Devil by the Tail

by Jeanne Matthews

  “Who told you that?”

  “Her bridesmaid, Miss Allbright.”

  “Did Miss Allbright give you the name of this man?”

  “No, but I’m going to interview Rhetta Slayne. She probably knows more of what went on in the Kadinger household than anybody and I’ve found out where she lives.”

  “The fire fighters questioned her and she knows nothing. Another interview would be a waste of your time.” Winthrop gathered up the pieces of the torn telegram and dropped them in the rubbish pail. “I’d prefer you spend an afternoon with Elfie and see if you can liven her up a bit. If she presents herself in a sympathetic way in court and Jemelle Clary sticks to her statement, we can declare victory.”

  “Don’t you want to find the murderer?”

  “Finding the Kadingers’ murderer is unrelated to winning an acquittal for Elfie, but it would strengthen the defense if Stram could be induced to confess that Bayer paid him to kill his wife. If you discover any clue at all as to where he’s gone to ground, report to me immediately.”

  “Rhetta Slayne may have seen him on the night of the fire. Maybe she noticed something that would lead us to him.”

  “She was blithering that night and if she saw anything, she’ll already have forgotten. Put that witless housemaid out of your mind and rest on your laurels. You’ve saved a woman from the gallows, detective. I want to take you for a celebratory dinner at John Wright’s restaurant. I shall pick you up tomorrow evening at seven.” He gave her an assessing look. “It’s in the Opera House, you know. There’s always a dressy, upper-crust crowd in attendance. But I’m sure you have a suitable frock stowed away in the back of your wardrobe, something you wore prior to your widowhood. It doesn’t have to be the latest mode. Simplicity has its own style.”

  Chapter 13

  By four o’clock a gaggle of boisterous customers had congregated on the front lawn at the Mansion. Quinn looked on from a block away and debated how to enter without being accosted. She assumed Garnick had stationed himself in the salon or possibly outside Jemelle’s door. Regardless of his whereabouts, she would probably have to announce herself to the woman in the indigo dress.

  An approach through the hedge in the back seemed the least risky. Eyes lowered, resolutely deaf to any come-on, she skulked down an unpaved, overgrown lane that dead-ended in the alley behind the brothel. She hurried along beside the hedge, careful to step around the blood-drenched spot where Handish’s body had lain and stole into the back garden. Garnick sat under the gazebo with Jemelle and two other people, Fen Megarian and the woman in indigo.

  Garnick said, “I reckoned you’d be getting back about now, Miz Paschal. Seems the Tribune’s star reporter searched out Miss Clary same as us.”

  Megarian saluted her with his notebook. “Afternoon, detective. I wasn’t sure you and Garnick would pay me another visit after you got the photograph. Big Annie told me I might find you here and I’m glad I came. Like Garnick promised, it’s a gripper of a story, if what Jemelle says is half true.”

  “She’s about to swear that it’s all true,” said Quinn. “Micah Winthrop, Elfie’s lawyer, drew up a statement for her to sign. Under penalty of perjury.”

  “Wide is the gate and broad is the way,” intoned Megarian, burying a pencil in his stork’s nest of hair.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Jemelle.

  “People generally reach the conclusion they want. Sometimes it’s true and accurate, sometimes not. A reporter sifts through a range of opinions and conclusions. It’s my job to turn the hodgepodge into a tale that’ll titillate the public, one that beguiles them to shell out and buy a copy.”

  “Weaving a fantastical myth into a real-life tragedy is shameful,” said Quinn. “It’s malpractice.”

  “Oh, just let me sign the blasted thing and be done,” said Jemelle. “I can’t get quit of you gassers soon enough.”

  Quinn took the statement out of its folder and smoothed it out on the table for her review.

  Garnick held out a pen.

  Jemelle took it and scrawled her name in a slashing script. “There. Now will you all please go away and leave me be?”

  “Hold on,” said Megarian. “She can’t swear to something she didn’t read. Let’s hear it read. I want to compare what you told these detectives with what you told me, missy.”

  Quinn picked it up, but Jemelle snatched it out of her hands. “I’ll do it.” She read, haltingly but with seeming comprehension. When she finished she dropped it on the table and fumed off into the house.

