Devil by the Tail

by Jeanne Matthews

  Garnick edged around the circular bench to get the sun out of his eyes and took over the questioning. “How did you and Elfie stay in touch after you left Rock Island?”

  “My man took off and I ran out of money. I wrote home for help but that lot of brimstone preaching gospellers would as soon stone me as spare me a nickel. I knew Elfie had a little put away on account of Burk’s salary from the sawmill so I wrote and asked her for a loan. She sent me a few dollars. When she turned up at Annie’s after he chucked her out, I figured I owed her.”

  “Is Stram a Rock Island man?”

  “He wasn’t there when I was.”

  “You didn’t know him before he showed up at Annie’s to buy your connivance?”

  “The first time I seen him, all he wanted was to mingle limbs. It was a week or so before he mentioned Elfie. After that he came back a few times to yammer about the set-up.”

  “How could he have known you were Elfie’s friend,” Quinn asked, “or supposedly her friend?”

  “Ask Elfie. I don’t know who she woulda told about me or where I worked. All I know about Stram is he’s a mean drunk and a dead weight with his heels to Jesus.”

  Quinn could have lived a happier life without that vision in her mind. “Why’d he hit you, Jemelle? You agreed to do what he asked.”

  “He thought that fifty covered as much mingle-mangle as he wanted. I thought different.” She stood up to leave.

  “Wait.” Quinn caught her hand. “Will you sign a statement and swear what you’ve told us today is the truth?”

  She smirked. Now she had something to sell. “What’s the name of that dentist?”

  Garnick scribbled something on the back of a card and handed it over. “Whatever it costs, tell him it cancels out his I.O.U. to me.”

  She stretched her sinuous anatomy in a provocative way, tucked the card between her breasts, and started back toward the house.

  Quinn called after her. “We’ll be back with that statement.”

  Garnick stood up, raring to leave. “We don’t need to go back through the house. Let’s cut through the gap in the hedge, have a look at the alley where Handish was shot.”

  Quinn dipped a cookie in her tea and exulted. Jemelle’s admission had ousted her other worries. She and Garnick had scored a momentous success. Jemelle’s testimony would vindicate Elfie and bring into the agency a trove of paying clients. “We have to report what we’ve learned to Winthrop right away. He can draft a statement for Jemelle to sign and we can get back here before she changes her mind.”

  “Hurry up then. Full chisel.”

  They were on the far side of the hedge when a cornsilk blonde in a vivid pink dress ran out of the house and clasped her hands to her heart. “Garnick! Sissy told me you were here. I knew you’d come back to see your lovey-dove Minnie.”

  Chapter 12

  Winthrop’s office reflected the man – neat, orderly, and meticulously clean. The afternoon sun flooded every nook and cranny, but Quinn saw not a speck of dust. Winthrop sat at his desk poring over a thick, leather-bound tome. He didn’t look up as she entered, but held up his hand to preempt interruption. Her thoughts were still back at the Mansion. She see-sawed between the urge to cry and the determination not to appear foolish. Or judgmental. Or jealous, which she was not. She was embarrassed by her behavior and surprised by Garnick’s, that’s all. She couldn’t let him see how surprised. How…disconcerted. This meeting with Winthrop would give her time to digest the revelation and revise her assumptions.

  After what seemed a long time, he marked his place in the book, closed it, and regarded her with a sullen countenance. “Mrs. Sinclair. I had hoped to see you yesterday.”

  Quinn could barely recall yesterday and was in no mood to be reprimanded. “I was busy working on the case, both yesterday and today.”

  “Were you able to find the alibi witness you promised?”

  “Yes, but there is more to the story than what we expected.”

  “Please sit down and brief me.”

  Quinn gave him a detailed account of her interviews with Elfie and Jemelle, the intrusion of Ned Handish and Jack Stram into the case, and the chilling news of Handish’s murder. “Handish gave Stram money to bribe Jemelle to supply the police with a made-up story and a scorched shawl, which she claimed Elfie had worn on the night of the fire.”

  “I can’t believe the police withheld information from me about the Clary woman. This is the first I’ve heard about any shawl. And you say this Handish person hired you to track down Stram?”

