Harry Houdini Mysteries

by Daniel Stashower

  “Like his daughter, you mean?” Lieutenant Murray shook his head. “I don’t see it. You just can’t have it both ways, Hardeen. On the one hand, you and your brother have gone out of your way to paint this man as a charlatan and a huckster. On the other, you’ll have me believe that he’d be rendered helpless when a seasoned professional such as Houdini ties him up. I don’t buy it. Not for a minute. If he’s what you say he is, he’ll have picked up a trick or two over the years. How old are you, Houdini? Twenty-three? Twenty-four?”

  “I am of age,” Harry said quietly.

  “Well, Lucius Craig has a lifetime of experience over you. I don’t doubt that he could teach you a thing or two about pulling the wool over a sucker’s eyes.”

  “Possibly,” Harry admitted. “But last night he’d have been obliged to teach that lesson with his hands tied.”

  “Have it your way,” said the lieutenant. “But there’s one thing I may have neglected to mention.”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  A flicker of satisfaction passed over the lieutenant’s features. “The blood,” he said.

  “Blood?”

  “Lucius Craig had blood on the right leg of his trousers and another small smear on the silk lining of his coat. Neither mark was especially dramatic—you could have covered the pair of them with penny—but our boys noticed them last night. I find that sort of suggestive, don’t you?”

  I curled my fingers around the arms of the chair, wishing that I were free so that I could begin pacing. “Very suggestive,” I said.

  “Can we be certain that the blood belongs to Mr. Grange?”

  Lieutenant Murray scowled. “Now, how are we supposed to know that? We can’t exactly ask him.”

  “I thought Dr. Peterson might have performed a test of some sort.”

  “A blood test? What do you know about blood tests, Houdini?”

  “Well,” said Harry, puffing his chest a bit, “I am familiar with a technique involving a chemical reagent which is precipitated by a hobgoblin—and by nothing else. It is considered superior to the old guaiacum test.”

  The lieutenant could scarcely have looked more surprised if my brother had begun walking on the ceiling. “Chemical reagent?” he asked. “Precipitated by a what?”

  Harry glanced at his fingernails, his confidence fading. “A hobgoblin,” he said.

  “Harry,” I said, “I believe the word you’re searching for is ‘haemoglobin,’ and since that test has never been mentioned outside of a Sherlock Holmes story, I’m not sure that it has much bearing on the matter at hand.”

  “My point is perfectly valid,” he insisted. “There are tests that might determine whether it is the murdered man’s blood on Mr. Craig’s clothing.”

  Lieutenant Murray shook his head. “Doc Peterson says he couldn’t get enough of a sample even to try a test,” he said. “Even if he had, none of those things carry any weight in court. For our purposes, all that matters is that he has blood on his clothes.”

  “I dare say that if you examine his wrists you will find that he has rubbed them raw,” I said, glancing down at my own wrists. “That might account for it.”

  “It might,” the lieutenant conceded, “but Doc Peterson doesn’t think so. He says it looks like splashes to him. The sort of splashes that result from a cut, as opposed to a scrape.”

  “You’d be surprised,” Harry said. “Sometimes, when I’ve been practicing an especially difficult escape, it appears as if I’ve been in a knife fight of some kind. There was one occasion, when I was trying to master the Conklin knot, that Mama nearly fainted at the sight of me.”

  Lieutenant Murray studied the knots around my wrists for a further moment. “I don’t think so,” he said. “What makes you two so eager to clear Lucius Craig, anyway?”

  “The man is a scoundrel and a cad,” Harry declared. “I just do not happen to think that he is a murderer.”

  “Well, he’s the only one in the room who had blood on his clothing.”

  Harry considered the problem while I struggled vainly to get some slack in my bonds. “What did Mr. Craig say when you asked him about the stains?” Harry asked.

  Lieutenant Murray’s jaw tightened. “He says it’s not blood at all. He says it’s the spirit residue of the ghostly presence of Jasper Clairmont. He had a word for it. Ectoplasm.”

