“And?”
“She admitted meeting Czolgosz in July, but that was it. Then she said, and get this, ‘I consider McKinley too insignificant a man for the purpose of assassination.’ Woman’s got backbone. Gotta admit that.”
“And you waited to tell me all this?”
“Well, you were off checking something out. And I wanted you to meet Hawkesworth first.”
“So, do we get to talk to her?”
“Not right away. Mayor Harrison and Chief O’Neill are personally conducting the interrogation. Nobody trusts Hannigan. We may get a shot tomorrow. Buffalo coppers want her too. Early word is, though, that she’s got solid alibis to prove she didn’t see the Polack again. Newspapers are already screaming that she was at the head of a conspiracy though.”
“Newspapers will write anything.”
“Usually.” Harry chuckled. He didn’t mind when newspapers wrote good things about him. “If she can prove she wasn’t involved, it’s going to make for some very disappointed coppers.”
Walter nodded. “They can’t just fake evidence with her. She’s too smart.”
“Too well known,” Harry corrected. He knew Goldman was smart too, but wasn’t going to admit it. “So what about now? Ready to tell me about your checking?”
“Not yet, Harry. I’ll tell you tomorrow after we talk to Goldman.”
Harry considered it. “Okay, Walter. But this better be worth it.”
“Have I ever disappointed you, Harry?”
“We’ll see.” They both knew he wasn’t talking about McKinley.
Walter almost gave in and invited himself back to Harry’s for dinner, but instead he ate alone. He’d never been a traitor to anything and he had no intention of beginning with Lucinda. After a passable slice of roast and undercooked spuds washed down with three beers at Henry’s, Walter made for home.
As soon as he turned the corner of his street, Walter knew something wasn’t right. Nothing specific—no sight or sound was obviously out of place—but somehow the air was wrong. In his younger days, Walter would simply have scoffed, dismissed the feeling as nerves, but after eight years in the saddle and six more in the division, he had learned that such instincts are to be heeded if one wanted to remain alive.
With his right forearm, he moved his jacket back, allowing him quick access to the Colt. Whoever was ahead of him was not announcing his intentions, meaning that those intentions were serious. This was not to frighten him or send a calling card. And he had not been followed since he returned from Cleveland. No one ducking into a carriage or disappearing around a corner. Perhaps this was why.
Some foot traffic would have helped him time his movements, but Walter was alone on the street. He moved toward the entrance to his building, a bit slower than his normal pace, but not so much so as to communicate wariness. Without moving his head, he shifted his eyes from side to side, studying the road ahead, looking for whatever had prodded his suspicions. No movement. Nothing. He continued on, waiting for whatever was waiting for him to show itself.
About ten yards from the entrance to his building he saw it. In the recess under the stairway that led to his front door. A flick of movement in the shadows. Walter shifted his body to allow him to grasp the Colt without being seen. He kept walking, prepared to draw his weapon and fire. A glint of metal from shadows or any sign of further movement that seemed threatening would have been all he needed. But whoever was there seemed content, at least for the moment, to wait and watch.
When Walter reached the stairway he walked heavily, he turned as if to go up, but instead darted past the stairs to the other side. The revolver was now in his hand. He jumped into the recess.
“Breathe and you’re dead,” he growled.
“No . . . don’t.”
“You?”
“I’m sorry,” said Natasha Kolodkin, moving into the light. “I didn’t mean to . . .”
Walter felt his eyes bug. “What are doing, hiding there like that? I almost shot you!”
“Don’t yell at me.”
“I’m not yelling!”
“I didn’t want to wait for you where . . . someone might see me.” She looked to his hand. “You might put that away.”
Suddenly acutely embarrassed, Walter holstered the Colt. “Who were you afraid would see you? Your friends or mine?”
“Would it matter?”
“Then why did you come here? How did you know where I lived?”
