by Amy Stewart
There was more murmuring between them and he told her to go. “Felix usually stops in after lunch. Hurry over before he gets there and leave this with the cloakroom girl.”
She gave some muffled answer, and then I could hear keys rattling. I slipped around the corner and ran down the stairs ahead of her. From across the street I saw the receptionist leave and walk along Fifty-Fifth, never looking back at me. I followed from a half a block away and easily kept up with her. When she reached Murray’s I stopped and waited outside. I didn’t dare follow her for fear that she’d turn and walk out just as I was walking in.
Murray’s occupied several floors of a fine brick building in the theater district. An elaborate series of stone columns, latticework, vines, and sculpture around the entrance gave the place the air of a Roman palace. It took only one inquiry at a newsstand on the corner to learn that it was a restaurant with a rather notorious cloakroom. One could check a coat or hat, or leave an envelope of money or some other dubious parcel for another party. Only a few days ago, the man told me, someone had left an urn holding the ashes of a famous musical actress. When the parcel was left unclaimed, the cloakroom girl opened it and believed the smooth metal surface to be the side of a bomb. The police were called, but a note inside explained the urn’s contents and the package was returned to the funeral parlor to be reunited with its owner.
The receptionist was inside for only a minute. When she left, I dashed across the street and stepped inside.
I wasn’t prepared for the decadent spectacle around me. At the end of the vast main dining hall stood a stage two stories high flanked by Roman columns and statues of nymphs and fantastical creatures. The ceiling was painted a deep ultramarine blue and hung with tiny lights that gave the effect of sitting out under the stars. Above the clamor of the luncheon crowd—and there must have been hundreds of people, all impeccably dressed for a matinee or afternoon shopping—above all of that, I could hear a good-size orchestra rehearsing tunes for the evening’s dancing. There was even a barge fit for an emperor floating in a grand fountain, where I could imagine the dancers splashing and laughing under a glittering waterfall in the small hours after midnight.
This was a good place to be seen, but was it also a good place to hide? Could a man like Felix put on his best suit, slip into the crowd, and escape notice? If he did, I couldn’t go in after him. I’d be too conspicuous in my plain street clothes and wide felt hat, towering as I did over all of the women and many of the men. I had to hope he was only going to stop into the cloakroom and not spend the afternoon there, dining on blue points and little neck clams.
I’d managed to push myself into a corner where the waiters rushed past and ignored me. I could see the cloakroom at the end of a narrow hall. There was a girl in a green dress collecting coats and handing out tickets. She would notice me eventually and wonder why I was watching her. The waiters who had been ignoring me thus far would want to put me at a table or send me on my way. There was nothing to do but wait outside and hope that I spotted Felix before he saw me.
I passed the next few hours engaged in the mundane and tedious work of waiting and watching. It may sound like a simple thing to stand outside a building and look at the people going in and out, but not everyone can do it. The job takes a particular kind of focus. One must look carefully at every hat and coat, asking the same question each time: Is he the right height? Has he the same hair color? What of his demeanor or his posture? Within a second, each man must be considered and dismissed. Although one wouldn’t be aware of it, some amount of time is occupied in simply sorting the men from the women so that the mind knows which figures to follow. The work is dull and undemanding, but it requires a great deal of attention, for if the mind wanders for even a minute, the man in question could slip past.
It helped to move from one spot to another so as not to invite suspicion. I stood under an awning across the street, then moved to a row of shop windows, then crossed over Forty-Second to a busy street corner, and back again. My legs ached from spending so much time on the pavement. My feet were swollen, the blisters were screaming at me, and my nose was red and wet from the cold. All of these discomforts served their own purpose in keeping me alert and eager to catch my man and put an end to my suffering.
When Felix did appear, it was in the fading blue hours of early evening, and he was walking out of Murray’s, not going in. How had I missed him? I caught only a glimpse of him in profile and doubted myself for a moment. But he would get away if I didn’t move quickly.