  “Ectoplasm,” said Harry with a sigh. “The last refuge of the desperate spiritualist. What cannot be explained is attributed to ectoplasm.”

  “Does Mr. Craig have any kind of a criminal record?” I asked, trying to sound casual even as I strained against the ropes. “His early years are rather mysterious.”

  The lieutenant glanced at one of the papers on the séance table. “Noticed that, did you? He says he was raised in a Chinese monastery. His parents were missionaries, he claims.” He drummed his fingers across the sheet of paper. “Hogwash.”

  “Very convenient hogwash, at that,” Harry said. “It relieves him of the obligation to explain how he came to the mystic arts, and it confers a pleasing air of mystery on his persona. Our friend Harry Kellar did much the same in his own biography. Perhaps I too should adopt a colorful childhood for myself.”

  “Your childhood was colorful enough without embellishment, as I recall, Harry.”

  “Perhaps so,” he answered. His eyes brightened as a new thought struck him. “Lieutenant, last night Mr. Grange seemed strongly in favor of my efforts to expose the tricks and deceits of Mr. Craig. Do you suppose that might have been a motive for his murder?”

  “I don’t see how, Houdini. This crime had to have been premeditated. I don’t know how the killer managed to make that ghost appear, but he couldn’t possibly have done it on the spur of the moment. Besides, if the motive had anything to do with your exposure of Craig’s tricks, wouldn’t it have made more sense to kill you?”

  “An intriguing thought,” Harry admitted, obviously picturing himself with a knife in his back. “I can’t say I had ever considered that possibility.”

  “Uh, Harry.” I said, having abandoned my struggle to free myself from the ropes. “Would you mind—?”

  Harry ignored me. “If Craig was not afraid of being exposed, what do you suppose his motive might have been?”

  “Harry. Lieutenant. Would someone—?”

  “That’s not too hard to figure,” the lieutenant said. “Those men have all been circling the widow Clairmont like buzzards. They are determined to marry into that fortune, and our Mr. Craig seems to have decided to thin out the ranks of the competition.”

  “There has to be more to it than that” Harry said. “Mr. Craig seems to enjoy a rather comfortable existence without marrying his hostess.”

  “Perhaps he was planning his retirement.”

  Harry shook his head. “Not all men are suited to the joys of matrimony,” Harry said, with a significant glance in my direction. “Lucius Craig simply does not seem the sort. If he were, I do not think he would have to worry himself too much over the competition. Mrs. Clairmont seems absolutely besotted with him.”

  “I’m not sure about that, Houdini.”

  “Harry, I’m really quite uncomfortable. Would you please—?”

  “If you’re so certain about Craig’s guilt, Lieutenant, why don’t you arrest him?”

  “Because the minute I do, Mrs. Clairmont will hire some fancy-pants defense lawyer and get me thrown off the force. Oh, I can just hear it now. The suspect tied to a chair? A ghost with a knife in its hand? A roomful of witnesses and nobody saw a thing?” He shook his head. “She’d have my badge on a velvet pillow.”

  “You need to know how it was done.”

  “That’s right, Houdini. I need to figure out how it was done.”

  “Gentlemen, I’m beginning to lose feeling in my hands...”

  Harry gazed thoughtfully at the desk where Jasper Clairmont had died. “The lieutenant wishes to know how, and I wish to know why. A strange turnabout, is it not?”

  Lieutenant
Murray stepped to the door as Sergeant Flaherty appeared carrying a red-bordered messenger packet. The lieutenant tore open the flap and unfolded the single sheet inside.

  “Dash,” said Harry, acknowledging my predicament at last, “why are you still tied to that chair?”

  “Harry, my hands are turning blue. Would you please—?”

  “Well, gentlemen,” said Lieutenant Murray, crossing the room, “it seems our murderer has been busy.”

  “What do you mean?” Harry said.

  “Has someone else been killed?” I asked.

  The lieutenant shook his head. “Someone tried to break into the Puck building last night. The night watchman took a cosh over the head. Whoever it was, he got away.”