  “Yes, it’s very strange. He said he’d been wrongly accused of killing his wife, but insisted it was Stram, not him.”

  “Sounds the kind of brute who’d naturally end up dead in an alley. What can we expect now from Jemelle Clary?”

  “I convinced her, I mean Garnick and I convinced her to retract her accusation against Elfie and admit the shawl was a ruse. If you prepare a statement with the right legal terms, I’ll see to it she signs today and in front of witnesses. Even if she changes her story at Elfie’s trial, her waffling will give the jury reason to doubt.”

  “Excellent work, Detective Paschal. You elicited a lot more from Elfie than I did. And a woman like Jemelle, I wouldn’t have known how to interrogate her. You and Garnick are to be congratulated. Where is he, by the way?”

  “He stayed behind at the brothel. To make sure Jemelle doesn’t bolt and run. I took the horse-car.”

  “Good thinking. The two of you make an efficient team. I was out of sorts when I last spoke with Garnick. I want to apologize. No question I misjudged the man.”

  “He can be hard to read sometimes.” She forced a smile and pressed ahead with her report. “Jemelle characterized Burk Bayer as a man bent on making money, come what may. He’s the one who benefits most from the Kadingers’ deaths.”

  “Bayer’s an unprincipled reprobate. I wouldn’t be surprised if he killed his wife for her fortune and will eventually go back to his mistress. Water seeks its level.”

  If Quinn weren’t preoccupied with other concerns, she would have chided him for his snobbery. But she couldn’t let herself be sidetracked. “Bayer fixed himself up with a pat alibi, but he could have paid Handish and Stram to set the fire, then sent Stram to buy Jemelle’s false witness against Elfie, or beat it out of her.”

  “Yes. And with Elfie in prison, she could cause him no more embarrassment.”

  “After doing his level best to incriminate her, Bayer has the gall to express his hope that you prove her not guilty.”

  “I didn’t know you had interviewed Bayer. When and where was this?”

  “In Edmond Allbright’s drawing room the day before yesterday. He was visiting Miss Josabeth Allbright at her invitation.”

  Winthrop crimped his mouth in marked distaste. “I heard he was ingratiating himself into the Kadingers’ social set.”

  “He said Rolf Kadinger had a son, Verner. Mr. Kadinger wrote the boy out of his will, which made Verner extremely angry.”

  “Verner Kadinger has asked me to represent him.”

  Quinn was dumbfounded. “Why you?”

  “I assume he saw my name somewhere in connection with the criminal case against Elfie. He’s been out of the country. He may not know any other attorneys.”

  “But you can’t represent him and Elfie! What if the jury doesn’t believe Jemelle’s retraction and you have to argue that Verner had a motive to murder his father? He was in Chicago a whole month prior to the fire and had a nasty row with him.”

  “I haven’t accepted him as a client yet. We’ve communicated only by telegram. But if you believe Bayer is guilty of the murders, I should think you’d be pleased if I could uphold Verner’s claim to the estate and prevent Bayer from profiting from his crime.” He pulled his watch out of his pocket. “I’ve scheduled a meeting with Verner for four o’clock tomorrow afternoon. I’d like you to attend and take notes. Now, give me a few minutes and I’ll prepare that statement for Jemelle Clary.�
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  Quinn wanted very much to meet Verner Kadinger, although she didn’t relish the idea that Winthrop would take Verner on as a client. She wouldn’t like it if he represented Geneva Sinclair at the same time he was representing her, regardless how finely he split the hairs.

  The wait while he crafted his lawyerly statement was excruciating. She needed to keep moving, to keep thinking about the next thing. To keep not thinking about the cornsilk blonde Garnick had been mingling limbs with. Minnie. She permeated Quinn’s thoughts like cheap perfume. Minnie was the reason he didn’t want to accompany her to Lou Harper’s hookshop. Minnie was the reason he’d been dousing himself with Florida Water and getting his hair barbered.

  “How does she spell her name?” asked Winthrop.

  “Who?”

  “Jemelle Clary?”

  Quinn spelled it like it sounded. She didn’t think Jemelle would object.