He pulled his hat down and turned east toward Times Square, sliding into a crowd of overcoats and hats, where he would be easily lost. I was still across the street and had no choice but to risk my own limbs as I dodged motor cars to get to him. When I reached the other side, he’d gained quite a bit of distance and was moving fast. It was nearly impossible to keep an eye trained on his hat and shoulders, and not to lose it among all the others.
There was no avoiding notice now—I was running, pushing men in topcoats out of my way. I nearly knocked over a trio of young women walking arm in arm.
Already a man was putting his hand on my elbow to offer assistance. I was soon to be surrounded by a crowd of people eager to detain me and calm me down. I did the only thing I could think of, which was to shout, “Purse thief!” and tear myself away from them in pursuit.
It worked, for two young men took up the chase. There were so many people on the sidewalk that none of us could make much progress, but the two of them elbowed others out of the way and cleared a path. I pulled ahead and threw myself on him, panting, at the next intersection.
Felix was half a head shorter than me, and I managed to take him by the shoulder and throw an arm across his neck. He coughed from the unexpected force of it. I pushed him to his knees and crouched behind him. He tried to elbow me but I took hold of his wrists and pushed him face-down on the sidewalk.
Judging from the size of the crowd gathered around us, it would appear that Felix and I were the most interesting people in New York City at that moment. There were so many onlookers that they spilled into the street, making one lane impassable. A man jumped right out of the coach he was riding while it was still moving to get a better look at us.
The two young men, each of them no older than twenty and looking like they’d just had the adventure of their lives, helped me up but kept Felix down on the ground. “Is this the man, miss? Is this the one who took your purse?”
Felix struggled to turn around but couldn’t see me. “I didn’t snatch a purse!”
I walked around in front of him and bent down. When he looked up and recognized me, he gave a sigh and slumped down again, his cheek on the icy pavement.
“I work for the sheriff of Bergen County,” I said to the boys, “up in Hackensack. This man is wanted for harboring a dangerous fugitive.” I looked around at the crowd of theatergoers, all in their fine dress, out for an afternoon’s amusements. They looked as if they might start tossing coins at us in appreciation of our performance. “If someone could find the police, he’ll be placed under arrest.”
A few men went running off to summon an officer, but most people just stood and watched me with mild and bemused curiosity. Some of the onlookers were asking each other questions that I knew were soon to be posed to me: Who was the dangerous fugitive? What had he done? Who was I, and in what capacity did I work for the sheriff?
But it was Felix who needed to answer questions. I knelt down and my skirts pooled on the sidewalk all around me. The boys pulled him to his knees and he had no choice but to face me. It was as close as I’d ever been to him.
Felix’s face was a study in lines: narrow jaw, hollow cheekbones, pinched mouth, and vertical slits for eyes. He seemed leaden and angry, with none of his brother’s highbrow pretensions.
“Where is he?” I demanded.
He coughed—his collar was chafing at his neck because of the way the boys were holding him—and said, “Who?”
I didn’t like
that sneaky little smile or the tea-stained teeth behind it. He had a small pinched face like a rat. His nose even twitched.
A whistle sounded from down the street. The police were on their way and I feared they would take him away before I learned anything. “Tell me now and it’ll be easier for you.”
He turned his head away. I felt a hand on my shoulder, and in an instant four policemen pulled us apart and arrested us both.
“You’ll have a circular from the sheriff of Bergen County at the station,” I shouted as I was being dragged off. “Telephone him if you don’t. Robert Heath. Hackensack jail. The von Matthesius escape. This is Felix von Matthesius. It’s been in the papers all week.”
The officer who took Felix away paid no attention to my story. The jovial and red-faced Irishman who arrested me leaned over and whispered in my ear. “Not to worry, miss. We’ll have a nice long chat at the station. This gets us out of the cold for a good hour. It could be the rest of the night if we have to wait to speak to this sheriff of yours.”