  Garnick slid the document across to Megarian. “Add your John Henry at the bottom. You’re a witness that it’s her own signature.”

  Megarian signed and Garnick handed it to the woman in indigo. “Now you, Sissy. Your name in full if you please.” He looked at Quinn. “I beg your pardon, ladies. Miz Paschal, this is Miss Sissy Dinkins.”

  “How do you do,” said Quinn.

  “Pleased to meet you.” She signed and stood. “Can I go now?”

  “Sure. And thanks for your time.” Garnick handed the document back to Quinn. “Exhibit One for Elfie’s defense.”

  Megarian slithered off the bench and grinned. “Don’t miss the poetic threads I weave into tomorrow’s paper, detectives.” He tapped his notebook against his forehead and followed Sissy into the brothel.

  Suddenly Quinn found herself alone under the gazebo with Garnick.

  He said, “Leonidas is hitched a ways down the lane. I’ll drive you back to Winthrop’s office to drop off the statement, or home if that’s your druthers. We can talk on the way. I need to explain myself.”

  She panicked. Of all the talks she didn’t want to have at this particular time, a heart-to-heart with Garnick ranked foremost. And of all the reactions she didn’t want to convey, disappointment and disapproval took priority. Not that she felt disappointment or disapproval. There was a twinge of punctured vanity, a sense of diminished closeness, a belief that someone of Garnick’s caliber could do better than Minnie. But these feelings were mean-spirited and hypocritical given the way she, herself, had behaved. She’d thrown herself at him like a love-addled hoyden, then misunderstood the ardor of his response. Any man invited to take such liberties would have responded the same way. It was humiliating. Least said, soonest mended.

  “Heavens sakes, Garnick, you don’t owe me an explanation. Please.” She put on a hectic smile. “Absolutely we have to talk. I’ve a hundred things to tell you. Verner Kadinger showed up at Winthrop’s office while I was there. He’s an absolute wild man, knocked over the furniture, looked as if he wanted to knock me down and you wouldn’t believe the spiteful things he said about his father and sister. You remember what Bayer and Josabeth said about him. They weren’t exaggerating. We definitely need to question him. I was thinking you could deliver Jemelle’s statement to Winthrop and see if you can locate that rooming house on Pine where Bayer said Verner was living. While you’re doing that, I’ll take the horse-car over to Rush Street and interview Rhetta Slayne and by tomorrow, we’ll have even more to talk about.”

  She handed him back the statement and tried to ignore the reproach in his eyes, a look that said he was being unjustly done by.

  “The horse-car doesn’t go anywheres near Rush, Quinn.”

  “I’ll transfer.”

  He held her eyes for a long moment. She could feel the bond between them stretch.

  He said, “Nothing I can say if you’ve made up your mind. We’ll cross paths sometime tomorrow. Don’t forget your bonnet.” He went out through the gap in the hedge and she saw she’d left her tea-stained bonnet behind when she tore out in a rush to Winthrop’s office. With a catch at her heart, she retrieved it and stuck it on her head, probably lopsided. She removed the hatpin and stabbed it through the crown to secure the confounded thing. Her aim was off, the pin nicked her scalp and she winced. The tears she’d been holding back for the last few hours began to spill.

  She ripped off the bonnet and sat down
to feel sorry for herself. She was exhausted. This day had already lasted a thousand years and still the relentless sun beat down on her neck. Inside the brothel, somebody played Goodnight, Ladies on the piano. It was a sign. She retraced her steps through the hedge and down the alley and trudged to the nearest horse-car stop. But by the time the omnibus arrived, she had shelved the idea of visiting Rhetta Slayne. She needed a cool bath. She needed time to absorb the shifts and turnabouts in this awful day and to think. More than anything, she needed sleep.

  ***

  The voice shrilled and resounded again and again. “Get out”, cried Elfie. “Get out, get out, get out of here.” A man cursed and something smashed.

  “Where is she?”

  “No one here – stop! Where are you going?”

  Elfie screamed.

  “Light! Light a lamp!”

  Quinn burrowed deep under a blanket, making herself small, hiding from the invader. In the dark of her cell she fondled the hilt of a knife. If she had to fight –

  “Mrs. Sinclair! Wake up!”