  Winthrop’s gold-nib fountain pen scratched slowly across the page, pausing every other word. At the end of her endurance, she got up and browsed a shelf of thick law books and statutes, some as heavy as andirons. She opened Bouvier’s Law Dictionary to Doubt, defined as “The uncertainty which exists in relation to a fact, a proposition, or other thing; an equipoise of the mind arising from an equality of contrary reasons.” Quinn’s mind stretched in equipoise like a clothesline hung with contrary reasons and contrary feelings, not to mention a load of dirty linen. How could she have so misread Garnick? What was it Josabeth said? Elfie misconstrued Burk’s kindness. Apparently naïve prairie girls weren’t the only ones liable to misconstruction. The one thing about which Quinn had zero doubt, she had to conquer this ridiculous urge to cry before she saw Garnick again.

  She wrested her thoughts off personal matters and considered Bouvier’s definition of Reasonable Doubt – “proof to a moral certainty as distinguished from an absolute certainty.” By her lights, Winthrop had already compiled more than enough reasonable doubt to win Elfie’s acquittal. As soon as she had obtained Jemelle’s signature, she would go back to the jail and give Elfie the good news. Maybe she could suggest a way for Elfie to earn a living and live independently. If Winthrop could cajole a settlement out of her in-laws, maybe she could afford to hire Elfie as a receptionist and buy a second horse and buggy so that she and Garnick didn’t have to spend so much time together.

  She shelved the book and wandered around. A collection of ambrotypes and cabinet card photographs caught her eye. Displayed on top of a pine pie safe, they added a homey, sentimental touch to the office. Quinn wouldn’t have thought Winthrop had a sentimental side. One of the older ambrotypes showed an elderly gentleman posed with two children at his knee, a boy and girl. The boy in short pants had a robust, chesty look. She guessed it was the young Winthrop. The facing picture of a middle-aged woman with a haughty, down-the-nose mien was probably his mother. The cabinet photo featured a flamboyant young woman sporting a spiky tiara and intricately carved eardrops in the same design. Her hands were crossed theatrically over her bosom to exhibit cameo bracelets with dancing cupids. Could she be Adelaide Ristori, the Italian actress who portrayed Medea?

  On the wall facing his desk, he had tacked a playbill advertising last January’s production of the play at Uranus Crosby’s Opera House. The poster depicted a red-robed, gimlet-eyed Medea facing down her domineering husband while a cauldron of poison brewed behind her back. Quinn opened her mouth to tell Winthrop that she had now read the play, but the door swung open and a black-haired lunatic barged in. He had a scoop nose and small, blazing eyes that broadcast fury.

  “Are you Winthrop?”

  “I am.” The lawyer stood. “Who might you be, sir?”

  “Verner Kadinger.”

  “You are early, sir. Our meeting isn’t scheduled until tomorrow.”

  “Forget that. I need advice now.”

  “If you must.” Winthrop held out his hand.

  Kadinger was either too rude to take it or too blinded by fury to see it. “I won’t

  let that greedy swine steal what’s mine. Papa was a vindictive old scoundrel, but he wasn’t mad. He was a Kadinger. He wouldn’t give what he worked for all his life to a bloody fortune hunter.”

  “This is Mrs. Sinclair,” said Winthrop, calling his attention to Quinn. “I’ve asked her to take notes of our meeting.”

  Verner half-turned but offered no greeting. He drew a telegram out of his sack coat. “What’s this improper influence you say here? Can you get the will revoked if Bayer flimflammed the old man?”

  “If it can be proven,” said Winthrop. He handed Quinn a notebook and pen and pulled out a chair for her next to his desk. “Let’s sit, shall we, and start from the beginning. Why do you believe your father was flimflammed?”

  “I’m my father’s only son. I’m the only legitimate heir.”

  “Tell me the name of the attorney who read the will. I need to see it for myself.”

  “Caleb Cranston.”

  “Did you attend the reading?”

  “I stood up, I told him it’s a fake. My father didn’t want that bloody bastard to get his hands on one cent of his money. Cranston, he insisted it was Papa’s true testament, authenticated by witnesses, leaving everything to Delphine contingent on her marital status at the time of his death. But that can’t be right. He knew better than to trust Delphine or any husband she might have chosen. That bastard Bayer is the author of this fake will.”