I didn’t like the idea of spending the night in a New York City jail cell, but as long as Felix von Matthesius was locked up as well, I wouldn’t complain.
They drove us to the squat brick precinct house on Fifty-First Street. Felix went to another room to be booked, but they kept me standing inside the front door with an officer on either arm. “We’ll just have to hold you here for a few minutes, miss,” the Irishman said. “We have to wait for a ladies’ matron before we book you in.”
“I am a ladies’ matron.” I was impatient with the idea of waiting for a woman to be summoned just so my name could be written in a ledger book. “Call the sheriff and ask him. Tell him Constance Kopp has made an arrest.”
The Irishman laughed. “Kopp! That’s a good one. You were meant for it, weren’t you?”
I looked around at the small and sparsely appointed room, with its bare wooden chairs bolted to the floor and a wall covered with the cartes de visite of wanted men. I felt so terribly at home there that I said, “Yes. I was.”
It occurred to me that if I’d lost my position at the jail, perhaps the New York police would have me, as long as they weren’t bothered by a matron with an arrest record.
No woman could be summoned and I persuaded them to book me in themselves. The cell they found for me was larger and more comfortable than my own back in Hackensack. None of the officers could believe that I spent nights at the jail, living in the same conditions as the inmates.
“Don’t you want to go home, miss? See your family?” the Irishman asked from the other side of the bars.
“I go home. They see me. Sometimes.”
He left me alone and told me to rest as it would be some time before the sheriff could get into the city. I didn’t want to, but my eyes drifted closed and I gave in to a heavy dark sleep.
The jingle of the jailer’s keys startled me out of it, and all at once I was upright in my bunk with Sheriff Heath standing over me. His hat was down over his eyes and I couldn’t make out his expression. I hadn’t any idea if he was angry or pleased, or, for that matter, if he intended to take me back with him or let me serve out the night in jail. Nonetheless, a great wave of relief washed over me at the sight of him.
“You tackled him,” he said.
“Well, I—”
“They told me you leapt across the sidewalk and threw him down.”
“Give me a day and I’ll have the bruises to prove it.”
“You spotted him and chased after him without any regard for your own safety. There are men under my command who wouldn’t have wrestled with a suspect the way you did.”
“If you can show me an easier way, I’d like to know it.”
We faced each other with the old familiarity that had developed between us. At last he said, “You’re the only one who’s brought me anything.”
“I’m also the only one who let a prisoner escape.”
He gave a tired half-smile. “Now that we have Felix, old von Matthesius will find it harder to stay hidden. If you’ve any other ideas, tell them to me. You were conducting a much more interesting investigation than we were. It was nothing but train stations and police departments for us.”
The fact that I’d been the only one to make any progress gave me a little thrill that I tried to push away. I was disappointed to realize that Henri LaMotte was right. The sheriff had been doing the same three or four things anyone would do when a crime was committed. “If I hadn’t found Felix today, it would’ve been train stations and police departments for me, too.”
He shifted around inside his old tweed coat and said, “Then come back to the jail.”
“It doesn’t seem right.”
“Miss Kopp, I have Morris guarding the female section and he’s tired of it. There’s a problem with Providencia Monafo’s case and she won’t speak to any of us.”
“What’s the matter?”
“Just come back to work. After we catch von Matthesius, I’ll do something about that badge.”
“After.” I didn’t have to ask what would happen if he wasn’t caught.
He looked around the jail cell and I wondered if he was imagining himself living there. “What else are you going to do? I can’t have you out here by yourself, without a partner, or a badge and gun and handcuffs . . .”
“I took my gun,” I said.
He smiled and looked down at his feet. “That’s right. The officer out there told me. He wasn’t ready to believe your story until he found a Police Positive in your handbag. That’s as good as a badge.”
What else would I do? I stood up and shook out my dress. “There’s another man involved, a doctor who was waiting for Felix to deliver a package or to pick one up. The New York police wouldn’t go after him on my word alone. He’s probably run off, but someone should check.”