  “The Puck Building?”

  “On Lafayette Street. You’ll never guess who kept his offices there.”

  “Don’t tell me,” I said.

  “That’s right,” said the lieutenant. “The late Mr. Edgar Grange.”

  9

  THE KALEIDOSCOPE KILLER

  “I DON’T UNDERSTAND IT,” HARRY SAID AS WE MADE OUR WAY across 21st Street. “Why should anyone wish to break into a dead man’s offices?”

  “If we knew that,” I said, “we’d also know why someone wanted to kill him in the first place.”

  “Perhaps there was something in that office that our murderer does not wish for us to see.”

  “That would be my guess, Harry.”

  We had been at the Clairmont house for another hour or so before Lieutenant Murray declared himself finished with the interviews. We had been unable to pry any further information from him concerning the burglary at Mr. Grange’s office, although we overheard Sergeant Flaherty informing him that the criminal had evidently fled without gaining entry.

  “I’m sure the lieutenant will make a thorough examination of the premises,” Harry said. “If there is anything to examine.”

  “No doubt,” I agreed. “Although he didn’t seem to be in a great hurry when we left him.”

  “No,” Harry said. “He did not.”

  We walked on for several moments without speaking. I had not eaten since breakfast and began to feel peckish. I fished a handful of walnuts out of my pocket and offered one to Harry. He popped it into his mouth without troubling to remove the shell.

  “How very delectable,” he said, amid loud crunching noises. “Dash, something has just occurred to me.”

  “What’s that, Harry?”

  “Perhaps it would be to our advantage to examine Mr. Grange’s offices for ourselves.”

  “My very thought.”

  He stopped walking and looked at me in surprise. “Really? I expected an argument.”

  “No argument.”

  “No? I imagined that you would say that Lieutenant Murray is one of the finest detectives in New York and that you and I are nothing but busybodies who should keep their noses out of police business.”

  “All of that is true, Harry. Even so, I still think we should take a look at Edgar Grange’s offices.”

  “You do?”

  “This is no ordinary crime,” I said. “If it were, Lieutenant Murray would have solved it by now. So far we’ve had no luck figuring out how Edgar Grange was killed. If we can’t figure out how, maybe we can figure out why.”

  “What about the lieutenant? He thinks we’re chasing after ghosts.”

  “That’s exactly what we’re doing,” I said.

  “Splendid!” Harry cried, clapping me on the back. “We will go home and gather our dark clothing from the old Graveyard Ghouls routine! I shall fetch the dark lantern and some blacking for our faces! We shall wait for the cover of darkness and then stealthily make our approach by means of—”

  “Not this time, Harry,” I said. I turned and resumed walking.

  “What?” he asked, falling in beside me. “But you just said that we must examine the premises! Surely this calls for the unique lock-picking talents of the Great Houdini!”

  “Harry, whoever tried to break into Mr. Grange’s office must be desperate. We should get down to that office building right away.”

  Harry whistled and rubbed his hands together. “A daylight raid! Yes, that is just the thing! I must say, Dash, this is an uncommonly bold and original plan. Ordinarily you are depressingly cautious about such things.”

  “Depressingly cautious? Just because I discouraged you from leaping off the Brooklyn Bridge does not make me—”

  “A thousand pardons. In any event, we must plan our moves with the skill and precision of a surgeon! A rooftop approach, perhaps? Yes! The very thing! I shall gather a hank of stout rope and a pair of ankle stocks. We shall gain access from the adjacent building, then secure the rope to a—”

  “Harry.”

  He stopped short.

  “No rooftop approach, no ankle stocks. We’re just going to walk in through the front door.”

  “How is that possible? How will we manage to get in if the killer tried and failed?”

  “Simple,” I said. “We’ll use our ace in the hole.”

  “And what is that?” he asked.

  I pointed over his shoulder at the familiar marquee of Ravelsen’s Review.

  “Bess,” I said.