In the half-light of the street, he saw her smile. “I came to deliver the drawings. I found out where you lived . . . well, that’s my affair. You’re not the only person in this city who can find things out, you know.”
Walter heaved a huge sigh. He should have made her tell him, but he didn’t. “All right. So where are the drawings?”
She reached down and picked them up. “I’m not going to show you anything down here. You’ll have to invite me up.”
“No,” he said. Other than Harry and the anonymous woman who the landlord let in once a fortnight to clean, no one came into his room. He was as alone as a bear in a cave. “We’ll go someplace.”
“There isn’t anyplace. If you want to find out what the men looked like, you’ll have to ask me up.”
“All right,” he heard himself whisper. “But it’s . . . messy.”
Natasha giggled and Walter felt his throat go dry. “You can’t shock me, Mr. George. I’ve seen the way single men live.”
She moved out from the recess and marched up the stairs. “Well, you are coming?” she asked from the front door.
Walter followed, terror and longing mixing in an incendiary brew. But he was going to let her in. He was powerless to stop himself. At his door, he turned the key and stood aside. She glanced at him, smiled, and walked through. He followed and closed door. At least Swenson wasn’t about.
“Oh, Mr. George, this isn’t so bad. I’ve seen far worse.”
Walter did not venture to ask where. Instead, he took stock of his rooms as if he had walked in for the first time. A sitting room and bedroom. A burner in one corner, a sink with hot and cold water nearby. Furniture that performed a function, but provided no esthetic enhancement. Gas lamps throughout. But Natasha saw something else.
“Very impressive,” she said, walking to the bookcase. “Have you read all of these?”
“Most. A few I haven’t gotten to yet.”
“Darwin, St. Augustine, Francis Bacon, Emerson . . . even Marx. Did you like Marx, Mr. George?”
“Not especially. It’s a lot easier to be profound about what’s wrong in a society than it is to know how to fix it.”
“Yes. That’s true.”
“You agree?”
“Do you think I walk in lock-step with Emma Goldman? Do you agree with everything your colleagues do?”
“No. Can I see your drawings now?”
“Of course.”
Natasha looked around and, not seeing anyplace to open the portfolio, cleared the table of two dishes, which she deposited in the sink, then moved an empty vase to the window sill. Then she spread the portfolio and removed two drawings. Both were charcoal and each was a detailed depiction of one of the men who approached her sister. But they were more than that.
“These are excellent. As drawings I mean.”
“Thank you, Mr. George.”
Walter studied the portraits. They were in remarkable detail, with subtle shading along the cheeks and forehead and lines about the mouth and under the eyes. The men depicted appeared stolid and . . . dangerous.
“Do you really remember them well enough to draw these?”
“Oh yes. Once I began, details came back. The one on the left was a bit taller. He was the one who romanced Esther.”
Walter studied the face, feeling a note of familiarity. Walter had seen it before. But where?
“You know him?” she asked.
“I’ve seen him. I’m certain. But I can’t remember where. In a crowd, I think.”
“Perhaps it will c
ome back to you. These are for you to keep.”
“Thank you, Miss Kol . . .”
“Natasha. And I should call you Walter.”
“Of course. But . . .”
Before Walter could move to push her away, Natasha had taken his face in her hands and kissed him.
22
Wednesday, September 11, 1901
It was three in the morning. Walter had no clock near his bed but years in the saddle had taught him to tell time by instinct. He lay with his head propped up against a balled up pillow, Natasha nestled against him, her breathing deep and regular. Her body gave off a reassuring warmth, like spring sun. For one of the few moments in his life, Walter felt totally, utterly at peace. Was it because of the lovemaking, the presence of another person, or specifically Natasha? He couldn’t be certain. Would he feel this way if it was Lucinda resting against him?
“You’re awake?” Her whisper jarred him, left him feeling as if he’d been caught in a deception.
“Yes. I thought you were asleep.”
“I was.”
“Aren’t you tired?”
