They were all dressed in the Institute’s gray-and-blue uniforms, which the Doctor had designed himself and required the kids to wear so that the richer ones couldn’t lord it over the poorer. The first little girl, the one what had never spoken to her family, had a firm grip on one of the Doctor’s legs, making it tough for him to move as he walked alongside the reverend and gave him some last bits of instruction and advice. The other girl was holding both her hands behind her back and looking around like she wasn’t quite sure what the hell was going on. The two boys, meantime, were laughing and taking playful jabs at each other from opposite sides of the Doctor, using him as a shield. All in all, a pretty typical scene for the place; but if you looked close, there were clues that something unusual was up.
Chief among these was the Doctor himself. His black linen suit was rumpled and wrinkled in spots, making it pretty clear that he’d been up working all night. Even if the clothes hadn’t given him away, his face would’ve: it was drawn and exhausted, and the look of contentment what could be found in his features only at the Institute was nowhere to be seen. As he spoke to Reverend Bancroft, he leaned forward with a kind of uncertainty that was unusual for him, and the reverend seemed to sense it: he put his hand on the Doctor’s back and told him to just relax and try to make the best use of the weeks to come, that he was sure everything would work out for the best. At that point the Doctor stopped talking and just shook his head in resignation, rubbing his black eyes and suddenly becoming conscious of the kids what were all around and over him.
He smiled and tried to perk up as he first pried the one little girl off his leg and then got the two boys to calm down, speaking to them like he did to all us kids, with affection but directly, as if there was no wall of age between them. When he looked up and caught sight of me at the curb, I could see that he was trying to hold himself together long enough to make it to the calash-but the second little girl proceeded to make that job a lot tougher. Out from behind her back she brought a bunch of roses, wrapped in the plain paper of a local flower shop but still showing the full glory of the new summer in their white and pink petals. The Doctor smiled and kneeled down to take them from her, though when she threw her arms around his neck, that former fallen angel what the Doctor’d given a second lease on childhood, his smile disappeared and it was all he could do to keep his composure. He stood up quickly, told the boys one more time to behave themselves, then shook hands with Reverend Bancroft and near ran down the steps. I had the carriage door open, and he shot in.
“Get me home, Stevie,” was all he managed to say, and like spit I was back up top, whip in hand. The kids continued to wave as I turned the calash around and headed back the way I’d come; but Dr. Kreizler made no reply, just sank further into the maroon leather seat of the carriage.
He remained silent during the trip uptown, even when I mentioned my near run-in with the shotgun-toting maniac. I glanced back just a few times, the first to see if he was even awake. He was; but though the morning was only growing more beautiful, with the breeze continuing to blow the smells of fresh, full greenery and leaves around the street so that they near overcame the stench of garbage piles and horse manure and urine, he didn’t seem to take note of it. He had his right hand balled into a fist that he tapped against his mouth as he stared intensely at nothing, and with his left hand he clutched at the bunch of roses so tight that one of the thorns stabbed him. I heard him hiss a little in pain, but I didn’t say anything-I didn’t know what I could say. The man was a spent bullet, that much was clear, and the best thing for me to do was get him home in a hurry. With that in mind, I gave Frederick a little ripple of the reins and told him to pick up his pace, and soon we were moving back around Stuyvesant Park.
Once inside the house at Seventeenth Street, the Doctor, his face by now ashen with exhaustion, turned to Cyrus and me. “I’ve got to try to get some rest,” he mumbled, starting up the stairs. He stopped and flinched a bit at the sound of a bucket overturning in the kitchen hallway with what was, even for Mrs. Leshko, an amazing crash. The racket was followed by a long stream of what I figured were Russian curses.
The Doctor sighed. “Assuming it’s possible to communicate with that woman, would you please ask her to keep the house quiet for a few hours? If she’s incapable, give her the afternoon off.”
“Yes, sir, Doctor,” Cyrus said. “If you need anything-”
The Doctor only held up a hand and nodded in acknowledgment, then disappeared up the stairs. Cyrus and I looked at each other.
“Well?” Cyrus whispered to me.
“It isn’t good,” I answered. “But I’ve got an idea-” Another crash and more curses came from the kitchen. “You handle Mrs. Leshko,” I said. “I’m going to telephone to Mr. Moore.”
Cyrus nodded, and then I bolted down through the kitchen hallway and past the muttering, mopping mass of blue linen and stout flesh that was Mrs. Leshko. I kept on going through the white ceramic tiling and hanging pots and pans of the kitchen itself and finally got into the pantry, where there was a telephone on the wall. Closing the pantry door, I grabbed the phone’s small receiver, yanked the stem of the mouthpiece down to my height, and got hold of an operator, telling her to connect me to The New York Times. In a few seconds, I had Mr. Moore on the other end.
“Stevie?” he said. “We’ve had some developments. Interesting ones.”
“Yeah? Any word on the baby?”
“Only confirmation that she is, in fact, missing-none of the help at the consulate have seen her in days. I didn’t want to question anybody higher up, though, not with what the señora’s been through. But tell me-what’s the word on your end?”
“Well, he’s in pretty bad shape right now,” I answered. “But he’s gone up to rest. And I think-”
Mr. Moore paused, waiting for me to go on, and I could hear the clack of typewriters in the background. “You think-?”
“I don’t know-this case. If you were to put it to him just the right way, he might… I mean, the whole connection to the Spanish business-and the señora, if we could get him to meet her… and that picture of the little girl…”
“What are you saying, Stevie?”
“Only that… he’s in a mood, all right. And if this case leads in the direction it might-”
“Ahhhh,” Mr. Moore noised in a happier tone. “I see. …. Well. Your education’s starting to pay off, kid.”
“It is?”
“If I get you right, you’re saying that this case may end up revealing some pretty unattractive things about the same kind of society types that’re trying to shut the Doctor down. And the fact that it involves an innocent baby is just so much gravy. Right?”
“Well, yeah. Something like that.”
Mr. Moore whistled. “I’ll tell you what, Stevie-I’ve known Laszlo since we were younger than you are. I don’t care how fed up and exhausted he is, if that doesn’t get him going, we can start planning his funeral now-because he’s already dead.”
“Yeah. But we gotta slip the idea to him right.”
“Don’t you worry about that. I’ve already figured it out. Tell the Doctor the rest of us are coming by for cocktails.” I heard a voice call to Mr. Moore in the background. “Yeah?” he answered, away from the mouthpiece. “What? Bensonhurst”?No, no, no, Harry, I cover New York !I don’t care what Boss Platt says, Bensonhurst is not New York! But it wasn’t my story to start with! Oh, all right, all right!” His voice grew more distinct in my ear. “Got to go, Stevie-some fool doctor tried to shoot his family in Bensonhurst last night. Apparently the authorities don’t like the way we reported the story. Listen, don’t forget-we’ll be by for cocktails.”