” I said with a rueful smile. “So that’s how it is.”

  “It is.” His face was grim, and I knew from the expression in his eyes that his new responsibilities and their political pressures had begun to take their toll. “We’re set here.”

  I would say that we left each other on good terms, but that wasn’t quite the case. Or that I returned to Dobson with some mea sure of relief, but that wasn’t true, either. This case troubled me deeply.

  If Poe was truly guilty, then I was wrong— something I would accept. But if he was innocent, then not only was the wrong man sitting in the Tombs, but the cost of our mistake would be exacted by the blood of the next victim.