  “Elfie?” The jail was black as the inside of a cave.

  “Mrs. Sinclair!”

  Somebody was pummeling on the door, jiggling the knob. Quinn sat bolt upright. Her hand flew out and fastened around something round and solid. She broke out of the dream. She was holding the finial of her four-poster bed. The voice wasn’t Elfie’s, but Mrs. Mills’ and she sounded frantic. The house must have caught fire. Quinn threw on a wrapper and flung open the door.

  “There’s a drunkard in the parlor.” The lamp wobbled in her landlady’s hand. “He forced his way inside. Miss Nearest has gone next door for help. Miss Franks is down there with him. She’s in a state. I think she’s fainted.”

  “What man? What does he want?”

  “He wants to speak to a Detective Paschal. I told him no such person lives here. This is a home for ladies, but he refuses to leave. You’re so confident and strong-minded. Maybe you can ward him off while I tend to Miss Franks.”

  An assortment of possibilities scrolled through Quinn’s mind, none of them good. Megarian? Annie’s bouncer? She was still unsettled by her dream. What if Elfie had been raped or murdered and Captain Chesterton had come to tell her? Mother of God, what if Garnick had gotten drunk and decided to gloss things over in the middle of the night? Nothing could surprise her now. She said, “I’ll go down.” She took the derringer off the dresser and slipped it into her wrapper pocket.

  “That’s a gun,” blurted Mrs. Mills.

  Quinn nudged her landlady aside and padded stealthily down the steps. Two lamps had been lit, but they were both in the entry hall and most of the parlor was in shadow. She drew in a calming breath and stepped into the light.

  “You look more the ticket than the rest of these peahens.” The man had a thicket of whitish-blond hair, a drooping mustache of the same color, and deep-set, stone-cold eyes. He wore a red kerchief around his neck, baggy trousers, and a billed kepi cap. “Why are you looking for me?”

  “It’s the police who are looking for you, Mr. Stram. They think you murdered a man in the alley behind Lou Harper’s Mansion.”

  “What kind of cock and bull is that? What man?”

  “Ned Handish.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “He was looking for you before you put two bullets in his head. He said you strangled his wife to death in Cairo.”

  “What was her name?”

  Quinn stiffened. How many women had he strangled? “Her name was Florrie. Florrie Handish.”

  “Never heard of her neither. You’re barking up the wrong tree.”

  Quinn had been thinking that same thing ever since Handish’s case collided with Elfie’s. There were too many wrong trees. She couldn’t see the forest.

  “Git, you old boiler!” Stram shouted over Quinn’s shoulder.

  She looked around. Mrs. Mills was goggling like an owl. Quinn said, “Please go back upstairs, Mrs. Mills. I’ll attend to this matter.”

  “What about Miss Franks?”

  Quinn surveyed the shadows. A whimper arose from the darkest corner of the couch. “Miss Franks, there’s no need to be afraid. Please go with Mrs. Mills.”

  She jumped up and scurried across the room into the landlady’s outstretched arms.

  Mrs. Mills clucked and patted. “We can’t leave you alone with this ruffian, Mrs. Sinclair.”

  “Sure you can,” said Stram. “Mrs. Sinclair, if that’s what she calls herself, is tickled to see me. She’s been asking for me in every whorehouse in town.”

  The women gasped.

  “Miss Nearest will be back any minute with the police,” said Mrs. Mills. “You’d better get out of here, mister.”

  “We’ll both get out.” He clamped a steely hand around Quinn’s arm and dragged her out the door.

  Her heart stuttered. The man was a killer. His vise-like fingers dug into her flesh, but she didn’t cry out or try to resist. With her free hand she caressed the derringer in her pocket. Behind them the door spanked shut and she heard the deadbolt click. Stram towed her around the side of the house, past the small garden toward a vacant, overgrown field. A humpback moon cast just enough light to make out the ground in front of her. The darkness felt suffocating. Stram could strangle her out here and she wouldn’t be found for days, but curiosity eclipsed fear.

  “How did you find out where I live?”

  He stopped under a tree and leaned in close. “I got friends looking out for me.”

  The liquor on his breath nearly gagged her. She wrenched her arm free and backed away. “Who told you I was asking about you?”