“Aren’t you?”
“I never sleep very much. And this is my favorite time of night. Peaceful. It’s as if everything bad in the world has disappeared.”
“Until morning.”
“Yes.”
“I’ve got to leave very early.”
“I know. Will you come back?”
“Maybe. I’m not certain.”
“Why not?”
“This was wonderful. You’re a very nice man, Walter. But what is wonderful one time is often not so the next. It might be better to keep the memory of this night than risk ruining it by trying to replicate it.”
“Are you this way with many men?”
“Not many. Some. There are few I have liked as much as you.”
“Then why not see me again?”
“I didn’t say I wouldn’t. I’m simply not certain.”
Walter had no answer. He had always been the one to cut relationships short, to avoid any chance that someone could get too close. Now, for the first time he could remember . . .
By seven, Natasha had slipped out the door.
All that remained of her, like the smile on the Cheshire cat, was the drawings. Walter blew out a breath. They would have to do. He made himself a cup of coffee and looked them over again.
One of the faces continued to be unfamiliar, but the other one definitely was not. He tried to give himself a context. Washington. That was where the telegrams went. But where in Washington? The division? No. He’d remember. A Pinkerton? They were crawling all over the town. Didn’t register. Army maybe? He tried to envision the man in uniform. Easy to do. But still, Walter couldn’t jog his memory into recognition.
Instead of place, Walter tried circumstance. In a crowd, as he first thought, but he was certain he hadn’t heard the man speak. And it was a crowd in which an hombre like this would not have stood out. Other lawmen or just other men who looked fast with their fists. In a bar? No. Wasn’t social.
Walter polished off two cups of coffee, never taking his eyes from the drawing. Natasha’s rendition was so real, had so much depth, that the man himself, and not his charcoal likeness seemed to be looking back at him, staring him down. He almost expected the mouth to turn up in a smile, taunting his adversary for his impotence.
Wait. Talking. Walter remembered the man talking, against the wall at the far side of the room. To another man.
Then he had it.
23
Heard about Tomassini?”
When Walter had walked into the outer office, Finneran and Slocum, two of the other operatives—new, eager beavers—were perched behind desks. It took young guys a while to realize that Harry was oblivious both to flattery and any effort to impress. In fact, attempts to ingratiate themselves with the boss generally achieved precisely the opposite effect. Harry ignored them as he waved Walter into his office.
“The grinder? No. what?”
“He was killed yesterday. An accident. Supposedly run down by a carriage while crossing the street.”
“Supposedly run down?”
“Sorry, Walter. I forgot ‘to whom’ I was talking. He was run down by a carriage. I meant that supposedly it was an accident.”
“I take it no one saw this accident.”
“Everyone saw the accident. They may be foreigners, but they aren’t morons. Tomassini sees a shooting. Tomassini talks about the shooting. Tomassini dies. That message is clear in any language.” Harry eyed him for moment. “You look tired. Trouble sleeping?”
Did Harry know? But Harry changed the subject and let Walter off. “They operated on McKinley again. Cut the stitches. To drain the wound they said. Made it sound like nothin’.”
“Did they get the bullet this time?” Czolgosz’s second shot had proved too delicate for Mann, the gynecologist, to remove, so after fishing around a bit, he had concluded that the bullet had lodged in the president’s back muscles and would not pose a threat to his life or his recovery. So Mann stitched just him up. When McBurney showed up, he decided to leaves things as they were. Up until now, it had seemed the correct call.
Harry shook his head.
“That’s bad, Harry.” As every soldier knew, nothing was worse than being gut shot.
“Yeah. But nobody else thinks so. Blood tests seemed normal. Hanna left town because he said McKinley’s recovery is assured. Said everyone should throw up their hats and cheer. TR left too. McBurney is prancing around like McKinley just adopted him.”
“TR? He’s the only one in the whole crew who knows anything about bullet wounds.”