  “You are unduly exercised,” said Winthrop. “Please calm yourself. There’s a lady present.”

  Verner slung a blistering look at Quinn. There was something feral about him, something wild and unpredictable. “Don’t try to put me in my place. I’ve had enough of that. Are you going to help me or not?”

  “I can try. Are you prepared to retain me as your counsel?”

  “I guess. How much?”

  “Fifty dollars.”

  “I’ll mail you a check.”

  Winthrop’s face said, “I’ll take you seriously if and when it clears the bank.” His voice said, “Tell me why you think the will is a fake?”

  “The original left everything to me, what’s left after his crack-brain investments.”

  “Could your father have misplaced the first will or left it in the keeping of a different attorney?” asked Winthrop.

  “He was a pigeonholer. Everything in its place, every number in its right column, every decimal point exact.”

  “Is it possible the original will was burned in the fire?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe Bayer stole it.”

  Quinn hesitated to further incite Verner, but his rant had tapered off and he seemed to have his temper under control. She said, “Mr. Bayer told me your father bequeathed you a spittoon. Was that in the will Mr. Cranston read?”

  He jumped out of his chair with such force that it toppled and crashed behind him.

  “You’ve talked to him? What kind of humbug is this?”

  Quinn bounced out of her chair and moved to safety behind Winthrop’s desk as Verner stomped around the office, muttering and flailing his arms. “What kind of a damned lawyer’s trick are you pulling?”

  “You are overwrought, sir.” Winthrop’s equanimity raveled. He looked genuinely alarmed. “I beg you to restrain yourself. Come and sit. There is no trick. As part of her investigation into the arson, Mrs. Sinclair had occasion to speak with Bayer. And what did he tell you about this, um, cuspidor, Mrs. Sinclair?”

  “He indicated that the elder Mr. Kadinger and Mr. Verner Kadinger didn’t get along. The younger Mr. Kadinger ridiculed his father for dipping snuff and the spit…the cuspidor was his father’s posthumous rejoinder.”

  Verner made a gnarling sound in the back of his throat.

  “We can explain away such family tiffs to the court,” said Winthrop. “I’ll consult with your father’s clerk. He may be able to validate your claim. Clerks often know their employers’ intents and purposes.”

  “Jones,” muttered Verner and circled bac
k toward the desk. “He worked for Papa for twenty years. He’ll tell you how Bayer twisted him around his finger.”

  Winthrop recovered his poise and settled into the chair behind his desk. “Did you remain close to Delphine while you were away in Germany? Did she write to you?”

  “Nothing but twaddle. ‘Met charming European actor at McVickers Theater’ and ‘Pearl eardrops for my birthday.’ She was too vain to live.”

  “Do you still have her letters?” asked Winthrop.

  “My sister was an imbecile!” A mist of spittle sprayed from Verner’s mouth. “A sap for any sweet-talking masher who whispered in her ear.”

  “Do you remember the names of any of the mashers?” asked Quinn. “One of them became angry when she rejected him. He may have set the fire.”

  “Why harp on that? All I want’s my money. If you can’t get it for me, take your improper influence and be damned!” He ripped the telegram in half and barged out as furiously as he’d barged in.

  “The man’s unhinged,” said Winthrop. “He clearly hated his sister.”

  “True, but if there was a will in his favor somewhere in the house, he wouldn’t burn it and wreck his chances to inherit.” Quinn deliberated the truthfulness of Verner vis-à-vis Bayer. Had Bayer persuaded Kadinger to disinherit his son or had he destroyed the old will and forged a new one? She still chafed over the fact her husband’s mother had falsified a deed to cheat her out of her inheritance. She said, “I wonder if Mr. Kadinger’s bad investments relate in some way to his death.”

  “Verner is a madman. He wouldn’t know a sound investment from a sack of salt. His father probably made business expenditures for necessary equipment that Verner believes should have gone instead for his personal upkeep.”

  “I guess that’s so.” Both of Rolf Kadinger’s children seemed remarkably self-indulgent. Quinn thought about Delphine’s pearl eardrops and recalled Josabeth saying her secret suitor had demanded his gifts back. “If you need to mention another suspect at Elfie’s trial, Delphine had a secret lover before she married.”