  Forty minutes later, Bess Houdini made her way along Lafayette Street with the two of us alongside, each lightly grasping one of her elbows. To the passer-by, it would have appeared that a pair of concerned young men were assisting a heavily pregnant young woman down the street, though a trained observer might have detected a certain lumpiness about the blessed protrusion—almost as if it were a wadded-up chorus girl costume.

  “Dash,” Bess said in a side-of-mouth whisper, “I feel perfectly ridiculous.”

  “Do you?” I answered cheerily. “You look positively radiant.”

  “This is a risky plan,” Harry said worriedly. “Are you sure we shouldn’t revert to a rooftop approach?”

  “I don’t think Bess should be climbing ropes in her condition, do you? Just relax, Harry. This will be smooth as glass.”

  It is difficult to convey the effect that the sight of a pregnant woman had on the average male in those days. It was the custom at the time for a woman in the family way to remain at home through the last months of her pregnancy, hidden away from the gaze of society. “Nature’s processes may be miraculous to contemplate,” wrote a newspaper commentator of the day, “but they must also be counted as raw and poorly suited for public display.” To judge from the reactions of the tradesmen and office workers we passed along the way, one would have thought that Bess had been carrying a keg of gunpowder with a fast-burning fuse.

  “I’m not sure I can tolerate much more of this,” Bess muttered as a man in a bowler hat literally jumped sideways to clear the path.

  “Are you uncomfortable?” Harry asked, as though her condition were genuine. “We can turn back if you like.”

  “We’re not turning back,” I said. “We’re almost there. For once, Harry, we’ll follow the plan as I’ve laid it out.”

  The Puck Building, which was then the home of the humor magazine of the same name, was perhaps only ten or twelve years old at that time, and its moulded red bricks were gleaming after a light afternoon rain. A gold-leaf statue of Shakespeare’s whimsical sprite peered out from the third-floor cornice at Houston as we passed, as if bestowing a mischievous benediction on our errand.

  We entered the building through a revolving door at the north entrance. I lingered a moment by the glass directory board while Harry led Bess across the marble lobby. An attendant at the polished reception desk regarded us with interest. “May I be of assistance?” he asked.

  “We’re here to see our attorney, Mr. Hawkins,” I said, coming up behind Harry and Bess.

  “Do you have an appointment, sir?” he asked, pulling out a heavy leather logbook.

  “No,” I said amiably, “although I mentioned it to him last night at the Peacock. We’ll just go on up, if you don’t mind.”

  “I�
��m sorry, sir, but my orders are very clear. No one may be admitted without an appointment in the book.”

  “I see,” I said, leaning forward in a confidential manner. “It’s a bit embarrassing, I’m afraid. My brother, you see, needs to make a certain amendment to his marriage certificate. Needs to bring the date forward a bit, if you take my meaning. Wants to get it done before the blessed event. To save a bit of embarrassment later. I mentioned it to Phillip last night and he promised that it wouldn’t be any bother.”

  The attendant winked to indicate that he, too, was a man of the world. “I understand you perfectly, sir, but I’m afraid I can’t let you simply go in without an appointment, though I’d be happy to—madam? Are you all right?”

  My sister-in-law had made a sudden lurching motion, and was now gripping the edge of the reception desk in an effort to steady herself. “I’m fine. Don’t fuss over me, Harry. I’m quite all right.” She straightened herself and turned to the desk attendant. “Young man, are you married?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “If you were, would you wish to see your wife standing about in this condition while your private affairs were discussed with a stranger?”

  “No, ma’am, but—”

  “Very well, then.” Without bothering to wait for a reply, Bess swept past the desk toward the stairway, with Harry trailing behind her. I gave an apologetic shrug to the attendant and followed after them.

  She waited until she had rounded a pair of stair landings and then slumped against the railing, her body shaking with laughter. “Amendment to the marriage certificate!” she cried. “Dash, that was priceless!”

  “Well, the only other offices on the same floor with Mr. Grange are those of an accounting firm, and I couldn’t think of what use they might be.”