“They’ve already sent a man.”
“Felix isn’t talking,” I said. “He’s a cagey little snake.”
“Well, let’s get him back to Hackensack. Miss Kopp, it’s unseemly for me to beg. Come along.”
15
“THIS IS YOUR CHANCE, FELIX,” the sheriff said as we drove away from the station.
Felix jiggled the chains around his arms and legs. “Chance for what?”
“To set yourself free. What do you say about taking us to your brother? If you do, I’m prepared to let you go, right now, in the middle of the night. We’ll take the handcuffs off you and put them on him.”
From the back seat, I could only make out the outline of the sheriff’s hat and collar. Felix was nothing but a dim shape next to him. He let out an aggrieved sigh.
“The way I see it,” Sheriff Heath continued, “is that if we put the Baron back in jail and set you free, all of us would be exactly where we started. No one would be any better or worse off than they were a month ago. Your brother would be serving his jail time, I wouldn’t have a fugitive on the loose, and you’d be at liberty to do as you please. Now, Felix, you tell me what’s wrong with that line of thinking.”
“I don’t know where he is,” Felix mumbled.
“Of course you do!” Sheriff Heath sounded almost cheerful about it. “You and Dr. Rathburn. Hasn’t the doctor been helping to keep him? He’s a good friend to the von Matthesius clan, isn’t he?”
“I don’t know any doctor.”
“I’m under the impression that you two traded love notes over at Murray’s cloakroom.”
Felix only snorted and fidgeted again with his handcuffs.
“It’s a shame the police didn’t find a letter in your pockets tonight. How’d you manage to throw it out? Or did you eat it? You didn’t eat it, did you?”
“I didn’t eat it.”
There was a police wagon up ahead and Felix started at the sight of it, in the manner of someone who is habitually fearful of arrest.
“You don’t have to hide from the police anymore, Felix. Now, I will withdraw this offer when we get to the jail. Think on it. Bring us to your brothe
r and away you’ll go.”
Felix made a dissatisfied little growl but stayed quiet. Sheriff Heath turned around to look at me.
“Has Felix ever seen the inside of our jail, Miss Kopp?”
“I don’t believe he’s made it past the visiting room, Sheriff,” I said, leaning forward to put my head between them.
“That’s fine. Sometimes a man doesn’t want to be too well-known to law enforcement.” Again Felix kept his head turned to the window.
“He might not be fond of all those doors and locks,” I offered.
The sheriff turned and raised an eyebrow. “That could be. Steel bars can make a man uneasy.”
We continued in this line all the way back to Hackensack, the sheriff and I trying to tempt Felix into saying something that might be of use, and Felix refusing. I was glad to be back in Sheriff Heath’s company. He had an easy way with criminals and always seemed unerringly sure of himself when he was working on a case. After a few days of running around New York on my own, with no real idea of what I might find, I was back on solid ground again.
“Here we are, Felix,” the sheriff said when the jail’s silhouette rose up before us. “I could turn around right now and we could go fetch your brother.” Felix gave the smallest shake of his head. I could hardly even hear him breathing.
THE WOMEN OF THE FIFTH FLOOR were glad for my return. Mary Lisco, the pickpocket who had escaped from the Newark jail, had been sent back, and in her place we’d acquired yet another pickpocket, this one a girl of only eighteen who specialized in train stations, lifting coins out of purses and slipping brooches and stickpins right off the coats to which they were affixed. Our hosiery thief Martha Hicks was due to be released in a few days and had embarked upon a program of reform aimed at convincing the new girl to put thievery behind her and find respectable employment. She’d had little luck so far and hoped I would help persuade the girl.
Ida Higgins, the woman accused of setting fire to her brother’s house, had originally been arrested on the strength of two cans of gasoline found in her bedroom. But it had been discovered that the fire was actually set by a friend of Ida’s brother, over some feud between the two men. She’d just been cleared of the charges but remained in custody as a witness until the trial, which was scheduled for the next week.