“Don’t forget the doctors, Walter. They know a little about bullet wounds too.”
“I guess.” Walter unrolled Natasha’s drawing. That was enough about TR. “Ever see this guy?”
Harry studied the faces before him. “Nice. Who did them? Anyone we know?”
“Never mind who did them. Tell me where you saw this guy.”
“I thought you asked if I ever saw him.”
“Well you did, Harry. We both did.”
“How many cups of coffee you had?”
“Two. So come on, Harry. Where?”
“Fuck, Walter, could we stop the riddles? Tell me where we saw this guy and what this has to do with the Goldman woman?”
“It has nothing to do with Emma Goldman. And we saw him in Buffalo.”
“Buffalo?” Harry looked at the picture again, this time more closely, then shook his head. “This wasn’t the guy we saw jumping into the carriage. I’m sure about that.”
“Not there. When we went to see Hanna. At the Iroquois. He was in the lobby. I saw him again when I when to the Millburn mansion to talk to the president.”
“He’s a lawman? Okay. I believe you.”
“He’s also one of the two men who recruited Czolgosz and Esther Kolodkin.”
Harry grabbed the picture from Walter’s hand. “Lemme see that.” He studied Natasha’s drawing, eventually turning the sheet of paper slightly to the side as if that would help him identify the man in profile. Soon he gave a tiny nod. Then he looked up at Walter, his mouth tight and his eyes cold, but otherwise with a sudden exaggerated calm. Walter had only seen Harry this way once or twice before and in each case a man had died soon thereafter.
“He was at the far side of the lobby.” Harry spoke in a dull monotone. “He was talking to another guy who had his back to us. Probably his partner. Smith . . . or Jones.”
“That’s how I remember it too.”
Harry placed the drawing on his desk, running his hands along the sides to keep it flat. He looked down at the man again, as Walter had, as a flesh and bone adversary. “All right, Walter, you got your wish,” he said softly. “It wasn’t the Reds.”
“Wasn’t my wish, Harry.”
Harry glanced to Walter for a moment as if he hadn’t heard. But Walter knew he had. “Now what?” Harry asked simply, is if two words were
all he could trust himself to say.
“We find out who they are and who put them up to it. Right now, they could be anyone.”
“Not anyone. Not the Buffalo coppers. Likely not anyway. But we can check. Shit, Walter, I suppose I should be happy. At least it ain’t nobody in the division.”
“Can you be sure?”
“Almost. Not anyone I ever saw in Washington at any rate. Or in Chicago. New York maybe, but no one else in the lobby seemed to know them and the place was crawling.”
“They were off by themselves at Milburn’s place too.”
“Okay. We got some idea who they weren’t. The trick is to figure out who they were.”
“Remember the telegraph office? The dead end in Washington? Maybe it wasn’t such a dead end after all.”
“We can’t be sure they didn’t phony that up. Even if they didn’t, Washington’s a big town.”
“We can make it smaller. We already know a lot.”
Harry nodded. “Okay. They had to be working for someone with a motive. Someone who would benefit from McKinley’s death. Wasn’t anything knee-jerk either. It’s been in the works for more than six months, since before that librarian got persuaded to move to Buffalo. Lucinda was right . . . whoever was behind it knew the president would come to the fair sometime. And they had access to right kind of people. Whoever it was we saw, they had to able to get into a room full of lawmen without being questioned . . . meaning they probably had badges themselves, even if they were phonies. That what you mean, Walter?”
“Yeah. We can work forward and backwards. Try to find them through the badges and also by figuring out who they might be working for.”
“That’s a short list, Walter. Not too many people would have enough to gain to hatch a plot to kill the president . . .”
“But it had to be somebody.”
Harry blew out a breath. “I don’t much like where you’re going with this, Walter.”
“I don’t much like it either.”
“Could be all coincidence . . .” Harry couldn’t come close to making that sound convincing.
Assassin of Shadows Page 14
