There followed a few more silent moments, during which I figured that the Doctor and Mr. Moore were glancing at each other, trying to come up with a way to find out what the “tragedy” Mr. Vanderbilt had mentioned was. Given his attitude, it didn’t seem likely he’d share any information about his former servant’s personal misfortune if he thought his visitors weren’t already aware of it.
“That was indeed uncommonly compassionate of your wife, sir,” the Doctor finally said. “And no doubt it helped Mrs. Hatch recover. A change of locale is often the only effective antidote to such an unfortunate experience.”
“ ‘Unfortunate experience’?” Mr. Vanderbilt rumbled back. “Seeing your own children shot down before you by a madman? Are you a disciple of understatement, Doctor, or have you simply become inured to tragedy through your work?”
That statement caused my eyes to pop a bit; and I could only think of how hard the Doctor and Mr. Moore must’ve been working to hide a like reaction.
“I-certainly didn’t mean to sound callous, sir,” the Doctor finally said. “Perhaps my work sometimes does prevent me from treating-murder”-he said the word carefully, as if he half expected a contradiction; but none came-“with the proper consideration,” he finished.
Mr. Vanderbilt huffed, rather than grunted, this time. “I suppose that’s to be expected. At any rate, she arrived here just two or three months later. And she worked with uncommon diligence, considering that the fate of her eldest daughter remained so uncertain.”
“Ah. Yes, of course,” Mr. Moore said. “And she left your employ, you said…?”
“I did not say, Mr. Moore. But she departed from our service the following May, when she was remarried and her nephew was left in her care. I offered her a recommendation, and it would have been an unqualified one, but she said that she wished to pursue a career in nursing. I told her that if I could be of any service in that regard, she should not hesitate to contact me. She never did. And that, gentlemen, is really all I can tell you.”
I heard the sound of a door opening, and then a careful little voice said, “Excuse me, sir, but the missus says it’s time for you to rest.”
“Yes,” Mr. Vanderbilt answered, “I’m coming. Well, gentlemen. I must obey the orders of my physician. I hope you will be able to locate Mrs. Hatch-although I suppose her name must have changed.”
“Yes,” Mr. Moore said. “Thank you, Mr. Vanderbilt, for seeing us. You have been exceptionally gracious-and helpful. Will you be leaving for Newport soon?”
“Tomorrow, in fact. Which is why I must gather my strength. I’ll have someone show you out.”
“Please, sir,” the Doctor said, “do not trouble yourself. We are quite capable. And thank you, once again.”
There were some general sounds of movement, and that was my cue: waiting ’til just a few people were passing by on the avenue, I ran full out for the iron fence, threw myself up and over it, then landed on the sidewalk and walked breezily away, ignoring the stares of a couple what were strolling by and trying to look like I jumped millionaires’ fences every day, twice on Sundays.
I got back to the calash a few seconds after the Doctor and Mr. Moore had reached it, making it necessary for me to explain where I’d been. This had the advantage of making it unnecessary for them to tell me about their conversation with Mr. Vanderbilt, though my second act of trespassing in a week didn’t please the Doctor much. But the shock of what they’d heard inside overrode any other considerations.
“I hate this!” Mr. Moore said as we started the drive back downtown. “I hate it! It’s exactly as Lucius said: every time we think we’re getting somewhere, slap!, some new piece of information crops up that changes the whole picture.”
“And what makes you so sure that the picture has changed, Moore?” the Doctor asked.
“You heard what he said, Kreizler!” Mr. Moore shouted in frustration. “The woman’s children were ‘shot down in front of her by a madman’! What the hell was that all about?”
The Doctor shrugged. “Any number of things. It may be true. It may also have been a fantasy she created.”
“Kreizler,” Mr. Moore answered, banging one hand against the door of the calash in annoyance, “he said he was told about it by friends. What’s she doing, going all over the state making up stories about dead children to gain people’s sympathy?”
“Not all over the state. The event occurred near the town where she was born, apparently. So if there’s any truth to it at all, your friend in the district attorney’s office should be able to tell us about it. Have you been able to contact him yet?”
“I wrote on Monday,” Mr. Moore answered glumly, settling into a mood that matched the hot, humid weather. “And sent a telegram on Tuesday. But I suppose now I’d better wire him again, or try to get him on the telephone. Let him know about this.” He roused himself just once more. “And what did he mean about her ‘nephew’ being left in her care, anyway?”
“That,” the Doctor said, “was almost certainly a fantasy. Or, to be more explicit, a lie. She had to create some story to explain the sudden appearance of the Johannsen boy in her life.”
“Oh. Yes.” Mr. Moore’s understanding of this detail didn’t cheer him up any. “Christ, it’s like trying to keep up with the machinations of three different people.”
“True,” the Doctor replied. “Layers upon layers…”
On hearing that statement, Mr. Moore gave up on trying to make any more sense out of the strange things Mr. Vanderbilt had said and just took to smoking cigarettes and knocking his feet against the wall of the carriage every few minutes, saying “I hate this!” over and over, like we hadn’t gotten the point. Dr. Kreizler tried to get his friend’s mind off the thing by going over the front page of the Times. But the news there wasn’t such as would cheer any of us up. The police had finally captured Martin Thorn, the suspected culprit in the “mystery of the headless body,” and, true to Detective Sergeant Lucius’s prediction, he’d never left the city during the whole time the manhunt for him had been going on. We had some reason to believe that the distraction of the case would continue a bit longer-though a confession had been gotten out of Thorn, it conflicted with all the “evidence” and theories the police had assembled-but at best the case would be resolved in a matter of days. An even greater worry was the fact that Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Mr. Roosevelt’s closest friend and political ally in Washington, was openly urging President McKinley to take stronger action against the Spanish Empire in all contested matters: the American war party was getting impatient, and though we didn’t know just what that would mean for our investigation, it didn’t seem to indicate anything good. Finally, there was a report of more personal importance to both the Doctor and Mr. Moore: Madame Lillian Nordica, one of their favorite singers from the Metropolitan Opera, was critically ill in London. The Times made it seem like she was at death’s door, though we eventually found out that the report was exaggerated; but even the possibility of such a loss was enough to cause the Doctor to join Mr. Moore in downhearted silence.
The rain didn’t let up much as we drove downtown, and neither did the stench on the street, which was a very bad sign: weather of that variety, coming at that time of year, could take quite a while to blow on out of town. As it turned out, that day did indeed mark the start of the first really dangerous period of the summer, the kind of natural phenomenon what the papers had taken to calling a “heat wave.” For the next week, average temperatures would not fall below the eighties; and even at night, the humid air and lack of wind would make sleep just about impossible. This situation was not helped by the fact that our investigation soon narrowed down to the tedious business of continuing the search for a talkative member of the group of women whose kids had been under Nurse Hunter’s care at the Lying-in Hospital (a job what had me driving the detective sergeants and Miss Howard to dismal parts of the city or, worse yet, out to the suburbs, over the next few days), as well as waiting for Mr. Moore to hear from his old pal up in Ballston Spa. By the following Monday, some of us were beginning to doubt the existence of this person. Mr. Moore had sent not one but two cables to the man, telling him what we were up to, but he’d had no reply. Such didn’t necessarily mean anything, one way or the other; but it was, given our circumstances and the weather, cause for much frustration.