  “Jemelle and me had a reunion earlier this evening. She said she told you I paid her to lie about the Jackson chippy. That’s bogus, like everything that comes out of that whore’s mouth. I should’ve busted her head.”

  Quinn’s stomach knotted. She should have given Jemelle money to hide out in a hotel for a few days. “Did you beat her up again?”

  “Jemelle’s too smart to need another lesson.” He leered. “An edgy bundle like you on the other hand–”

  She whipped out the derringer and pointed it at his face. “Make a move toward me and I’ll shoot off your ears.”

  He let go of her arm and took a step back.

  Quinn felt a boost of reassurance. “How’d you find Jemelle? What ‘friend’ told you she was at the Mansion?”

  “A girl at Annie Stafford’s. Sue. I was seeing her regular before Jemelle.”

  From what Quinn could see of his face in this light, he didn’t look as scared of the gun as she would have liked. He twirled a fob attached to his watch chain. It looked like a spent cartridge, the one Handish had mentioned. She tightened her grip on the derringer and put another foot of distance between them. “You followed me here from the Mansion?”

  “Ain’t you the clever minx. Yeah, I snoozed till the lights went out, but now I’m bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.”

  Like a skunk, thought Quinn. “Jemelle said Handish was the one who gave you the money to buy her off. Did he set the Kadinger fire? Did you help him?”

  “I told you I never heard of Handish.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “You listen now, Paschal or Sinclair or whoever you are. The somebody who hired me ain’t somebody you want to tangle with. What I did for him’s my business and he’d be one crazed zu-zu if he knew I was still knocking around this town.”

  “Crazed what?”

  He leered. Either the alcohol was tripping his tongue or it was an obscenity. “I don’t know who lit up that house and I don’t want to know. What I want’s to stay living. You and your chum Garnick noising my name around, you’re making it hard.”

  “You say you don’t know anything about Handish or the fire, but you know who hired you to bribe Jemelle.”

  “You gonna believe that lying slag?”

  Quinn widened her stance and leveled the gun at his chest. “Tell me. Who was it?”

  “You
don’t look much of a terror, puss. I’m gonna gamble you ain’t the type to shoot a man point blank, not ‘less he’s fixing to take your toy away from you and whack you in the head with it.”

  Quinn tried to swallow, but her throat constricted. Did he mean to lunge at her? She heard a whirring in her ears, like the whir she’d heard after her father walloped her. Her confidence drained away, but she’d never lacked for bravado. “You don’t know me, Mr. Stram. You would not be the first man I’ve shot. I’m asking you again, who hired you?”

  “Jemelle said your aim was to get Elfie Jackson off. You did that, or her lawyer will. If I was you, I’d forget about the man who hired me. Somebody higher up probably hired him. Swimming upstream’s a dangerous bet. Fish do it and they end up dead.” He twirled the cartridge at the end of the chain. “I’m gonna turn around and walk away now. Quit dogging me and you won’t see me again. There’s places in this town where a man can disappear and that’s what I mean to do.”

  “Are you afraid of him? The man upstream?”

  His lip lifted and she caught a flash of white teeth. “He’s a pit viper. He can change his skin, but not his fangs. Or his cold blood.” Then he turned and loped off toward the street. She called after him, but he didn’t look back. Questions tumbled and tossed through her mind like kernels in a threshing machine. Was it possible he’d told the truth about not knowing Handish? Had Jemelle lied, spinning a story her interrogators wanted to hear? She was devious enough to betray Stram just as she’d betrayed Elfie, but there could be no doubt that she knew Handish. If she didn’t, she couldn’t have come up with those sound-alike names.

  Somewhere in the dark, a coyote howled. It reminded Quinn of all the secret watchers she couldn’t see. An answering chorus of yips reminded her how lonely she was at this moment. She listened, goosebumps rising, and watched the moon slide across the sky until the coyotes went quiet. Until her heartbeat slowed and her slippers became clammy from the dew. The world seemed murkier and more baffling than ever. One thing was sure, it wouldn’t get any less baffling standing in a snaky field in her nightgown and wrapper. She pocketed the derringer and picked her way along the stubbly path back to the house.